(New: Share price development in Xetra trading, further details)
FRANKFURT (dpa-AFX) - A setback in the planned sale of the Foodpanda business in Taiwan weighed heavily on the shares of Delivery Hero on Friday. In Xetra trading, the shares of the food delivery company were last quoted 5.7 percent lower at 26.96 euros in the morning. In early trading, they had slumped to their lowest level since the end of August.
Since the annual high in October, Delivery Hero has fallen by around 36 percent. For the year 2024, the share price has now risen by around 8 percent.
The Taiwanese competition authority TFTC will not approve the sale of the Foodpanda activities to the US ride and delivery service Uber, Delivery Hero announced over the Christmas holidays. Uber wanted to acquire the division in a multi-stage deal for just under one billion US dollars and buy a small stake in Delivery Hero. Uber can appeal against the TFTC's decision or terminate the transaction, the MDax company's press release added.
Analyst Marcus Diebel from the bank JPMorgan saw the decision as clearly negative for Delivery Hero. The company had wanted to use the money from the sale to buy back convertible bonds and improve its capital structure overall. Meanwhile, the amount of a possible compensation payment (break-up fee) to Delivery Hero remains open. There are also opportunities for the company to make other sales in the region, which could then act as a positive catalyst for the share price, the expert emphasized.
Overall, Delivery Hero is currently looking at its regional companies. The Group subsidiary Talabat < AEE01569T24> went public in Dubai on December 10. Since then, however, Talabat's share price has been bobbing along. Nevertheless, with the IPO, Delivery Hero raised the equivalent of almost two billion euros with the 20 percent stake in Talabat that was offered./edh/mis/stk