Another day, another bid for a UK plc as In-Cap heads for Countryside

“The pace of the action in 2022 is not quite as fast and furious as in 2021 but Inclusive Capital’s £1.5 billion bid for Countryside is the latest in a growing list of takeover approaches for UK plcs,” says AJ Bell Investment Director Russ Mould. “The 295p-a-share bid represents a 24% premium to Countryside’s last closing price, to suggest that the predator thinks it is finding some value, but even that pales when compared to the average premium of 43% offered by would-be buyers so far this year.

“That compares to the 37% average premium seen on more than 60 takeover deals in 2021 (over a dozen of which ultimately failed to go through).

“The logical conclusion therefore is that buyers, be they trade or financial, domestic or overseas, still there are a lot of UK plcs whose shares simply look too cheap, especially for American buyers who also benefit from sterling’s slide from $1.42 to $1.26 over the past 12 months.

Source: Regulatory News Service (RN

“You can make the argument that company boardrooms agree, even if they may be the most entirely objective observers, given the rate at which executive teams are launching share buyback programmes. Members of the FTSE 100 are on track to buy back a record amount of stock in 2022, if they follow through on the announcements already made this year, whose value already exceeds the £34.9 billion returned to shareholders in 2018.”