Barnes & Noble announced a final date for the BN Education spinoff — distributing the new stock on August 2 (to BN shareholders of record as of July 27). BNED stock is expected to begin trading on a “when-issued” basis starting July 23 and will convert to regular trading on August 3. More importantly to investors and those concerned with the financial health of Barnes & Noble Inc., the company announced that it will resume paying quarterly dividends after the spinoff. They will pay at the annual rate of 60 cents a share, with the first quarterly record date of August 7. The bookseller had […]
Finance
Andersons Get “Definitive Agreement” to Buyout Books-A-Million For $21 Million
Six months after their latest offer to take Books-A-Million private, the controlling Anderson family has reached a deal to buyout shareholders of the country’s second-largest book retailer for approximately $21 million, an improved offer of $3.25 a share. (Previously, they offered $17 million, or $2.75 a share.) Unanimously approved by a special board committee and the directors, the deal offers a 23 percent premium over Monday’s closing trading price of $2.60 a share. A majority of the shareholders outside of the family still need to approve the deal for it to go through. The Andersons currently own just under 58 percent of shares. They […]
Court to Decide If Revised Family Christian Buyout Goes to Creditor Vote
The bankruptcy court is set to hold a hearing today on a new set of proposals from Family Christian Stores to put a revised buyout offer from FCS Acquisition to a vote among the creditors. Their previous bid of $43 million has been increased to a range of between $52.4 million and $55.7 million, according to Family Christian’s lawyers. Sources told Michigan Live that the liquidation companies that participated in the auction — since voided by the court — are no longer participating (and who could blame them, since Family Christian has been working hard since the outset to ensure the […]
RCS Weighing Formal Buyout Offer from Mondadori, As Three Italian Agencies Merge
Catching up on news from last week, Italy’s Mondadori Libri formalized their initial February offer to buy their biggest competitor, RCS Libri. The proposed price was not announced, but the Italian press says the offer was for 135 million euros (after a range of 125 million to 150 million euros had been tipped earlier this year). The RCS board issued a statement saying it “reviewed the offer received” while indicating it “reserved all its rights in regard to evaluating the offer, also taking into account wider considerations regarding the strategic outlook for the group.” For 2014, RCS Libri had sales of 222.6 […]
Six Months of M&A
It has been another busy year of mergers and acquisitions in the publishing space, though not with the same volume that we saw in 2014. But there have been billions of dollars of transactions already, with no shortage of deals of scale — including the sales of OverDrive and Scholastic’s educational technology and services business, along with Donnelley’s winning bid for Courier and the not-yet-revealed but surely sizable sum for Pearson’s Family Education Network, topped in value by the quiet, cashless merger of Macmillan Science and Education and Springer Science. The formal Mondadori offer we report on today to buy […]
Boire Named Barnes & Noble CEO; Carey Promoted to COO
Barnes & Noble has appointed Ronald D. Boire, currently president & chief executive officer of Sears Canada, as ceo of its retail business, effective September 8. Boire will succeed Michael Huseby who — as announced last week — will become executive chairman of Barnes & Noble Education once the company is formally spun off as a separate public company. Boire, who earlier served as evp, global merchandise manager for Best Buy, is expected to join the board of directors for the retail division. Huseby remains on the board of BN, Inc. until the split, after which Education will have its own separate […]