Walmart, the number one retailer in the United States, is making timid progress at the New York bank (+0.35% to 132.06 dollars) after having communicated a takeover offer of 6.4 billion rand (380 million of approximately dollars) on the 47% of the capital which it does not yet have in the South African distributor Massmart. In a document published on Monday August 29, Massmart specified that Walmart offered 62 rands per share in circulation to acquire shares of 47% of the capital of the group which notably holds the brands Makro, Game and Builders Warehouse.
Massmart board chairman Kuseni Dlamini said in a statement to the media that a preliminary report by an independent expert found that “the terms and conditions of the offer are fair and reasonable”.
A restructuring plan for Massmart was launched in 2019, providing, among other things, for the sale of non-essential assets, the withdrawal of fresh food from Game stores and the reduction of costs across all of the group’s brands. But headwinds such as covid-19 and the social unrest recorded in 2021 have delayed its application.
Suffering from strong competition in the South African market, Massmart saw its net losses widen in the first half of 2022, to 903.5 million rand ($53 million) from 358.5 million rand in the same period in 2021 .