International toll road investor Atlas Arteria (ASX: ALX) is still waiting to learn whether it will receive a full takeover bid from IFM Investors.
The superannuation funds-backed alternative investment firm holds about 19% of the company and indicated, when it first acquired shares in June, that it might consider moving to 100%.
Atlas Arteria released its half-year results on 31 August. After the results announcement, chief executive Graeme Bevans said the company was still unsure what IFM’s plans were.
IFM took almost a 15% interest in Atlas Arteria, buying at $8.10 a share, before notifying the company on 9 June. In its notification, IFM requested access to non-public information to help it decide whether to submit a non-binding indicative proposal to acquire the rest of the company. In a 10 June ASX announcement, Atlas Arteria said it had considered IFM’s request but had decided not to provide information “at this time”.
Since then, IFM has raised its stake to around 19%, just under the 20% level at which it would be required to provide a formal takeover offer for the company.
On 31 August, Atlas Arteria reported statutory net profit after tax of $117.1 million for the first half of 2022 compared with a revised net profit of $41.2 million for the same period in 2021. That 2021 figure would, however, have been $56.2 million excluding accounting impact of a capital restructure in one of the businesses in which Atlas Arteria is invested, Warnow Tunnel in Rostock, north-east Germany.
Atlas Arteria said its first-half 2022 revenue had benefited from progressive removal of government imposed COVID-19 restrictions in all the jurisdictions in which it was invested but overall average traffic was still below pre-COVID 19 levels.
News of IFM’s initial shares acquisition in June lifted Atlas Arteria’s share price from $7.08 to $8.25. The shares closed at $7.98 on 9 September.
Atlas Arteria is invested in four businesses: a 31.14% interest in the APRR Group and the smaller ADELAC toll road business in France; 100% of the Dulles Greenway toll road in Virginia in the US: and 100% of the Warnow Tunnel.
IFM is owned by a group of Australia’s largest superannuation funds. The firm makes direct investments on behalf of those funds but its Global Infrastructure Fund also includes as investors overseas institutions.
Image: The APRR Group’s A5 toll road in France.