News / Rival bidders DSV and CVC said to be offering €14bn for DB Schenker

Two rival bids have landed for DB Schenker, reports emerging this morning that Danish forwarder DSV and a consortium led by CVC Capital Partners had made binding offers in the region of €14bn ($15.6bn).

Bloomberg said the CVC-led group had “simultaneously” discussed a deal worth as much as €16m, which would also see the German government reinvest about €3bn, for a circa-25% stake.

According to the news agency, German state-owned parent Deutsche Bahn was evaluating the offers and would discuss CVC’s proposed higher bid with the government.

Expectations were rife that DSV had all but landed a deal after rumours began circulating yesterday of a €15bn bid.

Analysts at Bernstein noted today after the Bloomberg report was released that bids of €14bn were what they had “broadly expected from earlier rounds”. But they added: “More interesting is a second reported offer by CVC that would see the government reinvest, valuing the enterprise at €16bn, seemingly, with the additional cash.

“Other factors will likely matter to the bid – not just what is best for Deutsche Bahn’s balance sheet, but also what is best for Germany, from an overall economic perspective.

“In our view, the ‘about’ in the ‘about €14bn’ leaves certainty unresolved. The wording still leaves open the possibility of different valuations, and ‘people familiar with the matter’ expect bids to be renegotiated.”

This, they said, meant the door had been left open to either higher numbers or greater non-monetary concessions.

Deutsche Bahn finally put DB Schenker, up for sale in December, after assessing a multitude of options for addressing its mounting debts, asking interested parties to explain their reason for a bid and plans for the logistics operations.

Potential bidders were whittled down to four in June, with AP Møller-Maersk and Saudi carrier Bahri later confirming they had dropped out.

(Yesterday out on Loadstar Premium: ‘DB Schenker sale deadline is here‘)