Thomas Cook receives offer for northern European business

Thomas Cook said Thursday it received a bid for its northern European business from the private equity firm Triton Partners. The company confirmed that Triton had put forward a “highly preliminary and unsolicited indicative offer” for the Thomas Cook airline and tour operator business in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark, which accounts for about 17% of the company’s revenues. The bid comes after a week in which Thomas Cook’s share price fell nearly 40% after it revealed a record GBP1.5b loss for the first half of the year and had its equity valued at zero by analysts from the investment bank Citi. Thomas Cook said it was looking at the offer from Triton alongside the sale of its profitable airline, which it announced in February as part of a company-wide restructuring process. <br/>