De Rigo: recovery in 2004
The group De Rigo published its data for the first six months of 2003: net turnover had dropped by 0.3% to 273.4 million euros compared to the 274,1 million in the same period of the previous year.
Ebitda was 32.3 million euros, falling by 1.5% compared to 32.8 million euros for the first six months of 2002. Operating profit increased by 2.7% to 19.3 million euros against 18.8 million euros in 2002, while net profits, amounting to 8.5 million euros, showed a downturn of 9.6%, mainly due to the higher rate of income tax.
At June 30 the De Rigo Group's financial indebtedness was 44.6 million euros, a considerable reduction compared to the 63.2 million recorded at end 2002. The improvement in the Group's financial position is largely due to cash flow generated by the retail distribution business.
The decrease in turnover by the production and wholesale division is mainly due to lower sales volumes in certain European markets, particularly Italy and France, and to an approximately 65% falloff in sales by Eid, the joint-venture with the Prada Group. The division's gross margin increased, reflecting greater efficiency in the production process.
Ennio De Rigo, president of the Group, made this comment about the first six-month results: 'We believe we have overcome the recent problems that had negatively affected our results, such as the level of service by suppliers of D&A lenses and the efficiency of the production process at the Italian facilities, which has now improved, and it's our opinion that the negative impact of events outside our control, such as Sars and the war in Iraq, is now behind us. The retail distribution business is bringing a strong increase in sales. Our expectations of a positive economic outlook for 2004 will help the Group to recover its confidence in predicting increases in the sales of sunglasses. De Rigo will strongly support its own brands, Police and Sting, as we have demonstrated with the recent agreement with the Formula One world champion, Michael Schumacher (the new testimonial for the Sting brand), and over the next few weeks we expect further developments which will increase the worldwide visibility of the Police brand'.
Lastly, De Rigo SpA shareholders have approved a plan for the acquisition of a maximum of 4.4 million own shares on the New York Stock Exchange. At September 23 the Group had acquired 223,000 American Depositary Shares, the same number as the Company's ordinary shares.
