Metals recycler Befesa attracts private equity bids - sources

By Arno Schuetze and Claire Ruckin

FRANKFURT/LONDON, June 20 (Reuters) - Metals recycler Befesa has attracted bids from several private equity groups as its owner mulls whether to list the company on the stock exchange or opt for an outright sale.

CVC (Taiwan OTC: 4744.TWO - news) , Blackstone (NYSE: BX - news) and Access Industries have put in non-binding offers for the company, which is owned by buyout group Triton, the people said.

One of the people said that the offers value Befesa at about 1.3-1.4 billion euros ($1.45-1.56 billion) including debt.

Triton's sell side advisers Citi and Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS-PB - news) are supplying a pre-arranged staple financing package of 1 billion euros or 5.75 times Befesa's earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization, the sources said.

Other banks are working on financing packages of 6-6.5 times EBITDA of 150 million euros.

Separately, Triton is weighing the possibility of an IPO and Befesa may send out an intention to float as early as next week if Triton deems that option more profitable, the sources said.

Triton and the bidders declined to comment.

Befesa - which is headquartered in Luxembourg and was listed until it was bought by Spain's Abengoa (LSE: 0NUI.L - news) in 2000 - specialises in recycling steel dust from the steel and galvanizing industry and salt slags from the aluminium industry.

Abengoa sold the company to Triton in 2013 for 850 million in cash, or 1.1 billion euros including debt. ($1 = 0.8975 euros) (Additional reporting by Alexander Huebner Editing by Jeremy Gaunt)