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Dubai: Borse Dubai's $4 billion bid for the Nordic exchanges operator OMX is becoming more acceptable to institutional investors as the Swedish regulator has recognised the Dubai offer as legitimate, sources familiar with the situation said yesterday.
"Going by the fact that the Swedish regulator (Finansinspektionen) has recognised Borse Dubai's August 17 offer as legitimate, takeover bid has gone a long way in boosting confidence of OMX investors," said an investment banker.
The Swedish regulator investigating the takeover offer said on Thursday that the Dubai firm's open offer to OMX shareholders on August 17 is in compliance with the Swedish laws, although it noted that an earlier press release violated the takeover code.
With the Swedish FSA recognising the offer, M&A experts believe that the Dubai firm has crossed a major hurdle. "In any takeover situation, when a foreign company is the bidder it is but natural for the local authorities to check the bidder's credentials," said an analyst.
On the price front Dubai's all cash offer is about 13 per cent higher than the US-based Nasdaq's cash-and-share offer of 202.3 crowns per share as of August 17.
With more than 25 per cent of OMX's floating stock in the hands of hedge funds, price will be an overriding factor in the course of the takeover battle.
Although Nasdaq is yet to announce a competing bid, Borse Dubai is determined to play a leading role in the global consolidation of exchanges.
"Unlike Nasdaq, we don't believe there will be one big global exchange anytime soon. We believe in connecting exchanges around the world and want to bring OMX technology and expertise to Dubai to make a global financial centre in our region," Per Larsson, chief executive of Borse Dubai, was quoted by UK's Sunday Times yesterday.
Meanwhile the newspaper said in a report that Singapore's state-owned Temasek Holdings has approached Nasdaq to buy its 30 per cent stake in the LSE and the deal could lead to a full takeover of the LSE by Temasek.
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