Iceland's Stodir makes bid for Keops

Icelandic property company Stodir plans to acquire all the shares in the listed Danish property company, Keops. Providing it is approved by the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority, the offer, valued at DKK 24 (around EUR 3.2) per Keops share, will be presented to all Keops shareholders within the next four weeks. Existing shareholders in Keops will be given the choice of receiving cash payment or exchanging their Keops shares for shares in Stodir.

Keops is the largest real estate company in Denmark, with a market capitalisation of EUR 558 mln.

Reacting to Stodir's announcement of the proposed bid, Keops' supervisory board noted that there had been no previous dialogue between them and the Icelandic company, and said that they would not be announcing their recommendation until the offer had been officially published. They added that two of their major shareholders - Icelandic investment companies who have together held more than 60% of Keops shares since May this year - had indicated that they would accept the bid. They noted, however, that Stodir had stated that their offer would be conditional on them being able to acquire at least 90% of the shares and votes in Keops.

The day before the Stodir announcement, Keops had themselves announced the sale of 20 properties from its Nordic Light office portfolio on Thursday to a company in the Norwegian Otium Gruppen group for NOK 660 mln (approximately EUR 83 mln).