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Haikui Seafood asserts itself against tough market conditions

DGAP-News: Haikui Seafood AG / Key word(s): Half Year Results
Haikui Seafood asserts itself against tough market conditions

20.08.2014 / 08:02

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Results H1 2014

Haikui Seafood asserts itself against tough market conditions

* Resilient profit margins despite revenue decline in H1 2014
* Full-year 2014 guidance maintained

Frankfurt am Main, August 20, 2014 - Despite the challenging business
environment, Haikui Seafood has asserted itself by delivering improved
profitability in the first half-year of 2014 while maintaining its strong
financial position.

Haikui Seafood succeeded in raising Q2 2014 revenue by 4.8 per cent to 28.3
million Euros compared to the same period last year. However, primarily due
to lower sales volume arising from keen competition and the on-going tight
supply of raw materials, revenue of Haikui Seafood decreased by 15.7 per
cent to 58.5 million Euros in the first six months of 2014 (H1 2013: 69.4
million Euros). Measured in Haikui Seafood's local currency RMB, revenue
decreased by 13.4 per cent year-on-year.

Frozen products are again the main contributor, accounting for 80.9 per
cent (H1 2013: 86.2 per cent) or 47.3 million Euros of the revenue in the
first six months of 2014. Haikui Seafood's second product segment, canned
products, accounted for the remaining 19.1 per cent of the revenue (H1
2013: 13.8 per cent). The 17.3 per cent increase in revenue from canned
products to 11.2 million Euros is mainly attributed to higher sales of
abalone products.


Nearly stable margins and improved net profit

Lower revenue and higher production costs led to a decline in gross profit
by 21.1 per cent to 10.1 million Euros (H1 2013: 12.8 million Euros). The
slight reduction of the gross profit margin from 18.4 per cent in the first
half-year of 2013 to 17.2 per cent in the first half-year of 2014 is mainly
due to the higher costs for raw materials and direct labour, which could
not be fully passed on to the market.

For the same reasons, profit from operations (EBIT) decreased by 21.9 per
cent to 7.6 million Euros (H1 2013: 9.7 million Euros). The EBIT margin
lost approximately one percentage point, decreasing to 13.0 per cent in the
first half-year of 2014 (H1 2013: 14.0 per cent).

However, net profit grew by 3.2 per cent to 6.1 million Euros (H1 2013: 5.9
million Euros) resulting in a net profit margin of 10.4 per cent, up by 1.9
percentage points compared to the corresponding previous period. This