Pressure on Rightmove to open takeover talks intensified today after Australia’s REA Group stepped up its pursuit with a new approach worth a total of £6.2 billion.
The fourth proposal by REA, which is controlled by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, comes ahead of Monday’s deadline to make a formal offer or walk away.
Rightmove has said previous approaches, including one last weekend at £6.1 billion, materially undervalued its prospects.
REA said its cash and shares proposal represented an implied offer price of 775p, while it also intends to pay a special dividend of 6p a share.
Rightmove shares were today slightly lower at 660p despite REA’s latest move. Panmure Liberum said: “Overall, this offer is not significantly different to previously.”
The broker said 775p offered relatively little incentive to sell, being only marginally above Auto Trader’s valuation.
REA said it has repeatedly requested meetings but received “no substantive engagement beyond cursory procedural telephone calls with the Rightmove chairman”.
It has instead met with Rightmove shareholders as it presses its case for a combination of the leading digital property businesses in the UK and Australia.
Chief executive Owen Wilson said: “We continue to see the potential for us to strengthen Rightmove and accelerate its growth.
“This is a compelling opportunity to create a true global technology leader on the London market via a secondary listing, operating in two of the most attractive markets in the world."
The latest proposal, up from Sunday’s approach at 770p, is split 346p in cash and 0.0417 new REA shares. The company intends to include a mix and match facility for shareholders who wish to receive a greater proportion of their consideration in REA shares.
REA added that its new approach valued Rightmove at 821p a share or £6.5 billion when based on its own share price before the bid interest became public.
