It’s only central Europe

At the end of July, the financial news services reported a rumour that the field of potential bidders for AB-InBev’s central European breweries had narrowed in the weeks running up to the submission deadline set by AB-InBev. Apparently, potential buyers like Cinven, Warburg Pincus and KKR had all dropped out of the proceedings.

This is strange. Could it be that AB-InBev’s terms of sale for their central European assets have proven so unpopular? Or have the private equity companies secretly clubbed together and done a gentleman’s agreement to the effect that only one of them would submit a bid in order to find out how desperate AB-InBev really are to get rid of some of their assets?

Looks like AB-InBev may have to re-tender their central European breweries.