NRG Considers Rival Bids to Exelon Offer

NRG Energy told Exelon it was exploring potential rival offers to buy the company, Exelon said Tuesday in a regulatory filing.

Exelon , which has bid about $6.2 billion in shares for NRG, said its chief executive officer, John Rowe, met with NRG CEO David Crane in Washington, D.C., on Monday to discuss Exelon's hostile bid, but the two did not reach any agreement.

NRG was focused on "market discovery" about other options from companies that had expressed interest in buying it, Exelon said in a filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

A spokesman for NRG declined to comment on the companies that had expressed interest in buying the company.

In a separate filing by NRG Tuesday, the company confirmed it had met with Exelon but reiterated that it opposed the offer as too low and too difficult to close.

About 45.6 percent of the NRG's shares were tendered under the offer as of early January. Exelon has extended to February 25 its offer to acquire NRG shares at a fixed price of 0.485 shares of Exelon for each NRG common share.

NRG's Crane said in the meeting the company could at some point allow Exelon to conduct due dilligence on its operations, which Rowe said could enable Exelon to slightly raise its offer.

That due dilligence could allow Exelon "to verify assumed values and identify additional value," according to the Exelon's filing, but NRG said Rowe had indicated any increase in the offer would occur only once.

Shares in Exelon, largest nuclear power plant owner in the United States, were down 2.7 percent to $53.32 per share while NRG shares fell 3.9 percent to $22.92 per share, both outpacing the 0.8 percent loss in the Standard & Poor's utilities index.

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