Tobacco.org

In depth - Richemont break-up ($$) 

Cigarettes are famously moreish. For investors too – tobacco companies’ captive customer bases and reliable cash flows can be hard to give up. Hence the continued complication of what should be a relatively simple operation: separating the luxury goods business of Richemont from the stake it owns in British American Tobacco. That 19.4 per cent holding accounts for almost half of the Swiss group’s $33bn market capitalisation.

Anton Rupert founded Rothmans in South Africa during the 1940s.

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