A consortium around the real estate investor X + Bricks wants to take over the supermarket chain Real. The retailer Metro announced that it had agreed exclusive negotiations with the bidder consortium for the sale of the subsidiary Real. The goal is a contract signing by the end of January 2020.
The agreed concept provides for a sale of Real as a complete package, Metro said. According to the current state of negotiations, the supermarket chain could therefore go for 500 million euros net to the X + Bricks consortium.
Previously, Metro had explored with a bidder consortium to the real estate investor Redos a real takeover. The Cartel Office had already approved these plans. These negotiations have been ended, it is now stated in the communication.
According to insiders, Redos had planned to continue to operate more than 50 of the more than 270 real markets, the brand should be preserved. The remaining locations should go to competitors. Tegut and Edeka had already expressed concrete interest and filed the takeover plans with the Cartel Office.
Real should originally be sold in June
Metro boss Olaf Koch wants to break away from the chain to concentrate Metro completely on the business around the wholesale markets. Real has an annual turnover of more than seven billion euros and operates 279 stores. Of these, around 65 properties are owned by Reals.
Originally, a sale should be agreed in June. Because some interested parties let the final deadline for offers pass, Metro had
Suppliers, especially the large consumer goods companies, take advantage of the uncertain situation of Real at present and offer the supermarket chain according to SPIEGEL information worse conditions in the purchase prices. That's sensitive to Real's margin.
