LONDON - The European private equity firm CVC Capital Parters agreed on Monday to buy the Skrill Group, the British online payment company, for 600 million euros, or $801 million.
The announcement is the third deal in the last week for CVC Capital, which is in talks to buy some of Campbell Soup’s European operations and also acquired a British extended warranty company for $1.2 billion last week.
Under the terms of the latest deal, CVC Capital will buy Skrill, which generated revenue of 200 million euros last year, from Investcorp, which is based in Bahrain.
Skrill, founded in 2001, serves about 35 million account holders worldwide and was acquired by Investcorp in 2007 for around 100 million euros. The online payment company reported a pretax profit of 50 million euros in 2011, according to a company statement.
The acquisition highlights the mixed fortunes of Europe’s private equity sector. Some of the industry’s largest players continue to struggle under debts acquired before the financial crisis began, while others have benefited from less competition for assets.
Last week, CVC announced that it was in discussions to buy a number of brands in France, Germany, Sweden and Belgium from the Campbell Soup Company.
It also agreed to acquire Domestic and General, an extended warranty company, from rival private equity player Advent International for $1.2 billion.
Credit Suisse, Jefferies International and Royal Bank of Scotland provided financing for the deal for Skrill, according to a statement from CVC Capital.
Jefferies International and the law firm Clifford Chance advised CVC Capital, while Barclays and the law firms SJ Berwin, Travers Smith, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer advised Skrill.
