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Private equity-backed petrol station company EG Group is exploring the sale of some of its European businesses to tilt its focus towards the US ahead of an expected listing in New York.
EG Group, which is co-owned by TDR Capital and the billionaire Issa brothers, is considering offloading assets in France, the Benelux region, Germany or Italy to help ease its debt burden, according to people familiar with the matter.
EG Group is also aiming to sell its Australia business ahead of the initial public offering, the people said, as part of wider plans to transform the business into a US-focused chain.
The planned US IPO, which would bring a further blow to London’s stock market after investment outflows and a drought of new offerings, could come as early as this year and value EG Group at about $13bn.
EG Group is aiming for about two-thirds of its revenues to come from the US by the time it lists, the people said, up from one-third in 2024.
Europe and the US each accounted for about half of the group’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation last year.
EG Group was founded by Zuber and Mohsin Issa, two of the UK’s highest-profile entrepreneurs, with one petrol station near to where they grew up in Blackburn, Lancashire in 2001.
They expanded the business with the backing of TDR, which invested in 2014, through a string of debt fuelled acquisitions. The group now has more than 3,500 sites across Europe, 1,400 in the USA and 500 in Australia.
But the group has shed assets in recent years. In 2023, EG sold the bulk of its UK convenience stores and petrol forecourts to supermarket Asda, which is also owned by TDR and Mohsin Issa. Zuber Issa subsequently bought the remaining UK forecourts for about $340mn.
Revenues across EG Group fell 3.3 per cent in 2024 compared with the year before, with the Australian arm’s sales dropping 6.9 per cent and US sales down 6.7 per cent on a like-for-like basis.
TDR and EG Group declined to comment.
Additional reporting by Robert Smith
