G4S Share Price: Gardaworld's Hostile Takeover Bid Dismissed

"This should not be at the expense of G4S's shareholders and other stakeholders", G4S said. "G4S's customers deserve higher quality service, its employees deserve better leadership and its pensioners deserve a higher degree of certainty that their retirement income is secure". Harris Associates, one of the largest shareholders in G4S Plc, said it values the United Kingdom security group "significantly higher" than a roughly 2.9 billion-pound ($3.7 billion) takeover offer from Canadian peer GardaWorld.

British security company G4S on Sunday recommended its investors reject the hostile takeover offer sent to shareholders by Canadian rival GardaWorld the previous day.

"G4S has been fundamentally re-positioned and is a focused, industry-leading global security company", the company said in a statement. "We believe that Gardaworld needs G4S in order to realise its aspirations". "This should not be at the expense of G4S’s shareholders and other stakeholders".

G4S shares have surged more than 40% since September 14 after receiving a 190 pence-per-share offer from GardaWorld, closing at 208.7 pence on Friday. Year-to-date, the stock has lost about 4% in value.

G4S said early this month that US rival Allied Universal had expressed interest in making a counter offer.