Reuters: Financial Services and Real Estate: Asia Private Equity Weekly News, April 2, 2012

Reuters: Financial Services and Real Estate Reuters.com is your source for breaking news, business, financial and investing news, including personal finance and stocks. Reuters is the leading global provider of news, financial information and technology solutions to the world's media, financial institutions, businesses and individuals. // via fulltextrssfeed.com

Asia Private Equity Weekly News, April 2, 2012 Apr 2nd 2012, 00:43 HONG KONG, March 26 | Sun Apr 1, 2012 8:43pm EDT HONG KONG, March 26 (Reuters) - News and developments in Asia private equity from Reuters News for the week ending March 30. MARCH 30 PRIVATE EQUITY-backed Chinese sportswear brand Li Ning Co Ltd, which reported a two-thirds drop in 2011 net profit due to intense competition, expects savings in staff and operating costs to help boost gross profit margins this year, company executives said. BRITISH ACTIVIST investor Laxey Partners called on private equity firm 3i Group to accelerate the return of cash from investment sales to shareholders and freeze all new investments until its poor share price performance improves. JAPANESE BREWER Asahi is working to finalise the purchase of eastern European brewer StarBev from private equity owner CVC Capital Partners in a deal likely to be worth around $3 billion, people familiar with the matter said. PRIVATE EQUITY firm Shaw Kwei & Partners has completed its second Singapore buyout this year, acquiring PVC tape maker CHT Holdings for $49 million and delisting it from the Singapore Stock Exchange. In February, Shaw Kwei acquired another Singapore listed company, electronics firm Beyonics Technology Limited, for $110 million. MARCH 29 U.S. BUYOUT firm Cerberus Capital Management has sold the Japanese operations of an employment agency to private equity firm CVC Capital Partners for an undisclosed amount, after spending around two years trying to shift the unit. DISTRESSED INVESTMENT funds Oaktree Capital and Marathon are set to become the majority shareholders in health club operator Fitness First by swapping their debt for an equity stake in a restructuring of the company's debts of about 600 million pounds, bankers familiar with the matter said. MARCH 28 SAMSONITE INTERNATIONAL SA, the world's biggest luggage maker, expects its Asian sales to grow 20 percent this year, outpacing growth in Europe and the U.S., due to strong travel from China and other emerging countries. BLACKSTONE GROUP LP said it has raised a $4 billion second mezzanine fund - one of the world's largest mezzanine funds and the biggest to be raised since the 2008 financial crisis. MARCH 27 EXCLUSIVE-TEMASEK Holdings, the smaller but more visible of Singapore's two sovereign funds, is moving into a new phase with its investment strategy, and could look more like Blackstone, another $160 billion institution, which has grown from a focused private equity firm to a global asset manager. DEALTALK-JAPAN'S private equity firms, in search of new cash for investments, are gearing up to sell a chunk of their domestic assets this year to a willing group of buyers - the nation's cash-rich corporates. INDIA'S L&T Finance Holdings has acquired Fidelity Worldwide Investment's India mutual fund business to boost growth in the country's expanding but highly competitive asset management business. A SONY-led group has offered concessions to EU regulators in a bid to gain approval for its proposed acquisition of record label EMI's music publishing business, the European Commission said on Tuesday. SHAREHOLDERS IN motor racing group Formula One are raising $1 billion from a loan refinancing which will be paid into a holding company for future dividend payments and acquisitions, Thomson Reuters LPC reported, citing a source. NETJETS INC, a private jet-sharing company owned by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc, named Hony Capital and an investment company owned by the brothers who control Li & Fung Ltd as its joint venture partners in China, as it aims to tap soaring growth in the country's aviation market. RIO TINTO, the world's third-largest miner, effectively invited bids for its diamonds business, on its books at $1.2 billion, and joined rival BHP Billiton in backing away from a business that has lost its sparkle. MARCH 26 PERMIRA IS preparing a sale of Iglo, the maker of Birds Eye fish fingers, after approaches from rival buyout firms that could result in a 3 billion euro ($4 billion) deal, people familiar with the situation said. CHINA-BASED telecom software maker AsiaInfo-Linkage Inc , evaluating an offer from a CITIC Capital unit to take it private, said it will solicit similar proposals from others. ALVAREZ & MARSAL said it has hired James Dubow as a managing director and co-head of Asia alongside Oliver Stratton. Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

You are receiving this email because you subscribed to this feed at blogtrottr.com. If you no longer wish to receive these emails, you can unsubscribe from this feed, or manage all your subscriptions