It’s a battle the likes of which the retail industry hasn’t seen in ages. Each day brings its counter-offensive. On the one hand, the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky launched an offensive with a capital increase offer of 1.1 billion euros in which Fimalac is associated. On the other, the trio Moez-Alexandre Zouari, Xavier Niel and Matthieu Pigasse are fine-tuning a competing proposal, for an equivalent amount. The group led by Jean-Charles Naouri has formalized the delivery of an offer from him. “The Casino group indicates that it has received a preliminary letter of intent from Messrs. Xavier Niel, Matthieu Pigasse and Moez-Alexandre Zouari relating to a proposal to strengthen Casino Guichard Perrachon’s equity to an amount of €1.1 billion. euros,” the press release read. Other distributors are also in ambush. A suspense series of which we do not yet know the outcome. The only certainty: tomorrow, the retail landscape will be completely turned upside down. Decryption by Franck Rosenthal, retail marketing expert.
L’Express: The battle for the recapitalization of the Casino group is growing in intensity every day between Daniel Kretinsky on the one hand and the Zouari-Niel-Pigasse trio on the other with Intermarché in ambush. How do you view this capitalist war?
Frank Rosenthal: If the uncertainty of the battle is total, all this outbidding and its reversals of alliance are good news for the employees of the group who could have feared a sale by cutting or a more brutal end like Manufrance in the past. If the battle is so tough, it’s because the company has real value, despite a devastating stock market valuation. Despite huge debt, chronic under-investment in stores, a significant drop in market share and a dwindling store base, the Casino group is home to nuggets, Monoprix, the network of Franprix convenience stores and to some extent Cdiscount. Initially there was only one offer, that of Teract and InVivo. Then Naouri himself fueled greed by opening the doors to Kretinsky’s project, which is already a shareholder. Here we find the chess player who tries by all means to gain time to postpone the inevitable.
Which project do you think is the most relevant today?
It’s hard to say. Because on the side of the Czech billionaire, for the time being it is above all a financial operation and we do not really see the industrial and commercial strategy behind it. But just because he hasn’t revealed it yet doesn’t mean he doesn’t have one. As for the Zouari-Niel-Pigasse trio and the new 3F structure they have just created, the objective is always the same: to go up the entire sector and be in charge of the maneuver from upstream – the producer – to the downstream – the distributor. If they succeed, I can bet that one way or another, the InVivo cooperative will come back into the game because it is a great opportunity for them to sell their products. There is obviously Intermarché ready to get their hands on 180 stores and we are not talking about Carrefour which is still in ambush. Alexandre Bompard, the CEO of the group, is still looking to marry one of his competitors. The takeover offer with the Canadian Couche-Tard had been rejected by Bruno Le Maire, then the attempts to reconcile with Auchan were quickly abandoned by the Mulliez clan. If the consolidation of mass distribution went through an alliance between Casino and Carrefour, then the whole would become number one in France, provided that the competition authorities accept it…
Precisely, to what extent does this battle around Casino illustrate the necessary recomposition of the retail landscape?
The level of competition in supermarkets is very high and the margins are low. The “independents” like Leclerc, Système U and Intermarché are very strong and dynamic. Carrefour is back in working order. And even Auchan, which suffers from a greater position than the others in hypermarkets, which are no longer necessarily popular, is slowly climbing the slope. And then there are the two low-cost German Aldi and especially Lidl, which invest enormously in communication. Lidl in particular has invested almost three times more than Leclerc (compared to its market share), which is considerable. In this context, it is very complicated for a group like Casino, whose market share has fallen to only 6%, to resist.