value and opportunity

TNT Express is the express parcel service spun off from PostNL in 2011. I have looked at the stock a couple of times as a spin off situation.

In February 2012, UPS announced it’s bid to buy TNT Express. In march they increased the bid to finally 9.50 EUR.

In the meantime it looks like that there is a lot of unexpected resistence from the European monopoly regulator.

The share now trades below 7 EUR, interestingly this is only a little higher than the “undisturbed” price in January/February which was between 6.10 -6.50 EUR. Since then, for instance Deutsche Post for gained some 15% from February, Österreichische Post even some 20%:

Since February, the correlation to the overall market is very very low, almost close to zero.

So basically, the market now does not believe at all in the takeover, as TNT Express is trading very close (or even below) to its “undisturbed” price. In the meantime they made some progress with regard to the merger, among others they sold their Airline which was one of the preconditions to get the deal approved.

All in all I am somehow “tempted” by this. It is a Spin-off situation which in itself is interesting. Additionally, the “option” that the UPS deal closes is only partially priced in. If the deal falls through, I think similar to Rhoen, there might be other groups interested in the business.

The risk is of course that some (very slow) hedge funds might sell if the deal finally falls thorugh but I assume that the 2.55 EUR difference to the bid price implies that most of the “Clever” merger arbitrage players are already out.

As a first summary, I will watch this and maybe start a 1% position in the next few days for my “special situation” bucket.