Czech company raises offer for Vista Outdoor’s ammunition group, including Federal, to $2B

The tug-of-war for the future of Vista Outdoor continued Monday, with the Czechoslovak Group (CSG) raising its bid for a second time for the ammunition group, this time to $2 billion.

The Prague-based industrial holding company announced the new offer Monday for Vista’s Anoka-based ammunition business that includes Federal, Remington, Speer, CCI and other brands.

Shareholders are set to vote July 2. CSG’s initial offer of $1.91 billion was made in October after months of a competitive bidding process in which Vista and its consultants had identified 26 potential bidders. In May CSG raised its bid to $1.96 billion.

Under the plan endorsed by the board of directors, Vista’s outdoor products brands would be bundled under an independent public company named Revelyst.

Once a board of directors selects a bid, it normally can’t solicit more bids but can entertain unsolicited offers that arrive. Once shareholders approve a bid, the board can no longer entertain unsolicited offers.

MNC Capital, a Texas equity group, has made multiple unsolicited offers for the entirety of Vista operations. Its latest for $39.50 a share, just over $3 billion, was rejected by the Vista board of directors on June 10.

Another capital group made a bid of over $2 billion for the ammunition business on June 7. That bid was subsequently withdrawn in what Vista said was a dispute between MNC Capital and the company making the bid, which the Financial Times identified as Texas-based JDH Capital.

The shareholder vote has been twice delayed as the jockeying continued and CSG Group was working through the process to gain regulatory approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). That approval is still pending.

The Vista Outdoor board stated it remains confident in the bid from the CSG Group and that it can get the crucial CFIUS approval despite opposition from some conservative lawmakers and law enforcement groups.

“CSG brings a strong commitment to U.S. manufacturing and our American workforce and deep expertise in supply chain excellence, ammunition manufacturing and support for NATO and allied nations,” Vista said in its news release Monday.