‘Off the charts’: Behind Ryan Stokes-led SGH’s extra $2b for BlueScope
A week after threatening to walk, SGH boss Ryan Stokes has produced a “best and final” $15 billion bid for the steelmaker, reigniting a takeover standoff that appeared to have frozen.
“Frankly, we’ll move on,” SGH managing director Ryan Stokes told analysts almost exactly one week ago, seemingly despondent with his company’s flailing pursuit of the country’s largest steelmaker, BlueScope.
In the background, SGH, together with its consortium partner Steel Dynamics, was privately piecing together an improved takeover offer, unveiled this morning, which has heaped an extra $2 billion on the table. The companies have said it’s their “best and final” offer, valuing the target at $15 billion.
Market sources familiar with the offer, granted anonymity to discuss confidential information, called it a “very significant uplift”.
“The multiples were already off the charts in the earlier offer,” they told Capital Brief. “This just moves them even further off the charts.”
