Spanish retailer DIA sells Clarel perfume stores for around 60 million eur

MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish retailer DIA said it agreed to sell perfume store chain Clarel to C2 Private Capital for around 60 million euros ($64 million), including 10 million of net debt.

The deal, which includes 1,015 Clarel stores and three distribution centres, will have a negative impact of 22.5 million euros on DIA's income, it said on Friday.

DIA CEO Martin Tolcachir said that the sale was a strategic move. "We want to focus our efforts on what we do best: local food distribution," he said in a statement.

Subject to regulatory approval, the transaction is expected to close by mid-2023.

The supermarket chain earlier this year agreed to sell 235 stores to privately-owned French retailer Auchan and said it was considering the sale of Clarel.

Luxembourg-based investment fund LetterOne, in which Russian tycoon Mikhail Fridman is a major shareholder, owns almost 78% of DIA, according to Refinitiv data. It rescued DIA from the brink of insolvency in 2019, after the retailer's market value fell by 90% in 2018 as it lost market share.

Fridman, who is subject to Western sanctions, has had his LetterOne shareholdings frozen and is receiving no financial benefit from the fund, the investment group said in March.

($1 = 0.9430 euros)

(Reporting by Emma Pinedo; editing by David Latona and John Stonestreet)