Three years to the day since the announced integration of SWISS in the Lufthansa Aviation Group, the former majority shareholders of the Swiss carrier will shortly be receiving the payout for their out-performance option from the German airline. In exchange for their onetime SWISS shares, they will be paid a total of about 269 million Swiss francs (about 172 million euros). The payout level depends on the performance of the Lufthansa share price compared with the share price of a specified group of competitors (British Airways, Air France/KLM, Iberia). In the reference period Lufthansa shares have out-performed the defined basket of shares by 44.67 per cent. The success of SWISS in that period has contributed appreciably to this positive development. The payout formally concludes the trans-action between Lufthansa and SWISS announced three years ago.
Together with the some 70 million Swiss francs (around 45 million euros), which Lufthansa paid for about 15 per cent of SWISS equity in 2005, the price for the complete acquisition of the Swiss carrier now amounts to around 339 million Swiss francs (some 217 million euros).
