With Puma’s stock under pressure, Chinese giants are circling the storied brand

Last week, Bloomberg reported that Fila and Jack Wolfskin owner Anta Sports was mulling a potential takeover of Puma — sending shares of the German sportswear maker up some 19% on Thursday, the most since late 2001. And Anta Sports isn’t the only suitor eyeing the discounted Puma, per sources cited in the report, as rival Chinese apparel firm Li Ning and Japan’s Asics might also be interested.

That news finally gave investors something to smile about, but it’s still nowhere close to repairing the damage of Puma’s miserable year, in which the stock has shed more than 50%. Furthermore, any potential sale is unlikely to be an easy one, as the Pinault family, which owns a 29% stake in the company, could prove an obstacle to any sale.

No room to swing a big cat

Puma has long tried to straddle the fine line between athletic apparel and fashion appeal. But squeezed by new competition in the running space from brands like On and Hoka, and facing fading customer enthusiasm even with heavy discounts, the brand’s profits have vanished. Over the last four quarters, the company has racked up the equivalent of nearly ~$330 million worth of losses, and its market cap has shrunk from nearly $20 billion in 2021 to just $3.5 billion at the time of writing.

Under its new CEO, Puma aims to return to growth by 2027 and become one of the top three sports brands globally — but with swelling excess inventory and a customer base used to seeing marked-down prices, that’s not going to be easy, and the company has already slashed ~1,400 jobs this year.

One bright spot — which reportedly shocked the people at Puma as much as everyone else — is the company’s latest elite running shoe, Fast-R, which blew the competition away in one study.