The Canadian group Couche-Tard is launching for Carrefour with an offer of 20 euros for each share of the French company, as confirmed by the bidder in a statement released early this afternoon.
This price represents a
30% premium
over the value of Carrefour's securities at the close of the
trading
session yesterday, and represents a value of 100% of the company at
16,145 million
.
This Wednesday the shares of the European retailer soar above 15% to 18 euros and its capitalization is close to 15,000 million.
"Alimentation Couche-Tard confirms that it has recently submitted a
non-binding offer
to Carrefour for an amicable takeover at a price of 20 euros per share. The terms of the transaction are under discussion and remain subject to debate, but it is expected that the payment is made mostly in cash, "says the statement from the Canadian.
This clarifies that "there is no certainty" that at this point the talks "will result in an agreement or transaction."
Carrefour did not comment on the offer, but the
French government
did
, showing its opposition to the operation
.
"Carrefour is the leading private employer in France and an essential link in the food security of the French. (...) From that point of view, 'a priori' I am not in favor of the idea that Carrefour can be bought by a foreign competitor, "said the Minister of Economy and Finance, Bruno Le Maire in statements to France 5 collected by Efe.
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He also recalled that a control decree on foreign investment in France is still in force "that allows us to give our approval or not to operations of this type. The Minister of Economy and Finance is the one who gives or not his agreement and a priori I am not in favor"
Both companies confirmed on Wednesday morning that they are holding preliminary talks for a possible purchase by Couche-Tard, which specializes in convenience stores that also has a major gas station business.
He claimed that he had begun "exploring discussions" about a friendly settlement, with no certainty that the talks will lead to a compromise.
The French firm spoke of "preliminary" discussions about a "business combination."
Carrefour is worth slightly more than 14,000 million euros on the stock market, half that of the Canadian firm.
It has a network of 12,300 stores and around 320,000 workers in more than 30 countries.
Spain is one of the main markets of the French group, with 205 hypermarkets, 112 Carrefour Market supermarkets, 820 Carrefour Express convenience stores and 143 service stations.
Between January and September 2020, sales in the Spanish market were 7,217 million, 7.5% more than in the same period of the previous year.
For Couche-Tard, the operation would represent a major change in strategy.
The company had focused its growth on convenience stores and service stations, not supermarkets.
Although Carrefour also has a gas station business, this is a minority within the group as a whole.
Shareholders
It so happens that both companies have a good part of their shareholding in the stock market.
In the case of Carrefour, 61% of the shares are public, while in the case of Couche-Tard the percentage is 46.75%, according to Bloomberg records.
The case of the Canadian is very particular.
It does not have a large reference shareholder, since the rest of the capital that is in private hands is widely dispersed between institutional investors and individuals.
However, this is divided between two classes of shares: A and B. And the former have 10 voting rights for each title, while the latter only one.
And behind the shares of type A are those who really dominate the designs of the company.
These are none other than the four founders, Alain Bouchard, Jacques D'Amours, Richard Fortin and Réal Plourde.
Among the four they control 67% of the voting rights attached to all the company's shares, but the first of them, Alain Bouchard, is the most influential.
It has 45% of the type A shares, and together with the type B shares that it also owns, it holds about 35% of the group's total voting rights.
For its part, the most important individual shareholder in Carrefour is the Moulin family, which owns Galeries La Fayette, with 12.62% of the capital and 15.39% of the voting rights.
Next is Bernard Arnault, owner of the luxury giant LVMH.
The latter has 8.6% of the Carrefour shares and 8.56% of the voting rights.
Bank of America Merill Lynch also holds 8.03% of the capital and 6.35% of the voting rights.
What is Couche-Tard?
Founded in 1980, Couche-Tard has focused its growth through purchases of smaller rivals, first in Canada and then in the US, where it entered in 2011. In Europe it did so in 2012. In recent times it had focused its expansion both in the US and in Asia Pacific.
Last November it announced the purchase of the Convenience Retail Asia company, which until then operated under a kind of franchise regime the Circle-K gas stations, owned by the Canadian group.
He did it for about 230 million euros and has given him the management of 340 stores in Hong Kong.
"It is a milestone for the company because it allows it to have a platform in Asia from which to launch its growth ambitions in the area," Couche-Tard said at the time.
Although it is a perfect stranger to the Spanish public, this Canadian group had a turnover of nearly 35,000 million euros in its last full year and obtained a profit of around 1,500 million.
Carrefour reached 80,735 million in sales in 2019, although the profit was lower, of 1,129.
It has a network of more than 9,000 convenience stores in North America, most of which also offer fuel retail.
It also had around 2,700 locations in Europe as of October last year.
The Canadian group earns most of its income from the gas station business.
In the fiscal year that ended in April 2020, these represented more than 70% of the turnover, while the income of the retail activity represented the other 30%, with a business volume of 14,666 million Canadian dollars, around 10,000 millions of euros.
Couche-Tard appears in 97th place in the ranking of the largest retailers that Deloitte produces each year, although this only takes into account the retail business.
The bulk of the turnover is also generated in the US, specifically 70%.
The proportion reaches 75% in the convenience store business.
In its 2020 annual report, the company details that the sales made by these are mainly based on the commercialization of "tobacco and alternative products to tobacco, beer, wine, beverages, food articles, sweets, snacks and fresh food proposals, including quick service restaurants ".
In the first half of fiscal year 2021, Couche-Tard has reduced its turnover by 27% to around 13,000 million euros due to the drop in business at gas stations, linked to Covid-19.
"Traffic remained low throughout the network due to restrictive measures and teleworking in the different geographies where the group operates," he explained in a press release.
The part of retail trade did grow, 6.6% to close to 5,000 million.