3 minute read
Fishing for investment
ABANCA which owns 97 per cent of Nueva Pescanova,
synonymous with frozen fish in Spain, is reportedly looking for a business partner or a potential sale.
Based in Redondela (Pontevedra) Nueva Pescanova operates in 17 countries on five continents, selling its products in more than 80 countries.
Formerly known as Pescanova, which still appears on retail products, the original company collapsed and was refunded in 2015.
Kind gesture
HSBC is the first UK bank to delay closing a town’s only remaining branch until alternative arrangements are in place.
Banks agreed last year to fund hubs where all branches were closed and the cash machine network Link which connects practically all the country’s ATMs decided that a hub was needed to ensure continued access to cash.
Launching hubs has been slow, taking a year on average owing to difficulties in finding sites. This prompted HSBC to announce that it would suspend closures in Oakham (Rutland) Ripley (Derbyshire) and Colwyn Bay (Conwy) until cash deposit services were established.
Canadian seafood combine Cooke Inc was said to be in negotiations to buy a majority stake in the company in late February. It now has competition from US company Red Chamber
Group, which entered negotiations with Abanca in midMarch according to the Spanish digital newspaper, El Confidencial.
The deadline for paying a €150 million debt to Sabadell, Caixabank and Santander loomed at the same time although Nueva Pescanova announced beforehand that this would be paid “with total normality and full financial independence.”
Nueva Pescanova had total sales of €1.08 billion in the financial year that ended in
Essex freeport
DP WORLD, which owns P&O Ferries, will participate in the Thames Freeport in Essex.
Included in Rishi Sunak’s ports scheme, it will be corun by DP World, car manufacturer Ford and Forth Ports, with a £25 million (€28.4 million) allocation in government funding. This will go to local authorities, as the government tries to attract another £4.6 billion (€5.2 billion) in public and private investment.
The port is expected to generate more than 21,000 direct and indirect jobs.
DP World dismissed 800 P&O employees without giving them notice in March 2022, replacing them with foreign agency workers paid less than the minimum wage.
The government said at the time that the employees’ treatment was “wholly unacceptable” and two months later cancelled a P&O Ferries contract in response to the sackings.
LOWER energy prices in the UK now mean that the cost of ultra rapid charging for an electric vehicle costs less per mile than filling up with petrol.
The Electric Vehicle Recharge Report published by the Automobile Association found that drivers could save 8p (24 cents) per kilowatt by charging during off peak hours, but emphasised that savings were made only when plugging in at the right time.
Electric vehicle charging was ‘brilliant value for money’ compared to filling up with petrol and diesel, the report said, but warned that different operators had different off peak times, with some available only after 8pm.
March 2022, doubling its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (Ebitda) to €80 million compared with its €39.5 million results in 2020.
Despite these buoyant figures, the La Voz de Galicia predicted that the next fiscal year was likely to be “well below” the 2021 result.
Meanwhile, referring to negotiations with Cooke Inc and Red Chamber Group, Nueva Pescanova’s CEO Ignacio Gonzalez said Nueva Pescanova was not for sale.
Up goes Ale-Hop
GIFT shop chain Ale Hop had a 2022 turnover of €170 million, 70 per cent more than in 2021.
Instantly recognisable because of the trademark black andwhite cow outside the shops, Ale Hop was boosted by increased postpandemic sales but also expansion plans resulting in 48 new shops during the last financial year.
The company could meet the cost of the 2022 openings as a result of its policy of zero debt and reinvesting profits, said AleHop’s director general, Dario Grimalt.
The company, which now has more than 280 shops in Spain, Portugal, Croatia and Mexico, hopes to increase this to 300 by the end of this year.
Selling brand
RECKITT BENCKISER is selling its Spanish detergents division.
Headquartered in Britain, the €50 billion multinational which owns Durex condoms, Strepsils throat lozenges and Air Wick amongst other brands, will divest itself of Colon detergent and Flor fabric conditioner, two household names in Spain. It acquired both in the 1990s from the Catalan company Camp Hermanos, after fighting off Procter & Gamble in a bidding war, paying more than six billion pesetas (approximately €36 million) at the time.
Now, 30 years later, Reckitt Benckiser expects to sell for around €200 million.
Cutting salary
FLORENTINO PEREZ, president of construction, concessions and services company ACS, has forgone €1.5 million of his salary over the last two years. Owing to the economic slowdown during the pandemic he waived 30 per cent of the variable compensation added to his basic salary at the end of 2021, reducing this from €3.4 to €2.4 million owing to “exceptional circumstances”.
The Real Madrid president waived another €500,000 in 2022 after explaining that despite ACS’s good results, the group had not yet returned to prepandemic levels.
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