Herbert Smith Freehills is advising Pepper Group Limited (Pepper) on its initial public offering (IPO) and listing on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). The offer consists of a broker firm offer, institutional offer, employee gift offer, personnel offer and priority offer (Offer) and Pepper’s market capitalisation is A$471 million at the offer price of A$2.60 per share.
Linklaters advised the financing banks (Deutsche Bank and Morgan Stanley) on the €4.4 billion bridge financing of HeidelbergCement AG which the company needed for the public takeover of Italcementi S.p.A.
The takeover will be initiated by acquiring the 45% stake Italmobiliare S.p.A. possesses in Italcementi S.p.A., which is listed in the Milan stock exchange, followed by a public takeover offer.
Linklaters advised Deutsche Börse AG on the full acquisition of the electronic foreign exchange trading platform 360T Beteiligungs GmbH (360T). Summit Partners 360 S.à.r.l. as well as the other shareholders of 360T are the sellers. The total purchase price is 725 million euros.
King & Wood Mallesons has advised Deutsche Bank AG, Landesbank Baden-Württemberg and UniCredit Bank AG as arrangers on the syndicated financing of GFT Technologies AG, a listed corporation. The syndicate comprised of Deutsche Bank Luxembourg S.A., Baden-Württembergische Bank and UniCredit Luxembourg S.A. provides syndicated financing to the Stuttgart based company with a five-year term and an increase option.
CMS has advised Erste Group Bank AG and its subsidiaries (“Erste Group”) on its agreement with Global Payments Inc., a leading worldwide provider of payment technology solutions, to establish a joint venture providing merchant acquiring and payment processing services to retailers in the Czech Republic, Romania and Slovakia.
Upon completion of the transaction, Erste Group will sell 51% of its merchant acquiring businesses in the three countries for EUR 29.94 million to Global Payments, resulting in a joint venture in which Erste Group will retain a 49% stake.
Ashurst is advising Morgan Stanley as financial adviser to Bailey Acquisitions Limited ("Bidco"), in relation to the recommended cash offer of Quintain Estates & Development plc ("Quintain"), pursuant to which Bidco will acquire the entire issued and to be issued share capital of Quintain (the "Offer").
The Offer values the entire issued and to be issued share capital of Quintain at approximately £700 million. Under the Offer, Quintain shareholders will receive 131 pence in cash for each Quintain Share.
Clifford Chance has advised the lenders on the US$825 million financing of the construction and operation of a coal fired power plant and an adjacent coal mine owned by Maamba Collieries Limited, located in Maamba, Zambia. The lenders were Barclays Africa (formerly ABSA Bank), Standard Chartered Bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Limited, Bank of China Limited, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa Limited and Development Bank of Southern Africa.
Watson Farley & Williams (“WFW”) has advised UniCredit on the approximately €39 million refinancing of seven Solar Investment Group BV (“SIG BV”) owned special purpose vehicles (SPVs), collectively holding a photovoltaic portfolio in Italy of about 16.5 MW.
Shoosmiths has advised Octopus Investments (Octopus) on a 60m (USD) co-investment with Google Ventures, in to luxury online travel brand, Secret Escapes.
It is intended that this substantial investment will support the brand in Secret Escapes' expansion in to the US, Asian travel market and build on recent acquisitions, including Travelist.
SIX Group AG has announced that it has reached agreement with Deutsche Börse AG to sell its equity interest in STOXX AG and Indexium AG at CHF 650 million. SIX Group, which owns SIX Swiss Exchange, retains control of all its Swiss equity indices, including the blue chip Swiss Market Index and the broader Swiss Performance Index. STOXX AG and Indexium AG have previously been operated as joint ventures by SIX Group AG and Deutsche Börse AG. SIX has had an equity interest of 49.9% in STOXX AG and 50.1% in Indexium AG.