By Greg Roumeliotis
Nov 7 (Reuters) - Signa Holding GmbH, the Austrian property and retail group that owns German department store operator Karstadt, sent Hudson's Bay Co HBC.TO this week details of the financing it has put together for its 3 billion euro bid ($3.5 billion) for Kaufhof, a German retail chain owned by Hudson's Bay.
Hudson's Bay had said last week it would review Signa's offer for Kaufhof, but also called it incomplete, non-binding and unsolicited, with no evidence of financing. gave Hudson's Bay a copy of a financing commitment letter from Austrian Raiffeisen Bank International AG for 700 million euros, which together with a capital increase by Signa last month and the assumption of a 1.34 billion euro real estate loan from German bank LBBW tied to Kaufhof, fully accounts for the Kaufhof bid consideration, according a letter from Signa to Hudson's Bay dated Nov. 6 and reviewed by Reuters.
Privately held Signa also sent Hudson's Bay confirmation of its bank account balance and a letter from accounting firm KPMG confirming that Signa's retail arm has 400 million euros in available liquidity and more than 650 million euros of unconditional capital commitments from its shareholders, according to the letter.
Signa confirmed the letter but offered no additional comment. A Hudson's Bay spokesman did not provide any immediate comment.