Victoria’s Secret owners sells determining interest to private equity group

Victoria’s Secret, raid by descending sales and worried questions about a billionaire owners who has run a association for 5 decades, is being sold.

The company’s owner, L Brands, pronounced that a private-equity organisation Sycamore Brands will buy 55 per cent of Victoria’s Secret for about $525 million. The Columbus, Ohio association will keep a remaining 45 per cent stake.

Shares of L Brands, slid 12 per cent in premarket trade Thursday.

The offering cost signifies a noted decrease for a code with hundreds of stores that requisitioned about $7 billion in income final year.

Sales during a stores are in decrease since foe is augmenting and tastes are changing. Victoria’s Secret suffered a 12 per cent drop in same-store sales during a many new holiday season. L Brands pronounced Thursday that same-store sales declined 10 per cent at Victoria’s Secret during a fourth quarter.

At a peak, a underwear and slip code was famous for a catalog filled with supermodels and a glitzy annual radio special that churned fashion, models and music. Amidst a struggles, Victoria’s Secret sales have continued to erode, a uncover has been pulled from network radio and a batch — which traded during tighten to $100 in 2015 — now trades during around $24.

L Brands has also come underneath inspection since a CEO, Les Wexner, has ties to a late banker Jeffrey Epstein, who was indicted on sex-trafficking charges.

Epstein started handling Wexner’s income in a late 1980s and helped straighten out a finances for a genuine estate growth corroborated by Wexner in a rich suburb of Columbus. Wexner has pronounced he totally severed ties with Epstein scarcely 12 years ago and indicted him of misappropriating “vast sums” of his fortune.

Wexner offering an reparation during a opening residence of L Brands’ annual financier day in Columbus final fall, observant he was “embarrassed” by his former ties with Epstein.

Wexner will step down after a transaction is finished and turn authority emeritus.

Wexner is a longest-serving CEO of an SP 500 company. He founded what would eventually turn L Brands in 1963 with The Limited sell store, according to a company’s website. Wexner owns approximately 16.71% of L Brands, according to FactSet.

Sycamore has about $10 billion in resources underneath management. The firm’s investment portfolio includes retailers such as Belk, Coldwater Creek, Hot Topic and Talbots.

Article source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/victoria-secret-sale-1.5469609?cmp=rss