ROME, Feb. 12 (Xinhua) -- The sale of Italy's private rail company Italo-NTV to U.S. investment fund Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) was finalized on Sunday with the signature of the purchase agreement, the firm said on Monday.
The transition would be closed following the necessary clearance from European antitrust authorities, it added.
Last week, the board of directors of Italo-NTV accepted a bid by Global Infrastructure Partners, which overall offered 1.98 billion euros (2.43 billion U.S. dollars) to buy the entire share capital of the Italian company.
The offer allowed current shareholders to reinvest up to 25 percent of the proceeds from the sale in the group, at the same conditions applied to the U.S. fund in the context of the purchase, according to Italo-NTV.
The bid was submitted a few weeks before an initial public offering (IPO) up to 40 percent of capital, which the Italian company had planned to launch on the Milan stock exchange. The plan was discarded after the acceptance of the purchase offer.
Headquartered in Rome, Italo-NTV operates as a private rail operator since 2012. It runs a high-speed fleet on a route network of 14 cities and 19 stations across Italy, according to the firm's profile.
In 2017, its total revenues increased by 24.8 percent to 454.9 million euros (559 million U.S. dollars) compared to the previous year, according to financial results unveiled in January. Net profits grew to 33.8 million euros from 32.7 million euros in 2016. (1 euro=1.23 U.S. dollar)
