There is M&A on a serious level starting to raise its head, last week we had the news that French industrial company, Alstom, is the target for both GE and now Siemens too. Alstom is a monster company, employing 93 thousand people globally in 100 odd countries (as per their website). A press release suggests that the company will make an announcement no later than the 30th of April. That is tomorrow. In the meantime, the company has requested for their shares to be suspended from trade. In other words you cannot transact in the shares, because the company is obviously subject to a suitor. Strangely the share price was higher in January than now, but the last five trading sessions (ending last Thursday, since then it has been suspended) Alstom is up nearly 24 percent.
The market value currently? 11.5 billion Dollars. The French are the tricky part in all of this, because the state saved the business in 2004. The quantum of the GE deal is believed to be 13 billion Dollars. According to Bloomberg, Bouygues (who own 29 percent of Alstom) are welcoming of the deal. Siemens however might woo the regulators, with promises of no job cuts (the French officials are going to be very prickly here, no doubt) and because the regulator is more powerful, might have the more compelling European deal. The suggestion is that these assets could be worth as much as 14.5 billion Dollars (see Bloomberg piece titled Alstom Battle Intensifies as Siemens Plans to Counter GE). Wow.