© Reuters. AN INVESTOR ACTIVIST WANTS TO LEAVE BARNES & NOBLE RATING, ACCORDING TO THE WSJ
(Reuters) – The bookseller us Barnes & Noble objected Thursday to a plan of Sandell Asset Management aimed at making it out of the rating, explaining that its founder and chairman Leonard Riggio will not participate.
The fund activist, which holds approximately 2.75% of the bookstore chain, has proposed Thursday to raise financing to launch a bid to more than $ 9 the share, or more than $ 650 million (552 million euros) in total, reported the Wall Street Journal.
Action Barnes & Noble has ended in increase of 7,58% to 7.10 dollars to Wall Street after this information, after a high at $ 7.80, bringing the capitalisation of the group at 566,5 million.
The plan Sandell assumes that it meet $ 500 million worth of funds and that other shareholders support it by agreeing to retain their titles and to transfer them in the new unlisted entity he will control.
“Mr. Riggio has no intention of being involved in such a transaction, and the group considers it is very unlikely that a debt financing of $ 500 million,” responded Barnes & Noble in a press release.
With 18% of the share capital, Leonard Riggio is the principal shareholder of the group based in New York, according to data from Thomson Reuters.
In July, Sandell had already put the pressure on Barnes & Noble asking the company, which was severely challenged by the online sales of Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN).com, of sale.
(Gayathree Ganesan and Vibhuti Sharma in Bangalore, Véronique Tison for the French service)
