REFILE-UPDATE 2-PPF Group to become second-top investor in InPost as Advent partially sells out
Summary
May 26 (Reuters) - Private equity firm Advent International agreed to sell a 15% stake in InPost to PPF Group for 10 euros ($11) per share, making the Czech investment company the second-biggest shareholder in the Polish parcel locker firm.Advent will remain InPosts largest shareholder with a 30.3% ownership stake, it said on Friday, while PPF will hold a 16.75% stake.Under the terms of the deal, PPF has an option to buy a further 15% stake in InPost at an agreed price.Advent initially invested in InPost, known for its automated parcel machines (APMs) allowing customers to pick up their packages, in 2017.The stake sale price represents a 6.3% premium to InPosts closing price of 9.41 euros on Thursday.Shares in the firm, which operates in nine countries across Europe including the United Kingdom, Italy, France and Spain, have risen by 19.5% this year, but are down around 56% from highs reached close to its market debut in Amsterdam in 2021.We are extremely positively surprised by the expansion of the shareholding structure by such a partner as PPF Group, InPost spokesman Wojciech Kadziolka said in emailed comments.This shows that the strategy adopted by InPost to build the largest player in Europe in the field of out-of-home deliveries using our technology of Paczkomat devices (APMs) is becoming a fact, also in the eyes of large funds.PPF, founded by the now deceased billionaire entrepreneur Petr Kellner, has investments across 25 countries in banking, telecoms, manufacturing, real estate, biotech and other industries.With this investment, we have taken a major step towards strengthening the e-commerce sector in which PPF has long been active, PPF Chief Investment Officer Didier Stoessel said in a statement.Erste Group analyst Krzysztof Kawa said in a note the sale of stake to another private equity fund postpones any potential block trade deals. ($1 = 0.9084 euros) (Reporting by Piotr Lipinski, Anna Pruchnicka in Gdansk; editing by Jacqueline Wong and Jason Neely)