One of the biggest national stories on Tuesday was a pair of court rulings – including one in our state – against the proposed Kroger (QFC, Fred Meyer, etc.)/Albertsons (Safeway) merger. One day later, Albertsons has announced it’s officially canceling the merger. From the company’s announcement:
Albertsons Companies, Inc. today announced it has exercised its right to terminate its merger agreement with Kroger after the U.S. District Court in Oregon and the King County Superior Court for the State of Washington issued injunctions with respect to the proposed merger on December 10, 2024.
Vivek Sankaran, CEO, commented: “Given the recent federal and state court decisions to block our proposed merger with Kroger, we have made the difficult decision to terminate the merger agreement. We are deeply disappointed in the courts’ decisions.”
In a separate announcement, Albertsons announced it’s suing Kroger, with this accusation:
Kroger willfully breached the Merger Agreement in several key ways, including by repeatedly refusing to divest assets necessary for antitrust approval, ignoring regulators’ feedback, rejecting stronger divestiture buyers and failing to cooperate with Albertsons.
In its own announcement, Kroger says the lawsuit is “baseless and without merit.”
If the merger had gone through, three West Seattle grocery stores were slated for divestiture to a third entity, as reported here in July – Admiral Safeway and both QFCs (Westwood Village and West Seattle Junction). The mega-merger plan was first announced more than two years ago.
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