Federated to sell Lord & Taylor
Federated Department Stores Inc. is close to signing a deal to sell its Lord & Taylor chain to Apollo Real Estate Advisors and shopping center developer NRDC Real Estate Advisors LLC for approximately $1.2 billion, according to a report published Thursday.
The deal could be announced as early as this week, though it still needs the final nod from Federated and could still fall through, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing people close to the transaction.
According to the report, Lord & Taylor is expected to continue to run as a retail operation and its current chief executive Jane Elfers is expected to remain at the helm.
Wall Street Journal reported that Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase have been serving as advisers for Federated.
Federated, which purchased Lord & Taylor when it acquired May Department Stores Co. last year, announced this past January that it was putting L&T on the block because it no longer fit with an expansion strategy for its larger Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s chains. At the time, Federated said it was its intention to sell the chain, which operates 55 stores mostly in the Northeast, as a whole operation.
“France’s finance minister met with the German co-chairman of Airbus parent company EADS on Thursday for a discussion he said would focus on possible changes in the management after delays to the A380 program and inquiries into stock sales beforehand.
A week after shares in European Aeronautics Defence and Space Co. plunged on news of further delays to the superjumbo, Finance Minister Thierry Breton said he wanted to look into “the selection of managers” and “how it can be improved.”
The Finance Ministry confirmed that Breton met Thursday afternoon with Manfred Bischoff, co-chairman of the Franco-German company. It provided no details of their discussion and EADS in Paris also said it also had no information.
“Business software maker Oracle Corp. on Thursday said its fiscal fourth profit rose 27 percent on record revenue as sales surged across most of its business lines and geographic regions.
Net income for the three months ending May 31 rose to $1.3 billion, or 24 cents a share, compared with $1 billion, or 20 cents, in the same quarter of last year. Revenue grew 25 percent to $4.85 billion from $3.88 billion. The results were largely in line with estimates the Redwood Shores-based company issued last week.