For today, we decided to bring you an updated overview of the indebtedness and capital structure of Croatian companies using H1 2021 results.
As all Croatian blue chips published their H1 2021 results, we decided to observe how indebted the companies are by comparing net debt to TTM EBITDA and % of debt financing.
Note that Adris grupa and ZABA were excluded from the overview as Adris operates as a holding, while ZABA is a bank.
Net Debt/ EBITDA*
*trailing 12m EBITDA
Among observed companies Končar, HT, and Ericsson Nikola Tesla operate at a negative net debt, meaning their cash position (short-term financial assets + cash and cash equivalents) exceeds their financial debt. Besides that, Arena Hospitality Group reported a negative TTM EBITDA (HRK -23m), so it is not included in the list above. At the same time, Arena’s net debt stands at HRK 1.1bn.
Unsurprisingly, two tourist companies lead the list with the highest indebtedness (of the observed companies), mostly due to a sharp decrease of EBITDA since the outbreak of the pandemic. Valamar Riviera operates currently with a net debt/EBITDA of 11.6x.
As a reminder, in H1, despite a challenging quarter, Valamar’s H1 EBITDA stood at HRK 25.9m, showing a significant improvement from HRK -107.9m in H1 2020. Such an improved result could be attributed mainly to Valamar’s solid cost management, State support measures and improvement in sales in Q2 to 37% of pre-pandemic result (Q2 2019). Valamar has made solid adjustment of business to the pandemic environment, while we expect further pick-up in sales in the rest of 2021.
Maistra comes next, with a net debt/EBITDA of 6.7x, while the company reported a TTM EBITDA of HRK 195.1m. We note that such results of Croatian tourists are not indicative of the 2021 relative indebtedness of Croatian tourists, given that pickup of tourist activity is seen in Q3 already. To read more about the current state of the Croatian tourist season click here.
On the flip side, three food companies have the lowest indebtedness of the observed companies. To be specific, Atlantic Group operates with a net debt/EBITDA of 0.68x, representing one of the lowest indebtedness of the company in its history. Podravka follows with 0.72x and Kraš with 0.87x.
