Waterford set to unveil annual report

STRUGGLING luxury goods maker Waterford Wedgwood will finally publish its annual report later this week.

The company published its financial accounts in June for the year to end March 2004, but the annual report has yet to be published.

Some reports suggested that this was because new accounting regulations would show a major hole in the company’s pension fund. However, senior sources said yesterday that these rumours were “rubbish” and the report was currently being printed.

The deficit in the staff pension fund will stand at around €130 million.

Waterford Wedgwood normally issues the annual report to shareholders about a month before the annual general meeting. The meeting, usually held in late July, will not take place this year until late October.

It is believe that the meeting is being held later this year because of the time spent finalising the sales of its cookware division, All Clad, in June.

Waterford Wedgwood has suffered a terrible period since the bottom fell out of the luxury good market after the September 11 attacks on America in 2001.

It has been forced to shed thousands of jobs around the world to scale back its cost base and has outsourced some productions to China.

The continued woes at the firm means that managers at the Waterford plants have told workers to prepare for cuts in their working week to save money.

The pressure on the company eased somewhat with the sale of All Clad division for €206m.

This will go some way to pay off its debts (in the region of €380m at the end of March), but still leaves the company, valued at only €135m, with a large debt mountain.

In June, the company said sales, excluding exchange rate fluctuations fell from €860m to €831m.

It made a loss before tax of just under €45m compared with a profit of €7.2m in 2003.