Lexpert Magazine

36 LEXPERT MAGAZINE | MARCH/APRIL 2018 tegic acquisition of a bank outside Canada was praised on the Street as a smart move. While the deal had the support of both boards, it took a little bit of convincing for PrivateBancorp Inc. investors to approve. CIBC had to sweeten the pot twice from its original US$3.8-billion offer in order to win shareholder support. e Bank ex- pects the deal to be immediately accretive to earnings. INDUSTRIAL DEAL OF THE YEAR Toromont Industries Ltd. buys Hewitt Group Canada's Toromont Industries Ltd., a dealer in Caterpillar heavy equipment, reached a deal to buy a key rival, privately held Hewitt Group, for US$817-million in cash and stock in a bid to not only ride a mining-sector recovery, but also benefit from the massive pool of planned public infrastructure spending. It is the largest acquisition in Concord, Ont.-based Toro- mont's 56-year history. e purchase adds 2,100 employees to its existing 3,600 — and gives the com- pany another 45 dealerships in Québec, the Maritimes, Labrador West and Ontario to add to its existing 100 locations, creating one the largest sales territories in the Cater- pillar dealer network. It will now have deal- erships in Canada's seven eastern provinces and the northern territory of Nunavut. ings for the quarter ended Sept. 30 were released in November 2017, the combined company reported a third-quarter profit of $765 million, compared with a loss of $103 million for the same quarter a year earlier. FINANCIAL DEAL OF THE YEAR CIBC buys PrivateBancorp Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce gained an important foothold in the Unit- ed States with the US$5.89-billion cash- and-share deal to acquire Chicago-based PrivateBancorp Inc., a US commercial bank with 34 offices in 12 states. e trans- action allows CIBC to offer an integrated Canada-US banking platform, in a bid to retain clients who had been drawn to rival US banks. PrivateBancorp has about $20 billion in assets, and serves mainly mid-market companies, business owners and wealthy families. It comes with strong wealth-man- agement capabilities for high-net-worth cli- ents, has delivered consistent loan growth and has an experienced management team that has agreed to stay on, CIBC said. CIBC and other major banks are ex- posed to Canada's overheated housing markets. With concerns mounting over home prices in Toronto and Vancouver, re- balancing its earnings mix though the stra- Scott Medhurst, Toromont's Chief Ex- ecutive Officer, said the purchase "will allow us to better capitalize on organic growth opportunities given the recovery of the mining sector that we are currently experiencing and the promise of significant infrastructure investment." For the year ended Dec. 28, 2016, Point Claire, Québec-based Hewitt gen- erated revenue of more than $1 billion, operating profit of $66.4 million and net earnings of $46.6 million. Toromont said the acquisition is expected to add to net earnings this year. INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY DEAL OF THE YEAR TMX Group buys Trayport Holdings Canada has long been known for its Energy expertise, and so TMX Group Ltd., owner of the Toronto Stock Exchange and TSX Venture Exchange, clearly saw potential synergies when it seized the opportunity to buy Trayport, a London-based energy trad- ing soware firm, from Intercontinental Exchange Inc., or ICE, for $931 million. TMX said it did the deal in the hope of accelerating its global expansion, to increase the portion of its revenue from recurring sources, and enhance the port- folio of analytics products in its Market Insights business, which provides finan- cial content, tools and applications, and capital-markets analytics. Trayport provides services to energy commodities traders, exchanges, whole- sale brokers and central clearing coun- terparties. It has offices in London, New York and Singapore, and employs almost 250 people. As part of the deal for Trayport, TMX agreed to sell ICE its Natural Gas Ex- change Inc. and Shorcan Energy Brokers Inc., paying the remaining $592 million PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK | CANADIAN DEALMAKERS AWARDS |

• Cover
• front
• big