(BFM Bourse) – The CVC investment fund announced this Monday that it wanted to join the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, a few months after throwing in the towel due to degraded market conditions.
CVC wants to transform the test. The investment fund, which entered into the capital of the Six Nations Tournament in 2021, announced this Monday its intention to enter the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.
The European private equity giant is therefore on track to raise at least 1.25 billion euros, in the coming weeks and “subject to market conditions and other relevant considerations”, according to the cautionary formula devoted to .
This IPO, which is one of the most anticipated on European soil, aims to “provide a sustainable long-term institutional structure”, to support “long-term growth” and to increase “the notoriety of the group to existing and potential customers.
A way out for large shareholders
The offer envisaged by CVC has two components. The European private equity giant will issue new shares worth 250 million euros, while the balance will come from the sale of certain shareholders’ stakes in CVC. Among them, the British fund Danube Investments, the sovereign fund of Kuwait Kuwait Investment Authority, and the Hong Kong fund Stratosphere Finance as well as the sovereign fund of Singapore CIC, will take advantage of this window to monetize their participation in the heavyweight of private equity .
Next to it, a division of the asset manager Blue Owl which entered the capital of CVC in 2021 will, on the contrary, strengthen itself around the table of the European private equity giant. Blue Owl will increase its stake by 8% to 10%.
CVC is therefore aiming for a valuation of around 13 to 15 billion euros, sources announced to Bloomberg.
The private equity company manages, according to its website, assets representing 186 billion euros with stakes in 125 listed companies, in very diverse sectors.
CVC is particularly known to the general public for having purchased the Panzani pasta brand from the Spanish group Ebro Foods in 2021. The private equity giant has also taken stakes in Swiss watch brand Breitling and has invested heavily in sports. The company had, for example, acquired a stake in Formula 1 which it then sold to Liberty Media.
Never two without three
The third attempt will therefore be the right one, CVC hopes. At the start of 2022, the private equity company had already wanted to go public but had to give up following market conditions made difficult by the outbreak of the war in Ukraine.
Then, at the end of 2023, the group once again postponed its plan to enter the stock market, again due to market conditions which were not met for this operation, sources then explained to the Financial Times to justify this postponement. These same sources then cited the poor results of the companies EQT, a Swedish comparable company, or of Blackstone. The uncertainty caused by the conflict in the Middle East and concerns about the state of the economy had also tipped the scales in favor of postponing the operation.
Little affected by these various postponements, CVC believes to date that the window is more conducive to an IPO. It must be said that the IPO market in Europe will show its best annual start in 2024 since 2021.
Companies on the Old Continent raised $3.2 billion between January and March, more than double than last year at the same time, according to data from the London Stock Exchange Group cited by the Financial Times.
Several companies have already jumped into the stock market, such as the German perfume distributor Douglas – of which CVC is a major shareholder – which entered the Frankfurt Stock Exchange at the end of March.
In addition to Douglas, at least four major IPOs are expected across the Rhine, several sources also told Reuters. Including that of Flix, the parent company of Flixbus, which plans to launch an IPO in June in Germany with a target valuation of around 4 billion euros, according to people familiar with the matter cited by the Financial Times.
Other European companies have also expressed their intention to enter the financial markets this year such as Puig, the owner of Jean-Paul Gaultier, who announced last week that he was aiming for an entry on the Madrid Stock Exchange, as well as on the regional stock exchanges including that of Barcelona. The Catalan company plans to raise at least 2.5 billion euros in order to prevail against giants in the sector such as the American Estée Lauder or the French group L’Oréal.
Sabrina Sadgui – ©2024 BFM Bourse