An-bang, thank you ma'am

The big news is, that the consortium led by Anbang (the Chinese insurance group) has pulled out of the race to acquire Starwood. They left as quickly as they entered, and it is now all up to Marriott to clean up what remains, and complete the deal, once the shareholders vote in the next few days. Here's more...

If you've been following the story of Starwood's acquisition by Marriott, you'll know that in November last year, Marriott made an offer to acquire Starwood in a mostly-stock deal that valued Starwood at US$12.2 billion. 

Things looked pretty set for a while (except for SPG loyalists), until the middle of March this year, when a rather-little-known Chinese insurance company called Anbang made a counter bid (via a consortium that it led) for Starwood, in an all-cash deal, for $13.2 billion, significantly topping Marriott's original offer.

Marriott then responded within a week, with a counter-offer of $13.6 billion.

Each of the counter offers so far represented a superior deal, and therefore Starwood was expected to go with the highest bidder.

Which is when - and this is just 5 days ago - Anbang once again outbid Marriott with an offer of $14 billion. 

Ride my see saw! 

And then, just as we wondered if Marriott would outbid Anbang and/or engage in a last-minute price-war, before Starwood's shareholders vote on the deal on 8 April 2016, we learnt early this morning (India time) that Anbang has pulled out of the race, according to this Forbes report. That was a cameo that didn't last very long, and wasn't successful either! What a shame!!!

It's a good thing Marriott didn't further up the ante by making a higher bid!

So unless someone else makes an offer in the next week or less, chances are it is going to be Marriott tying the knot with Starwood. Which is what I'd predicted, though for a very different set of reasons!