AUB Group (ASX:AUB) share price plunges as EQT and CVC walk away – what the 2025 sell‑off means for investors

Published: 1 December 2025 – All figures in AUD unless stated otherwise. This is general information, not personal financial advice.

AUB Group’s takeover premium just evaporated

AUB Group Limited (ASX:AUB) – one of Australasia’s largest insurance broking and underwriting agency networks – has been dumped by the market after private‑equity suitors EQT and CVC Asia Pacific walked away from a proposed $45‑per‑share takeover.

By late morning on 1 December 2025, AUB shares were trading around $31.02, down roughly 16–18% from the last close of $37.25 after the company confirmed that the consortium would not proceed with a binding offer at $45. ^[1]

The board says the now‑lapsed offer “appropriately valued” the business, and at the same time reaffirmed guidance for another year of record earnings in FY26. ^[2]

Investors now have to decide whether today’s hit to the AUB share price represents a structural reset… or a long‑term entry point into a high‑quality compounder at a cheaper valuation.

AUB Group in brief: a scaled insurance distribution platform

AUB Group is an ASX 200 insurance distribution group built around an equity‑partner model:

Business mix: retail and wholesale insurance brokers, specialist underwriting agencies and risk services. ^[3]
Scale: ~579 locations globally, with nearly 6,000 team members serving about 1.2 million clients. ^[4]
Flow of business: the group now places more than $11 billion of gross written premium with local and international insurers each year. ^[5]
Geography: core franchises in Australia and New Zealand, plus a growing UK and international presence through London broker Tysers and UK retail networks Movo and Momentum. ^[6]

Management’s pitch is straightforward: AUB is a diversified, fee‑driven, capital‑light way to play global commercial insurance demand and the ongoing shift towards specialist intermediaries.

How the EQT / CVC takeover story unfolded

The 2025 share price rollercoaster has been driven largely by takeover speculation.

October 2025 – EQT comes knocking:
On 28 October, AUB confirmed it had granted Swedish private‑equity firm EQT six weeks of exclusive due‑diligence access after receiving an all‑cash proposal at $45 per share, valuing the company at roughly $5.25 billion – a 25% premium to the undisturbed price and following an earlier $43 indicative bid. ^[7]
November – CVC joins the party:
As outlined in the AGM Chair’s address on 13 November, AUB later agreed that CVC Asia Pacific could join EQT in a consortium at the same $45 price, and extended exclusivity to 4 December 2025. ^[8]
Market scepticism creeps in:
Coverage in The Australian noted that AUB shares consistently traded below the headline offer and highlighted investor wariness about EQT’s history of walking away from previous Australian deals (including Iress, Vocus and Perpetual), even when initial terms looked attractive. ^[9]
Today – No deal:
On 1 December, AUB announced that the EQT/CVC consortium had informed the board it would not proceed with a binding proposal at $45 per share. AUB responded by terminating discussions and reiterating that the indicative price fairly reflected the company’s value in current market conditions. ^[10]

In short: private equity had a close look at the books, then walked away at $45 – while the board is effectively on record saying it’s not interested in selling the business for less.

Share price reaction: from premium back to standalone

Before the takeover story broke, AUB had been treading water.

As at 28 November 2025:

The AUB share price was $37.25.
Market capitalisation was about $4.34 billion.
Trailing P/E sat around 24x, with a dividend yield of about 2.3%. ^[11]

After today’s announcement:

Capital Brief reports AUB trading around $31.02, down 16.7% by 11:20am AEDT – wiping out much of the deal premium in a single session. ^[12]
Reuters similarly notes an intraday fall of about 17–18%, with the stock briefly touching the low‑$30s in what could be one of its worst single‑day declines. ^[13]

Using FY25 underlying EPS of 171.75 cents per share (from the AGM) and today’s ~$31 price, AUB now trades on a rough implied P/E of about 18x and a historical dividend yield near 3% (91 cents per share fully franked for FY25). ^[14]

Those valuation metrics are approximate and will move with the share price, but they illustrate how dramatically today’s sell‑off has compressed multiples compared with last week.

FY25: strong profit growth and a bigger international footprint

Under the hood, AUB has just delivered what management calls a “strong and strategically important” FY25 result. ^[15]

Key numbers for the year to 30 June 2025:

Underlying NPAT (UNPAT): up 17.1% to $200.2 million, slightly above the top end of prior guidance. ^[16]
Statutory net profit: up around 31% to $180.1 million, beating market expectations. ^[17]
Underlying revenue: up 12.7% to about $1.5 billion. ^[18]
Group EBIT margin: lifted to 34.7%, from 26.9% in FY19. ^[19]
Underlying EPS: 171.75 cents, up 9.5% year‑on‑year. ^[20]
Dividend: total FY25 dividend of 91 cents per share (25c interim, 66c final), fully franked and up 15.2% on FY24. ^[21]

Balance sheet and funding:

AUB closed FY25 with around $375 million of available liquidity (cash plus undrawn facilities) and a leverage ratio of ~1.97x, leaving capacity for further bolt‑on acquisitions. ^[22]

Strategically, FY25 accelerated AUB’s international ambitions:

Completed 16 smaller acquisitions and step‑ups, plus larger moves such as Pacific Indemnity (professional lines) and UK retail brokers Momentum and Movo. ^[23]
UK retail gross written premium via Movo and Momentum jumped from ~£110m to ~£340m in one year, giving AUB a more meaningful UK platform. ^[24]
Agencies and BizCover continued to post strong earnings growth, while Australian broking margins improved thanks to portfolio simplification and restructuring. ^[25]

In other words, the core business looked solid and strategically on the front foot before private equity showed up.

FY26 outlook: guidance reaffirmed despite deal collapse

Crucially for investors trying to look past today’s price action, AUB has reaffirmed its FY26 earnings guidance.

From the AGM and today’s commentary:

FY26 underlying NPAT guidance: $215–227 million
– implying year‑on‑year earnings growth of 7.4% to 13.4% versus FY25 UNPAT of $200.2 million. ^[26]
FY26 EPS guidance: 184.41–194.70 cents per share, again solidly ahead of FY25. ^[27]

Early trading in FY26 appears supportive:

In Q1, AUB reported premium rate rises of 5–7% in Australian broking and 3.5–5% in New Zealand, with average income per client up 8.4% in Australia and 0.9% in NZ. ^[28]
Management noted that some softening cited by industry peers hasn’t shown up in its own numbers so far. ^[29]

Strategic priorities for FY26 include:

Portfolio optimisation in Australia to support scale and margins.
Scaling high‑performing agencies and seeding new ones.
Market‑share expansion in New Zealand.
Further execution of the international strategy (especially UK retail and Tysers’ global wholesale platform).
Continued investment in technology platforms (such as Aurora and Lola) to support productivity and retention. ^[30]

The important takeaway: today’s announcement did not come with an earnings downgrade. The business is guiding to another record year; only the “takeover option” has been removed for now.

What are analysts forecasting for AUB Group?

Analyst views were generally constructive before the consortium walked, though not euphoric. Different aggregators show slightly different numbers, but the message is consistent: moderate earnings growth, modest upside, and a broadly positive stance on quality.

Consensus ratings and 12‑month price targets

Recent data from several platforms shows:

Fintel:
- Average one‑year price target around $43.26, with a range from roughly the mid‑$30s to the high‑$40s.
- Trailing P/E at $37.25 of ~24x, with a 2.3% dividend yield and low short interest (short float ~0.6%). ^[31]
TipRanks:
- Average 12‑month target about $39.9, with a high of ~42.3 and low of ~35.6.
- Based on five analysts over the past three months, implying about 7% upside from the last pre‑sell‑off price of $37.25. ^[32]
Investing.com consensus:
- Around nine analysts with an overall “Buy” consensus.
- Average target of roughly $42.3, high of $45 and low of about $35.5. ^[33]
GuruFocus Q4 preview (August):
- Nine analysts with an average target near $36.4 when the stock traded around $32.90 – implying low double‑digit upside at that time. ^[34]

Broker‑specific commentary includes:

Ord Minnett recently reiterating a Buy rating with a target of about $42.17. ^[35]
CLSA upgrading AUB to Outperform in early September, with a target price around $38.85 – implying high‑teens upside versus the then market price. ^[36]

How those targets look after today’s drop

Those targets were largely set before the EQT/CVC proposal fell over and before today’s plunge.

At a share price near $31, the pre‑existing targets imply:

Roughly 17% upside to the more conservative ~$36–37 targets.
Up to 30–40% upside to the more bullish $40–43+ targets, if they were to be maintained.

Realistically, some analysts may trim their numbers as they remove takeover optionality from their models, but the pre‑deal consensus at least shows where the market thought “fundamental value” sat on a standalone basis.

Longer‑term growth forecasts

Simply Wall St’s aggregated analyst forecasts paint a picture of steady – not explosive – growth:

Earnings expected to grow around 7.6% per year, versus a forecast ~12% for the broader Australian market.
Revenue expected to grow around 9.1% per year, slightly ahead of the ~6% market average. ^[37]

So AUB screens as a moderate‑growth, high‑quality compounder, not a high‑beta growth story.

Valuation after the sell‑off: what’s priced in?

If we combine:

FY25 underlying EPS of ~1.72,
FY26 guidance pointing to further high‑single‑ to low‑double‑digit earnings growth, and
Today’s ~$31 share price,

then AUB’s forward P/E multiple is somewhere in the mid‑teens to high‑teens, depending on where FY26 actually lands. That’s a noticeable de‑rating from the low‑20s multiples implied pre‑deal, and potentially closer to (or slightly above) the broader market. ^[38]

On yield, using the FY25 dividend of 91 cents:

At $37.25, the trailing yield was around 2.4%.
At $31, that rises towards ~3%, before any future dividend growth. ^[39]

You can argue about the “right” multiple, but the simple fact is:

AUB is now much cheaper than it was last week, and significantly cheaper than the level at which a sophisticated private‑equity consortium concluded it couldn’t justify paying $45.

Whether that makes the shares undervalued depends on how much you believe in AUB’s ability to keep compounding earnings independently – and how much weight you give to the fact that EQT and CVC walked away after looking under the hood.

Bull vs bear case: how investors are thinking post‑deal

Bullish arguments

Supporters of the stock tend to focus on:

Resilient, recurring revenue: Insurance broking and agencies generate relatively stable fee income, with AUB reporting a premium retention rate of about 94%. ^[40]
Proven growth model: A long track record of mid‑teens underlying profit growth, driven by a mix of organic initiatives, margin expansion and bolt‑on acquisitions. ^[41]
Structural levers outside the insurance cycle: Management emphasises that earnings growth is driven by consolidation, equity partnerships, agency scaling and technology – not just premium rate inflation. ^[42]
International optionality: The successful integration of Tysers and rapid scaling of UK retail broking give AUB a much larger addressable market than Australia and NZ alone. ^[43]
Balance sheet capacity: Moderate leverage and ~$375m of liquidity provide room for further acquisitions without stressing the capital structure. ^[44]

From this angle, today’s share price fall looks like the market throwing out the takeover premium and then overshooting in the short term.

Bearish arguments

Sceptics see a different set of risks:

Private equity walked away: EQT and CVC chose not to proceed at $45 after full due diligence. That could mean they saw limited upside from that level, identified execution risks, or had other capital‑allocation priorities. Either way, the “smart‑money validation” argument cut both ways. ^[45]
Sector cycle risk: While AUB says it hasn’t yet seen the premium softening reported by some peers, the broader insurance cycle is gradually normalising from several years of hard‑market rate rises. If pricing slows faster than expected, revenue growth could decelerate. ^[46]
Execution complexity: Integrating multiple acquisitions, growing Tysers internationally and lifting agency margins all at once is operationally demanding. Missteps could dent margins that are now a key part of the equity story. ^[47]
Valuation still not “cheap”: Even after today’s fall, AUB isn’t trading on distressed multiples. For investors who want deep value or hyper‑growth, mid‑teens earnings growth at a mid‑ to high‑teens P/E may not be compelling enough. ^[48]

Both sides can point to data; the disagreement is really about how durable AUB’s growth levers are once the easy premium‑rate tailwinds fade.

Key risks and catalysts to watch

For anyone following AUB from here, the main forward‑looking checkpoints are:

1H FY26 results (likely February 2026):
– Will management reaffirm or upgrade guidance?
– Do premium and commission trends remain as strong as Q1?
M&A and capital allocation:
– Further agencies or broker acquisitions in Australia/NZ.
– Additional UK and European expansion around Tysers.
– Potential for on‑market buybacks if M&A slows and the share price stays depressed. ^[49]
Regulatory and commission environment:
– Any changes to broker remuneration, disclosure or capital rules could affect economics over time.
Industry consolidation:
– Macquarie previously flagged AUB as one of a broader group of likely takeover targets on the ASX, reflecting private‑equity interest in insurance distribution. ^[50]
– The collapse of the EQT/CVC bid doesn’t prevent another suitor emerging in the future, but it does remove the most obvious near‑term catalyst.
Market sentiment to financials and insurers:
– If investors rotate away from financials or “quality compounders” more broadly, AUB’s valuation could remain subdued regardless of its own execution.

Bottom line: AUB after 1 December

As of 1 December 2025, AUB Group has:

A share price back in the low‑$30s, roughly where it traded before takeover speculation, but with upgraded FY25 results and fresh FY26 guidance now in the price. ^[51]
A clear standalone growth plan, centred on margin expansion, agencies, and international scale. ^[52]
A board that believes $45 per share was a fair valuation, even though the private‑equity buyers ultimately disagreed. ^[53]

For investors, the question is no longer “Will EQT pay $45?” but:

“Is a capital‑light, moderately growing insurance distribution platform worth today’s de‑rated multiple, on a standalone basis, given the execution and cycle risks involved?”

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