The property of the Berlin luxury department store KaDewe now belongs entirely to the Thai Central Group. The previous owner, the insolvent Signa Prime Selection, and the group had reached an agreement for the complete acquisition, Central announced on Friday. Previously this had Handelsblatt reported about it. The KaDeWe property in Berlin is part of the insolvent Signa Prime Selection of the Austrian entrepreneur René Benko. It was known that the Central Group had been interested in buying it for a long time. The price is said to be more than 1.2 billion euros. Signa and Central have been business partners for many years. Since 2015, Central has held a narrow majority in the KaDeWe Group’s department store, but not in the real estate. The KaDeWe Group’s properties also include the Alsterhaus in Hamburg and Oberpollinger in Munich. The current deal should only relate to the KaDeWe property.
Meanwhile, it became known that the holding company of the largely insolvent real estate and trading group Signa will not be restructured as planned. The insolvency administrator of the holding company founded by René Benko announced this on Thursday in Vienna. The original restructuring concept stipulated that the most important sub-companies Signa Prime and Signa Development should also be renovated. However, a trust plan has now been drawn up for both units for the orderly sale of their entire portfolios, which include the Elbtower, the KaDeWe and department store properties of the Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof group.
Since the holding company is ranked relatively low in the ranking of prime and development creditors, it can no longer expect to reorganize itself by exploiting these portfolios, explained the insolvency administrator. Instead, the holding company’s insolvency proceedings should now take place in the form of a so-called bankruptcy, in which the focus is on the rapid realization of the assets. In contrast to a restructuring, creditors cannot expect 30 percent of their claims to be repaid in a bankruptcy.