Seems that some of the early momentum has run out of the SP increases with little updates on the takeover status to help further pricing. CRH are an interesting company but valuations are difficult as the last twelve months the price has been pushed up through M&A discussions and pushed down through negative financial announcements. There is value in the network but with heavy exposure to the SME market, management turnover and their ability to create scale untested it might take a little while to realise full values. The financial adviser market has gone through sharp consolidation over a number of years with drive towards economies of scale and linking to accounting services seen as positive for referrals/cross selling. SFW got cold feet on a deal to create a large adviser/accounting network with CRH last year and are now merging with IOOF having decided to join up with a larger party given the consolidation across the industry. Some of the larger parcels being bought recently are probably in profit at current SP so a takeover price a little north of current trading makes a profit for those recent purchases without having to receive a large premium. Value considerations will be interesting to see when the next round of updates occurs. Any would be take-over purchaser of CRH has to extract value from a network exposed to market uncertainties, regulation changes and client's demographic/life cycle vagaries. In addition the likely purchaser should either have existing scale or be prepared to line up other acquisitions to fold into this one.
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