Merger activity increased last week with nine new deals announced and two deals completed. Four out of the nine deals announced last week were potential deals in the works.
Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings (AAWW)
Founded in 1992 and headquartered in Purchase, New York, Atlas Air Worldwide operates a fleet of over 100 all-Boeing planes. The company counts all three of the world’s largest logistics companies FedEx, UPS and DHL among its customers and extends its services to the military. Atlas has been training the pilots and engineers that operate Air Force One since October 2007. Over the years, the company signed additional agreements with Amazon that give Amazon the ability to acquire 39.9% of the company. A stockholders agreement that Atlas has with Amazon caps Amazon’s ability to vote in its discretion at 14.9%.
We wrote in detail about Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings in our Special Situations Newsletter: March 2022, after the company announced a $200 million share buyback in February 2022, that amounted to nearly 9% of the company’s market cap. We wrote the following in the newsletter,
I find companies where the insiders are buying stock with their own money even as the company is buying back its own shares attractive and we track these kinds of companies in our Double Dipper screen for premium members. In the case of Atlas Air Worldwide, we are not seeing insider buying but we are seeing insiders exercise options and not sell all shares beyond the portion required to satisfy tax withholding. Some of these insiders were selling shares when the stock had eclipsed $90 and stopped selling after the recent pullback in the stock.