GPA and Klein advance in accordance to the Cade

After eight hours of meeting of the members of the Board of Directors of Via retail, the Klein family and the Grupo Pão de Açúcar (GPA), retail partners, managed to advance in agreement that paves the way for approving the merger of Casas Bahia and Ponto Frio in the Administrative Council of economic Defense (Cade).
It was not an easy conversation. As anticipated the value Pro, real-time news service of Value, GPA and Klein differ in relation to the closure of stores of Casas Bahia and Ponto Frio. The lack of consensus may delay more analysis in Cade.
This had determined that about 60 stores of Casas Bahia and Ponto Frio should be passed on to competitors. On Monday, Cade was informed by GPA and by Klein that the parties differed on this point. The Klein assessed that the Extra network, the GPA, would not be affected, but the Retail Route, Yes. Still, reported that this does not prevent the signing of the draft agreement.
Yesterday, at the meeting of the Board of Via retail, the sugar loaf, the company's controller, with 52.4% of the shares, has undertaken to assess the possibility of converting the electronic operation of 13 Extra Via Retail stores. This should be studied in the next 90 days. The Sugarloaf defined even if it is possible to seek another solution, if complete, after analysis of the conversion, that this change will not be positive to the GPA.
According to sources close to the companies, Michael Klein, Chairman of the Board of Via retail, defended his position by hard to understand that it would not be acceptable to penalise Via Retail simply because the GPA also explores the electronic retail-was because of that, has commented Michael, that the restrictions were larger Cade at about 25%, showed the value.
Members related to Casino, Aeneas Pestana, President of the GPA, and Abilio Diniz, a shareholder of the group, called together the same position, to study the case. The definition of 13 municipalities is based on the market share of Extra in each city. The "Note" of Cade was the participation of Via Retail and Extra up 57%. Among the 13 cities cited in the meeting are Guarulhos, Mogi das Cruzes, Santos, San Carlos, Playa Grande (all in the States of São Paulo) and Duque de Caxias and Nova Iguaçu in Rio de Janeiro.