According to a recent announcement, the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bahn AG has instructed the Management Board to develop an implementation plan for a third-party minority holding in DB Arriva and DB Schenker. A final decision on the matter is planned for this coming Autumn.
The Supervisory Board and Management Board have announced the intention to take this step to financially secure the largest quality and investment campaign in the company’s history and to invest further in the growth of DB Arriva and DB Schenker.
As the Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Utz-Hellmuth Felcht, stated, “If we don’t take action, the Group’s debt will increase substantially by 2020. A third-party equity interest limits the level of debt and creates the financial scope necessary to continue the quality and investment campaign in Germany.”
From 2016 to 2020, some €50bn, or 90% of the €55bn the DB Group plans to invest overall is expected to go towards rail operations in Germany. Of the total investment amount, €20bn has to be financed by the Group itself. As DB Management Board Chairman Rüdiger Grube stated, “Our express intention is for DB Arriva and DB Schenker to continue to be fully consolidated in DB’s balance sheet.”
As part of the restructuring of the Group, the Supervisory Board has announced the decision to dissolve the two-tiered holding structure of Deutsche Bahn AG and DB Mobility Logistics AG. DB ML AG is now planned to be merged with DB AG. This is expected to apply retroactively to the balance sheet as of January 1, 2016. According to the announcement, this decision was made because the DB ML AG IPO that was cancelled in 2008, due to the financial crisis, is no longer being pursued.
Source: DB Schenker
