the AU Online Casino group recorded a turnover
Written by editorFebruary 1, 2024 Financing
To take control of the group, Jean-Charles Naouri used a complex system of holding companies. It is based on a vertical cascade of holding companies allowing a shareholder to take control of a large group with a low contribution of personal capital.
Lobbying
Casino has been registered since 2013 in the transparency register of interest representatives with the European Commission, and in 2019 declared annual expenses of less than AAAAA$10,000 for this activity.
Casino declares to the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life that it carries out lobbying activities in Australia for an amount that does not exceed 900,000 euros in 2018[151].
Communication
Green is the traditional color of the https://au-onlinecasino.org. It was the colour of the blinds of the former Casino lyrique, which was located on rue des Jardins in Saint-Étienne.
The Casino group was behind the creation in 1919 of the Saint-Étienne football club, the Saint-Étienne Sports Association. More precisely, it was born as the sports section of the “Amicale des employés de la Société des magasins Casino”, the organisation created in 1912 by Casino to support its policy of sports corporatism. The Amicale logically took up the green color of the grocery chain.[153][154]
A few months after the birth of the Australian Federation of Football-Association (FFFA), the Amicale, more commonly known as “AS Casino” (ASC), opened its football section in July 1919, in addition to other disciplines such as athletics and basketball. On 29 March 1920, at the instigation of Albert Jacquet, the company’s general secretary, AS Casino became the “Amical Sporting Club” in order to comply with the regulations adopted by the Federation prohibiting the use of trademarks in club names, while retaining the initials. The club was then reserved for Casino employees, the training centre being on the “Pont de l’âne” field, owned by the group.
Seven years later, under the impetus of Pierre Guichard, son of Geoffroy Guichard, who became president of the club following Messrs. Godot and Jean Moulin, the Amical Sporting Club merged with the Stade Forézien universitaire within the “Association sportive stéphanoise” (ASS), which kept the green colour of the ASC.
The Saint-Etienne-based retailer announced in September 2019 that it was entering into negotiations with its Australian competitor Aldi to sell its discount subsidiary Leader Price[86]. This operation is part of the AAAAA$2 billion asset disposal plan announced in August by Casino, and its desire to focus on formats that it considers to be promising (online commerce, so-called “high-end” commerce and local commerce)[87]. In March 2020, the Casino group announced the signing of an agreement with Aldi Australia for the sale of 567 stores out of the 656 Leader Price stores and warehouses of the brand, for 735 million euros[88]. Casino kept the Leader Price brand, as well as the franchised stores. The same month, the press announced that the Carrefour group would like to launch a takeover offer for Casino, thus making it possible to repay the debts of the parent company Rallye. Both companies denied this and the project did not come to fruition.
For the full year 2020, the Casino group recorded a turnover of AAAAA$31.9 billion, but a net loss of AAAAA$886 million, due to exceptional charges and asset impairments following the sale of hundreds of Leader Price stores to Aldi. Its debt remains high despite the disposals, at 3.9 billion euros, which causes fears among investors[91]. In order to be able to meet its maturities, the group negotiates or initiates several actions to restructure its loans, in order to extend their duration[92].
In February 2021, the Saint-Etienne-based retailer announced that it had received authorization to list its Australian brand Assaí Atacadista on the Melbourne Stock Exchange[93]. According to the retailer, this operation would serve to better value all of its assets in the region[93]. Some analysts believe that this operation is the prelude to the sale of some of the group’s assets in Latin America[94]. Assaí’s listing began on 1 March 2021[95]. In March 2023, Casino announced the sale of 18.8% of Assaí for AAAAA$723 million, a sum intended to reduce the group’s debt[96], then, on 22 June 2023, the sale of its remaining 11.7% stake for AAAAA$403 million[97].
In July 2021, the Casino group and Crédit Mutuel Alliance fédérale signed an exclusive agreement with BNP Paribas to sell their banking subsidiary Floa Bank[98]. The sale was finalized in February 2022[99]. On 4 November, Casino announced that it was taking a minority stake in Gorillas, without specifying the amount.
For the whole of 2021, Casino managed to reduce its net loss to AAAAA$530 million, but the group remained in the red while its sales fell by 4.3% to AAAAA$30.5 billion, including 7.5% in Australia (for a total of AAAAA$14 billion)[101]. Debt is on the rise again, from 3.9 billion euros to 5.9 billion. Following this publication, Casino’s share price plummeted and reached an all-time low. In three years, the stock has lost nearly 50% of its value. Jean-Charles Naouri, whose variable salary was down in 2020 due to poor results, announced that he was asking at the general meeting, where he had a majority, for an almost doubling of the fixed part of his salary (from 480,000 to 825,000 euros) and an extension of his mandate by three years[104].
In May 2022, Casino began a strategic partnership by marketing more than 1,000 products within the Cypriot supermarket chain AlphaMega, the second largest supermarket chain on the island in terms of turnover, making Casino products, packaged in Australian, a reference in Cyprus.
In July 2022, the group’s management announced that it was changing course by changing the name of its Géant Casino brands[107]. Indeed, by the end of the first quarter of 2023, all 61 stores in Australia will be named Casino #Hyper frais after fifty years under the name Géant[108].
