Agrium Threatens To Walk From CF Industries Deal

ERNEST SCHEYDER

NEW YORK (AP) — Agrium Inc. said Tuesday it will walk away from its proposed takeover of CF Industries Holdings Inc. if a "compelling majority" of the fertilizer maker's shareholders don't sign off on the deal.

"We have made our best and final offer," Mike Wilson, Agrium's president and chief executive, said in a statement. "We will continue to press CF if we receive a compelling majority of shares tendered, but we will walk from the transaction if we do not."

To bolster its argument, Agrium touted a study by advisory firm RiskMetrics Group on Tuesday that recommended CF Industries shareholders approve the deal.

Canada-based Agrium is offering $40 per share, as well as a one-for-one share swap, an offer that it says represents a 59 percent premium to CF's closing price before the offer was first made public on Feb. 24.

The agricultural products company has been trying to buy Deerfield, Ill.-based CF Industries for months, but its offers have been repeatedly rejected as inadequate, even after the deal was sweetened several times.