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Biopharma firm Medivation ( MDVN ) rejected a $9.3 billion buyout proposal from big French pharma Sanofi ( SNY ) Friday morning, saying the offer undervalues the company. Medivation’s board unanimously voted against Sanofi’s bid of $52.50 a share in cash, which Sanofi first made by private letter on April 15 but made public on Thursday when it failed to get a response. Although that was around where Medivation was trading at the time, Sanofi said the stock has been pushed up lately by buyout rumors (including a report that AstraZeneca ( AZN ) is also interested), and that its offer is 50% higher than Medivation stock’s average price over the two months before the rumors surfaced. Medivation founder and CEO David Hung, however, claimed the price was unreasonably low due to the broad sell-off in drug stocks over the last eight months. “Sanofi’s opportunistically-timed proposal, which comes during a period of significant market dislocation, and prior to several important near-term events for the company, is designed to seize for Sanofi value that rightly belongs to our stockholders,” Hung said in a statement. Medivation stock bottomed at 26.41 on Feb. 9, a 63% drop from its then-52-week high set the previous March. In early trading on the stock market today , Medivation stock was down a fraction, near 56. Sanofi issued a brief response Friday promising to press on. “While to date Medivation has chosen not to enter into discussions regarding this value-creating transaction, Sanofi remains committed to the combination and looks forward to engaging directly with Medivation shareholders with regard to our proposal,” it said. Sanofi stock was down 4% in early trading Friday, near 41. Scalper1 News
Scalper1 News