Candle Lake offers to buy online casino firm Evolution for $14 billion

Aug 13 (Reuters) - Candle Lake has offered to buy Swedish online casino provider Evolution for about 131.7 billion Swedish crowns ($13.8 billion), or 695 crowns per share, the investment firm owned by billionaire Kenneth Dart said on Thursday.

Cayman Islands-registered Candle Lake last month disclosed a holding of just above 30% of the shares and votes in Evolution, triggering an obligation to launch an offer for the remaining shares.

• The offer marks a discount of 5.7% to Evolution's closing price of 737.2 crowns on Wednesday

• Candle Lake said it had made the bid due to the offer obligation but did not intend to buy all Evolution shares

• "The bid does seem to imply that Candle Lake would like to own more shares in Evolution," Jefferies said

• Evolution declined to comment on the offer when contacted by Reuters

• Evolution shares were down around 1% by midday in Stockholm

($1 = 9.5608 Swedish crowns)

(Reporting by Ananya Palyekar in Bengaluru and Alexander Klyve Gudbrandsen in Gdansk; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala and Milla Nissi-Prussak)