Cora officials denied the information, and even talked about resuming expansion, a process stopped five years ago. The representatives of Carrefour Romania, an about 9 billion lei (almost EUR2 billion) business a year will not comment on the issue.
Cora is the least expanded of the all the modern retail chains in Romania, with only 11 hypermarkets that generate RON1.8 billion revenue, 16 years after arriving in the country. A takeover of its local network by Carrefour would allow the latter to become the leader of the local modern grocery retail in Romania for the first time, beating Kaufland.
Ziarul Financiar reported as early as last year about Cora having resumed talks for a sale of its Romania operations.
The French-Belgian group was in talks with retailers with a local presence, among which Kaufland several years ago, market sources told ZF. Cora officials denied it, as well, at the time. The negotiations fell through, though.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)