Deutsche Lufthansa AG’s second-largest shareholder is selling more than half its stake in the airline group three months after the death of family patriarch Heinz Hermann Thiele.
KB Holdings GmbH, through which Thiele built an around 12% stake in the German company, will sell 33 million of its 60 million shares, according to a statement late Thursday. At current prices, the stake being disposed is valued at about 358 million euros ($437 million).
The Thiele family is the largest private shareholder in Lufthansa, after the German government, which obtained a 20% holding with the bailout last year. The family had previously cut its stake to 10.1%, according to regulatory filings.
Thiele, who died in February, took
center stage last year as an activist investor in a drama gripping Lufthansa. He built a significant stake in the airline and expressed dissatisfaction with the German government’s rescue plan, though he ultimately supported the bailout. BBG