Solomon Lew's raid on Myer's shares this week will determine the future of the grand old dame of Australian department store retailing.
Insiders suggest Mr Lew is behind a swoop on close to 10 per cent of Myer's shares late on Monday.
If this happens, it will deal the veteran retailer into any negotiations over a future sale of Myer, or could provide the foundation for a full takeover bid.
It's believed the Myer shares were bought through one of Mr Lew's private vehicles not Premier Investments, which operates the wildly successful kids stationery label Smiggle as well as Peter Alexander, Portmans and Dotti.
One Myer shareholder said Mr Lew was the "most obvious buyer" for the stake given his history with the department store as well as his recent involvement in the sale of David Jones to South Africa Woolworths Holdings.
Mr Lew built a blocking stake in David Jones, which he wielded to convince Woolworths to buy his minority stake in Country Road at a significant profit.
Mr Lew has a long and sometimes troubled association with Myer, dating back to his ousting from the Coles Myer board in 2002 and market watchers claim Myer's low-rent retail real estate could also be a factor in his interest in the stock.
"The strategic change at Myer [under chief Richard Umbers] appears to be starting to bear fruit, even though sales weren't great in the first half," one analyst said.
"That could point to opportunistic timing but it's also likely the buyer has a longer-term strategic view on this."
Premier has close to $280 million in cash on its balance sheet, according to analysts and there is a similar amount of cash in Mr Lew's Australian Retail Investments.
One experienced retailer said a stake in Myer would give an investor like Mr Lew "a lot of options" in a market that's facing significant challenges, evidenced by the collapse of six high-profile, Australia apparel brands since December.
"This could be a blocking stake but by the same token Mr Lew has a chief executive he could put in to run Myer, who has department store experience," the retailer said.
"He might not have a definite plan but this will give him a lot of options."
One of those options would be to prevent another would-be buyer from acquiring Myer amid speculation David Jones owner Woolworths Holdings has already run the ruler over the chain and there is talk of interest from another overseas buyer.
"If Sol is behind this raid he's been very patient but this could also be a very negative tactic against landlords," one retail insider said.
"He could buy Myer and take advantage of the rent reductions."
Retail insiders believe it's unlikely Mr Lew will launch a takeover but Premier did warn retail rents needed to come down at the release of its half-year results last week.
Premier's chief executive Mark McInnes, the former David Jones chief executive warned landlords needed to "right size" rents and that the space brands like Marcs and David Lawrence was quitting was worth "far less than it once was"
Broker Citi said Myer's key asset was its "cheap rents" in high-quality Australian shopping centres, where it pays less than "one-fifth the rent of specialty retailers in the same centres".
It's understood talk of a Myer takeover emerged a year ago after a group of property executives drew up a plan to carve up its low-rent floor space across its extensive network.
According to one insider, the strategy focused on how the new owner could squeeze considerably higher returns from a portion of Myer's retail real estate.
Myer claimed to be in the dark over the sharemarket raid that resulted in more than 14 per cent of its stock changing hands on Monday.
Close to 10 per cent of shares were bought in a single transaction on Monday, prompting speculation Mr Lew had swooped on the department store.
In a statement to the Australian Stock Exchange on Tuesday, Myer said it had not received any "communication in relation to yesterday's trading or any corporate activity".
Sources close to Myer suggest the raid took the retailer by surprise and the involvement of Pershing Securities, which has previously bought shares in other companies on behalf of Mr Lew, raised the prospect he was linked to the transaction.
Premier was not commenting on Tuesday and Woolworths Holdings would not make any comment either.
