Stifel has downgraded Digital 9 Infrastructure (DGI9) to ‘Neutral’ following news of Ardian's conditional acquisition of the trust’s crown jewel Verne Global, which the broker described as a “forced sale”.
On Monday (27 November), the DGI9 board said it had entered into a definitive agreement for its stake in the company for approximately £465m, representing a 5% discount to end-June carrying value. The $575m purchase price is comprised of a $440m cash sum split between $415m on closure of the Verne transaction and $25m deferred consideration, with an up to $135m potential earn-out, payable subject to Verne Global achieving run-rate EBIDTA targets for the 2026 financial year. DGI9 said the sale enables the trust to deleverage its balance sheet by paying down approximately £300m of its ...
To continue reading this article...
Join Investment Week for free
Signup and gain exclusive members-only insights - all free of charge!
- Unlimited access to real-time news, analysis and opinion from the investment industry, including the Sustainable Hub covering fund news from the ESG space
- Get ahead of regulatory and technological changes affecting fund management
- Important and breaking news stories selected by the editors delivered straight to your inbox each day
- Weekly members-only newsletter with exclusive opinion pieces from leading industry experts
- Be the first to hear about our extensive events schedule and awards programmes
