SPANISH construction and services group Ferrovial Servicios has made a cash offer of £0·32 per share for Amey plc. The directors of Amey have unanimously recommended acceptance of the ’fair and reasonable’ offer, and Ferrovial has received irrevocable undertakings to accept the offer in respect of 32·6% of Amey’s shares. It is intended to retain the Amey brand name.
The Amey board believes the offer will enable the exercise of an option to acquire by June 30 a £60m equity interest in London Underground Infraco JNP under the PPP deal, currently being funded by its partners in the Tube Lines consortium. The boards of Amey and Ferrovial Servicios have agreed to co-operate to ensure that this option is exercised.
Amey plc published its preliminary results for 2002 on March 26. Including Amey Rail, turnover at Transport was up from £322·5m in 2001 to £465·7m, with ’adjusted profit’ excluding exceptional items up from £16·1m to £46·05m. Group turnover was up 10% at £867·5m, but exceptional charges of £110·2m resulted in a post-tax loss of £118·5m.
Amongst exceptional items was a write-down of Croydon Tramlink as a current asset to £3·9m, ’being the amount of expected insurance recovery’, and a write-down of Amey’s investment in Tramtrack Croydon from £11·1m to zero. The concession company has been experiencing ’poor trading’, and Amey classified its stake in the venture as a continuing activity ’in the course of being discont-inued’. EBITA from TCL before exceptional items and goodwill amortisation was £200000, up from £100000.
