(Reuters) -Shares in John Wood Group were on track for their biggest one-day drop on record on Monday after U.S.-based Apollo Global Management said it would not proceed with a takeover of the British engineering services firm on its fifth attempt.
Shares were changing hands at around 140 pence in morning trading, down 36% from Friday’s close, after private equity firm Apollo said ahead of the market open it would not go ahead with an offer following an exploratory bid last month.
Apollo had until later this week to either submit a formal offer or walk away from talks following last month’s bid at 240 pence per share, which valued the company at about 1.66 billion pounds ($2.10 billion).
Wood’s board said on April 17 it would engage with Apollo and give it access to due diligence, having previously rejected four earlier proposals from the buyout firm.
Neither party cited any reasons in their statements on Monday for ending discussions.
Under UK takeover rules, Apollo cannot launch a takeover offer for Wood for the next six months, except with the company’s agreement or in the event that a rival bidder swoops in.
The news comes just days after British consumer group The Hut Group (THG) ended takeover discussions with Apollo after concluding that a preliminary bid by the fund was based on “inadequate valuations”.
($1 = 0.7923 pounds)
(Reporting by Eva Mathews in Bengaluru and Pablo Mayo Cerqueiro in London; Editing by Savio D’Souza, Sonia Cheema and Jan Harvey)
