Wood Group inches closer to a potential buyout, extends PUSU deadline

(Sharecast News) - Engineering and consulting firm Wood Group said on Monday that it has inched closer to a potential buyout after securing commercial alignment with bidder Sidara and its lenders on refinancing terms. Back in April, Sidara made a 35.0p per-share cash offer for Wood. Now, it said its board was working through the fine print, including a refreshed debt package that could extend maturities to 2028 and introduce new bonding facilities.

However, the refinancing hinges on Sidara making a firm offer for Wood Group, as well as shareholder approval and delivery of the first $250.0m liquidity tranche.

While most lenders were said to be on board with Sidara's offer, not all have signed on the dotted line as of yet. As a result, Wood said it may deploy a Scottish scheme of arrangement to make it all stick, which must be approved by a majority in number and 75% by value of committed lenders present and voting at the creditor meetings.

Wood Group also noted that a fallback plan was in place, in case of a shorter tenor extension, buying it time to explore alternative funding paths. Sidara now has until 25 August to put up or shut up.

As of 0825 BST, Wood shares remained suspended at 18.44p.





Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com