Songbird Estates rejects Qatar bid: Investors way off with Canary Wharf proposal
Songbird Estates, the majority shareholder of London’s Canary Wharf, values itself at over 25 per cent more than the recently rejected £2.2bn takeover bid from the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) and Brookfield Property Partners.
Songbird – which owns 69 per cent of Canary Wharf Group, the owner of the east London-based financial district—rebuffed the takeover proposal on Friday, saying it “materially undervalued” the group. The property firm’s investment portfolio is worth £6.3bn.
The bid valued Songbird at 295p a share. CityAM has learnt that the company would consider a deal of upwards of 400p a share, somewhere between the group’s net asset value per share of 319p – as published in its interim results in September – and a two-year forecast by financial analysts valuing it at 432p a share.
The takeover push represents an equal joint-venture investment between the state-run QIA and the US-based commercial real estate investor Brookfield Property Partners. QIA already owns 28.6 per cent of Songbird and, similarly, Brookfield has a 22 per cent stake in Canary Wharf Group.
Shares in Songbird dropped by 2.8 per cent to 311p following the rejection.
QIA and Songbird declined to comment when contacted by CityAM.