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Last weekend must have been a round the clock race to negotiate stuff with major shareholders and to prepare and draft the market press release.
Must have been one of the most testing weekends for Read - professionally and privately.
An activist must have played a role for sure.
Poker chips can you list what they should sell off? Italy?
I think VOD has to streamline itself first.....there are plenty of bits of VOD that a potential buyer may not want ....
you also have the huge problem of Competition Law when anyone mentions the likes of European mergers .... would take a long time to get any go-ahead ..I suspect..and in a different form than any original proposal
Oh Gutterboy. Of course being bearish on a stock is not whinging. I have many times welcomed bearish posts on here as I like a balanced view. What I don't welcome, are whingers. It might help if you read my posts properly , before responding, that way, you might make more sense. Good luck with that one?
"I wonder if Amazon would be interested, as a logical next step to their world domination."
Probably more chance of that, than Narcus's suggestion of Etisalat making a bid. I can see why he mentioned Etisalat though, with Atlas 2022 Holdings Limited owning 10% of Vodafone's stock, so Etisalat already indirectly own 10% of Vodafone.
I wonder if Amazon would be interested, as a logical next step to their world domination.
The article is 3 years old but the point is still relevant
https://www.trustedreviews.com/news/3820370-3820370
I would have though Etilsalat will come in for the remaining 90% at some point
"Who can Vodafone merge with? Orange in france?"
Orange crossed my mind as a possible European company, but I'm not sure where Orange's businesses may compete directly with Vodafone's, that's why I thought of US companies, like AT&T, or Verizon. If it was Big Tech, Apple or Google may be a possibility, of course all this is just speculation.
Who can Vodafone merge with? Orange in france?
"Takeover is definite within the realms of speculation"
Anyone who thinks my post about a possible merger/takeover for Vodafone is too speculative, look back at Vodafone's takeover of Cable & Wireless Worldwide. The timeline and events leading up to that takeover is interesting:
Gavin Darby
Vodafone PLC CEO, USA, Africa, China, Africa. 2004 – 2008.
Vodafone PLC Director, Asia Pacific - Middle East. 2008-2010
Vodafone/C&WW
15th November 2011, Announcement. Vodafone executive Gavin Darby drafted in to replace Pluthero as C&WW CEO
July 2012 Vodafone takes over C&WW
So, Darby started at C&WW late November and C&WW was taken over by Vodafone within 6 months; That was VOD taking over C&WW and shows the sort of timelines and events shaping my current thinking.
" otherwise why didn't they just keep Read in place until a new CEO is found? "
They may well be doing that Fleccy .... Margherita Della Valle wants the job ...plus the recent NED Stephen Carter..so it may all be decided internally before April 2023 anyway....possibly up to MDV to show she is up to it from now until then ...in her hands to get the support of the main shareholders .....
Takeover is definite within the realms of speculation
Being bearish on a stock is not whinging Danny boy.
It just means that you think it will go down.
Rob. As I have said many times, I am happy to leave it to those who know what they are talking about, Very good post from Gary by the way. I thought one good thing though, it would stop all the whingers on here, but so far I'm not convinced. Even Mikey doesn't seem very pleased, still going on about ski slopes? There is no pleasing some, once a whinger, always a whinger. What do you think rob, Good news, let's hope so. So what is going replace the sack Nick mantra? Sack ???? Only time will tell. Have a good one.
Thanks "MikeM14" for your answer regarding dividends - It seems to encourage trading a share though rather than investing in it long term for the dividend. There will undoubtedly be opportunities to dip in & out of shares then back before the Ex Div date.
I've just got back in and had some thoughts while I was out and was looking at starting a thread titled Merger/Takeover, but I can see that Takeover's already mentioned in this thread, so I'll share my thoughts here.
What if a takeover/merger is already been agreed in principle?
Read is due to step down at the end of December but will remain in a consulting role until the end of the tax year.
One possibility is that a merger announcement comes along early in the New Year, with an announcement that the CEO of the other company will be named as the CEO of the combined company; Read will get a big consultancy fee for managing the Vodafone side of the merger, with Margherita Della Valle dealing with the day to day running of the Vodafone, during the due diligence and approval part of a deal.
Speculative, but makes sense to me, otherwise why didn't they just keep Read in place until a new CEO is found? It could be Read is making way for the other guy, so there's no battlelines drawn down the road.
It would have to be a big company, maybe one of the big US Telecom companies, or possibly a big tech company looking at moving into the Telecoms space. This is how rumours start lol.
Careful what you wish for. The next one can’t do much better.
The chairman reveals the boards attitude in congratulating Nick for unlocking value of Towers. Selling a key asset essential to your businesses operation is just desperate. The chairman, the board, and investors are just asset stripping to give themselves a few more divs before there is nothing left. The board is now hunting for someone to strip assets faster.
If the new CEO comes in, cancels divs, buybacks and asset sales, streamlines staffing in uk and Germany and tells those operations to get their heads down and try harder on profitability, I will be impressed and may invest, but I doubt it.
Farewell Nick. Enjoy the gardening.
They could sell of Vodacom and merge it with orange Africa or something
" I also wonder if VOD would be considered a critical asset by the government and prevented from takeover."
VOD UK is just a small part of VOD ...so it would only involve that part of the business .... with regards to any UK Government interference ...
Foreign companies own airports , water , electricity ,rail etc etc within the UK ...so one does have to wonder what actually defines "critical asset" anyway
The only surprise is he is staying till next year.
Go now.
* to HELP bankroll the €14.8bn towers business stake
Putting together a "hostile takeover bid" would take a massive amount of work and would need to have the finances in place to be taken seriously to even be considered for announcement .....plus on top of that ..you need a pretty strong plan to get the finances , which at the moment is unlikely due to market conditions ..... PE like GIP and KKR are not going to have the cash for it ..they would seek to raise debt/consortium of lenders ..something the current debtors would have to agree on
..They needed the Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund to bankroll the €14.8bn towers business stake
Interesting now is if strategic investors like Cevian Capital re-take a stake if they believe the new CFO/CEO intends to move on restructuring ....or ..are they just going to drift along until a new CEO gets appointed
maybe other Middle East investors will take a stake , like Emirates Telecommunications Group did ...or maybe involvement from that Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund
not much going to happen until Spring at the earliest I wouldn't imagine
Haha hostile takeover bid for this pile of steaming shxt? It has debts of 40b in a rising interest rate environment, no investment bank would lend any party the money to buy a dog like Vod, especially as once dividend is slaughtered and the numbers in Germany start bleeding off even more these will be down to .65p. Terminal, like U.K. in general.
I agree! but I still think the hostile takeover bid would be at a significant premium to current share price.
I wonder if VOD will introduce an anti-takeover plan like BT did.
I also wonder if VOD would be considered a critical asset by the government and prevented from takeover.
The influencers internally and externally got what they wanted.
I am still of the opinion that loaded PEs and wealthy individuals are looking to snap up dirt cheap assets. Once they have attained the golden portion of the votes, the narrative will, over night, change to one of optimism etc.
Wash, rinse and repeat.
In summary, a hostile take-over attempt is "imminent".