LISTED Walnut producer Webster Limited has acquired listed land and water company Tandou, completing one of the biggest listed agricultural land and water plays in Australia's history.
The deal will take Webster's market capitalisation to well over a billion dollars and make it the country's biggest owner of irrigation water. It also grows 95 per cent of Australia's walnuts.
Late on Friday, Webster chairman Rod Roberts announced the successful takeover with Webster voting power in Tandou above 96 per cent.
Logistics legend Chris Corrigan, who sits on the Webster board and has a 15.3 per cent share in Webster, and farming expert David Robinson, were behind the play for Tandou. The takeover bid began in February with an offer of one Webster share for every 2.25 Tandou shares.
The takeover follows Webster's acquisition of row-cropping property Kooba Aggregation in December and Bengerang (former listed PrimeAg Australia) in May.
Webster will now begin compulsory acquisition of all the outstanding shares in Tandou. It plans to issue new Webster shares to Tandou shareholders later this month.
The share prices of both stocks have jumped since the $114 million offer was made in February. Webster shares closed on Friday at $1.83 and Tandou at 75¢.
Shareholders in Tandou include Tim McGavin's Laguna Bay Pastoral Company. According to its website, Tandou has 13,380 hectares of irrigable farming country and runs 18,000 ewes producing organic lambs on its 79,000-hectare landholding 142 kilometres south-east of Broken Hill.