m-and-a-special-situations theme · 88 dossiers

Deal-arb discount narrowed to 7.5%: RKLB closed $82.83 on 2026-08-07, $15.33 inside the collar's flat band, so the package still marks $54.00 against IRDM's $49.93. Forty days post-announcement there is still no Form S-4, no FCC docket and…

Beat-and-raise LTL margin story the tape only half pays for: after Q2 adjusted OR 79.9% and an at-least-200bps full-year guide, price lost the $199–$201 shelf on 2026-08-03 at $197.01 and reclaimed it 2026-08-07 at $202.58 with no company…

June memory/HBM semicap re-rating that ran ACLS to a $193.78 high has broken; stock chopping ~$134 (−5.2% on 2026-07-24), ~31% off high, on flat FY2026 revenue. Forward path is now two binaries: the 2026-08-06 Q2 print and the…

Closed special situation: Arcline's $29.00 all-cash take-private (signed 2026-06-16, ~$272M, Q3-2026 close) hard-caps the stock. At $28.65 (2026-07-21) only a ~1.2% arb spread remains after the 2026-07-16 preliminary proxy — a frozen…

The July 14–17 Delaware bench trial closed with no verdict and no buyout; the quick-resolution crowd unwound and ANAB round-tripped from the low-$70s to ~$54 (Jul 24). The whole equity is now a dateless wait on a Chancery post-trial…

AbbVie's signed all-cash takeout at $135.11 (announced 2026-06-23, ~$10.9B, ~49% premium to the $90.38 pre-bid close) caps the stock at the bid and killed the IL-13 momentum leg. What trades now is merger-arb carry into an expected H2-2026…

Gold/copper producer basing $53–$76 under a broken ~$72 shelf after a ~45% fall from the $110 high. Q2 output slipped 8% QoQ — first sequential drop after a record Q1 — as gold cools to the low-$4,000s and sell-side keeps trimming (JPM to…

Take-private is done: AVNS holders approved the $25.00/share all-cash AIP buyout on 2026-07-22 (~99.75% of votes cast), all regulatory clearances in hand, close guided by 2026-07-27 with NYSE delisting on completion. Price is pinned to…

Parent-level distress in the courts: ~2026-06-26 60-day São Paulo shield plus Chapter 15 in SDNY, Fitch C / S&P default (2026-06-30); management skipping ~$177M July–Aug coupons and pushing an extrajudicial plan (5-yr extension, 100% PIK)…

The premium-to-book re-rating has unwound: BH ~$384 (Jul 17) sits back under the ~$401/Class B book line while CBRL rallied to $53.61 — the holdco is falling as its main asset rises, re-widening the discount. A $500M ATM with ~$485M…

Still a merger-arb wrapper rather than an oncology stock: the object is a planned $44–48M pre-close cash dividend plus a 3.69% stub in the AATD base-editing NewCo. The 2026-08-07 10-Q re-documented it ($72.6M cash, 75% RIF), but price has…

Broken IPO that cleared its 2026-07-21 lockup without a supply flood but is grinding on the $4.665 all-time low with no bounce; Goldman cut its target to $7.75, and the undated $100M Galaxy verdict plus the ~2026-08-26 Q2 print are the…

CAN-2409 lung program promoted to pivotal on the 2026-06-30 AURORA Phase 3 launch, and sell-side keeps stacking (Stifel Buy $22 on 7/13, avg PT ~$20 vs high-single-digit spot) — but the June breakout to $11.36 round-tripped to ~$9.50 and…

Cash merger-arb in its final mechanical innings: shareholders adopted the $13.25 Knox Lane take-private on 2026-07-16 (~72% of shares for) and HSR is cleared, leaving only customary closing before delisting. Pennies of upside vs a residual…

Humanoid-robotics de-SPAC: Churchill XI merges with Agility Robotics (~$2.5B, Nvidia/Amazon-backed, re-lists as AGLT). Theme intact, but the tape is an RSI-98 filing-driven blow-off that has since gone quiet with no dated catalyst until…

Hormuz war-risk re-escalation fired — the US-Iran MoU collapsed and tankers were struck 2026-07-19/20 — yet CMBT stalled near $15.7, ~11% under its $17.72 high, while broad VLCC spot bled ~40% off the late-June ~$470k/day peak. The equity…

Terminal special situation, unchanged: Lilly's $38.00 cash plus up-to-$9.00 non-transferable CVR scheme became effective 2026-06-24, last Nasdaq print was 2026-06-23, and Form 15-12G is dated 2026-07-06. The only live development is…

Fee-reform catalyst landed: the 2026-07-13 Ninth Amended MSA cuts the base fee from 2.00% to 1.25% of ANA and caps 2027 base fees at $30M (est. $19–22M saving) — but nothing hits P&L before 2027-01-01. Price recovered ~$10.08 (2026-07-08)…

Deal-arb thesis is now spent: the $100M Apotex asset sale closed 2026-07-01 after a 99.84% shareholder vote on 2026-06-24, so the dated binary that drove the ~3.2x off $1.85 to a $7.36 high is consumed. What remains is a cash-rich clinical…

Momentum leg is dead: the story crystallized into Vertex's $85.00/share all-cash takeout (announced 2026-07-06, ~$10B). Shares gapped to ~$83.50 and now trade as a merger-arb spread capped at $85 with ~$40 of air below on a break. Residual…

Takeover-premium leg is dead: the 2026-07-06 Vista/Quinti gap is fully filled and the 2026-08-05 print cut FY26 contribution ex-TAC guidance to $1.034–1.058B from $1.175–1.198B, re-basing the standalone any bid would price. No board…

Currency/payments spinoff re-rating on two legs: a US "Catalyst Series" banknote redesign (redesigned $10 late 2026, higher-denom print volume ~+90% vs 2025) plus a De La Rue + Antares authentication roll-up (SAT sales +51% YoY, FY sales…

Deleveraging-and-refranchising turnaround with a now-dated catalyst: Q2 FY2026 prints 2026-08-06. Net leverage cut to ~5.5x from 6.7x, liquidity >$300M, but revenue still shrinks and ~23-29% of the float is short. The tradeable energy is a…

Take-private special situation: the board rejected Yellow Wood's $30 bid as too low, and mid-July sell-side PT raises (Canaccord $34, Wells Fargo $30) confirm a >$30 intrinsic read. But a month on no competing bid has surfaced, the theme…

Resolved and off the tape: ARCHIMED closed its take-private of Esperion on 2026-07-13 at $3.16 cash plus a non-tradeable CVR of up to $100M aggregate, and the common stock ceased trading and delisted the same day. Last listed close was…

Busted-merger workout losing its bid: the +48% June bounce to $14.87 (on a speculative Amazon-bolt-on thesis) has faded ~13% to ~$13, whole-company sale is now reported "unlikely," and the 2026-07-10 chairman exit forfeited…

Take-private arb in its endgame: DEFM14A filed 2026-07-06, vote 2026-08-03, HSR expired 2026-06-22. Closed $9.44 on 2026-07-31 vs the $9.50 cash price — ~0.6% gross left against a ~37% break tail to the unaffected $5.93. Only offshore…

Alternatives-manager re-rate stalled — GCMG printed a new $14.38 high on the 2026-07-13 Piper upgrade, then reversed ~15% to a $12.20 close into the 2026-08-06 Q2 binary. The AI-datacenter infra/private-credit fundraising thesis is intact…

The 2026-07-08 double beat was sold — closed $25.18, -10.2% — because margins compressed (GM 46.0%, -110bp; adj EPS $0.17 vs $0.41). The live leg is now deleveraging: net leverage 3.48x from 3.87x, debt $716.1M from $871.0M, FY27 FCF…

M&A leg is dead — no SiriusXM headline since the 2026-05-29 NYT "stalled" report and the April spike fully round-tripped ($6.33 high → $3.86 on 2026-08-07, -39%). What is left is a binary: Q2 print 2026-08-10 after the close is the first…

Busted-catalyst pancreatic biotech: atebimetinib's 17.3-mo single-arm 1L OS is real, but the Phase 3 binary is mid-2028 and the tape keeps fading post-ASCO ($5.11→$4.32 in two weeks) even as targets climb to $18–$30. Cheap…

The $39.49 tape is a frozen June 8 last-trade, not a live market — a ~3,600% blow-off from ~$1 on a $3M AI 'used-phone agent' deal, halted under Nasdaq T12 ever since while the board probes its own trading. Seven weeks on, still no…

Quality-defensive re-rating (~+39% YTD, ~$122) is maturing: Q2 net sales grew just 2% to $341M with anchor license Lacoste -19%, yet Canaccord chased its target to $141 (2026-07-23) as sell-side catches up to decelerating growth. Full Q2…

Special-situation biotech, not momentum: the 2026 Linzess pricing-restructure re-rate faded to the low-$3s, then bounced ~30% to a $4.65 close July 8 on M&A speculation with no confirmed bid, since fading to ~$4.21. The Aug 6 Q2 print is…

The equity is now a deal instrument: KKR's $127 all-cash agreement, signed 2026-08-03, leaves $1.73 of headline consideration above the 2026-08-07 close of $125.27, while a break returns it toward the $96–$110 pre-leak analyst zone.…

June's move was a float mechanic — Russell Microcap inclusion (effective 2026-06-30) into a 40%-short float drove $8.92 to $18.13, and it is unwinding ($14.98 on 2026-07-17, -7.76%). SSS is genuinely inflecting (-6.7% → -3.8%), but price…

Closed takeout, not a security: Chiesi's $27.00/share all-cash acquisition of KalVista completed 2026-06-11, shares delisted from Nasdaq with deregistration (POS AM, Form 25, Form 15) underway. No spread, no momentum leg, no listed share…

Pension-reversion fat pitch fired and is spent; the re-rate has fully unwound from the $14.87 May high to ~$7.78, losing the $9 June shelf and printing a $4.94 52-week low. A July 1 resale shelf of up to ~39.46M shares and a June 29 Sell…

The binary already fired: KOMZIFTI's 2025-11-13 approval and ~40% R/R NPM1 share are priced, and the $24–28 targets need a frontline Phase 3 that doesn't read until 2028. The tape is drifting — $10.39, lower third of the H1 range. A…

The 2026 lithium-recovery narrative has broken: CATL's ~46ktpa Jianxiawo mine restarted 2026-06-29, pulling the supply-discipline leg out from under the rally. China carbonate fell to a ~4-month-low CNY 151,000/t and LAR sliced its $7…

Contested insurtech IPO reclaimed its $19 price in a late-June ~28% rip and has held it into a fresh JPM Overweight (PT $23, 2026-07-13). But the reclaim runs into the 2026-07-27 final lock-up and an unresolved upfront-accounting short…

Insider-cluster leg has already paid: Malone/Fries/Nair bought the post-distribution $4.98 June base, and the common is $7.34 — ~47% higher in under a month. July brought Citi's downgrade to Neutral (PT $8) and a Barclays Underweight at…

Post-catalyst drift: the $500M preferred special dividend and the June Malone/Nair insider cluster already drove a ~70% run off $4.76 to ~$8.30, and the tape has stalled at $7.33. Citi cut to Neutral 2026-07-10 with a $8 target already…

Legacy-risk-transfer re-rating: the 2026-07-30 Talcott deal cedes ~$5.8B of GUL statutory reserves for ~$200M all-in statutory capital, alongside a Q2 adjusted EPS beat at $2.24 vs $1.96. But the information is out, price sits 2.1% under…

Take-private process went live: WSJ reported substantive Diller talks 2026-07-10, MGM seated a special committee mid-July, and the board reportedly views $48.30 as too low — so the trade is now a bump handicap, not a growth story. At…

ICE's $167.00 all-cash agreement signed 2026-07-30 converted MKTX into a spread instrument: the 2026-08-07 close of $162.53 leaves $4.47 gross against an H1 2027 guided close. The operating narrative is fully priced and the issuer has…

Re-rating leg has stalled: NUTX closed $162.98 on 2026-07-17 after five straight down days, ~20% off the $204.00 high, giving back the June breakout that B. Riley's 2026-06-26 Buy/$290 initiation topped out. A $55.0M true-up of 18,950…

Takeover binary is resolved and deal-pinned: OGN trades ~$13.51 into Sun Pharma's $14.00 all-cash offer, a ~$0.49 (3.7%) gross spread. The 2026-07-06 disclosure suit was mooted by 2026-07-17 supplemental proxy filings, clearing the path to…

Closed by event: the Henkel all-cash takeout completed and OLPX was delisted from Nasdaq on 2026-07-07, with each share converted into the right to receive $2.06 cash. There is no longer a listed security, no price series, and no thesis to…

Post-Chapter-11 reorg equity: emerged 2026-06-17, ~$714M debt wiped, distressed funds (Helix, Redwood) now hold the ~22M-share float. Shares ripped +11%/month into RSI 78.5 on thin volume ahead of the first post-reorg print ~2026-07-29 — a…

Rumor is now a signed contract: Nuvei's $7.40 all-cash take-private (announced 2026-06-15, close mid-2027) pins PAYO near the $7.12 close as pure merger-arb. Only ~4% spread left to the deal vs ~28% air to the $5.14 standalone base; the…

PBI broke the $17.62 shelf to a fresh 52-week high $18.62 (Jul 16) — the buyback/cost-cut re-rate is now extending, not consolidating. But revenue still shrinks ~3% YoY, consensus PT $16.43 sits below spot, and Q2 prints after close Jul…

Recovery leg re-fired: $66.06 (2026-06-05) → $71.49 on 2026-07-15 (+5.9%) → $73.20, back within 3% of the $75.25 high and ~6% ABOVE the $68.80 consensus target. Wells Fargo's 2026-07-10 note flags June financing data accelerating into a Q2…

Special-situation setup: an April-2026 strategic review (Morgan Stanley engaged) puts a possible sale on a controlled, down-~90%-from-IPO name, while record DTC revenue (+62.8% YoY) and Disney Solitaire drove a Q1 guidance raise. The Aug 6…

Merger-arb stub, not a momentum vehicle: the Publicis $38.50 all-cash deal now has a dated shareholder vote (2026-08-17, 66⅔% threshold) and HSR filed 2026-06-11. At ~$37.82 the remaining spread is ~1.8% into a year-end close, against…

MEMS-timing picks-and-shovels story is fundamentally intact — Q1 datacenter revenue +158% YoY to 67% of sales, Renesas timing deal closed July 1 — but the momentum leg has broken: ~$550 on July 18 is ~39% off the May 11 all-time-high close…

China EVO+ recovery leg is decelerating: Q2 prelim (2026-07-16) of ">$90M" was in-line, sequentially below Q1's $93.52M, and drew an 8.8% gap-down that broke the $29.43 50-day. Triple-digit YoY comps end here, the M&A binary died at the…

All-stock takeout capped the story and the acquirer de-rated: ON's ~19% announcement drop and slide to $87.37 cut the 1.350-ratio implied value from ~$160 to ~$118, with SYNA at $114.05. What's left is a 3.4% gross spread to a mid-2027…

Terminated, not traded: the IKS Health merger closed 2026-07-09 at $26.25/share cash after the 2026-07-07 vote passed 11.31M for / 8,818 against. Shares were cashed out and delisted from Nasdaq. No tradable equity remains; the ticker is a…

Panagiotidis shipping shell (NOT lawnmower TTC) ran 1.93→8.50 on a sub-NAV/special-dividend story that is now fully paid out and closed. Six weeks of dead tape since the 2026-06-05 payout ($3.8M cash + 5,707,246 NEW shares); on a true…

Activist sum-of-the-parts special situation cooling: the board-control catalyst passed, TheFork sold to Amex for $700M, and BTIG's July 21 downgrade reframed Viator as a keeper rather than the next breakup piece — draining…

Hyperscaler dark-fiber demand turned the post-Windstream deleveraging grind into a growth story (~$1.5B disclosed funnel, $68.7M of Q1 IRU revenue from one hyperscaler), but the June re-rate to ~$11 has stalled in a three-week range above…

New-management turnaround re-rating has stalled: after Goldman's June double-upgrade drove VAC to a $105.97 high, price rolled ~11% to the low-$90s while the two most recent Street notes (Morgan Stanley $52, Wells Fargo $68) are both…

Merger-arb tracking stock for Axcelis: fixed 0.3575 ACLS/VECO, both votes cleared 2026-02-06, only China SAMR remains before the 2026-09-30 outside date. ACLS's slide to ~$134 de-pegged VECO to a premium over the exchange ratio (~$48) —…

Engine-leasing supercycle still printing records (Q1 rev +23%, EPS $4.03 vs $3.02 est), but the theme is maturing and the stock has faded ~18% off its 2026-07-06 ATH into the now-completed 3-for-1 split. The event stack has collapsed to…

Cyclical modular-space leasing recovery with a small data-center kicker and an activist/M&A floor, but range-bound and digesting: shares drifted to ~$26 under the $31.88 high after the 2026-06-27 Russell growth-index removal. The confirmed…

Distressed-deleveraging special situation that round-tripped its June activist pop into a binary 2026-07-30 Q2 print. At ~$2.60 it sits below the $2.75 Hold consensus and inside the $2.25–$2.50 target band; anchor buyer STARTEEPO (8.8M sh,…

Delisting binary fully resolved to the survive side — Nasdaq confirmed regained compliance 2026-07-20, but with a one-year no-cure monitor attached. What's left is a ~$7M psilocybin micro-cap with a going-concern warning and heavy…