The fertilizer and salt producer K + S is apparently on the verge of reaching its goal in the planned sale of the American salt business.
According to a report by the Bloomberg news agency, the US subsidiary Morton Salt will go to the Kissner Group for around three billion dollars or the equivalent of almost 2.6 billion euros. The transaction could be sealed and announced this week, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter. According to the report, a spokesman for K + S did not want to comment on the information. At Kissner, no one could initially be reached.
K + S had bought the US company Morton Salt for around 1.7 billion dollars and announced in March that it would sell the division because of the high level of debt. The people of Kassel had amassed this by building a potash plant in Canada, which cost billions. Debt reduction also stalled due to sluggish business. Among other things, through the sale of the American salt business, the debt is to be reduced by well over 2 billion euros by the end of 2021, according to earlier information.
The partial sale of the Europe + division, which also includes the new Canadian potash plant Bethune, which was also considered when the comprehensive measures were announced in December, is thus off the table. The possible sale of Morton Salt could support the share price, which has been under severe pressure in the past few months. This year alone, the stock market value of the MDAX- listed company fell by 45 percent to just under 1.2 billion euros. For comparison: In autumn 2015, when the company was still listed on the Dax, its market capitalization was around six billion euros.
In early XETRA trading, the K + S share rose 11.31 percent to 6.79 euros at times.
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