On Tuesday, the regular General Assembly of Badel 1862 will be held, which should mark the beginning of the end of the agony in which the company found itself after last year’s General Assembly, which resulted in a split among shareholders, the departure of Ante Perković from the position of CEO, and the revelation of massive losses of the company.
The current Management and Supervisory Board have made significant efforts in the past period to ensure that tomorrow’s General Assembly accepts the proposals of the Management and proceeds without surprises. According to Zvjezdana Blažić, CEO of Badel 1862, discussions have been held with certain groups of shareholders of Badel 1862, and positions have been aligned regarding the decisions that the Assembly needs to make for the implementation of sustainable development and restructuring plans. In other words, the main shareholders have agreed to vote for all decisions proposed by the Management tomorrow. The most important of these decisions is granting the Management consent to prepare for the state’s entry into the ownership structure of the company in exchange for the debt that Badel 1862 has accumulated in previous years due to customs and tax obligations. The company submitted a formal request for the conversion of the debt in June to the Ministry of Agriculture, its parent ministry, which forwarded the request to the Ministry of Finance.
Atlantic made a final offer for Kalničke vode
Recently, a final proposal for the acquisition of Kalničke vode has arrived at the address of the Management of Badel 1862 from Atlantic Group. Therefore, the Management believes that the sale of Kalničke vode to Atlantic Group could be realized as early as this week or next week. The amount involved is still unknown. Although they say that Atlantic Group’s offer for Kalničke vode was the best, Badel 1862 does not hide that they will not earn much from this sale. However, given that Kalničke vode continuously generate losses for the company, the primary goal of Badel 1862’s Management is now to rid itself of this burden in its operations.
Although the Government has not yet responded to this request, Badel 1862’s Management believes that resolving the debt problem in this way will not be in question; it is just not yet possible to say whether all approximately 120 million kuna of debt will be converted into a state ownership stake in the company or whether part of the debt related to interest will be written off beforehand. That the state is willing to participate in resolving Badel 1862’s problems in this way is inferred by the Management from the decision to postpone the payment of this debt for 10 months by the Ministry of Finance, which referred to the request that Badel 1862 submitted to the state in the decision on the postponement of collection. Last year, Badel 1862 reported a loss of 221 million kuna. In the first six months of this year, the loss amounted to 29 million kuna, while in July, on a monthly basis, a profit of over six million kuna was achieved, resulting in a seven-month operation in the red by over 22 million kuna. (M.T.)
