EG Group has agreed to sell its Italian and Australian businesses. The transaction agreements come after co-founder Zuber Issa proposed on Friday the sale of its entire U.S. convenience-store business as a way to reduce the United Kingdom-based company's debt.
- EG America is No. 6 on CSP’s 2025 Top 202 ranking of U.S. c-store chains by store count.
EG Group has entered into a definitive agreement to sell its Italian business for about $494 million to a consortium of established Italian operators, the company announced on Monday. These regional, family-owned Italian operators include PAD Multienergy S.p.A., Vega Carburanti S.p.A., Toil S.p.A., Dilella Invest, S.p.A. and GIAP s.r.l.
The proceeds of the sale will be used to further reduce debt. EG expects the transaction to be completed by the end of 2025.
“We remain relentlessly focused on driving forward EG Group's growth strategy,” said Russ Colaco, CEO of EG Group. “This important transaction is fully aligned with this strategy, as we continue to focus on our core markets with the greatest growth potential and deliver on our deleveraging program. We are grateful to our colleagues in Italy for their hard work and dedication, and we wish the business continued success in the future.”
EG Group has also agreed to sell its Australian business to Ampol Ltd. for about $715 million, EG said Thursday.
Ampol is an independent company based in Sydney, New South Wales, that supplies branded fuel and convenience, electric vehicle (EV) charging, refining and more.
EG expects the Australian transaction to close by mid-2026.
In April 2024, EG was eager to exit Australia after five years in the country, according to a Bloomberg report, which cited people familiar with the matter. The Blackburn, U.K.-based company bought 540 gas station sites in Australia for $1.1 billion in 2018.
“This transaction is a significant milestone in our ongoing efforts to streamline EG Group’s global portfolio and sharpen our focus on the markets where we see the largest growth opportunities,” Colaco said on Thursday. “We remain fully focused on executing our strategy and building a platform for further growth, with our world-class grocery and merchandise, foodservice and fuel retail proposition."
Colaco began his role as CEO in May. At the time, Mohsin Issa, co-founder and former CEO, said that after the sale of its U.K. business in November to Zuber Issa, the United States is EG’s largest region by sales, and the company needs its lead executives there. Colaco then assumed direct responsibility for EG America.
EG Group considers sale of U.S. c-store business
The Italian and Australian sales come after Zuber Issa pushed to sell the convenience-store company’s entire U.S. business to reduce its $5.3 billion debt load, according to the Financial Times. The recommendation contrasts with London-based private equity firm TDR Capital’s preference to take the company public.
Zuber Issa said selling the U.S. business is attractive because there are similar companies in the market to benchmark valuations, and a sale would lower the group’s leverage to about three times earnings, said the FT. Last year, EG’s U.S. division, EG America, generated an adjusted profit of $449 million, nearly 50% of the group’s total.
Zuber Issa said there are already potential buyers for the U.S. business.
“It will be an auction process which would get to a clear end goal much quicker than an IPO, and we can pay the debt off,” he told the FT.
EG Group is considering listing its public, non-restricted stock in the United States, for an initial public offering (IPO) worth more than $14 billion, according to a report in December by The Telegraph. The Blackburn, U.K.-based owner of the Cumberland Farms and other U.S. c-store chains is lining up banks for a potential listing in 2025, said the report.
The deal could bring EG Group an estimated valuation of approximately $14.3 billion, 13 times its underlying earnings of $1.1 billion last year, the report said.
Meanwhile, in an effort to reduce its debt, the company disposed of 26 non-core Minit Mart sites in the United States in April and received net proceeds of $43 million from Casey's General Stores Inc., Ankeny, Iowa. In May, it also completed a sale-and-leaseback transaction of 415 Cumberland Farms sites in the United States with Realty Income Corp., a San Diego-based real estate investment trust (REIT), resulting in net proceeds of about $1.4 billion.
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