The French competition authority has given final approval to Carrefour‘s acquisition of Louis Delhaize Group‘s operations. However, the retailer must divest eight stores.
With a delay
Judging by the comments in the French media, Carrefour is well off. The retailer only has to sell eight stores: five hypermarkets and three supermarkets. It also has to divest a shopping arcade at one of its stores. The retailer plans to complete the process by the end of the year.
The approval nonetheless took some time: in fact, Carrefour had already announced its intention to take over Cora’s 60 French stores and Match’s 115 stores in November 2023, and had finalised the acquisition by July 2024. Since then, the Cora hypermarkets have already been fitted with the Carrefour sign on their facades. The Match supermarkets will keep their brand name.
Yet the French competition authority had a lot of work to do, given the huge wave of consolidation that has taken place there in recent years, including the sale of hundreds of Casino Group stores to Intermarché, Auchan and Carrefour, explaining the delay.
