(Bloomberg) -- Arconic Inc., the aeronautics parts-maker that split with Alcoa Corp., is poised to rise on speculation that it could be taken over by a private-equity shop.
Apollo Global Management LLC is among the firms that have expressed interest, the Wall Street Journal reported late Friday. The newspaper reported that no deal is imminent. Arconic declined to comment, as did Apollo.
The shares climbed 10 percent to $19.15 before the start of regular trading in New York on Monday.
Arconic is still working to move past a tumultuous stretch following its 2016 separation from Alcoa. Its stock was down 44 percent Friday from a 52-week high on Jan. 16, the day after Chip Blankenship took over as chief executive officer, leaving it with a market value of $8.39 billion. Part of the decline was from tensions concerning the U.S. aluminum and steel tariffs that have roiled metals producers.
There have also been internal issues. A proxy fight with activist investor Elliott Management Corp., its largest shareholder, led to the departure of Klaus Kleinfeld as chief executive officer in April 2017. An Arconic product, known as Reynobond PE, was used in the cladding of London’s Grenfell Tower, which caught fire last year, killing at least 80 people. And in April of this year, it slashed its forecast due to rising aluminum prices and business inefficiencies.
Arconic is also in the midst of a review of its strategy and portfolio that it has said it intends to complete this quarter.
“This is a tool for us to understand how do we compete, where are we strategically advantaged, where are we not, so that we know whether we’re investing in the right technologies to further our strategic advantage,” Blankenship said in a February call with analysts.
(Updates with premarket trading in third paragraph.)
--With assistance from Richard Clough.
To contact the reporter on this story: Brian Eckhouse in New York at beckhouse@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lynn Doan at ldoan6@bloomberg.net, Kevin Miller, Ros Krasny
©2018 Bloomberg L.P.
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