IT’s not just the huge cross-currency international deals, like Anheuser-Busch (AB) InBev’s purchase of SABMiller that result in sleepless nights for their champions when currency markets start to spin. Deals involving much smaller companies can also be swept up in the swings and roundabouts of forex markets and cause sleepless nights.In the past several months since Vivian Imerman’s Vasari started looking at Niveus’ KWV, the rand has swung drastically against sterling. For a long time sterling looked like a one-way bet. And then it didn’t. In mid-December 2015, London-based Imerman could have bought the local wine and spirits business for petty cash — almost.Shortly after President Jacob Zuma fired the finance minister, Imerman was eyeing an exchange rate of R24/£. At that stage, buying the operating assets of one of SA’s oldest wine-exporting companies from HCI-controlled Niveus would have cost him only £62.5m.Six months later, when Vasari and Niveus issued the joint announcement ...
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