Hargreaves Lansdown reveals vote date and lenders for takeover deal

The private equity consortium set to take over Hargreaves Lansdown has added a host of lenders to the group financing the £5.4bn takeover deal.

This morning, buyout giant CVC, alongside Nordic Capital and Platinum Ivy, a subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, said that it had added four new lenders to fund the cash offer for the investment platform.

The lenders are Korea Investment, KDB Asia, Sona Asset Management, and Canadian pension giant The Public Sector Pension Board.

Last week, the private equity consortium also said it had added Oaktree Capital Management, Pinestreet Asset Management, Albacore Capital, LGT Capital Partners, Stepstones Group, the Novo Nordisk Foundation, HSBC, and Japanese banks Mizuho and MUFG to the list of lenders.

The deal, which was approved by the Hargreaves Lansdown board on 9 August, will shift the UK’s biggest retail investment platform, with a 40 per cent share of the market, into private hands. The deal marks yet another takeover of a London listed company after a flurry of exits from the London Stock Exchange this year.

It had previously rejected three bids for a takeover from the group.

The original lenders for the deal, announced before the takeover was approved by the board were HPS Investment Partners, KKR Credit Advisors, Apollo Global Management and Blackstone Credit.

Yesterday, Hargreaves Lansdown also announced the date that shareholders will be voting on the deal to approve the takeover.

In a stock exchange announcement, the platform’s board said that shareholders will be asked to vote through the deal on 14 October.

In addition, the group will push back the company’s annual general meeting, which had previously been scheduled for 22 October, to December.

Hargreaves Lansdown’s board noted that a 30 pence per share dividend is also due to be paid to shareholders on 1 November, based on the group’s full-year dividend for the year ended 30 June.