Activist investor urges Big Yellow to consider sale

Summarised from 2 outlets · Updated 14 Oct, 11:34 · Archive

US activist investor Ancora Alternatives, which owns four per cent of Big Yellow, has urged the FTSE 250 self-storage firm to consider a sale or take-private deal. Big Yellow's share price jumped more than five per cent to 844p following the announcement. Ancora argues that Big Yellow, the UK's largest self-storage provider, operates 113 sites across the UK and is trading at a 39 per cent discount to the value of its assets, despite having a "highly resilient business model". The investor called this "trapped value" and said a sale would be the best risk-adjusted outcome for shareholders.

Ancora argued that potential buyers would value Big Yellow's premium London-based property portfolio highly, as it offers rarer access to high-value London properties than US rivals and would come at a cheaper price. Big Yellow held sales talks with Blackstone last year but terminated discussions after the asset manager submitted an offer. Any potential deal would come amid a wave of takeovers of UK property firms by private equity buyers, including Blackstone's £489m acquisition of Warehouse REIT in September last year and Prologis's £14bn takeover of Segro announced in August this year.

How it is being reported

• Activist investor urges storage firm Big Yellow to put itself up for saleShares in storage firm Big Yellow bounced on Wednesday after an activist investor urged the company to put itself up for sale. The FTSE 250 self-storage provider jumped more than five per cent to 844p after Ancora Alternatives, which owns four per cent of the group, told it to consider a take-private deal. The Ohio-based [...]City AM · 14 Oct, 11:19
• Self-storage firm Big Yellow should consider a sale, says activist investorBig Yellow Group should review its operations and consider putting itself up for sale, a US activist investor has declared.This is Money · 14 Oct, 09:47

In this story: Big Yellow · Ancora Alternatives · Blackstone · London · UK

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