General – Stake Sale
Ørsted is in discussions to sell a 50% stake in its USD 11.4bn/EUR 9.7bn Hornsea 3 offshore wind farm project in the UK.
Ørsted previously unveiled it was holding advanced pre-contractual negotiations with an unnamed preferred bidder over selling the 50% interest in the 2.9-GW Hornsea 3 project. The Financial Times sources have now revealed that the talks are with US investment company Apollo.
Farm-downs are an important part of Orsted’s business model. In August, Ørsted announced a move to raise DKK 60 billion (USD 9.4bn/EUR 8bn) through a rights issue to beef up its capital structure after determining it would not be able to sell a minority stake in the Sunrise Wind offshore wind project in the US on satisfactory terms.
It then said it was continuing to advance the farm-down processes for its Changhua 2 and Hornsea 3 offshore wind farms and had commenced a sales process for a potential full divestment of its onshore business in Europe. It anticipates raising over DKK 35 billion from such sales in the period 2025-2026.
