Free ride

24 February 2003

The next step for the family could be to fold the debtladen bid vehicle into the Italian motorway group. That way the Benettons could end up with more than double their original stake without spending an extra Euro.

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The Benetton family successfully closed its takeover of Autostrade Italiane, the former Italian roadways monopoly, late on Friday. The family's bid vehicle, Newco28, received 54% of the motorway operator's shares. At an offer price of E10 a share, that's a total expenditure of E6.5bn. This is entirely financed by debt. The Benettons already hold 30%

of Autostrade through another company, Schemaventotto.

The Benetton family are expected to merge Newco28 into Autostrade. The timing of the merger is not yet known. The motorway group currently has an equity value of E11.8bn and debt at yearend 2002 expected to be E1.1bn, according to UBS Warburg.

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