Shares of BT Group PLC (LON: BT.A)are likely to open higher on Monday after it emerged that the company’s board had requested bankers at Goldman Sachs to update its bid defence strategy against a potential takeover bid from a rival firm.
The company, which is currently valued at £10.1 billion is preparing to defend itself against a potential takeover bid worth £15 billion representing a 50% premium to Friday’s closing price.
A bidder who is willing to pay that much for BT Group is not likely to take no for an answer, which means that they could launch a proxy war against the board as part of a wider hostile takeover bid.
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However, BT Group is the largest telecoms provider in the UK, which implies that the government might not take kindly to a hostile takeover, especially by a foreign company.
Now that Huawei has been banned from the UK’s 5G networks, BT will play an important role in Britain’s 5G buildout having committed £12 billion to the project.
BT Group share price
BT shares have been on a downtrend this year and have lost 47.1% of their value at the start of the year when they were trading at 192.7p given Friday’s closing price of 101.8p.
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