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General Electric's decision to sell most of its financial assets marks the most prominent victory in regulators' quest to incentivize breakups of large conglomerates. But it may turn out to be a one-off event.
April 10 -
The middle-market lending community is watching closely General Electric's announced plan to sell GE Capital, the largest lender in the space and the winner of Mergers & Acquisitions' 2014 M&A Mid-Market Award for Lender of the Year.
April 22
General Electric's deals to sell the bulk of its vehicle fleet-management business push the company near a goal of unloading at least $20 billion of finance assets before the quarter ends.
Canada's Element Financial will acquire GE Capital's fleet assets in the U.S., Mexico, Australia and New Zealand for $6.9 billion. GE also said Monday that it signed a provisional accord with Arval, a subsidiary of BNP Paribas, to sell the European portions of the leasing operations.
The agreements represent about $8.6 billion in assets, excluding cash and some liabilities, and come less than a month after GE sold its $11 billion U.S. private-equity lending business to Canada Pension Plan Investment Board. GE executives said last month they expect to announce $20 billion to $30 billion of asset sales before the end of June.
GE Capital has said its top sale priorities are unloading units that finance health-care businesses and foreign buyouts. The company has received bids for the health-care division from Capital One Financial, Apollo Global Management, Ares Management and Ventas, people familiar with the matter said last week.
GE plans to shed about $200 billion of lending assets to refocus on industrial operations after GE Capital's struggles during the 2008 financial crisis imperiled the parent company. Fairfield, Conn.-based GE will retain divisions that support manufacturing including aircraft leasing, a boost for jet-engine production while unloading the fleet unit and similar businesses.
GE Capital has announced about $63 billion in sales to date. The company remains "on track" to sell about $100 billion of assets by the end of the year and be mostly done in 2016, Sherin said.
The U.S. and Mexico portion of the deal is expected to close in the third quarter, and the Australia and New Zealand part in the fourth quarter, GE said.
