UK public house chain Punch Taverns bought rival Spirit for £2.68 billion ($4.75 billion) in December in a deal financed by Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and RBS. The sale followed an auction involving Robert Tchenguiz’s investment vehicle R20, the Macquarie Group, Robin Saunders’ Clearbrook Capital Partners and the Barclay brothers.
But the highest bidder did not win. Tchenguiz bid about £2.8 billion for Spirit, which comprises some 1,800 pubs. However, Punch’s bid was fully financed so Spirit’s private equity owners, Texas Pacific Group, CVC and Merrill Lynch, had greater certainty that the deal would be completed before the end of the year.
The transaction is something of a homecoming since about 40% of the Spirit portfolio was owned by Punch before its 2002 IPO.
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