Retail

Bloomberg Steinhoff International Holdings NV ex-Chairman Christo Wiese is suing the scandal-hit retailer for $4.8 billion as the South African billionaire seeks to recoup investments he made in the company in 2015 and 2016. The retail tycoon was the biggest shareholder in the owner of Conforama in France and Mattress Firm in the US when the company reported a hole ...

Bloomberg Paul Singer’s activist hedge fund, best known for its jousts with underperforming corporate titans, is about to start selling books in the UK. Elliott Advisors, a unit of Elliott Management Corp., has entered a binding agreement to acquire Waterstones from Alexander Mamut’s Lynwood Investments, the bookseller said in a statement. Waterstones operates a chain of 283 bookshops in the ...

Bloomberg The people have spoken. And they want fried chicken late at night — preferably without leaving the comfort of their homes. Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen, the fast-food chain owned by Restaurant Brands International Inc., posted a surprise gain in same-store sales in the US last quarter. Helping the business? Dinner and post-dinner delivery orders. While the service is only offered ...

Bloomberg Steinhoff International Holdings NV’s former Chief Executive Officer Markus Jooste has been thrown a lifeline by banks as the global retailer he oversaw for 18 years struggles to survive an accounting scandal that happened under his watch. The 57-year-old’s personal investment company Mayfair Holdings Pty Ltd. has been given until the end of the year by lenders to sell ...

Bloomberg Kering SA rose after the luxury company’s white-hot Gucci brand kept up its relentless growth pace at the start of the year, with online sales more than doubling in the first quarter. The Paris-based company’s shares rose as much as 6.1 percent early Wednesday after it said comparable sales grew 37 percent in first quarter. Analysts had expected a ...

Bloomberg Whitbread Plc is betting that its faster-growing Costa Coffee chain will compete more effectively against the likes of Starbucks Corp. once separated from the company’s hotel business. Costa will be spun off from Premier Inn within 24 months, the Dunstable, England-based company said. The planned split follows mounting pressure from activist investors who said the two businesses sit uneasily ...

Bloomberg Jana Partners, the activist fund run by Barry Rosenstein, disclosed a stake in Pinnacle Foods Inc. and is urging the packaged food manufacturer to explore a sale or another transactions in the frozen food space. The New York-based hedge fund and its partners own 9.5 percent of the food manufacturing company, according to a regulatory filing. Jana said in ...

Bloomberg Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd., the investment firm run by billionaire Prem Watsa, signed an agreement to buy the Canadian unit of Toys ‘R’ Us Inc. for about $237 million. The so-called stalking horse bid allows other potential buyers were expected to enter competing proposals, according to a US bankruptcy court filing submitted by Toys ‘R’ on Thursday. Fairfax would ...

Bloomberg Walmart Inc. lost out in China by betting on the wrong horse. In India, the retailer is prepared to pay up to secure the top steed. The world’s biggest retailer is nearing a deal to buy a majority stake in India’s top online retailer for at least $12 billion, people familiar with the matter said. Flipkart Online Services Pvt’s ...

Bloomberg Walmart Inc. is close to finalising a deal to buy a majority stake in India’s leading e-commerce company for at least $12 billion and may complete the agreement in the next two weeks, according to people familiar with the matter. All the major investors in Flipkart Online Services Pvt are now on board with the Walmart purchase, after an ...