Blackstone, THL Group’s Fidelity Bid May Exceed $15 Billion

Blackstone, THL Group’s Fidelity Bid May Exceed $15 Billion


May 12 (Bloomberg) -- Blackstone Group LP, Thomas H. Lee Partners LP and TPG Capital are in talks to pay more than $15 billion including debt for Fidelity National Information Services Inc., said a person with knowledge of the matter, a deal that would value the company at about $32 a share.

Fidelity National Information may reach an agreement with the buyout group as soon as May 16 if talks don’t collapse, this person said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the discussions are private. Marcia Danzeisen, a spokeswoman for Fidelity National, didn’t return a call after regular business hours yesterday.

A $15 billion deal would be about three times as big as the largest leveraged buyout since the credit markets crumbled in July 2007, showing how private-equity firms are again putting capital to work after more than a two-year drought in transactions. LBO funds worldwide have about $500 billion of unspent committed capital, according to researcher Preqin Ltd.

Private-equity firms announced about $24 billion of company takeovers so far this year, compared with $5.7 billion during the same period in 2009.

For Fidelity National Information, a Jacksonville, Florida- based payment-processing company, a deal in the $32 a share range would represent more than a 20 percent premium to the $26 closing stock price on May 5, the last day before the Wall Street Journal reported the company was in buyout talks.

Other private-equity firms have recently held talks about joining the group bidding for Fidelity National Information, said two people with knowledge of the matter. With banks preparing about $10 billion in debt financing, the private- equity group would have to put up more than $5 billion, one of the people said.

Financing Group

Bank of America Corp., Barclays Plc, Citigroup Inc., Credit Suisse Group AG, Deutsche Bank AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co. are among the banks that have been working on financing the takeover, said other people with knowledge of the matter.

Credit-market turmoil in 2007 led banks to pull back on leveraged loans used to finance buyouts. Since July of that year, the largest LBO was that of IMS Health Inc., acquired in February for about $5 billion including debt.

Fidelity National Information had about $2.9 billion of net debt and noncontrolling interest as of March 31. With about 377 million shares outstanding as of April 30, a deal at $32 a share would value the company’s stock at $12.1 billion.

Thomas H. Lee, also known as THL Partners, already owns about 4.4 percent of Fidelity National, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Private-equity firm Warburg Pincus is the company’s largest shareholder, with about 11 percent.

Fidelity National Information processes payments and issues cards for more than 14,000 institutions globally. The company had profit of $105.9 million in 2009 on revenue of $3.77 billion.

source: bloomberg.com