Peugeot family "relinquish control" of PSA in Dongfeng + French state rescue

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-26243593

Struggling French carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen has sealed a long-awaited rescue deal that will see its founding family cede control of the company.

China's Dongfeng Motors and the French government will each invest about 800m euros (£660m) in return for 14% stakes.

The French government said earlier this week that further plant closures were "not on the agenda" once it became a major shareholder.

In that case, I predict that profits won't "be on the agenda" for a good while either...

Note: "reports say the deal is likely to be formally signed in March."

Still not much different to the state of the MGR-SAIC deal in February 2005 and the European operations are still making far too much loss for the amount of money being invested to last long. The deal will only be done if the Chinese government believes that Europe can be made profitable reasonably quickly which may be difficult since the French government has promised zero job losses if it makes its part of the investment.

How does it stack up regarding EU state-aid rules anyway?

Morris Motors wrote:How does it stack up regarding EU state-aid rules anyway?

I did read something about how they were getting around that a few weeks ago, can't remember the details, but clearly this isn't state-aid, there are no subsidies, grants or loans involved   

Press release

29 APRIL 2014
Completion of share and rights issues reserved for Dongfeng and the French state, new supervisory board structure

Following the Annual Shareholders' Meeting of 25 April 2014, PSA Peugeot Citroën today announced the completion of share and rights issues reserved for DongFeng Motor (Hong Kong) International Co., Ltd. and SOGEPA, a fully-owned French State company, for a total of €1.048 billion.
Following the completion of these transactions and the election of Xu Ping, Liu Weidong, Bruno Bézard, as well as SOGEPA (represented by Florence Verzelen), Etablissements Peugeot Frères (represented by Thierry Peugeot) and FFP (represented by Robert Peugeot) to the Supervisory Board, the latter appointed Louis Gallois, who is an independent member, as its Chairman.
In addition, the Supervisory Board appointed Bruno Bézard, Thierry Peugeot and Xu Ping as Vice-Chairmen of the Supervisory Board, Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux as Senior Independent Supervisory Board Member and Jean-Philippe Peugeot as Board Observer.
On taking up his duties, Louis Gallois, speaking on behalf of the members of the Board, paid tribute to Thierry Peugeot for the work he accomplished as Chairman of the Peugeot S.A. Supervisory Board since 2002.