Shares were near worthless
Trading at a tenth of a cent — and unmoved for some time — shares in the cash-strapped luxury goods group have been all-but-worthless for a long time. The company — which even last week was hopeful of inking a deal with a US-based private equity house to inject around €600 million into the business in return for a controlling stake and the soaking up of its €400m debt — said yesterday it was still hopeful a buyer for part of the business would be found.
Indeed, Waterford’s group chief executive David Sculley stated yesterday that the board remains optimistic “that ongoing discussions will result in a buyer being found for the businesses”.
David Carson of Deloitte, appointed as receiver for Waterford’s Irish-based subsidiaries, added that the business would be continuing to trade while a sale would be sought to keep it operating as a going concern.
The highest the group’s share price has been for sometime was 40c back in 2003.. Since then its share price has been in free-fall, dipping to 6c by the end of 2005 and 2c by the end of 2007. Total group turnover fell by 6.5% over the past five years.
Only last month, the group detailed how its first half losses — for the six months to the first week of October — had grown by 13%, on a year-on-year basis, to €63.2m and how first half revenue was down by 15% to €207.6m.
