Shareholders of Alleghany Corporation (NYSE:Y) have approved company’s acquisition by Berkshire
Hathaway (NYSE:BRK.A) for $848.02 per share of common stock in cash.
<b)More than 98% of the votes cast, voted in favor of the merger proposal.
The transaction is expected to close in Q4 2022, subject to regulatory approvals.
The transaction announced in March 2022, represents a total equity value of ~$11.6B and a multiple of 1.26 times Alleghany’s book value as of Dec.31, 2021.
“We are pleased our stockholders have overwhelmingly voted to support this compelling transaction, which delivers significant value to them,” said Joseph P. Brandon, Alleghany’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “Alleghany looks forward to further building on its success as part of Berkshire Hathaway.”
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/alleghany-corporati…
More to the story perhaps. Joe Brandon coming back into the fold. Some have remarked he might be an heir apparent to Ajit Jain. Any thoughts from the more informed?
Bloomstran has owned Y for years and he spoke very highly of Joe and the deal at the Gabelli conference in Omaha. He said he would not be surprised at all if Joe takes over for Ajit in time, but it was just pure speculation and people/ great managers are prioritized by WEB. It seems Chris has had fairly close connections with key figures at Alleghany. I hope Ajit will be there for many more years!
5 Likes
I have owned Y since the early 1990’s. My kind of thing, I just had to own it. Same reason I bought Fairfax, Markel, Tootsie Roll, Brascan (now Brookfield) in the 1980’s…these things interested me.
For what it’s worth, just in case anyone has any connections, I also bought some North Carolina Railroad stock (I also inherited a tiny, tiny, tiny bit). NC RR owned all the land Norfolk Southern uses through the center of NC from Raleigh to Charlotte (plus some other land and RR lanes).
There was one small problem. The land was leased to NSC for 99 years and when the lease came up for renewal about 20 years ago the state of NC (which owned 75% of NC RR) decided to buy out the 25% minority shareholders. NC literally stole it from us…“for the good of NC”. Kinda agreed with that but…
7 Likes
“NC literally stole it from us…“for the good of NC””
chomp,
At least you now enjoy the railroad last laugh thru your ownership piece of BNSF. Maybe 400% gain in 12 years, and growing!
I hope Ajit will be there for many more years!
Speculation on my part… When WEB is no longer running the company, I am expecting WEB, Munger, Jain all gone, and even few of the old hands on the board move on. New management, new board.
Remember Jain is an equal to Greg and when he loses the CEO race, why would he chose to report to Greg? I see no reason for Jain to continue. And BTW, if he wants to run an insurance company, probably he would get many offers with much better compensation or for that matter he would have so many employment offers, there is no upside for him in continuing with Berkshire.
2 Likes
Jain has publicly stated that he will not leave Berkshire to join any other firm.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9tUU6bi7D8
See 5:20 onwards.
1 Like