"Around 51% of the company's unsecured financial creditors have joined the agreement," Orpea said in a statement, adding that these lenders hold a total of "about 1.9 billion euros" in debt.
This majority membership paves the way for "the opening of an accelerated safeguard procedure" that the group intends to request "in the coming days" from the Commercial Court of Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine), "with the aim of implement its financial restructuring plan".
This plan plans to erase 3.8 billion euros of the group's debts out of a total of 9.7 billion, by converting them into capital.
It also stipulates that investors bring 1.55 billion euros of fresh money to the group, present in 22 countries and which manages some 350 establishments - retirement homes and clinics - in France.
Operations that accompany the change of shareholders recorded in early February, since at the end of the process, Orpea will be 50.2% owned by a group led by Caisse des dépôts and including insurers such as CNP Assurances, Maif and MACSF .
In turmoil since the publication in early 2022 of the investigative book "Les Fossoyeurs" and its revelations of mistreatment and financial irregularities, the French champion of retirement homes has lost more than 95% of its stock market value in 14 months.
This did not prevent it from obtaining 600 million euros in additional credit last week from "large French banks", to "cover its liquidity needs".
A sum that the group has promised to complete by selling "1.25 billion euros of real estate assets" by the end of 2025.
© 2023 AFP