For Q3 11, Chargeurs reported a 4% increase yoy in revenues to €132.9m, mainly due to a price effect of +8.3% partly offset by a 4.3% decline in volumes.
For the first 9M, revenues jumped to €423.6m, +10.4%, with volumes up only 0.7%.
The Wool division performed well to €140.1m (33% revenues) which represented a 24.3% increase compared to the same period last year (+18% in Q1 and +27% in H1) driven by the wool price.
The Protective films and Interlining divisions brought weaker top-line growth, with respectively +3.8% and +5.3% vs 7.7% and 8.1% in H1.
For FY 11, despite the lack of visibility on the macro-economic environment, the group guides for revenues to reach €551.1m (+7.6%), operating income to stand at €22.8m (+7%) and the net result to drop to €10m (-22.5% due to higher interest expenses).
After a good start to the year, the group was much more cautious for H2 and has been proved right.
Weakening demand will have a huge impact and debt should increase further (c.€8m according to our calculations to €83.24m).
Moreover, doubts remain on the group’s pricing power from Q4 and onwards: higher costs could also threaten the group’s profitability (time lag between cost increases and the rise in selling prices and resistance from customers).
Downward revision of our EBITDA forecasts for 2011, 2012 and 2013 by respectively -7.7%, -6.8% and -5.9%, to take into account the economic / financial turmoil.
