House of Fraser is set to be acquired by Chinese conglomerate Sanpower imminently with a deal expected as early as today.
Sources said that the pair’s legal teams are in the final stages of securing the deal, which is thought to value the department store at £450m.
Chinese website Sina.cn published a photo of House of Fraser chairman Don McCarthy shaking hands with Yuan Yafei, the multimillionaire founder of Sanpower, who is understood to be taking a 89% stake in the business.
The deal ends House of Fraser’s prospective IPO, which it had been planning to get away in July this year.
It had been running a dual-track process with Rothschild, HSBC and Numis advising on its IPO.
House of Fraser has a complicated ownership structure with a number of investment groups holding stakes in it, including representatives of the Icelandic banks that took control of failed Icelandic investor Baugur.
House of Fraser declined to comment.
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