Trio ponder joint bid for €5bn Holcim-Lafarge assets

Blackstone, Cinven and a Canadian pension fund are said by the UK’s Financial Times (FT) newspaper to be exploring a joint bid for €5 billion worth of assets earmarked for sale by cement makers 725 Lafarge and 680 Holcim.

The move by the two private equity groups and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, said by the FT to have been disclosed by two people familiar with the talks, is the latest claimed interest from buyout groups in the facilities to be sold by the world’s two largest cement groups to help win approval for their €29.22 billion merger.

After announcing their intention to merge in April 2014, Lafarge and Holcim are said by FT sources to be looking to start a competitive sale of the €5 billion valued assets as soon as this month.

Credit Suisse, HSBC, 4323 Morgan Stanley and 4515 BNP Paribas are managing the auction. Zaoui & Co and Rothschild are advising Lafarge and 3059 Goldman Sachs is advising Holcim on the merger. First round bids are expected to be due in September 2014, according to one FT source.

The disposal of production facilities was announced as part of the April 2014 deal to pre-empt the complex set of antitrust and regulatory concerns the deal is expected to face. The merger involves businesses across 15 countries in a sector dominated by a handful of global companies. The industry has been under investigation by the 1022 European Commission for cartel behaviour and price-fixing since 2008.

Blackstone, Cinven and CPPIB making a joint bid would also, says the FT, mark the return of club deals, whereby several private equity funds unite to finance a large or complex acquisition.

The FT says that Blackstone, Cinven and CPPIB all declined to comment when asked of the claimed joint Lafarge-Holcim asset bid.