AER LINGUS LIFT-OFF AS INVESTORS BOOK SHARES - Investors are booking shares in Aer Lingus at such a rate that the sell-off is well on the way to being a major success - even before the formal flotation, reports the Irish Independent. And last night the company cleared the final industrial relations hurdle when workers at Shannon agreed to sign up to the deal. The appetite for shares in the airline, among institutional and private investors, has surprised brokers. Aer Lingus sources last night said they were confident they could sell off even more than the 60% of the airline being offered to the market on the basis of pre-float demand. The Government is retaining 25% of the company while the employees own the remainder. The early indications of interest mean the Government will take in between €190m and €293m from the sell-off. The formal flotation is on October 3 but the key date is next Wednesday when the share price is set.
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MAINPORT BUYS RIVAL - Cork shipping company Mainport has bought a smaller rival in a move that will create a business with revenues of almost €60m, says the Irish Independent. Mainport said yesterday that it has bought Drogheda-based Patrick Monahan, a stevedoring and shipping company, for an undisclosed sum. Monahan's had a turnover of €12m in 2005, while Mainport's sales are likely to hit €45m this year. At those rates, the combined business will have revenues of €57m. Both companies are privately held, family-owned businesses. The Monahan family of Drogheda owns Patrick Monahan while the Ronaynes own Mainport. Its chief executive, David Ronayne, indicated that as both companies are involved in the same activities, the deal created scope for savings. However, there is no likelihood of job losses.
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FARMERS INVEST IN US GOLF COURSE - More than 100 Irish farmers have come together to fund the $200m (€157.8m) development of a championship golf course and the construction of 550 condominiums in Florida, says the Irish Examiner. The pioneering deal was masterminded by Irish off-farm investment consultants Farrelly and Mitchell, managers for Green Oak Holdings LLC, a US-based company, which is lead partner in the development. Farrelly and Mitchell directors, Philip Farrelly and Malachy Mitchell, set up Green Oak Holdings in 2005 raising equity from farmer investors. The investor equity was supplemented with bank debt bringing the total of this actively managed fund to approximately $25m (€19.6m) and growing. The company acquired its first asset, a retail centre worth $5.5m (€4.3m) in December 2005 and development land in a joint venture arrangement in early 2006.
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MARKET GOSSIP GOES HIGH-TECH - Market gossip is to take on a more high-tech form thanks to a new automated system that will trawl through more than 40m internet sources - from blogs to regulatory filings - on behalf of hedge funds, says the Financial Times. Due for an official launch early next year, the platform is being run by a former Deutsche Bank executive and has received financing from, among others, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, the venture capital firm that backed Skype before it was sold to Ebay for $4.1 billion last year. Ten hedge funds are trying out the system. Called Monitor110, the platform acts as an aggregator and a filter for hedge funds trying to keep up with the explosion of information sources on the internet, such as blogs. The blog search engine Technorati currently tracks 50m blogs, with about 175,000 new ones created every day.
