Casino Guichard-Perrachon SA is getting a $556 million cash infusion after Grupo Calleja agreed to buy the troubled French retailer’s stake in Almacenes Exito.
(Bloomberg) — Casino Guichard-Perrachon SA is getting a $556 million cash infusion after Grupo Calleja agreed to buy the troubled French retailer’s stake in Almacenes Exito.
Casino said Monday it will get $400 million for its direct equity interest, while its GPA unit will get $156 million. Casino shares rose as much as 1.4% before reversing gains, while GPA shares rose as much as 17%, the most in two years.
Exito investors will get 90.53 cents a share in the deal, which values the Colombian grocery store chain at $1.2 billion. The transaction is expected to close around year end.
The agreement follows months of negotiations and comes two weeks after Casino signed a lock-up agreement with a majority of its secured creditors to restructure the balance sheet.
Through that deal, the company will get a €1.2 billion ($1.26 billion) equity injection led by by Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky and conversion of all of Casino’s unsecured debt and part of its secured debt into equity. The plan envisages a €6.1 billion reduction in the company’s indebtedness and will see majority shareholder and Chairman Jean-Charles Naouri lose control.
Casino extended the deadline to sign the agreement to Oct. 17. As of Oct. 13, 44% of unsecured financial creditors and 42.7% of the perpetual subordinated noteholders had signed the lock-up, the company said on Friday.
Colombian billionaire Jaime Gilinski had previously made a bid to acquire Exito.
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Grupo Calleja operates a chain of more than 100 super markets across El Salvador called Super Selectos, with more than 7,500 employees and another 4,500 suppliers, according to its website.
–With assistance from Giovanna Bellotti Azevedo and Daniel Cancel.
(Updates shares in second paragraph, adds background starting in seventh.)
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