Major shareholder comes out in support of board in takeover battle

One of the biggest investors in Manchester retailer Findel Group has backed the board’s efforts to fight off an acquisition bid by Mike Ashley.

Schroders, which owns more than 18% of the firm, believes that Sports Direct’s £130m offer seriously under values the business.

Findel has labelled Sports Direct’s takeover offer as “opportunistic” and urged all shareholders to “take no action and reject the offer”.

Last month Sports Direct made a mandatory offer of 161p per share, which was triggered after the Mike Ashley-owned retail company raised its stake in Findel through the purchase of six million extra shares.

Mike Ashley has been in acquisition mode in recent weeks and has been engaged in a tug of war with board of Debenhams for ownership of the firm.

The board at Findel announced Schroders backing on the Stock Market.

The company said it had received a letter of support from its second largest shareholder, Schroders Investment Management.

Schroders is the discretionary investment manager of, with power to dispose of and direct the exercise of voting rights attached to, 16,297,490 ordinary shares representing approximately 18.85 per cent of the issued share capital of Findel.

In its letter, Schroders has confirmed that “it remains supportive of Findel and its management team and the operational and financial progress that the group has made under the leadership of Phil Maudsley and Stuart Caldwell”.

Schroders said that having carefully considered the merits of the offer and the arguments it has decided the offer significantly undervalues the future prospects of Findel and its current intention is not to accept the offer on the terms proposed.

Ian Burke, chairman of Findel, said: “We are grateful for the support of our second largest shareholder in Schroders, and continue to recommend strongly that all other shareholders take no action in respect of the offer from Sports Direct.”