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Wren House Weighs Buying Rest of Spanish Energy Firm

Wren House Weighs Buying Rest of Spanish Energy Firm

(Bloomberg) -- U.K. investment firm Wren House Infrastructure Management is considering buying the remaining 70 percent of Spain’s Global Power Generation SA that it doesn’t already own, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The potential deal could be valued at more than $1 billion, the people said, declining to be identified as the deliberations are confidential. London-based Wren House had acquired a 25 percent stake in the unit of Naturgy Energy Group SA, Spain’s biggest natural gas utility, in 2015.

Wren House may yet decide against pursuing the transaction, the people said. Representatives for the investment firm declined to comment.

“Naturgy has no interest in selling GPG and is not holding any talks with anybody over this asset,” a spokesman for the Spanish firm said Wednesday.

Naturgy, formerly known as Gas Natural SDG, has said it plans to sell 300 million euros ($350 million) of assets -- on top of the 2.7 billion euros in divestments completed in the first half of 2018 -- as the utility pulls out of most countries where it operates and focuses on boosting returns.

Meanwhile, Wren House, a division of Kuwait Investment Authority, has built up a portfolio of investments in airports, ports, water and energy generation businesses since it was founded in 2013. Its holdings include stakes in Associated British Ports, Thames Water Utilities and London City Airport, according to its website. In June, Wren House and Macquarie Group Ltd. agreed to sell parts of Viesgo, another Spanish energy company, for about 750 million euros to Repsol SA.

--With assistance from Rodrigo Orihuela.

To contact the reporters on this story: Dinesh Nair in London at dnair5@bloomberg.net;Manuel Baigorri in Hong Kong at mbaigorri@bloomberg.net;Ruth David in London at rdavid9@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Dinesh Nair at dnair5@bloomberg.net, Chitra Somayaji, Amy Thomson

©2018 Bloomberg L.P.