In an ASX statement, the firm confirmed it has received a confidential, preliminary, non-binding and indicative proposal to acquire all of the shares in Insignia Financial by way of a scheme of arrangement from Bain Capital.
Bain Capital is a US private investment firm with US$185 billion ($290 billion) in assets under management and offices in Melbourne and Sydney.
Under the proposal, Insignia shareholders would receive $4 cash per share.
“The board of Insignia Financial, together with its financial and legal advisers, is considering the indicative proposal to assess whether it is in the best interests of shareholders to engage with Bain Capital. There is no certainty that the indicative proposal will result in a binding offer or that any transaction will eventuate.”
The proposal is expressed to be subject to a number of conditions including satisfactory completion of due diligence on an exclusive basis, execution of a binding scheme implementation agreement, unanimous recommendation from the Insignia Financial directors and commitment from all directors to vote in favour of the transaction (in the absence of a superior proposal and subject to an independent expert concluding that the transaction is in the best interests of Insignia shareholders) and approval of Bain Capital’s investment committee.
It would also be subject to regulatory approvals.
$4 isn’t going to wash. Insignia paused its dividend this year to reinvest into completing its transition, so major shareholders like John Wylie are going to want a bigger Xmas present than this initial offer. Might flush AMP out again tho.
Would there be a more hated company in our industry? Well – AMP of course, but Insignia would get the silver.
So the overall theme for the Australian Financial Planning landscape is it will be eventually owned by foreign firms?
Are you kidding, it’s the bargain of the century!
They should buy AMP as well while they’re at it.
if Bain takes over you can guarantee a lot of the advice firms will be gutted and shuttered
By the time they finish with their cost-cutting, they could rename the company to Insignificant.
Such a poorly run business that has destructed so much wealth over the past decade or more; replacing its Board and management can’t be a bad thing.
I would have thought a company the size of Bain might have been a bit smarter than this.