Italian banking giant UniCredit has received a further tranche of Commerzbank shares tendered under its takeover bid, with shareholders in the German lender offering up 10.91% of shares by Tuesday, UniCredit announced on Tuesday evening in Milan.
One week earlier, 7.58% of shares had been tendered to the Italian bank under the offer.
UniCredit had previously held 26.77% of Commerzbank shares. With the newly tendered shares, its stake would rise arithmetically to 37.68%.
With its voluntary takeover offer launched in May, UniCredit is avoiding a mandatory bid, which would otherwise be required upon crossing the 30% threshold and which would have become significantly more expensive given the recent rise in Commerzbank's share price.
Rather than cash, the bank is offering 0.485 UniCredit shares for each Commerzbank share. On the basis of recent closing prices, that is less than Commerzbank shares are currently fetching on the stock market.
UniCredit also holds financial instruments giving it access to a further tranche of Commerzbank shares.
The Milan-based bank is reserving the right to extend the offer, which runs until June 16, to July 3.
Commerzbank has rejected the takeover.
Commerzbank attacks UniCredit
The fact that UniCredit has already gathered so many shares well before the deadline is surprising, given that its offer is below the current Commerzbank share price.
Large investors also typically tender their shares only shortly before a takeover deadline expires.
Commerzbank again criticized UniCredit's approach. "Based on the information available to us, not a single acceptance from an institutional investor has so far been identified, and the total of all acceptances by retail investors corresponds to a shareholding of just around 0.05%," it said.
Commerzbank had recently already brought in the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, commonly known as BaFin.
The bank complained that the tendered shares came predominantly from banks and parties connected to them, some of which were known counterparties of UniCredit for financial instruments - and not independent investors.
UniCredit hits back
UniCredit in turn criticized Commerzbank's defensive strategy. Its management had every right to advise against accepting the takeover offer, UniCredit said, but it was not entitled to "undermine the integrity of the bidding process by making unfounded allegations."
UniCredit said its disclosures were made in accordance with legal requirements and in transparent dialogue with BaFin.
