Filed by Synchrony Financial
Pursuant to Rule 425 under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended
Subject Company: General Electric Company
Commission File No.: 001-00035
News Release
Synchrony Financial to File Registration Statement in Connection With GE Exchange Offer
Exchange offer is next major step for Synchrony Financial to be a fully independent company
STAMFORD, Conn.– October 19, 2015 – Synchrony Financial (NYSE: SYF) today announced that it intends to file a Registration Statement on Form S-4 with the Securities and Exchange Commission in connection with the proposed exchange offer announced by General Electric Company (NYSE: GE). In the offer, GE shareholders will have the opportunity to exchange some or all of their shares of GE common stock for shares of Synchrony Financial common stock.
GE currently holds approximately 85% of the outstanding shares of Synchrony Financial common stock. Synchrony Financial has been working toward previously announced plans to separate from GE, and anticipates that the exchange offer will be the next major step in the planned separation.
“We have been preparing to separate from GE since plans were announced two years ago,” stated Margaret Keane, president and CEO of Synchrony Financial. “We have built the infrastructure and the teams needed for separation and are excited about our future as a standalone business. The GE team has been tremendously supportive of our efforts, and I thank them for all they have shared with us on our journey toward independence. What will continue through the separation and beyond is our unending commitment to serve our client partners and consumers with technology, innovation and financial solutions that help grow their businesses, as well as the award-winning customer service they rely on us to provide,” Keane concluded.
This information is neither an offer to sell nor the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities nor a recommendation as to whether investors should participate in the exchange offer. The exchange offer will be made solely by the prospectus.
About Synchrony Financial
Synchrony Financial (NYSE: SYF) is one of the nation’s premier consumer financial services companies. Our roots in consumer finance trace back to 1932, and today we are the largest provider of private label credit cards in the United States based on purchase volume and receivables.* We provide a range of credit products through programs we have established with a diverse group of national and regional retailers, local merchants, manufacturers, buying groups, industry associations and healthcare service providers to help generate growth for our partners and offer financial flexibility to our customers. Through our partners’ over 300,000 locations across the United States and Canada, and their websites and mobile applications, we offer our customers a variety of credit products to finance the purchase of goods and services. Synchrony Financial (formerly GE Capital Retail Finance) offers private label and co-branded Dual CardTM credit cards, promotional financing and installment lending, loyalty programs and FDIC-insured savings products through Synchrony Bank.
*Source: The Nilson Report (April, 2015, Issue # 1062) - based on 2014 data.
Additional Information
The terms and conditions of the exchange offer will be more fully described in the registration statement being filed by Synchrony Financial with the SEC and a Schedule TO being filed by GE with the SEC. The prospectus, which is included in the registration statement, and other filed documents contain important information about GE, Synchrony Financial, the planned separation of Synchrony Financial from GE and related matters. GE will mail the prospectus to its shareholders. Investors and security holders are urged to read carefully and in its entirety the prospectus and any other relevant documents filed with the SEC by GE and Synchrony Financial, if and when they become available and before making any investment decision. None of GE, Synchrony Financial, or any of their respective directors or officers or any dealer manager appointed with respect to the exchange offer makes any recommendation as to whether investors should participate in the exchange offer. Investors will be able to obtain a free copy of the prospectus and other related documents filed with the SEC by GE and Synchrony Financial at the SEC’s web site at www.sec.gov. Those documents may also be obtained for free from www.edocumentview.com/GEexchange or by calling (866) 300-8594.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains certain forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements may be identified by words such as “outlook,” “expects,” “intends,” “anticipates,” “plans,” “believes,” “seeks,” “targets,” “estimates,” “will,” “should,” “may” or words of similar meaning, but these words are not the exclusive means of identifying forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on management’s current expectations and assumptions, and are subject to inherent uncertainties, risks and changes in circumstances that are difficult to predict. As a result, actual results could differ materially from those indicated in these forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include global political, economic, business, competitive, market, regulatory and other factors and risks, such as: failure to consummate the exchange offer; the impact of macroeconomic conditions and whether industry trends we have identified develop as anticipated; retaining existing partners and attracting new partners, concentration of our platform revenue in a small number of Retail Card partners, promotion and support of our products by our partners, and financial performance of our partners; our need for additional financing, higher borrowing costs and adverse financial market conditions impacting our funding and liquidity, and any reduction in our credit ratings; our ability to securitize our loans, occurrence of an early amortization of our securitization facilities, loss of the right to service or subservice our securitized loans, and lower payment rates on our securitized loans; our reliance on dividends, distributions and other payments from Synchrony Bank; our ability to grow our deposits in the future; changes in market interest rates and the impact of any margin compression; effectiveness of our risk management processes and procedures, reliance on models which may be inaccurate or misinterpreted, our ability to manage our credit risk, the sufficiency of our allowance for loan losses and the accuracy of the assumptions or estimates used in preparing our financial statements; our ability to offset increases in our costs in retailer share arrangements; competition in the consumer finance industry; our concentration in the U.S. consumer credit market; our ability to successfully develop and commercialize new or enhanced products and services; our ability to realize the value of strategic investments; reductions in interchange fees; fraudulent activity; cyber-attacks or other security breaches; failure of third parties to provide various services that are important to our operations; disruptions in the operations of our computer systems and data centers; international risks and compliance and regulatory risks and costs associated with international operations; alleged infringement of intellectual property rights of others and our ability to protect our intellectual property; litigation and regulatory actions; damage to our reputation; our ability to attract, retain and motivate key officers and employees; tax legislation initiatives or challenges to our tax positions and state sales tax rules and regulations; significant and extensive regulation, supervision, examination and enforcement of our business by governmental authorities, the impact of the Dodd-Frank Act and the impact of the CFPB’s regulation of our business; changes to our methods of offering our CareCredit products; impact of capital adequacy rules; restrictions that limit Synchrony Bank’s ability to pay dividends; regulations relating to privacy, information security and data protection; use of third-party vendors
and ongoing third-party business relationships; failure to comply with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism financing laws; effect of General Electric Capital Corporation being subject to regulation by the Federal Reserve Board both as a savings and loan holding company and as a systemically important financial institution; GE not completing the separation from us as planned or at all, GE’s inability to obtain savings and loan holding company deregistration and GE continuing to have significant control over us; any conditions of the Federal Reserve Board approval required for us to continue to be a savings and loan holding company; our need to establish and significantly expand many aspects of our operations and infrastructure; loss of association with GE’s strong brand and reputation; limited right to use the GE brand name and logo and need to establish a new brand; GE’s significant control over us; terms of our arrangements with GE may be more favorable than what we will be able to obtain from unaffiliated third parties; obligations associated with being a public company; our incremental cost of operating as a standalone public company could be substantially more than anticipated; GE could engage in businesses that compete with us, and conflicts of interest may arise between us and GE; and failure caused by us of GE’s distribution of our common stock to its stockholders in exchange for its common stock to qualify for tax-free treatment, which may result in significant tax liabilities to GE for which we may be required to indemnify GE.
For the reasons described above, we caution you against relying on any forward-looking statements, which should also be read in conjunction with the other cautionary statements that are included in our public filings. You should not consider any list of such factors to be an exhaustive statement of all of the risks, uncertainties, or potentially inaccurate assumptions that could cause our current expectations or beliefs to change. Further, any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it is made, and we undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which the statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as otherwise may be required by law.
For more information contact:
Synchrony Financial: (855) 791-8007 or media.relations@synchronyfinancial.com
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