Instructed Thames Water Two days ago it received £5bn from Covals Capital, which had been issued by France’s Suez Group, to manage the restructuring of the world’s largest water company.
Infrastructure investor Covals Capital has won the tender for Thames Water, which has been on the verge of collapse for several months. struggling with a £19bn debt pileaccording to financial times.
Covals plans to provide £1bn of upfront funding and raise a further £4bn from the sale of competing water companies’ assets.
The sale could reportedly include divesting parts of the company, such as operations in the Thames Valley, and then a subsequent flotation of trading shares of the restated business.
Under the plans, the UK government would retain a seat on the board and a “golden shareholder”, which would give them certain rights to protect the provider’s water and sewage services to 16 million customers across London and the Thames Valley.
Thames Water, which was struck by shareholders earlier this year pulling the plug on £500m of fundingIt needs £3.25bn to run and such as infrastructure improvements by the end of the decade.
of Suez, who contracted the good waters to run in . France and employing five thousand people in the UK, would act as an operating partner and not own portions of the Thames water.
“At this stage, the scope of Suez’s work is limited” [an] an advisory mission to ensure the success of the project and to address the specific challenges faced by Thames Water“Suez,” he said, confirmed that it had provided an “exclusive deal” with a non-binding offer to advise and assist Thames Water.
Other potential suitors include Hong Kong-based company CK Infrastructure Holdings, which already owns Northumbrian Water, and Castle Water, which is co-owned by Conservative Party treasurer Graham Edwards.
The final bids are due in January after the regulator for England and Wales, Ofwat, decides how much water companies will be allowed to raise their bills. Water supplies are lobbying for higher returns to shareholders and regulators from his message on the 19th of December.
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Thames Water has called for a 53% increase in bills by 2030. But Covals believes his price will do with a less generous deal from Ofwat.
Coval’s mandate for Thames Water is based on access to a £3bn emergency loan that will provide the company with immediate liquidity and prevent it from running out of cash in the new year.
Existing in Thames Water, which included the funds Omers and USS, as well as Chinese and Abu Dhabi, the highest wealth funds, said that they believe the business is “uninvestable”.