GE Capital has received irrevocable acceptances from the directors of Woodchester Investments for its offer of 263p per share for the 4,371,878 shares they hold. The shares held by the directors account for about 1.9 per cent of the Woodchester issued share capital.

On September 23rd GE announced that it had received an irrevocable acceptance from Credit Lyonnais of its offer for the French bank's entire 117.9 million Woodchester shares. Following the irrevocable commitments given by the Woodchester directors, including chairman Mr Craig McKinney, GE now has commitments covering 54.5 per cent of the issued Woodchester share capital.

The Woodchester board has recommended that shareholders accept the GE offer which values the company at £591 million. However, some institutional shareholders feel that the offer undervalues the company. Mr McKinney is to receive just over £7.5 million for his shares and share options in the finance company he set up 20 years ago.