KKR Should Boost Spain Pizza Chain Offer, Shareholder Argues

(Bloomberg) -- KKR & Co. should raise its takeover offer for Spanish pizza delivery company Telepizza Group SA, a bid that currently undervalues the company by at least 17 percent, according to Perpetual Ltd.

The U.S. private equity firm is offering 6 euros-a-share, valuing Telepizza at 432 million euro ($497.5 million), but the business should be worth between 7 euros and 10 euros per share, according to a letter from Perpetual’s Garry Laurence seen by Bloomberg News. He holds 3.04 million shares and has support from three other shareholders who each own stakes equating to about 3 percent of the company, he said.

“KKR is opportunistically bidding a low price to take advantage of market skittishness,” said Laurence, who runs a global equities fund for Perpetual in Sydney.

Laurence said he will send the letter, which details why KKR’s offer does not meet the fair and reasonable test required by Spanish regulators to approve it, to both Telepizza and KKR on Friday.

To contact the reporter on this story: Adam Haigh in Sydney at ahaigh1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Christopher Anstey at canstey@bloomberg.net, Teo Chian Wei, Ravil Shirodkar

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