By Markus Wacket and Emma-Victoria Farr
BERLIN/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – German rail operator Deutsche Bahn’s management board has asked its supervisory board for the go-ahead to prepare a sale of its international logistics subsidiary Schenker, according to documents presented to Reuters on Thursday.
The formality would allow management to “examine and prepare a sale of up to 100% of the shares in Schenker,” the internal documents state ahead of a supervisory board meeting next week.
This gives the state-backed train company the opportunity to consider a complete or partial sale to Schenker’s competitors or to financial investors.
An IPO would also be possible, although this is currently considered unlikely in the volatile market enviroment.
A spokesperson for Deutsche Bahn declined to comment.
(Reporting by Markus Wacket in Berlin and Emma-Victoria Farr in Frankfurt, editing by Rachel More)