Retail chain Golf & Co. (TASE:GOLF) is negotiating the acquisition of the Honigman retail clothing chain, sources inform "Globes." The negotiations are in the initial stage, at a company value of NIS 120 million. The parties met recently, and are scheduled to meet again in two weeks. On the other hand, the negotiations for the acquisition of Aldo Israel, which owns the Aldo and Spring chains, have been broken off, and the deal will not go through at this time. Market sources believe that the contacts with Aldo were at a company value of NIS 140 million. These negotiations were part of the Golf group's strategy. The group has concluded that the way to strengthen itself is through acquisitions. As part of this, the group made an inhouse acquisition of fellow subsidiary Kitan, mainly for the purchase of cost cutting. The group is now turning to external acquisitions.
Golf trades at a market cap of NIS 480 million. The group, controlled by Len Blavatnik-owned Clal Industries, owns the Golf, Golf and Co. Polgat, Intima, Blue Bird, and Max Moretti chains. In recent months, Eli Mizroch has been CEO of the group, after the resignation of Ilana Kaufman, who managed the group for many years.
Golf's revenue totaled NIS 340.9 million in the first half of 2014, and its gross profit was NIS 205.6 million, amounting to 60.3% of sales. Operating profit was NIS 30.3million, 8.9% of sales, and the group's net profit was down 5% to NIS 23.3 million.
Honigman has 170 branches deployed nationwide. The chain is owned by brothers Yaakov and Micha Honigman, and Micha Ronen is CEO. The group has five fashion brands: Honigman Women's Fashions, the TNT fashion chain for young people, Honigman Kids, the youth brand Virus, and Honig Baby. Golf said in response, "The group has no real contacts at the moment with any company. We don't comment in the media about the many queries reaching us about acquisitions or cooperation." Honigman said that there were no negotiations and never had been.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on October 28, 2014
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