German bank to pick up 7.5% in EADS
German state development bank KfW plans to take over a 7.5 per cent stake in European aerospace firm EADS, parent of troubled planemaker Airbus, from car firm DaimlerChrysler, a magazine reported on Saturday.
Germany’s DaimlerChrysler currently holds a 22.5 per cent stake in EADS and wants to reduce it to 15 per cent, the weekly Der Spiegel said in a preview of an article to appear on Sunday.
The article cited no sources for the report, but quoted the mayor of Hamburg as saying that the northern German port city was also willing to purchase a stake in EADS.
KfW would take over DaimlerChrysler’s stake to prevent the shares going to a foreign company or investor, Der Spiegel said.
KfW would only hold the stake until an interested German investor could be found, the report said. KfW has sufficient funds to purchase the stake, which would cost around 1.5 billion euros at the moment, Der Spiegel said.
Negotiations on the sale are nearly completed, it added.
The EADS crisis erupted after the company acknowledged recently that production problems with Airbus’ A380 have led to delivery delays and a 4.8 billion euro future profit shortfall. Airbus chief executive Christian Streiff quit on Monday and was replaced by Louis Gallois.
Berlin has said that it did not want German ownership and influence in EADS to be diluted by any restructuring.
Some of Germany’s 16 states have said they would be willing to purchase stakes to help stabilise the company and prevent massive layoffs in Germany, which would increase unemployment in a country that has long struggled with a double-digit jobless rate.
The idea that states could purchase stakes in EADS, however, has sparked criticism from several leading German politicians, who said that state intervention would not resolve underlying structural problems at the company.
A spokesman for the German government said on Friday that the offer by German states would have to be taken seriously.
The leaders of France and Germany on Thursday pledged to share the burden of an Airbus restructuring after repeated delays to its flagship A380 superjumbo project but said no decision on the company’s future ownership had been made.
Source:
