Damien Kantor
11/06/2020 9:37 AM
Clarín.com
Economy
Updated 11/06/2020 9:45 AM
Surprisingly, the race to buy Walmart is yet to be defined.
The parent company of the supermarket chain has two specific offers on its desk, one from Francisco De Narváez and the other from Alfredo Coto.
Sources close to the negotiation assure that the agreement
could be announced this Friday
, but no one considered the deal closed.
The negotiations were in the hands of Citibank, which had the mandate to negotiate the local Walmart subsidiary, who yesterday announced at the last minute that exclusivity had been granted to a single candidate: one of them would be De Narváez himself, who would have added José Luis Manzano as a partner.
But it also emerged that at the last minute,
Coto himself presented a very aggressive offer
, well above estimates, which contemplates the continuity of the 9,000 employees that Walmart has in the country.
In addition to De Narváez and Coto, Walmart had other stakeholders: the main ones were Inverlat -the owner of Havanna- and a consortium in which the logistics entrepreneur Oscar Andreani and the Carval fund stand out.
The buyer selection process was halted last night when Citi informed all interested parties that the deal was almost closed.
Even De Narváez received several congratulatory calls, but to everyone's surprise, the novelty of Alfredo Coto emerged.
The businessman would have traveled directly to the United States in the last hours to present an offer directly to the headquarters.
Walmart's departure comes at a difficult time for supermarkets.
In billing, it is the 4th chain in the country behind Carrefour, Cencosud (Jumbo, Disco and Vea) and Coto.
The data is relevant for the appraisal, but it is not the only one.
Of all the points of sale and production, the chain owns 68 buildings.
The rest are rented.
What is out of the question is the transfer of the Walmart brand, which will be withdrawn from the Argentine market within a period to be agreed with the buyer.
Not so Changomas or Punto Mayorista, which will be part of the package.