(Finance) – LINE expects for 2021 a Normalized EBITDA of approximately 109 million euros (without the positive effect of IFRS 16), up by 14.3% compared to 95 million euros in 2020. The bank debt it is net improving to approximately 65 million euros, excluding the exchange rate effect. The company – listed on Euronext STAR Milan and active in the sale of items for the visual and plastic arts, creativity and design – says that the progress of the school & office in the most profitable geographic areas such as Europe and North America and a better sales mix of fine art, hobby & digital, more than offset the lower performance of India and Mexico, which show important signs of recovery for the year 2022.
“The pre-closure results of 2021 show a growth and data significantly above our expectations and forecasts at the beginning of the yearboth in terms of EBITDA and cash generation, considering that our forecasts included a contribution from India and Mexico, as early as June 2021, which did not fully occur – commented CEO Massimo Candela – In two years characterized by Covid we have generated around € 95 million in cash and brought leverage back to an optimal leveldemonstrating, in particular, our ability to improve the management of working capital and the efficiency of our integrated logistics, which we believe could represent an important competitive advantage in the coming quarters.
“Finally, I would like to underline that, also thanks to the vaccination campaign, the schools are reopening regularly around the world and that the Indian market, in particular, has already started growing at full capacity since the last months of 2021 – he added – We expect the same to happen in Mexico starting from the next few weeks “.