JPMorgan Chase, the lead advisor to General Electric Co on the sale of its finance assets, vaulted to the top of the Canadian M&A league tables following a string of GE asset sales to Canadian buyers, Reuters reported. Thomson Reuters data showed US$191 billion in mergers and acquisitions involving Canadian entities year-to-date, up 28 percent from a year ago.
InstarAGF Asset Management is seeing stronger-than-expected demand from institutional investors for its flagship infrastructure fund and is confident it will close the first round of fundraising by year end, Chief Executive Gregory Smith told Reuters. Toronto-based InstarAGF plans to raise between $400 million and $450 million in the first close of its $750 million-targeted fund.
Toronto-based Kilmer Group, a family office led by billionaire investor Larry Tanenbaum, recently replaced its private equity fund business with a fund-less strategy in order to invest longer in promising companies. After raising more than $415 million for its funds since 2001, Kilmer today operates with a model that combines its long-term, direct approach to deals with co-investment opportunities for limited partners.
Give and Go Prepared Foods Corp, a Canadian maker of thaw-and-serve sweet baked goods such as Two-Bite Brownies, is exploring a sale it hopes could value it at around $550 million, sources told Reuters reported. The company's owner, OMERS Private Equity, has held talks with investment banks in recent weeks to appoint a financial adviser to run an auction or initial public offering, the sources said.
Swedish buyout group EQT has received offers for its Dutch oil storage group Koole Terminals valuing the business at more than 1 billion euros (US$1.1 billion), several people familiar with the deal told Reuters. The Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan and Borealis Infrastructure are said to have joined consortia bidding for Koole.
European telecoms group Altice will become a major force in the lucrative U.S. cable market after it agreed to buy fourth-largest operator Cablevision shares in a deal worth US$17.7 billion, Reuters reported. Altice, which acquired regional cable group Suddenlink in May, will fund the deal partly with equity from Suddenlink's backers, BC Partners and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board.
Colombia's top judicial authority has approved the sale of the government's 57.6 percent stake in power generator Isagen, expected to raise at least US$1.8 billion, Reuters reported. Brookfield Asset Management was said to be one of several firms planning to bid for the company.
Canada's Concordia Healthcare Corp said it would buy Amdipharm Mercury Ltd from European private equity firm Cinven for US$1.9 billion to expand its portfolio of drugs aimed at treating rare diseases, Reuters reported. Including debt, the deal is valued at US$3.3 billion.
Tesco is selling its South Korean arm, Homeplus, to a group led by private equity firm MBK Partners for US$6.1 billion, as the British supermarket retreats from foreign markets to focus on reviving its troubled domestic business, Reuters reported. The PE consortium includes the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Public Sector Pension Investment Board and Temasek Holdings.
Vancouver-based Bond Capital has been named to Preqin‘s global list of most consistent performing mezzanine fund managers. Bond, which in May 2015 was tapped to manage the private equity fund of Beedie Capital Partners, was one of three investors to achieve a top score in a peer group of nearly 100 mezzanine firms managing about 200 funds.