Equiniti Shares Soar on Interest From a Private Equity Firm, Will It Sell?

Shares of Equiniti Group PLC (LON: EQN) gapped up to 52.2% higher after news leaked that a private equity firm had reportedly made a £600 million bid for the back-office services provider. However, both companies did not confirm the reports.

However, the latest bid is not the first from the leverage buyouts firm, which had made offers for Equiniti without much success in the past. The value of the previous proposals was not made public.

Of great interest is that Equiniti has rejected all previous bids from the private equity firm and there is a reason for this. Private equity firms are known for their tendency to restructure businesses, cut costs and take on huge debts for their own gain.

X testing X

WELCOME BONUS - Free Share Bundle When You Invest £50! Get up to £500 cashback for investing with IG.

Invest in 15,000+ shares and ETFs. Open an account now, invest at least £50, and you’ll get a free share bundle worth between £40 and £200. T&Cs apply.

5.0

Open Account Spread bets and CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 68% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading spread bets and CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how spread bets and CFDs work, and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Given the importance of the services Equiniti provides to over 70% of the firms listed on the London Stock Exchange (LSE)’s main index, the FTSE 100, you can imagine what radical cost-cutting measures could do to the company.

Now, we don’t know what the PE firm plans to do with Equiniti. Still, if they plan to do what most private equity companies do to their acquisitions, the businesses that rely on Equiti’s share registrar services and other crucial back-office services may suffer.

The private equity company would want to recoup their investment, given that they would have paid a premium to acquire Equiniti. One way to increase the firm’s revenues is by hiking prices for the existing customers, which is the simplest option.

It is not easy for large firms with millions of shareholders to switch registrars would force the affected firms (70% of the FTSE 100) to pay the higher fees for a while as they consider finding another registrar.

If raising Equniti’s fees is out of the question, maybe due to long-term contracts, the PE firm would take on new debt to pay its shareholders and saddle the company with those debts.

The typical holding period for portfolio companies bought by PE firms is five years or less, after which they will sell the company to another buyer leaving the business a shell of what it once was.

Equiniti share price.

Equiniti shares spiked 52.24% higher to trade at 176p having risen from Monday’s closing price of 115.6p.