Los Cosmen y Asterion unen 2.700 millones para Mobico

The future structure of Alsa's owner group envisions a financing of €2.700 million for Mobico, with €900 million contributed by investors and €1.600 million in debt. Multiple derivatives of the acquisition public offering (apo) by the Cosmen family and Asterion fund on the 100% of Mobico include debt financing, for which the buyers have contracted Santander, CaixaBank, and Japanese MUGF.

Although details will only be finalized upon completion of the sale - likely in the first half of 2027 - the structure begins to take shape with an estimated value around €2.700 million, distributed approximately as follows: one third in equity contributed by investors, and the rest in bank debt. Although Mobico, Alsa's mother company, is listed on the London Stock Exchange and the debt is primarily in pounds, the financial operation to be undertaken by the Autobuses de León joint venture of Cosmen and Asterion will be denominated in euros.

Roughly, around €900 million will correspond to equity (basically, assets incorporated by Cosmen and Asterion metallic), while the remaining €1.800 million will be debt that the three contracted banks will gather. The refinancing will be similar to the sector of long-term infrastructure with the intention of involving both banks and institutional investors (for example, insurers).

The buyers' intention is to pay the shares they do not control (Cosmen already own 26% of the Alsa mother company), refinance all debt assumed by Mobico - €1.381 million pounds (€1.657 million euros) in gross terms -, pay the expenses derived from the apo, and have funds for growth operations. One of the doubts is what will happen with a 500 million pounds (600 million euros) hybrid bond, of which AdL has a 53.4% indirect stake, as stated in the information submitted to the London Stock Exchange.

Like the rest of Mobico's bonds, there are clauses that require a repurchase in case of "change of control". Cosmen and Asterion have the option to retain the hybrid bonds (perpetuity), but if they did not, the interest rate would increase by five percentage points. Sources from the market explain that the alliance between the founding family of Alsa and the fund led by Jesús Olmos began before the summer.

At that time, Asterion injected €288 million into AdL, a firm with bus concessions in Malta and Cyprus, and, in return, received 49.9% of the capital in this company. The Cosmen retained 50.1%. The cash contributed by Asterion was used to acquire more than half of Mobico's hybrid bonds, which were launched in 2020 at an initial interest rate of 4.25%.

The purchase of those titles allows AdL to give some return to the money contributed by Asterion to this vehicle while the apo is being executed, and also to have more strength in negotiations with Mobico's board, which has the advice of Bank of America. "AdL intends to support Mobico through a sustainable capital structure, with the financial flexibility required to invest in the business and seek sustainable growth in the long term," explains one of the documents submitted to the London Stock Exchange.

The financial aspect is one of the most delicate of Mobico and the board, in its recommendation to sell, explains that one of its motivations to support the apo is that, if it remained as an independent company, the refinancing to which the group would face "would be a complex process, requiring negotiations with a wide range of actors in the midst of a volatile capital market."