A new saga in the “Alitalia takeover”-story, on 28 December Italian daily newspaper Corriere della Sera announced that German airline Lufthansa was the favourite for the takeover of the troubled Italian flagship carrier. Today business daily newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore claims that the Air France-KLM group and its American partner Delta Air Lines have decided to join the offer made by British low-cost airline easyJet.
Alitalia is not only an old acquaintance of Air France-KLM -being a reference shareholder from 2008 to 2013 before its departure to Etihad-, but the Italian airline is also the partner of Air France-KLM and Delta Air Lines in a trans-atlantic joint venture that started in 2010.
Bruno Trévidic wrote in an article for French business daily Les Echos that the Air France-KLM group and Delta Air Lines refused to comment on the subject and called it a “press rumor”. Meanwhile investors did react: the Air France-KLM group shares at the Euronext Paris dropped roughly 6% in two days.
