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Statement by AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA on the short attack by Gotham City and outlook on the development of the business (deutsch)

Statement by AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA on the short attack by Gotham City and outlook on the development of the business

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DGAP-News: AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA / Schlagwort(e):

Stellungnahme

Statement by AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA on the short attack

by Gotham City and outlook on the development of the business

28.03.2017 / 16:17

Für den Inhalt der Mitteilung ist der Emittent verantwortlich.

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Statement by AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA on the short attack

by Gotham City and outlook on the development of the business

- Allegations of short-seller Gotham unfounded and distorting reality

- Share buy-back stepped-up: EUR 50m immediately, additionally EUR 160m as

of June 21, 2017

A. Executive summary

1. The report published today by Gotham City primarily consists of the

manipulation of facts known and already published by AURELIUS, which have

been presented intentionally in a misleading fashion and with false claims,

presumptions and assertions to deliberately distort the situation in order

to cause damage for the shareholders of AURELIUS in its own economic

interest (short position).

2. The conclusions drawn by Gotham City Research are substantially

incorrect. At no time has Gotham City Research attempted to make contact

with AURELIUS, let alone held a telephone conversation or personal

conversation with AURELIUS.

3. Gotham City Research claims to hold a significant short position in

AURELIUS. Gotham City Research therefore has a fundamental interest in

damaging the reputation of AURELIUS by making false assertions and drawing

incorrect conclusions in order to manipulate AURELIUS's share price and make

significant speculative gains to the detriment of our shareholders when

prices fall substantially.

B. Corrective statement

Below, we correct the main incorrect claims made by Gotham City Research:

Re Arques

It is true that Dirk Markus worked for Arques until of the end of 2004. He

has been responsible for the operational turnaround of portfolio companies.

The disappointing development of Arques that started in 2008 is due to bad

deals done in 2006 and 2007 rather than the business model in general.

Achieving negative goodwill upon the acquisition of companies is an

intrinsic component of the business model and AURELIUS has always been very

transparent in disclosing and explaining it.

Re Contingent liabilities

Contingent liabilities are not overstated. Guarantees given to buyers of

businesses are part of normal M&A transactions and materialize only in

exceptional cases. The example of Wellman cited in the report demonstrates

this well. The presumed "risk" at Wellman mentioned in the report never

materialized and the last guarantee tranche expired in Nov 2016.

Re Insolvencies

AURELIUS has since 2006 acquired almost 80 companies all of which were in a

special situation. While AURELIUS was able to restructure most of them in

some cases insolvencies could not be avoided, especially when insolvency

regime tools such as ESUG (in Germany) and pre-pack (in the UK) were used to

actively safe a company.

Re Net Asset Value

NAV is a model and as such always subject to assumptions. With regard to

most of the exits we had since publishing the NAV the purchase price was

always close to NAV. Discount factors used are published quarterly and

influenced by interest rate changes. As such it is not surprising that they

are lower today then a few years ago.

Re Auditor

AURELIUS has been audited by Warth & Klein Grant Thornton since 2010. While

not a member of the big four, Grant Thornton is among the top ten auditing

companies in the world with a well reputed network and presence in 130

countries.

Re Why not an unqualified audit?

For more than ten years, the audit has led to no reservations; the audit

opinion has only been qualified with regard to the disclosure of individual

purchase prices paid in acquisitions under IFRS 3 and 8. We strongly believe

that disclosing purchases prices would have a negative competitive impact in

comparison to non-listed competitors and therefore have never done so

Re Is Dirk Markus CEO and CFO in one person?

Dirk Markus is CEO of AURELIUS and lives in London because he is in charge

of the international portfolio of Aurelius as well as Investor Relations.

Steffen Schiefer is CFO of AURELIUS and has been so successfully since 2012.

Re Litigation

Litigation is part of normal live in a corporation in our size and in

restructuring situations can sometimes be contentious. However the number of

lawsuits is in line with a company of our size, total cash out for lawsuits

over the last ten years has been a single-digit million EUR-amount and

AURELIUS does not expect this to change materially in the future.

Over the coming days, we will issue a more comprehensive rebuttal of the

allegations.

Further, the company is evaluating possible damage claims with regard to a

liability for unlawful acts, the notification of BaFin and the filing of a

criminal complaint against the responsible individuals with the hedge funds

Gotham City for market manipulation.

Share buy-back stepped-up: EUR 50m immediately, additionally EUR 160m as of

June 21, 2017

AURELIUS will immediately set-up another share buy-back program in the

amount of EUR 50m and will cancel the shares already bought by the company

during the current buy-back programme. In addition, the company will propose

to the Annual General Meeting on June 21, 2017 to authorize the acquisition

of up to 10% of the Company's share capital, equaling approximately EUR 160m

based on the current share price.

Positive Outlook

AURELIUS sees a strong exit pipeline and interest in its subsidiaries.

AURELIUS expects to successfully exit two to three sizeable companies over

the next few months.

With the acquisition of Office Depot and WEX, AURELIUS had a good start to

fiscal year 2017. Group revenues and total group EBITDA are expected to

increase further.

AURELIUS will continue to position itself as preferred partner in complex

pan-European corporate spin-offs. AURELIUS expects a minimum of 6

acquisitions in 2017.

AURELIUS will continue a sustainable dividend policy and share buy-back

program.

Conference Call on full-year results on May 29, 2017

AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA will publish its full-year

results 2016 on March 29, 2017 at around 11am CET. A telephone conference

with the AURELIUS Executive Board will be held at 2pm CET on Wednesday,

March 29, 2017 in English for interested investors and journalists. Please

send an email to [e-mail] to register.

March 28, 2017

CONTACT

AURELIUS Group

Anke Banaschewski

Investor Relations & Corporate Communications

Phone: [phone]

Fax: [phone]

E-Mail: [e-mail]

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28.03.2017 Veröffentlichung einer Corporate News/Finanznachricht,

übermittelt durch DGAP - ein Service der EQS Group AG.

Für den Inhalt der Mitteilung ist der Emittent / Herausgeber verantwortlich.

Die DGAP Distributionsservices umfassen gesetzliche Meldepflichten,

Corporate News/Finanznachrichten und Pressemitteilungen.

Medienarchiv unter http://www.dgap.de

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Sprache: Deutsch

Unternehmen: AURELIUS Equity Opportunities SE & Co. KGaA

Ludwig-Ganghofer-Straße 6

82031 Grünwald

Deutschland

Telefon: [phone]

Fax: [phone]

E-Mail: [e-mail]

Internet: www.aureliusinvest.de

ISIN: DE000A0JK2A8

WKN: A0JK2A

Börsen: Freiverkehr in Berlin, München, Stuttgart, Tradegate

Exchange; Open Market in Frankfurt

Ende der Mitteilung DGAP News-Service

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