US-BASED Peabody Energy has complained to the Takeovers Panel about Macarthur Coal's handling of its revised bid for the collier, which Macarthur rejected yesterday.
Peabody has told the Takeovers Panel that Macarthur failed to provide shareholders with relevant information about its revised bid.
It has asked the Takeovers Panel to order the postonement of a meeting of Macarthur shareholders, due next Monday, April 12, to consider Macarthur's own bid to take over Gloucester Coal Ltd.
Macarthur has made a bid for all the shares in Gloucester Coal, in which Noble is major shareholder. As part of the deal, Macarthur would issue Noble with shares in return for its Gloucester holding.
At the same time, Peabody made a bid for Macarthur, which rejected the initial $13 per share bid and, now, also a revised bid of $14 per Macarthur share.
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Peabody now alleges that Macarthur failed to provide its shareholders with additional information in relation to the revised Peabody proposal, and has asked the Takeovers Panel to issue an order postponing next Monday's shareholder meeting.
Peabody says the information not provided to shareholders included updated information in relation to the Gloucester/Noble transactions which took into account the revised Peabody proposal.
Peabody says the failure to provide the information prevented Macarthur shareholders from comparing the relative merits of the Peabody bid against the proposed Gloucester/Noble deal.
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