Aldeasa share price reacts to news of AENA tensions

John Gallagher

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The retailer's share price dropped over 10% on opening today as the market considered the implications of changes to its contract with the Spanish airport authority

Trading in Aldeasa shares was closed temporarily this morning as the market reacted to news over the weekend of tensions between Spanish airport authority AENA and the travel-retailer. A flood of sell orders for the shares, which opened at Eu29.91 ($38.84), down 10.7% after closing at a five-year high of Eu33.50 ($43.51) on Friday, forced traders to resort to the auction system to restart trading. The shares recovered to between Eu30.70 ($39.87) and Eu30.80 ($40.00) during the morning as the market debated whether a counter bid would appear after the weekend's revelations, which some sources speculate could knock between Eu15m ($19.5m) and Eu17m ($22.1m) off Aldeasa's profits.

As RavenFox.com reported on Saturday, an exchange of correspondence between Aldeasa and AENA, lodged with Spanish market regulator CNMV after trading closed on Friday, revealed that the airport authority had intimated to the retailer of their intention to increase the fee and minimum annual guarantees paid by the retailer in its Spanish outlets.

Rumours have circulated about the interest of venture capital companies of launching a counter bid to the Gestion de Explotaciones Aeroportuarias (GEA) consortium's offer of Eu29 ($37.9) per share, but so far only Advent International has confirmed that it is actually studying a bid.

The recent news may benefit GEA as rival bids may now be unlikely to go ahead. However, GEA has already argued that its initial offer represented full value to Aldeasa shareholders, and if the new concession structure emerges it could be argued that the bid is too generous.

Keep an eye on RavenFox.com for more details as they emerge.