Accor shares plummet on new hotel strategy

Shares in hotel group Accor, owner of chains Sofitel and Ibis, plummetted on Wednesday with investors disappointed by a plan to reorganise the company into distinct hotel and real estate arms. The announcement was the first big move by new chief executive Sebastian Bazin, an activist shareholder who took the company reins in August after helping push his predecessor out the door for taking too soft an approach on strategy, notably real estate. But Bazin's plan, announced before trading opened, left investors cool with the price of shares in the company down by 2.73 percent in midday trading to 32.65 euros. The overall French market was showing a gain of 0.11 percent. "The new strategy doesn't exactly meet market expectations," analysts at Societe Generale said. "The market was looking for a cost cutting plan and an acceleration in changes." Denis Hennequin, a former head of McDonalds Europe, was sacked as chief executive in April with the board unhappy that the executive was not moving fast enough to unload the company'sreal estate holdings in order to focus on hotel management. The group, the sixth-biggest hotel chain in the world and Europe's biggest, reported in August a half year net profit of 34 million euros ($45.5 million) from a loss of 532 million euros at the same time last year.