US equity firm Apollo Global Management Inc. is considering taking over German specialty chemicals company Covestro AG, Bloomberg reported, citing sources with knowledge of the matter. According to the sources, the New York-based buyout firm contacted Covestro in recent weeks. Following the report, Covestro shares were up 9.5% at €47.41 at early trading on Friday in Frankfurt.
A spokesman with Covestro said that the company regularly engages in talks on strategic opportunities with various market participants but denied the report, saying that it was not in takeover talks with Apollo. Covestro was part of drugmaker Bayer and was spun off in 2015. The company’s market value stood at €8.14 billion ($9.64 billion) as of Thursday.
