Washington - Home Depot Inc, the world's largest home- improvement retailer, has reduced its selling price to a group of investors by 18 per cent because of the current US credit squeeze, media reports said early Monday. Bain Capital LLC, Carlyle Group and Clayton Dubilier & Rice will only pay 8.5 billion dollars instead of the 10.3 billion dollars floated two months ago for Home Depot's construction-supply unit, according to the New York Times and Bloomberg financial news service.
They quoted people familiar with the agreement.
Declining investor demand for private-equity debt, a slumping housing market and corrosive effects from subprime lending to homeowners have combined to make banks wary of loans for leveraged buyouts such as the Home Depot deal.
"This is really going to change the balance of power," Walter Todd, of Greenwood Capital Associates LLC in Greenwood, South Carolina, was quoted by Bloomberg as saying.
"Private equity had the upper hand for a while, and banks were falling over each other to get the next deal. Now the shoe is on the other foot."
