GE Capital Spinoff Opens Opportunity for Overseas Acquisitions: Strategist

General Electric (GE) said it will sell most of its finance arm, GE Capital, to Blackstone (BX) and Wells Fargo (WFC) for $26.5 billion. Kevin Kelly, chief investment officer at Recon Capital Partners, told TheStreet's Scott Gamm that the environment for such deals is attractive given how low interest rates are. 'I think M&A deals going forward will start happening in Europe, which is expanding and starting to grow,' Kelly said. 'With the strong dollar, companies can actually start putting capital to work overseas.' GE’s actually looked at acquisitions overseas, so now they’ll have deeper coffers to do that.' In 2014, GE purchased the energy divisions of French train company Alstom (ALSMY) for $15.4 billion.