Drowning in debt AA sold for a song to private equity as City mug money go round continues

The company was loaded up with debt and floated in 2014. If it gets through its current troubles there’s a decent chance it will be back for a do over in a few years time

With a mountain of debt on its books, the AA has turned to private equity for a roadside rescue  (Reuters)

The AA has been looking like one of its beleaguered clients for a while now. The business has basically been stuck on the hard shoulder with an engine pumping out something that could be steam but smells a lot like smoke while awaiting rescue from someone with a van.

That rescue has now arrived in the form of a private equity consortium with the only van willing to pick the distressed drivers up (another one said no thanks and drove away a few weeks ago).

The business is being purchased for £219m, which is less than 10 per cent of the value of its debt (about £2.6bn) and not quite twice what it has been paying in interest on that (about £128m). Since coming to the market in 2014, when it was valued at £1.4bn, the AA has lost 85 per cent of its value. Remarkably it is still making money, but those sorry numbers tell their own sorry story.