2024-01-11 18:12:17
Casino shareholders voted this Thursday on the group’s safeguard plan, in the absence of the current CEO and largest shareholder Jean-Charles Naouri. The result of the vote to be announced by Friday morning.
It is a “painful and sensitive meeting for many” shareholders, declared before the vote, Hélène Bourbouloux, one of the three judicial administrators present at the Maison de la Mutualité in Paris. The holders of shares of the distribution group in serious financial difficulties had been summoned to decide on the company’s safeguard plan agreed with its main creditors and with the candidates for its takeover, the billionaires Daniel Kretinsky and Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière , backed by the British fund Attestor.
The result of the vote, which is expected by Friday morning before the opening of the financial markets, leaves little doubt to the extent that Jean-Charles Naouri, one of the architects of this rescue plan, is still the main shareholder of the group . It is “in support of the plan” proposed as part of the accelerated safeguard procedure, according to another judicial administrator, Aurélie Perdereau. She presented the safeguard plan as “the only solution on the table to make” a group in great financial distress.
“Where is Naouri? »
The shareholders present on Thursday made their anger known, to the extent that the plan provides for them to be diluted very massively by the capital increase of 1.2 billion euros provided for in the safeguard plan. They also questioned the buyers about the future of the group. “Where is Naouri? » exclaimed one of them.
For his part, the press publisher and politician Nicolas Miguet, a small shareholder of the group claiming the support of “hundreds of shareholders”, spoke on several occasions. Like Casino, it is targeted by a preliminary investigation for suspicion of stock price manipulation, “active and passive private corruption” and “insider trading committed during 2018 and 2019”. Both Casino and Nicolas Miguet contest the alleged facts.
Casino’s flight plan drawn up for the coming years was presented to shareholders at the podium by Philippe Palazzi, expected to become the group’s general manager once the buyers have taken control by March-April. The takeover candidates, Daniel Kretinsky and Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière, are themselves already significant shareholders of Casino.
313 hypermarkets and supermarkets sold to Intermarché and Auchan
At the same time, the Intermarché distribution group will have to sell 3 of the 61 stores it bought from Casino in the fall of 2023 for “risks of hindering competition”, according to a decision published this Thursday by the Authority of competition. The two distribution groups had announced “an enterprise value of 209 million euros including service stations”. The group of independent retailers Mousquetaires/Intermarché had specified that three stores would be subject to a “resumption delay”, due to “compliance problems to be addressed before being able to integrate them”.
The Competition Authority indicates that “after careful examination of the takeover operation, it authorized the takeover of the target stores subject to commitments presented by Intermarché including the sale of three stores”. The stores concerned are in Lons-le-Saunier (Jura), Plouaret (Côtes-d’Armor) and Vals-près-le-Puy (Haute-Loire). “The transfers must include all the elements necessary to maintain the viability of the activity and integrate the staff employed in the stores concerned before their takeover by Intermarché. These transfers therefore do not mean closure of stores, but resumption with change of brand,” it is stipulated. Casino plans to sell 313 hypermarkets and supermarkets to its competitors Intermarché and Auchan, which will fundamentally reshape the retail landscape in France.
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