Topic: How To Invest

Spinoffs, Takeovers & Special Situations Hotline – Friday, February 16, 2018

Article Excerpt

SUPERVALU INC., $15.01, symbol SVU on New York, is a Minneapolis-based wholesale food distributor and grocery-store retailer with annual revenues of $16 billion. Blackwells Capital, a New York-based special situations investment manager, owns 4.3% of the company. It’s pressing SuperValu to give it three board seats and split its business into two pieces. Blackwells cites what it calls “the lackadaisical, misguided and value-destructive complacency of the company’s leadership.” Currently, SuperValu has 213 grocery stores operating in seven states under five banners—Cub Foods, Farm Fresh, Hornbacher’s, Shop ‘N Save and Shoppers. Its wholesale food distribution business serves over 3,000 independent grocery stores. In late 2016, SuperValu sold its Save-A-Lot discount grocer to Canadian private equity firm Onex Corporation (symbol ONEX on Toronto) for $1.4 billion. As an activist investor, Blackwells believes that SuperValu should now sell its more-profitable wholesale business and much of its valuable real estate. The company has so far resisted pressure from Blackwells; in early February, SuperValu issued a statement to investors highlighting…