Thiele's heirs sell their Lufthansa shares

Less than three months after the death of the self-made billionaire Heinz Hermann Thiele from Munich, his heirs parted ways with a good half of their Lufthansa share stake. The family company KB Holding raised 323 million euros in just a few hours with the sale of 33 million Lufthansa shares on Thursday evening, as the investment bank commissioned with the placement announced. At EUR 9.80, the price was ten percent below the Xetra closing price of EUR 10.87 - an unusually large discount. KB Holding is reducing its stake in Lufthansa from 10.04 to around 4.5 percent, but is still likely to be its second largest shareholder after the federal government. Thiele had made rescuing Lufthansa in the Corona crisis in summer 2020 a tremendous game because, as a major shareholder, he refused to accept the conditions of partial nationalization until the last moment. He only got into Lufthansa during the pandemic on the hunt for bargains and at times held more than 15 percent. Lufthansa shares fell in late trading by 3.4 percent to 10.44 euros. However, the group is likely to come under further selling pressure. Thiele’s stakes in listed companies are to be brought into a foundation by the end of the year, as can be seen from his will. With its majority stakes in the Munich truck and rail supplier Knorr-Bremse and in the rail technology group Vossloh, the family emphasized that the shares remained entirely in the family's hands. The foundation and Thiele's daughter Julia Thiele-Schürhoff then together own 59 percent of Knorr-Bremse and 50.1 percent of Vossloh. There has never been such a specific commitment to KB Holding's involvement in Lufthansa. Thiele started at Knorr-Bremse in 1969 as a patent clerk, bought his employer during the crisis in 1985 and developed the medium-sized company into the world market leader for truck and train brakes. In 2018 Thiele brought the group to the stock exchange. In 2011 he joined Vossloh from Werdohl in the Sauerland. The "Manager Magazin" recently counted him and his family among the eight richest Germans, with assets of around 17 billion euros.