2024-08-15 11:07:01
Baywa’s agricultural business is in business worldwide – and it has passed. The company is important for farmers and food supplies in many countries. Now comes first aid.
Munich.
The Baywa Assembly, which suffers under billions in debt, is supported by creditor banks and major shareholders with a short-term cash injection of over half a billion euros. This is intended to ensure that the conglomerate, which is important for farmers and food supply, especially in southern Germany, is water. As Baywa announced, the aid package has several components, most of which are loans totaling nearly 400 million euros.
The most important creditor banks provide a loan of 272 million euros, limited to the end of September and with the option to extend until the end of December. The main shareholders of Baywa are the holding companies of cooperatives in Bavaria and Austria: Bayerische Raiffeisen Beteiligung (BRB) and Raiffeisen Agrar Invest (RAIG) share shareholder loans of up to 125 million euros. On the other hand, Baywa sold his own 45 shares in BRB to DZ-Bank and BRB for 120 million. In addition, the sale of grain and a small share of our company to Austria for a total of 30 million euros.
Over five billion euros in financial debt
Baywa, which emerged from the cooperative group and has 24,000 employees worldwide, has short-term and long-term financial liabilities of up to 5.6 billion euros. The immediate cause of the current crisis is a combination of interest rate increases and a weak global economy. Due to the rapid increase in loan interest rates, Baywa’s interest burden tripled to 362 million euros from 2021 to 2023. This year also started expensively: in the first quarter of this year alone, Baywa paid 97 million euros Europe has a loan interest to banks.
A long-term fix is pending
Now we have helped Baywa out of his financial problems in the short term, but that does not mean a long term solution. Roland Berger’s management consultancy, brought in by the board, is due to present its restructuring report in mid-September. In view of the billions of debt, it should not be expected that everything in Baywa should continue as before. In all likelihood, Baywa’s advisors will recommend selling shares in the company in order to return to a more stable footing.
The most of the expansion on credit
The debts of the S-Dax group even go back to the office period of the former President Klaus Josef Lutz, who recently denied responsibility in an interview with “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. The president of the Bavarian Chamber of Industry and Commerce sits at the executive chair of Baywa until the spring of 2023. Under his aegis, the company, which was once limited to agricultural business, turned into an international corporation.
Works in 50 countries
Not everyone knows Baywa, but many people know its apples
Many customers who are not familiar with the Baywa company name are still familiar with the company’s products: In New Zealand, under Lutz’s aegis, Baywa became the majority owner of the apple producer Turners & Growers (T&G), which operates the plant in all continents and export its fruit to 60 countries. The two T&G apple varieties “Envy” and “Jazz” can still be found regularly on German supermarket shelves.
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