Brazil Marfrig to buy last big Argentine meatpacker
One of Brazil's leading meatpackers, Marfrig (MRFG3.SA), said on Monday it had signed an initial agreement to acquire a 70 percent stake in Quickfood (QUI.BA), the last of Argentina's large local meat processors.
Marfrig said in a statement that it would also acquire the Uruguayan subsidiary of Quickfood, Estabelecimentos Colonia, as well as two independent Argentine meatpackers, Best Beef in Vivorata and Estancia del Sur in Cordoba, through its own Argentine subsidiary Argentine Breeders and Packers (AB&P).
"The total value of the agreement for the eventual acquisitions is $266.8 million, to be adjusted according to the results of the audits," Marfrig said in the statement.
Quickfood's plants have a slaughter capacity of 1,400 head a day, and its Uruguayan subsidiary Colonia has a 1,200-head slaughter capacity.
With the weakness of the peso ARSP=, Argentine ranching and farming assets have made attractive targets for foreign takeovers, analysts said. And Brazil's real BRBY has strengthened against the dollar in the past two years.
This is not the first Brazilian meatpacker to seek an international footprint in the world beef market through acquisition. With the takeover of U.S. beef and pork company Swift & Co. announced in May, Brazil's JBS-Friboi (JBSS3.SA) became the world's largest meat processor.
All of Argentina's biggest meatpackers will now be owned by foreign companies once the Marfrig-Quickfood deal goes through. Marfrig had already acquired AB&P.
Through the Swift takeover last year, Argentina's biggest meatpacker, Swift Armour, passed into hands of JBS-Friboi. And Finexcor, one of the biggest beef exporters in Argentina, is owned by global commodities company Cargill.
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