Danone completes sale of portion of your participation in Yakult for about R bi $5.3

Danone announced on Tuesday (27/03), the completion of the sale of 24.6 million shares of Yakult for about R $5.3 billion (1.3 billion euros), which corresponds to the rating of 39 times the net income obtained by the Japanese company in 2017. With that, the Danone's stake in Yakult's social capital was reduced by 14.7 percentage points, from 21.3% to 6.61%. Despite the reduction, Danone will continue being the main shareholder of Yakult and display two directors for approval at the annual general meeting of shareholders. In a statement, Danone noted that the operation's resources will be used to "give a result of deleveraging strategy adopted by the company and invest in acceleration of organic growth and the maximization of efficiency up to 2020 to generate value sustainable ". Still in the planning phase, the transaction was announced by French multinational last month. At the time, the companies signed a memorandum of understanding confirming commitment to a long-term strategic relationship and shared vision to promote probiotics as part of a balanced diet. There is a formal collaboration between the companies since 2004 and Danone stressed that he intends to continue to work in these projects.