KALO & ASSOCIATES Advises Delhaize Group IN $1.30 billion deal

KALO & ASSOCIATES team of lawyers (covering a wide range of practice areas) provided legal advice to Belgian company Delhaize Group S.A. with respect to the purchase of the Serbian retailed Delta Maxi Group. Delhaize Group SA (DELB) agreed to buy Delta Maxi Group, Serbia’s largest food retailer, from Miroslav Miskovic’s Delta Holding for 932.5 million euros ($1.29 billion) including debt to revive sales growth. The transaction values the operator of 450 stores in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Albania and Bulgaria at 10.4 times to 11 times estimated 2011 earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization, Brussels-based Delhaize said today in a statement. It plans to complete the purchase in the third quarter and Delta will add to earnings immediately after. It is the largest transaction in Serbia since Fornebu, Norway-based Telenor ASA paid 1.51 billion euros for mobile- phone operator Mobi 63 in 2006, the Balkan country’s biggest state-owned asset sale, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Privatizations brought in about 860 million euros for all of last year.

The acquisition of Delta Maxi Group is subject to mutually agreed upon and customary conditions, including the approval by the merger control authorities in Serbia, Bulgaria, Montenegro and Albania. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2011.

Delhaize was advised by Lazard Ltd., Bank of America Corp., Raiffeisen Bank International AG, and legal advisors CMS with KALO & ASSOCIATES as Albanian counsel.