Wendy's International
(NYSE:WEN) shares moved up $1.63, or 3.64%, to $38.75 today after
Nelson Peltz disclosed a 9.8% stake and identified Triarc as a
"natural, strategic buyer" for the struggling restaurant chain. Many
investors are hoping that Nelson Peltz will be able to use his weight
on the board to pursue the best value for shareholders.
Nelson
Peltz is a successful activist investor that was responsible for
Wendy's earlier decisions to spin-off its Tim Horton subsidiary and
sell off its Baja Fresh chain to an investment group. These efforts
provided healthy returns to shareholders in the past and many are
hoping that the activist investor's new push to remove substantial
barriers for a sale of the entire company will yield similar results.
Nelson
Peltz expressed his concern today over Wendy's restrictive one-year
standstill clause that drew criticism from Triarc. The activist
investor believes that the company has a strong bias against Triarc but
should work to include them in the sale process despite these
differences - as the board has a fudiciary to shareholders to pursue
the greatest value.
While there are no official bids for the
company yet, clearly we have two parties that may be interested in
putting a bid together. Nelson Peltz request that the standstill clause
be removed (which should be followed given his board presence) which
should pave the way to more bids from a wider audience. Whether or not
these bids materialize at a substantial premium remains to be seen;
however, WEN is definitely a stock
worth watching in the meantime.
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