Sawt Falasteen - 7-Eleven, Couche-Tard explore sell-offs ahead of potential merger

It comes just days after Seven & i -- which for two decades has wholly owned 7-Eleven, the world's biggest convenience store brand -- announced measures including a huge share buyback to fend off a takeover from Canada's Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT).

Seven & i last year rebuffed ACT's initial buyout offer worth nearly $40 billion, saying it had "grossly" undervalued its business and could face regulatory hurdles.

It would be the biggest foreign takeover of a Japanese firm -- merging the 7-Eleven, Circle K and other franchises to create a global convenience store behemoth.

Japanese media reported last week that a special committee scrutinising a raised offer by ACT of reportedly around $47 billion had decided to reject that too.

But Seven & i said merging with ACT was still on the table, and on Monday gave details of how they are working together.

The pair will "map out the viability of a divestiture process" by discussing "the group of stores to be sold and identifying potential buyers", a Seven & i statement said.

This would give a sense of how likely US antitrust regulators were to be satisfied, it said, adding that "joint outreach" by financial advisors to potential buyers had begun.

"We can now make progress towards determining whether a credible and actionable... divestiture package can be achieved that would allow a realistic assessment of ACT's proposal," it said.

- 'Hostile' bid -

Seven & i operates some 85,000 convenience stores worldwide.

Around a quarter of 7-Eleven outlets are in Japan where they sell everything from concert tickets to pet food and fresh rice balls, although sales have been flagging.

On Thursday, Seven & i had said it planned to buy back two trillion yen ($13.2 billion) of its own shares.

It also announced an IPO of its US unit and named Stephen Dacus as its first foreign CEO.

ACT, which began with one store in Quebec in 1980, runs nearly 17,000 convenience store outlets worldwide, including Circle K.

"We believe there is a clear path to obtaining regulatory approvals," ACT said Friday, adding that it had "identified a potential divestiture portfolio of US stores".

Roy Larke, co-founder of analysis firm JapanConsuming, told AFP that "I think Seven & i still plans to fight what is in practicality a hostile takeover bid from ACT".

"To avoid this, Seven & i may agree to sell all or part of 7-Eleven in order to be allowed to continue its rebuilding in Japan alone," he said.

"The antitrust issues raised by Seven & i are likely to be genuine problems and prove to be a significant barrier," Larke said.

But "I would not be surprised if a deal was done to merge the US operations (subject to government approval)".

O.Salim--SF-PST