Mister K, as the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky, 47 years old, one of the most mysterious protagonists of European finance, continues to buy the best of the continent's retail, after becoming number one in the energy field (gas, oil, coal) and in publishing. Although this latest move of his, among the others, concerns us very closely, in Italy the press and the distribution operators do not even remotely know who he is. And yet, he already decides what happens in our country in retail, energy and the press.
Daniel Kretinsky: number one in Europe in retail
A few days ago Kretinsky, through his Luxembourg financial institution Vesa Equity Investment, he bought himself a stake of more than 13% of Fnac Darty, one of the major international groups with chains of household appliances, IT, telephony and home electronics as well as entertainment (more than 8 billion euros in turnover in 2021, present in Europe, Africa and MO), becoming the second largest shareholder after Ceconomy . Which also includes the European giant MediaMarktSaturn and of which Kretinsky owns a substantial stake in addition to the fact that he also boasts a 37% stake in the German Metro AG (of which he intends to become the absolute owner).
Not only that, Mister K is also the reference shareholder of the French food giant Casino (30,5 billion in 2021, present in France and Latin America) in which it holds 10,01% of the capital and 7,42% of the voting and choice rights of the executives of the group which includes brands such as Monoprix, Franprix, Géant and Naturalia. Vesa Equity has recently increased its stake in the capital of the US sports distribution giant, Foot Locker (7 billion dollars in turnover) bringing it from 6 to 10,3% (equivalent to a value of 400 million dollars), with an extremely rapid disbursement of several billion.
It is also a European number one in energy
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the gigantic state-owned companies of the satellite countries, full of debts but also of patents, technologies and personnel, are at the mercy of Western businessmen with enormous financial means. Slovak businessmen like also profit from it, well guided and financed Patrick Tkac e Petr Waiter and very ambitious operators such as the very young Kretinsky who founded the company in 2009 Energeticky to Prumyslovy Holding AS (EPH), one of the leading electricity companies in Central Europe and which today records undisclosed turnovers but apparently higher than 3-4 billion euros.
And despite the opposition of Brussels circles that ban investments in polluting coal mines, Kretinsky has acquired the brown coal assets in Germany, Poland, England, France and Slovenia and also in the electricity sector with many plants including 7 in Italy. “Lignite is the ideal bridge technology – he declared the day after the operation to the Handelsblatt newspaper – Germany cannot only produce electricity with renewable energies“. Never more appropriate investments, in the face of that energy hurricane that is arriving with the collapse of gas supplies from Russia. There's more, this shrewd Mister K, in 2010 acquires 49% of Eustream, the main pipeline connecting Russian gas transiting Ukraine with Slovakia and Europe (particularly Poland, the Czech Republic and Austria). And which, according to an initial agreement between Slovakia, Poland, Romania and Hungary, should be transformed into a network for the transport of hydrogen and CO2, instead of natural gas.
Kretinsky also owns several media
From the very beginning Mister K dedicated himself to the ascent of the media of the whole of Central Europe, the former satellite countries of the USSR and built a media empire capable of influencing public opinion in all these countries. In 2018 he opens his impressive takeover of the French media, while at the same time he takes over numerous European radio stations. In France he acquires the publishing empire of the group Lagardiere Active and enter the capital of Le Monde in a dominant position. Among the newspapers he now owns in France, through Czech Media Invest (CMI), there are extremely important publications such as Elle, Art&Decoration, Télé 7 Jours, France Dimanche, Ici Paris and Public. And in September 2021 the Czech tycoon announces that he owns 5% of the national broadcaster TF1, but his sights are also directed towards the ProSiebenSat1 radio and television group based in Bavaria. And so Kretinsky now controls 12% of the capital, according to what has been revealed by the Suddeutsche Zeitung, compared to 25% of the reference shareholder, the Italian Mediaset.
The secrets of a meteoric rise: who is Daniel Kretinsky?
Mister K is also growing in football; he is in fact co-owner and president of the Sparta Prague and wants to become a minority shareholder of the West Ham for about 27%. The English company, due to Covid, is in a very serious crisis, with a loss of over 77 million euros in the 2020 financial year. This would be only the last of Kretinsky's turnover growth operations for the external perimeter, because the European and American financial market analysts believe that it has the firm intention of growing again and very rapidly thanks to a large and constant availability of financial resources. With operations, among other things, very careful not to immediately raise alarms and obstacles. Mister K, in fact, starts from the purchase of small shares of the targeted company's capital, without apparently showing a great interest in increasing them and not even in entering the board of directors or requesting any position. And then suddenly, putting enormous resources on the table in the face of serious crisis situations, he implements his quotas, becoming decisive in everything, in management, strategies, policies.
Last secret: he chooses sectors where, for various reasons, the traditional economy still counts a lot, from traditional media to retail for basic needs, from coal to football. He chose, for example, mines and coal-fired power plants as the core business of his energy company, because – he underlines with cynical realism – 75% of world electricity is produced from coal and will continue to be so. And since none of the purchased plants have been started up from scratch, Mister K manages to quickly amortize the investments. Thus, from the 2,6 billion dollars invoiced 4-5 years ago, Daniel Kretinsky has managed to rise to the current 5,3, which however are considered well below the real size of the group.
Read more: "Daniel Kretinsky: here is the new master of half of Europe"
