5 per cent in exchange for the cancellation of about £3 These could include Associated British Foods and Doughty Hanson, the owner of Ranks Hovis McDougall.Weetabix, which also owns the Alpen and Ready Brek brands, has a 14.2 per cent market share by volume of the breakfast cereal business and is the number two branded cereal manufacturer behind Kellogg's.However, it has been hit by increasingly fierce competition on the supermarket shelves from bigger rivals, including Kellogg's, Nabisco and General Mills. The famous Weetabix brand, which has been a staple of the British breakfast table since 1932, has been acquired for £642m by Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst, an American private equity group thatowns such household names as Typhoo Tea, Branston Pickle, Hartleys Jam and Sun Pat peanut butter.
The deal, which has reaped a £130m fortune for the George family who have owned and run the business for the past 70 years, could spark a bidding war from rival food groups and private equity houses. In the year to 30 June, it made a pre-tax profit of £400,000 on turnover of £1.3m.Ukbetting said it believed the business to be the UK's leading odds comparison service with 75 per cent of the UK market and more than 100,000 gaming and betting users.The £11m fundraising, through a share placing at 45p which is fully underwritten by Collins Stewart, brings the total the company has raised on the stock market in the last two years to just over £20m.Mr Dubens said it would have about £5m to £6m of cash post the deal after it used £3m to eliminate debt and used some cash to finance the initial fee of £2.75m for Oddschecker.. they're doing well so we don't see any issue with them missing the target."Oddschecker, which is owned by its 16 staff and some private investors, was set up about three years ago. The internet betting group ukbetting yesterday announced it was raising £11m - partly to help it buy Oddschecker, a privately owned odds comparison service, and partly to pay down debt and fund further acquisitions. Ukbetting is to pay a maximum of £4.75m for the Fulham-based business if it hits certain targets, including making a profit of £800,000 in the current year to next June.Peter Dubens, ukbetting's executive vice chairman, said: "They've known us for a couple of years because we've been providing sports information to their site ... Mr Hoffman said Barclays had withdrawn the advertising campaign because the bank took "transparency very seriously and as such, when a body like the OFT raises a complaint about our advertising, we have to listen carefully. We have agreed to change the wording of our advertising and marketing literature to make it more explicit for customers in terms of how the offer works."The OFT said it was looking at a number of other examples of misleading advertising for credit cards.. In the end, Mr Barrett had to get Gary Hoffman, chief executive of the Barclaycard division, to help him explain what a customer would actually have to repay each month if they were to take up the "0 per cent" offer.The Consumers' Association welcomed the crackdown by the OFT, attacking Barclays' offer as "deeply cynical".Ashleye Sharpe, of the organisation's magazine Which?, said such offers "target people who are trying to pay off their debts, and yet the conditions of the deal trap them into running up further debt, which is charged at a much higher rate and cannot begin to be cleared until the balance transfer is paid off".Barclays insisted its customers did understand the terms of its offer and said it did not believe it breached the Consumer Credit Act. John Vickers, OFT chairman, said: "Barclaycard promoted this product as offering the opportunity to borrow at 0 per cent interest for ever."It does no such thing The promotion in these terms has therefore been stopped. Barclaycard owes it to the public to set the record straight."The OFT's ruling is a further embarrassment for Barclays - Britain's largest provider of credit cards - which was heavily criticised by MPs last month for the high rates it charges customers who use Barclaycards. Mr Barrett, who has been at the helm of Barclays for four years, also came unstuck when questioned by the MPs about exactly how the "0 per cent for ever" card worked.He insisted the terms and conditions were "clear", but conceded that reading the details of the promotion, which appears in branches and has been sent to hundreds of thousands of customers, was like an "eye test".
But advertising stated that customers would never pay any interest. Barclays Bank was forced to withdraw advertising yesterday for one of its credit cards after the Office of Fair Trading complained it was "highly misleading." Barclays Bank was forced to withdraw advertising yesterday for one of its credit cards after the Office of Fair Trading complained it was "highly misleading." The climbdown follows an admission by Matt Barrett, the bank's chief executive, to the Treasury Select Committee that he would not borrow on a credit card because it was "too expensive".Under the "0 per cent for ever" card, balances transferred from other cards do not get charged interest providing other purchases are made at a higher rate. It could be in the next fortnight, even next week," said one source.Mr Yassukovich said: "As the formalities for completion of the restructuring arrangements must now be undertaken, it is appropriate that I now resign from the board."For the restructuring to go ahead officially, it needs the backing of the banks, who are owed about £2bn, as well as the bondholders.Cob Stenham, the chairman, said: "In the circumstances faced by the Telewest group, we have concluded that a restructuring on the revised terms remains in the best interests of our stakeholders.". moving [Telewest] to the US means there'd be different corporate governance," one source said.In his letter of resignation, Mr Yassukovich wrote: "As you know, I never accepted the decision of the ad hoc committee of bondholders to renegotiate the terms of the restructuring as originally agreed, albeit on a non-binding basis. As I consider the revision of the terms to be prejudicial to the interests of all the stakeholders, I could not join in what you would correctly wish to be a unanimous recommendation to shareholders."Nevertheless, Mr Yassukovich's resignation seems to signal Telewest is close to announcing it has completed its debt-for-equity swap "The documents will soon be filed. Sources said Mr Yassukovich, who is known as Stani, had serious concerns about corporate governance issues "This is not about the economics of the deal ... Under the revised terms, shareholders are set to end up with just 1.5 per cent of the company's equity compared with 3 per cent previously. But one of the other changes that the bondholders - who are agreeing to take 98.5 per cent in exchange for the cancellation of about £3.5bn of debt - are said to have demanded is that the company be moved to the US and its shares listed on Nasdaq.It is that issue which is said to be behind the resignation of Mr Yassukovich, a former deputy chairman of the London Stock Exchange. Another example is Pearson, the media group run by Dame Marjorie Scardino, the chief executive, and Rona Fairhead, the finance director.Ms Cartwright, who has three children, will replace Mike Metcalf, who is leaving to pursue other interests. She will earn a base salary of £350,000 a year but can double that in bonuses if performance targets are met. She will also be eligible to receive a share options package equal to twice her basic salary. The company said Ms Cartwright's options would not become exercisable for at least another three years.Mr Metcalf said he would be staying on for six months to ensure a smooth handover. After that, he said, he would be looking for opportunities to take up a chief executive's role, probably at a private equity-backed business involved in the consumer goods industries. |
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