Yenot Bitan's competitors are benefiting from the supermarket chain's sale of assets in order to deal with its cash flow problems. Victory Supermarket Chain Ltd. (TASE: VCTR), led by CEO Eyal Ravid, will acquire five branches from Yenot Bitan for NIS 80 million.
As far as is known, Yenot Bitan is selling branches in Rehovot, Netivot, Tirat Hacarmel, and Yavne, plus a branch of Mega B'Ir in Mevaseret Zion converted into a Yenot Bitan branch two years ago.
The current deal follows a previous one last month in which Yenot Bitan sold seven branches to Fresh Market for NIS 110 million.
The current deal is an opportunity for Victory, which has long sought to expand through acquisitions. The deal increases the number of its branches by 10%. The aggregate annual sales volume of the acquired branches is NIS 240-250 million.
The two deals totaling NIS 190 million will help Yenot Bitan repay its NIS 150 million debt to the trustees for the Mega chain, which Yenot Bitan acquired three years ago.
At the same time, it appears that over NIS 100 million more will be needed in order to fully stabilize Yenot Bitan. Three months ago, "Globes" reported that the Yenot Bitan group was delaying payments to suppliers and reporting a steep drop in sales, and that the chain's controlling shareholder had injected tens of millions of shekels into it.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on October 30, 2019
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2019