Ahh…I dont think the sale will go through for a number of reasons. 1, The British Govt is still a major shareholder in BAA, owning something like 20% of the company,so there on to a winner with Airport taxes and dividend payments.

2, The deal would be subject to the European mergers and monopolies comission, and even possibly an investigation by the DTI in the uk.

3, i have also heard on some financial programmes and read in the financial pages that BAA shares could possibly be undervalued,this is the kinda thing that would be needed to kick start the share price to reach its proper value

4. It could a fishing exercise from the spanish company. I.E. to boost its own share price, or even to test the market waters and see what happens.

But Answering Flying-Forever’s question….BAA will have to spend alot of money in preparing for a defence for a possible take-over.
Im not sure who the company was…but they spent close to or over £100million in fighting a take-over,which was in lawyers and Stockbrokers fee’s