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Walgreens Comeback? Private Equity Circling for a Buyout  Sometimes, the stock market gives investors the opportunity to play in the corporate leagues, where deals are made not on the stock chart or tape but at the negotiating table when markets are closed and everyone goes home. Today, a potential buyout deal is being discussed by a private equity firm looking to eat up and potentially turn around one of America’s darlings in the retail sector, though one that has recently become a sort of “fallen angel,” so to speak.
This deal is centered around shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. (NASDAQ: WBA), a company that has faced difficulties in recent quarters due to the decline of its business model as a brick-and-mortar shop, not adjusting to some of the online sales model or even on-site ancillary services such as its competitor CVS Health Co. (NYSE: CVS) had done as soon as headwinds started to come. However, not all hope is lost in Walgreens as these private equity buyers do see some potential for it to unlock a higher valuation and thus drive up returns for whoever owns the stock or the company as a whole. Investors now get a chance to step behind the curtains of corporate dealings with Walgreens’ latest quarterly earnings report, one that might push the envelope for a double-digit percentage upside by the time the buyout bid is announced. While the world watches Nvidia, Microsoft, and Google battle it out in the AI arms race, Elon Musk has been building something much bigger — and doing it under the radar.
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