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2 Sisters owner Boparan Holdings has received a takeover approach for its Fox’s Biscuits business from an unnamed suitor, valuing the division at around £350m.
Boparan released a statement to the Luxembourg Stock Exchange on Friday, where its debt is listed, announcing it had received a “preliminary approach for Fox’s Biscuits, the trading name of Northern Foods”.
The statement added: “The group’s expectation is that any formal offer for Fox’s Biscuits would be at a valuation in the region of £350m,” noting there was no certainty a deal would be done.
Boparan has not named the potential buyer, but it was in talks last year with Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan-owned Burton’s Foods over the sale of Fox’s, though negotiations were thought to have stalled over price.
Both Boparan and Burton’s have declined commented further on the news.
Boparan bought Fox’s as part of its £342m takeover of Northern Foods in November.
Morning update
EY has warned that consumer spending will fall this year as inflation and rising import costs put pressure on disposable incomes.
The latest EY Item Club forecast says the post-Brexit fall in the value of the found will push inflation up to 3.1% by the end of 2017.
Although it predicts inflation will ease back to 2% by the end of 2018, it says inflation in 2017 couple with weak employment growth will mean household incomes will fall by 0.3% during the year and consumer spending growth will ease back from 2.8% in 2016 to 1.7% in 2017 and just 0.4% in 2018.
“A weakening labour market, tepid growth in wages and rising prices on the high street will squeeze household spending in 2017, in particular on discretionary items which have been doing well over the past year.” said Peter Spencer, chief economic advisor to the EY Item Club.
On the markets this morning, the FTSE 100 has continued the negative mood from last week as it falls from record highs to drop another 0.9% to 7,135.4pts so far this morning.
Most of the FTSE 100 is in the red, including Unilever (ULVR), down 1.8% to 3,300.5p ahead of its trading update later this week, while Tesco (TSCO) and Sainsbury’s (SBRY) are also major fallers - dropping 1.6% to 195.2p and 1.5% to 258.9p respectively.
The big winner so far this morning is SSP Group (SSPG) ahead of its first quarter trading update latest this week - the travel food retailer has jumped 7% to 418.5p so far this morning.
Other risers include PureCircle (PURE), up 2.8% to 293.9p, McColl’s Retail Group (MCLS), up 2.3% to 181p and C&C Group (CCR), up 1.4% to €4.06.
Fallers include Crawshaw Group (CRAW), down 4.7% to 20.5p, Premier Foods (PFD), down 1.4% to 40.9p and Total Procude (TOT), down 1.4% to 155.3p.
This week in the City
It’s a relatively quiet start to the week this morning, but there are a number of key grocery suppliers scheduled to provide market updates this week.
The trading updates kick off tomorrow with PZ Cussons (PZC) releasing a half year trading update.
WH Smith (SMWH) will issued its Christmas trading update ahead of its annual shareholders meeting on Wednesday. Marston’s (MARS) also holds an annual shareholders meeting on Wednesday.
Then on Thursday FTSE 100 heavyweights Diageo (DGE) and Unilever (ULVR) will issue their half year earnings and fourth quarter numbers respectively.
On the same day, travel food specialist SSP Group (SSPG) will issue its first quarter trading update, while AGMs will be held by Britvic (BVIC), Walgreens Boots Alliance and Monstanto.
In economic news, this week brings the CBI Industrial Trends Surveys, while on Thursday the latest official GDP figures for the final quarter of the year are released.
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