REA makes fourth offer for Rightmove and repeats call for talks with board

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Australian property listings group REA, which is majority owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, has made its fourth offer in a month for UK rival Rightmove and repeated its call for the company’s board to engage in talks.

REA said that, based on its own latest share price, its cash and shares offer gave Rightmove shares an implied value of 781p, valuing the company at £6.2bn. Rightmove’s shares were down 1.5 per cent at mid-day on Friday in London, at 655p.

The latest offer takes advantage of a slight recovery in REA’s share price, which had fallen since news of its first offer became public at the start of September.

Its shares had fallen from A$219 at the end of August to A$192 on Wednesday, before recovering to A$200 by the market close in Australia on Friday.

REA’s previous offer, which was announced on Monday, valued Rightmove at 770p per share for a total of £6.1bn, the company said.

The Australian group has repeatedly criticised Rightmove’s board for failing to engage with its offers.

Under UK takeover rules, REA has until 5pm on September 30, to make any final offer or give up its pursuit of Rightmove. REA on Friday demanded Rightmove’s board permit the extension of the deadline and engage in talks with REA.

REA’s chief executive Owen Wilson said the company had met Rightmove shareholders to discuss the offer. REA has said it would maintain a secondary listing on the London Stock Exchange if it succeeds.

“We continue to see the potential for us to strengthen Rightmove and accelerate its growth,” Wilson said. “This is a compelling opportunity to create a true global technology leader on the London market via a secondary listing, operating in two of the most attractive markets in the world.”

The company also announced on Friday that it would allow Rightmove shareholders who wanted a higher proportion of REA shares in the cash-and-shares mix to take that option.

The latest offer is made up of 346p cash, 0.0417 new REA shares and a 6p special dividend for each Rightmove share.

REA offered 341p cash and 0.0422 new REA shares on Monday. It said its very first offer, put to Rightmove on September 5, valued each share at 705p and the company’s share capital at £5.6bn.

“We believe it is in the interests of Rightmove shareholders for the Rightmove board to engage with us and to extend the September 30 2024 deadline,” Wilson said.

Rightmove did not immediately comment on the latest offer. On Wednesday, it dismissed the third offer as “unattractive”.

REA said its offer on Friday represented a 41 per cent premium to Rightmove’s 556p share price on August 30, before news of REA’s interest emerged.