“The deal has not yet been closed yet. I don’t think it’s anybody’s business to know who is paying how much and for what. I may only say that the amount exceeds 10 million litas,” Gudelis told the Lithuanian Radio on Wednesday.
According to the news portal lrt.lt, the businessman said that, in his view, it was high time to enter the media market and in particular to join the Lietuvos Rytas group, which had high potential.
Gudelis added that his investments in Lietuvos Rytas would be long-term unless there was any interference from the authorities.
Gudelis refused to disclose the value of the deal on Tuesday. Tadas Povilauskas, an analyst with investment bank Finasta, guessed that the deal might be worth up to 30 million litas.
Neil Cooper, Snoras’ bankruptcy administrator, expected to get at least 20 million litas for the shares in Lietuvos Rytas.
Earlier this year, Gudelis was forced to sell his 49-percent stake in Douglas Baltic, the Baltic unit of Douglas, one of Europe’s largest cosmetics chains. Last week, Germany’s Douglas Holding received the green light from the Lithuanian competition panel to buy that holding from Fragrances International. Gudelis later told BNS that the deal was ‘very profitable’.
Fragrances International owns subsidiaries in Latvia and Estonia. Gudelis also owns KristiAna, a company that has a chain of perfumery retail stores in Lithuania and Latvia.
