Mergers & Acquisitions

Canadian aluminum maker Alcan has rejected the $24.7-billion bid from rival Alcoa that would have been the biggest takeover in the metals industry, and signalled its intention to look elsewhere. Alcoa’s  $74.60-per-share bid was inadequate, Alcan’s CEO said today, reigniting rumors that both companies may be ripe takeover targets. More »

Shenanigans at the New York Post may mean trouble for Rupert Murdoch's Dow Jones bid, David Carr writes in today's Times. The tales of sex, lies, and bribery spicing up Page Six are normal fare for the gossip standby, but the fact that they're about the Post itself may not sit well with the owners of the Wall Street Journal. More »

The Chinese government will buy a 9.9% stake in Blackstone, the US private equity fund that's about to launch its IPO. The $3 billion purchase of nonvoting shares, the first time China has invested its enormous foreign reserves in commercial stock, is meant to exploit a private equity market booming almost as much as China itself. More »

Italian lenders UniCredit and Capitalia yesterday inked a $29.7 billion deal to create a bank with the world's fifth (and Europe's second) largest market cap. The hurried Rome merger indicates, according to the Wall Street Journal , a rush to consolidate Europe's banking sector, but also the persistent challenges to cross-border deals within the EU. More »

Microsoft will plunk down $6 billion for aQuantive, a leading digital marketing agency. The $66.50 per share offer—nearly double aQuantive's closing price yesterday—comes on the heels of WPP's 24/7 Real Media purchase. It's Microsoft's biggest acquisition ever, reflecting its growing desperation to regain its status as a major player in the online advertising sphere. More »

Blackstone has snapped up credit card services provider Alliance Data for $7.8 billion, joining a surge of private equity into dull but profitable back-office firms. The 30% above-market offer for Alliance, which also runs a data processing unit, is the latest in a wave of takeovers in the financial-processing sector that started with KKR's April bid for First Data. More »

Reuters and Thomson have settled on the terms of the $17.24 billion merger announced last week, sounding the starting bell for a longer-than-usual regulatory review, the Journal reports. Reuters head Tom Glocer will become CEO of the new Thomson-Reuters, which combines the second- and third-largest providers of financial data and raises antitrust concerns. More »

Rupert Murdoch doesn't want to shake things up at Dow Jones—or so he implied in a weekend missive wooing the Bancroft family. In the folksy, flattering letter, Murdoch called himself "first and foremost" a "newspaper man," and promised to appoint an independent editorial board for the Wall Street Journal should he take over the company. More »

Private equity powerhouse KKR has been on a monumental spending spree this year, closing more than $120 billion in deals to date in 2007—more than twice its closest rival. Now the Financial Times wonders whether the veteran PE firm it may be hitting the market too forcefully. More »

Private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management is said to have cut a deal to buy Chrysler from DaimlerChrysler.  Cerberus has lots of experience in negotiating for assets in the auto industry, having led the buyout of auto parts maker Delphi, which has not yet closed and may yet fall apart. More »

Financial data giants Reuters and Thomson have confirmed that a merger is in the works. Should the deal go through, the company will control 34 percent of the financial data market, to current leader Bloomberg's 33 percent. Reuters CEO Tom Glocer would head the new Thomson-Reuters, which would remain under the Thomson family's control. More »

Thomson, the Canadian publishing company, is poised to buy Reuters, the global news and information agency, the Globe and Mail reports. The timing of the takeover, which values Reuters at $17.7 billion, appears a response to Rupert Murdoch's proposed purchase of Dow Jones, but sources say they have been in talks with Reuters for months.  More »

Aluminum titan Alcoa is hoping to get its largest rival, Alcan, to melt under a hostile takeover bid, after merger talks between the two companies collapsed. Alcoa, the world's largest aluminum company, has offered $26.9 billion for its Canadian competitor in an effort to beat out the emerging market producers who have recently dominated the industry. More »

A powerful shareholder in Dow Jones  is opposing Rupert Murdoch's takeover bid, saying the tabloid publisher would destroy the Wall Street Journal 's integrity. James Ottaway Jr. said Murdoch "has for a long time expressed his personal, political and business biases through his newspapers and television channels." More »

Reuters is being wooed by a buyer, though the British information service is steadfastly mum on its suitor's identity. The WSJ predicts one of two outcomes: an intra-industry move from Canadian publishing powerhouse Thomson, or a swoop in by private equity, aimed at profiting off the company's steady cash flow. More »

Qantas Airlines will keep flying solo, after what would have been the biggest airline takeover in history fell through yesterday evening. Airline Partners Australia, the private equity consortium that offered $11.1 billion for the company, failed to secure the 50% of stock it needed to move the deal to its next stage. More »

Could a Microsoft-Yahoo! merger be in the works? The New York Post reports that Microsoft has quietly approached the Internet giant about opening merger negotiations, after informal talks fell apart several months ago. Insiders say Microsoft is looking to fight back against Google after the search-engine leader bested it in a spate of recent deals. More »

Rubert Murdoch sometimes finds Wall Street Journal stories a little long. He'd like to see more politics on the editorial page, and to launch a glossy magazine for the Saturday edition . The Aussie tycoon wasn't shy about sharing plans for the paper, should he succeed in buying parent company Dow Jones, in a lengthy sit-down with the Times. More »

A Dutch court has blocked the sale of ABN Amro's LaSalle Bank, throwing Amro's proposed merger with Barclays into jeopardy. The move—which the court says is intended to protect shareholder interests—could spark a new bidding war over the Dutch bank, whose $87.5 billion proposed merger with Barclays has been slammed by shareholders as a lowball deal. More »

The Bancroft family's rejection of Rupert Murdoch's $5 billion offer for Dow Jones set the stage yesterday for a battle with other shareholders and the board of directors—as well as within the family itself. Without the family's controlling votes, the board would likely jump at the offer, a 67% premium over the company's closing price Monday. More »