Topic: Growth Stocks

Stock Pickers Digest Hotline – Friday, May 25, 2012

Article Excerpt

ALIMENTATION COUCHE-TARD INC., $40.67, symbol ATD.B on Toronto, recently agreed to buy Norway’s Statoil Fuel & Retail ASA for $2.8 billion U.S. That’s equal to 39% of Couche-Tard’s $7.3-billion market cap. Statoil Fuel has over 1,700 gas stations in Scandinavia and over 550 in Central and Eastern Europe. The company accounts for over 30% of convenience store sales in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Latvia and Estonia, and is among the top five in both Lithuania and Poland. Norway’s largest North Sea oil producer, government-controlled Statoil ASA, owns 54% of publicly traded Statoil Fuel. Couche-Tard wants to acquire at least 90% of Statoil Fuel’s shares. That would let it compel the remaining investors to tender their stock. However, only 67% of the shares have been tendered so far, including Statoil SA’s 54% stake, so Couche-Tard has extended its offer to May 29, 2012. Couche-Tard may raise its offering price to entice more shareholders to tender. But even if it has to settle for less than 90%,…