B&M disposes of poorly-performing German subsidiary

Discount retail group B&M European has announced the disposal of its German business, Jawoll (JA Woll-Handels GmbH) for €12,501,000.

It follows a review of the poorly-performing German operation which began last November.

The sale is for the group’s entire 80% shareholding in Jawoll to a purchasing consortium led by AC Curtis Salta GmbH, a company funded by Adiuva Capital.

The purchaser consortium also includes Wiebke Stern, Sebastian Dorin, Alexander Dorin, STIWEC GmbH and Jalogy Beteiligungs GmbH.

Completion of the transaction, which is conditional upon, among other things, German competition authority clearance being granted, is expected to occur within the next 28 days, or by a long stop date of June 1, 2020.

In addition to the purchase price, on completion the purchaser’s consortium will repay Jawoll’s bank debt, which has a facility limit of up to €16m, and had been guaranteed by B&M, which is based in Speke, South Liverpool.

Jawoll, together with its wholly-owned subsidiary, Jawoll Vertriebs GmbH, is a general merchandise discount retailer with 89 stores in the North-West of Germany.

The consolidated losses of those entities as reported for the financial year ended March 31, 2019 was £15.4m and the value of their gross assets as at September 28, 2019 (under IFRS16) was £192.6m.

One of the purchaser’s consortium, STIWEC GmbH, is an existing shareholder owning 13% of the shares of Jawoll.

Another member of the purchaser’s consortium, Jalogy Beteiligungs GmbH, is an investment company owned by Ralf Hartwich.

Mr Hartwich is the managing director of Jawoll and Vertriebs and he is also an existing shareholder owning seven per cent of the shares of Jawoll

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