After the close on Friday, retailer and brand owner Frasers Group (LON: FRAS) announced a revised proposed bid for AIM-quoted Mulberry (LON: MUL) of 150p/share in cash. This is well above the original proposal of 130p/share and the 100p subscription price in the funding that raised just over £10m, including £392,000 from a retail offer. The current share price is 112.5p.
Frasers currently holds 37.3% of Bath-based brand owner Mulberry after clawing back some of the shares in the subscription that were going to be taken up by Chalice, which owns 56.7%.
The conditions still include unanimous recommendation by the Mulberry board, plus irrevocable undertakings by the directors and Chalice. It is also dependent on due diligence. Frasers does say that it can choose to waive any of the conditions, although Chalice is the majority shareholder, so its acceptance is key.
Mulberry fell into loss in the year to March 2024. Even stripping out restructuring and impairment charges, the loss was £22.6m on revenues 4% lower at £152.8m. Net debt was £23.7m at the end of March 2024.
In the first five months of the new financial year revenues have declined 18%. Andrea Baldo became chief executive on 1 September.