Spanish builder ACS gets extension for Hochtief bid

Spanish construction giant ACS has been granted four more weeks to present its takeover bid for Germany’s Hochtief in order to approve a capital increase, the company and Germany’s financial supervisory authority Bafin said Friday.

“The deadline to present their offer was extended by four weeks on Thursday,” a Bafin spokeswoman said.

The group made the request in order to be able to hold a board meeting on Friday and call an extraordinary shareholders meeting that will decide on a capital increase, an ACS spokeswoman said.

ACS said in a later statement that the shareholders’ meeting would be held on November 19.

“The planned capital increase provision will have a maximum volume of 50 percent of the existing share capital, amounting to up to 157 million ACS shares,” it said in a statement.

The provision is aimed at “increasing ACS’s flexibility in facing any possible scenario that might arise until the successful completion of the proposed voluntary public tender offer for Hochtief…

“As a result of this step, ACS has requested and obtained an extension of the submission deadline of its official public tender offer for Hochtief” with Bafin.

“This extension will most likely lead to the offer completing in January 2011,” it said.

ACS, which owns just under 30 percent of Hochtief, Germany’s largest public works group, plans an all-share offer for the outstanding equity, which Hochtief says does not represent fair value for the group.

ACS had initially planned to launch the bid “around November 2.”