The Porsche Wars: Porsche Negotiating a Stake with Qatar

The ongoing Porsche-Volkswagen saga continues today with a confirmation of Middle East involvement. We reported in May that Lower Saxony had opened the doors to all those who wanted a piece of the action and now news agency Reuters writes that Porsche Automobil Holding SE is in talks to sell a stake of up to 25 percent in its holding company to the Gulf state of Qatar.

Citing a Financial Times report, the aforementioned source informs that Porsche CEO Wendelin Wiedeking has met with the state's Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), which is already looking through Porsche's books. Apparently, a deal is likely to be announced within weeks.

The alleged deal will involve a capital increase of up to 4.5 billion euros ($6.2 billion), in which Porsche and the Piech family owners would also participate.

As we initially reported, the outside investors variant surfaced after rumors about some Middle East-based sovereign wealth funds eyeing Volkswagen and Porsche started appearing.

The German automotive war started due to a huge 16.2 billion euro debt, most of it coming from the acquisition of Volkswagen stock. As a result, Ferdinand Piech started contemplating the idea of selling the company to Volkswagen. In addition, he said Porsche's CEO, Wendelin Wiedeking, as well as its CFO, Holger Haerter should be replaced by Volkswagen's Martin Winterkorn and Hans Dieter Poetsch respectively.

Reuters learned about the Middle-East involvement on May 30 when Qatar's prime minister, Youssef Kamal, told reporters Qatar was considering taking a stake in Porsche.