London Stock Exchange Group PLC's board is expected to meet in the coming days to decide on Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing Ltd.'s unsolicited offer to merge the two companies, Reuters reported, citing a source close to the British bourse.
LSE shareholders are understood to be leaning towards rejecting HKEX's £31.6 billion offer, as they prefer the company to focus on executing its own proposed acquisition of financial data analytics platform Refinitiv, according to the source. One of the conditions of the HKEX offer is that LSE drops the Refinitiv deal.
A source close to the Hong Kong bourse told Reuters that it is common for such offers to be rejected initially and that the company is already evaluating its next steps. Informal discussions between the two firms have begun, the same source added.
HKEX on Sept. 11 disclosed the offer to acquire LSE, valuing the British bourse's entire issued and to-be-issued ordinary share capital at roughly £29.6 billion. However, the deal has already been subject to political and regulatory scrutiny. A merger would create the world's largest exchange group by total revenues.
Giulio Centemero, a member of Italy's League party, called on the Italian government to consider using special powers to protect the country's bourse in the event the deal pushes through. LSE owns the Italian stock exchange and the deal would see a Chinese company acquire the primary equity markets of both the U.K. and Italy.
