American Greetings Corp's founding family raised its offer price to take the gift card and party goods company private, sending its shares up 10 percent in extended trading. Chief Executive Zev Weiss, other members of the founding Weiss family and related parties offered $17.50 per American Greetings share, up from their previous offer of $17.18.The deal, which values the company at about $553.7 million, based on 31.6 million shares outstanding, represents a premium of 13 percent to the stock's Thursday close of $15.48.In a letter to the company's board, Weiss said the group, which held about 80 percent of American Greetings' Class B shares as of Jan. 17, has secured over $700 million of bank financing for the proposed deal. ()Weiss also said the group does not intend to further increase the offer price.
American Greetings Corporation (American Greetings) is engaged in the design, manufacture and sale of everyday and seasonal greeting cards and other social expression products. Shares of AM fell by 5.03% or $-0.82/share to $15.48. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $12.53 and as high as $17.49. On average, 337136 shares of AM exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 709070.
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