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SAAB

Saab green light from Spyker shareholders

Spyker's shareholders have given the all clear for the Dutch luxury car maker to press ahead with the purchase of Saab Automobile from General Motors.

“The proposal to acquire Saab was accepted by the vast majority” at an extraordinary shareholders meeting held in Zeewolde in the central Netherlands, Spyker chief executive Victor Muller told journalists via a webcast.

“We held a vote and of the 8.4 million shares represented at the meeting, all of them voted in favour with the exception of 1,174 votes represented by the Association of Stock Owners, which abstained from voting.”

Spyker and GM reached a deal last month for the sale of Saab for $74 million

in cash and about $326 million worth of redeemable preferred shares to be retained by the American giant.

Saab’s future had been in doubt throughout 2009 as GM, going through bankruptcy, radically restructured its business and tried to sell off what it saw as non-core and unprofitable assets.

Spyker, a minnow in the global auto industry, manufactured 21 cars in the first quarter of 2009 and sold 23. It has a workforce of about 90 assembly workers while Saab has 3,400 employees in Sweden alone.

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MONSANTO

Bayer buys Monsanto for $66 bn after months-long pursuit

German chemicals giant Bayer said on Wednesday it had signed a $66 billion (€58.8 billion) takeover deal with US seeds and pesticides firm Monsanto.

Bayer buys Monsanto for $66 bn after months-long pursuit
Photo: DPA

“Bayer and Monsanto today announced that they signed a definitive merger agreement under which Bayer will acquire Monsanto for USD 128 per share in an all-cash transaction,” the firms said in a statement.

Bayer repeatedly increased its offer to Monsanto since its first $122-per-share bid, but the US firm had until now held out for more cash.

“This represents a major step forward for our crop science business,” Bayer chief executive Werner Baumann said in the statement.

The two firms said that the deal “brings together two different, but highly complementary” businesses.

Monsanto shareholders still have to approve the deal, as do regulators – with Bayer staking a $2 billion reverse antitrust break fee in case the merger is rejected by US or European authorities.

The deal is expected to be completed by the end of 2017.

Bayer has been pursuing Monsanto since late May, when it made an initial bid of $122 per share (€109), valuing the US genetically modified (GM) crop giant at $62 billion. Monsanto rejected that bid, but said it was “open” to further talks.

Since then the German chemicals behemoth has raised its offer twice, first to $125 per share in July and then to $127.50 last week, but was rebuffed each time.

Mosanto held out for more money, calling the July bid “insufficient”.

The long-mooted tie-up has rung alarms bells for some farmers who fear the power of the combined company in the market for seeds and pesticides, while opponents of genetically-modified food in Europe worry about Monsanto's influence on the continent.

“We do not like this transaction, because we think that Bayer is overpaying significantly,” wrote analyst Peter Spengler of DZ bank on Wednesday before the deal was confirmed.

Monsanto's genetically modified (GM) seed offerings and Climate Corp data analytics offering to farmers would fit in with Bayer's crop protection lines, the firms said in the statement announcing the deal.

The combined group will also emerge with a total research and development budget of €2.5 billion. Added together, Bayer and Monsanto booked sales of €23 billion in 2015.

Bayer said that it expects synergy savings from the merger will allow it to add $1.5 billion to its underlying profit as measured by EBITDA within three years.

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