METRO AG (Public, ETR:MEO) is a Germany-based trading and retail company. It acts as a holding company for the METRO Group, which is organized into four independent sales divisions: Metro Cash & Carry, which is engaged in cash and carry wholesaling worldwide; Real, which operates hypermarkets in Germany, Poland, Romania and Turkey; Media Markt and Saturn, which sells consumer electronics across Europe, and Galeria Kaufhof, a chain of department stores in Germany and Belgium.
The Company is active in about 2,200 locations in 32 countries in Europe, Africa and Asia.
On 30 May 2012, Metro Group of Germany sold the 30 Makro UK stores and all operational assets to Booker Group Plc in return for 9.99% of Booker's share capital, plus £15.8 million in cash: although the merger was referred to the Office of Fair Trading it was cleared by the Competition Commission in April 2013.
David versus Goliath in fishing Peru
A little more than three years ago, the government of the People's Republic of China surprised the world by reporting that its distant water industrial vessels, which fish for squid at the edge of the...