At the time of writing, it is impossible to know for certain whether a number of large merger and acquisition deals will have been completed, or at least moved towards an inevitable end.
The most likely change to occur by next week is movement on the local asset purchase of Axa Asia Pacific Holdings (Axa AP) by National Australia Bank (NAB).
There is a chance the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) may choose to forgo its planned 18 March announcement date and instead hand down its decision this month on whether to give NAB clearance regarding its proposed acquisition of the local business units of Axa AP.
On 19 January, the ACCC commenced an informal review of NAB’s proposal as NAB and Axa AP overlap in the areas of life insurance, superannuation products, wealth management and financial planning and advisory services. As part of the review, the ACCC called for industry consultation.
Another deal in the works is the sale or partial sale of dealer group Professional Investment Services (PIS).
While the chiefs within PIS are yet to go on the record regarding whether the business is officially on the market, despite no official offers exchanging hands, many believe NAB is close to stitching up a deal with the dealer group.
At this stage, both parties remain coy, with neither NAB nor PIS showing their hand by making a public announcement.
However, internal murmurs within NAB claim the deal is all but complete, with a number of large PIS member firms signing on the dotted line with the bank.
Listed financial services firm Count Financial also surprised the market last week by purchasing a 5 per cent stake in Melbourne-based dealer group DKN Financial Group.
The surprising part of the move is that Count was once at odds with DKN over the purchase of dealer Lonsdale Financial Planning Group from Zurich Financial Services. DKN was the eventual victor.
Count’s stake in DKN is not believed to be an early takeover push by the accounting group, though with Count set to welcome a new chief executive in a number of weeks, it would perhaps be fair to say ‘watch this space’.
At this stage there has been little word from advisers regarding the prospect of these mergers, outside of Count Financial and DKN, and what, if any, concerns advisers may have.
This comment is by no means meant to offend. Consider it more a question of what do you get out of these proposed deals?
