GE May Buy Alstom For A Whopping $13 Billion!
General Electric is reportedly in talks to buy Alstom SA — one of the biggest energy solutions and transportation companies in the world — for more than $13 billion.
This would put the buying price about 25% higher than Alstom’s current market price. If completed, the acquisition of the French-owned multinational builder of power plants and trains will be GE’s largest ever.
If the deal goes through, an agreement may be announced as early as this week, according to Bloomberg‘s unidentified source.
The deal would give the US maker of jet engines and locomotives control of Alstom’s technology for power transmission and power plant maintenance as Europe’s economy starts to revive. A purchase of Alstom, which also sells high-speed TGV trains and rail signals, would be a rare example of a major French company being taken over by a US rival.
For a couple of examples of the technologies in question — the ones that GE will gain control of — see: Alstom Completes World’s Largest Offshore Wind Turbine; Alstom To Build Israeli Hydro Storage Power Plant; and Alstom Joins 250 MW Swansea Bay Tidal Power Project.
“Acquiring Alstom would put an exclamation point on GE’s return to deals,” stated Sanford C Bernstein analyst Steven Winoker. “It is among the best fits we have seen with the GE portfolio for some time.”
GE and Alstom have, again, reportedly, already held talks with government officials in France in order to address any potential political concerns that the government there may have.
We’ll keep you posted on any further developments. 🙂
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I would expect a political veto on this takeover of a “national champion”. Watch out for GE’s second-best strategy. Which bits of Alstom do they really want?
The garage sale of French assets and companies is about to start. The country’s finances are the unspeakable mess of Europe, and the Socialist’s tax rates are driving business out of the country. Soon all that will be left will be tourism and luxury goods production.
Actially, France was recovering from the Financial Crisis slowly but surely until all that idiotic Austerity nonsense hit the Eurozone Economy like a freight train:
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/france/gdp-growth
Slowly may be kind
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/france/gdp-growth
Don’t forget that the French banks have the largest exposures to the weakest economies in Europe, and that they would all be insolvent if they had to mark these exposures to market.
The worst kept secret in Europe is that France is broke and Germany can’t afford to let them go down.
Great maybe part of the 13 Billion will come back to the US The practice of holding profits overseas has been highlighted as a strategy to avoid paying taxes. GE paid no U.S. taxes at all But GE has come under fire for its light tax burden. Though it has been earning billions in profits, it paid an average tax rate of just 1.8 percent between 2002 and 2011, according to Citizens for Tax Justice
GE is a BUY and HOLD dividend stock. GE is going back to their roots: manufacturing. They are getting out of the financing business. Compounding dividend earnings via DRIP is a beautiful thing!
-Cheers.
Not abusing the CapsLock key is a beautiful thing.
Speaking of that – would it be possible to get options for bold, underline, italics and the like in the menu under the text box? It’s a pain to use HTML markups and this site frowns quite heavily on caps for emphasis…
I’ll pass it on to Zach. The allcaps ban thing is an attempt to keep the whacko ranters under control.
I understand, but had to try… Just hard to put emphasis on important points in long comments. Sadly, I understand the need to limit options to keep forums readable… Thanks for the consideration though!