Thursday, May 27, 2021
Partnership continues
Tui separates from Riu hotels
The tourism companies operate around 100 holiday domiciles together. Nothing should change about that. However, Tui sells its shares in 21 hotel properties to the Riu family. The plans for this come from pre-Corona times.
The travel group Tui is selling its shares in 21 Riu hotels for up to 670 million euros to its Spanish partner, the Riu family. The 49 percent stake in the hotel property, which Tui had previously held together with the family, goes to Saranja SL, which Carmen and Luis Riu owns, as the group announced.
Tui receives around 540 million euros immediately and wants to use it to reduce its debt, which has risen sharply in the corona pandemic. A further 130 million euros could be added, depending on how business in the hotels concerned is going over the next two years. The hotel stake was last in the books of TUI with 433 million euros, so that a strong book profit can be expected.
Tui and Riu together operate around 100 hotels and holiday villages. The German-British group emphasized that nothing should change in this operational partnership through the sale. The management of all 100 Riu hotels and resorts worldwide will therefore remain unchanged at another equal joint venture between Riu and Tui, as the group announced. “In future, the cooperation will be geared even more clearly to the brand, hotel management and sales,” explained Tui.
With the sale, Tui is following the strategy adopted before the corona crisis at the end of 2019 of holding fewer properties and land itself and thus freeing up capital. “The aim is to decouple growth in hotels and cruise ships from investments.” The Riu family holds 3.6 percent of Tui.
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