Hochtief announced the sale of its airport company Hochtief AirPort, which includes its 26% interest in the Athens International Airport, to a subsidiary of the public Canadian investment fund (PSP Investments) for an estimated 1.1 billion euros. The deal is retroactive from the 1stof January 2013.
This deal complicates the situation with the plans for privatization, since Hochtief has held on to a 13.3% share in the airport by keeping Hochtief AirPort Capital GmbH & Co. KGaA outside of the deal. Furthermore, Hochtief initially intended to exclude the Athens airport from its sale, in order to combine efforts with TAIPED. The privatization fund’s plans of selling a 30% share and increasing the airport lease have been cancelled.
Aside from the Athens International Airport, Hochtief AirPort has interests in the airports of Budapest, Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Sydney and Tirana, managing a total of 95 million passengers annually.
Hochtief’s chairmanMarcelino Fernández Verdesnoted that “the transaction was the result of a very competitive process”. The deal came to a total of 1.5 billion euros, with 400 million going towards minority rights. The transaction needs to be approved by relevant authorities, with all procedures expected to be complete by the end of 2013.
