Done deal? Take­da reach­es a ‘break­through’ in Shire merg­er talks as deal an­nounce­ment looms — Reuters

The lat­est word from the front­line on the Take­da/Shire merg­er is from Reuters, which re­ports that the two sides have reached a break­through in their talks. They are now plan­ning to an­nounce a pre­lim­i­nary deal on Wednes­day, with an ex­ten­sion on the deal talks past the 5 pm dead­line re­quired by UK M&A rules.

The sto­ry fol­lows Shire’s ac­knowl­edg­ment to­day that the com­pa­ny re­ceived their 5th of­fer from Take­da, fol­low­ing up on the last pub­lic of­fer of £47 per share of­fer that came ear­li­er with £21 in cash and £26 in shares to­tal­ing around $62 bil­lion. Take­da has re­port­ed­ly been adding more cash to the deal to make it more at­trac­tive to Shire in­vestors, who have been in­creas­ing­ly vexed by the com­pa­ny’s in­creas­ing weak­ness in the face of se­vere com­pet­i­tive pres­sures and the com­pa­ny’s debt load.

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