Yesterday, Iberdrola completed the acquisition of the 18.4% of the capital it did not yet have in its US subsidiary Avangrid for 2,348 million euros, which means a price per share of 32.91 euros. This offer increases the price by 4.38% compared to the offer that the company chaired by Ignacio Galán launched in March, although it is below the value at which Avangrid was trading on the market yesterday at 34.5 euros.
The offer had the unanimous favorable vote of the members of the boards of directors of both Avangrid and Iberdrola. The objective of this transaction “is to increase exposure to the networks business in the United States at a key moment for Iberdrola, which wants to grow in markets with high credit ratings and in regulated businesses such as networks” he assured yesterday evening the company in a statement.
Avangrid, of which Iberdrola already owns 80.6% of the capital, is a company whose volume of assets, mainly in electrical networks, amounts to 40,391 million euros and is present in 24 states of the United States.
Through its grid business, it owns and operates eight electric and natural gas utilities, serving more than 3.3 million customers in New York and New England.
In the renewable energy business, Avangrid owns and operates a portfolio of renewable energy generation facilities throughout the US. In 2023 it obtained an adjusted gross operating profit (ebitda) of 2,230 million euros and exceeded the 2,061 million of the previous year.
The acquisition of Avangrid was the first corporate move announced by Iberdrola after the sale, in February, of its non-renewable business in Mexico for around 5.7 billion euros and after being forced to abandon the merger with PNM Resources , which intended to become one of the country’s major energy companies.
The communication of this operation was made at the end of the day, when the company had held its shareholders’ meeting that the company held yesterday at its headquarters in Bilbao. At this meeting, its president, Ignacio Sánchez Galán, spared no effort to praise the company’s current leadership position and its good prospects for the future.
“The wind is blowing in our favor. We are in the best situation to advance in a virtuous circle of growth”, he assured after recalling that the company he chairs “is worth more than all the Spanish energy companies put together”. Galán had special words of thanks for Sheikh Abdullah bin, executive director of the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) investment fund, “without whose support we could hardly do what we are doing”, he acknowledged.
