Another Big Merger Deal Brewing in Booze

Diageo PLC (NYSE: DEO) is reportedly set to acquire the well-known and widely distributed Jose Cuervo tequila brand. The deal was talked up in the Sunday Times and is said to be closing as soon as this week for as much as $3 billion.

Bloomberg TV was reporting that, as the distributor, Diageo has the right to buy Jose Cuervo from the Beckmann family. As far as the details of the deal, these remain sketchy, other than that Diageo may fund part of the deal with its own shares and that the deal may have multiple agreements based on the various aspects of the Jose Cuervo business.

The world is seeing a mass consolidation of brand ownership among top beer and alcohol companies. Anheuser-Busch InBev (NYSE: BUD) is not that old of a merger itself, with the Budweiser empire becoming part of the InBev empire, and now it has gone after Grupo Modelo, also in Mexico, for the stake it does not own.

As far as how this would compare to the Diageo empire, its listed value of its ADRs per Yahoo! Finance is $66 billion. Those ADRs are at $106.05 so far today, and the 52-week range is $72.33 to $109.33.

JON C. OGG