Last word

Goldman Sachs Asset Management and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board have co-led the secondary purchase of a US$925m stake in the JPMorgan Partners Global Fund from JPMorgan Chase. The deal with Goldman Sachs and CPP, in which Paul Capital Partners also participated, is described as a synthetic secondary as it allows the investor group to partner with a private equity management team to actively manage a portfolio of buyout and growth equity investments.

The move comes as JPMorgan Chase spins off its large buyouts arm, JPMorgan Partners, into an independent entity to reduce its potential for conflicts of interest to form in advising on deals as well as buying them. JPMorgan had been criticized by private equity firms for buying UK-listed drugs company Warner Chilcott last year as well as advising on the competitive auction.

• Electrolux Group is preparing to de-merge and list or sell its Sweden-based outdoor power equipment company Husqvarna, which is the world’s largest maker of chainsaws. The company has just arranged a SKr11bn (US$1.44bn) credit facility to repay inter-company loans and is a sign the spin-off is near. The annual general meeting on April 24 will distribute shares in Husqvarna on a one-for-one basis to Electrolux shareholders. Husqvarna is the new name for the Electrolux Outdoor Products operation, which recently appointed Lars Westerberg as its chairman and has Investor executive president Börje Ekholm on its board. Electrolux said it would be spun off in Ferbuary 2005 and it has operating income of SKr3bn on annual sales of SKr27bn.
• Yell and a private equity consortium made up of Apax and Cinven will be the two finalists in the bid for Telefonica’s 59.9% stake in €3bn ‘yellow pages’ unit Telefonica Publicidad e Informacion (TPI), according to a report in Spain’s El Pais newspaper, citing unnamed sources close to the process. The report said final offers will be submitted by April 21, but said Telefonica could still declare the auction process void if final bids are too low.