Edizione writes down stake in Benetton: 560 million impact

Edizione devalues half a billion Benetton Group, distributes one hundred million in dividends to shareholders, and aims to grow in the airport and motorway business.

The holding company headed by the Benetton family has filed its 2023 financial statements with important management growth results that mark an important stage in the transformation that has affected the holding company in recent years. The process, launched in 2021 by the second generation of the Ponzano Veneto-based family, and outlined by chairman Alessandro Benetton and ceo Enrico Laghi, has led the group to strengthen its position in strategic businesses, through the creation of Mundys and Avolta and through the growth of its stake in Cellnex.

All this in parallel with the diversification of the business, through investments in packaging companies such as IMA and ProMach Inc, and a constant strengthening of the international presence, through new acquisitions made by the motorway network platform Abertis. All this allowed Edizione in 2023 to record growing motorway and airport traffic flows, which ensured that the values of the most relevant business sectors remained stable. So much so that Net Asset Value reached EUR 11.7 billion in 2023 from EUR 11.4 billion in 2022. On the numbers front, consolidated revenue stood at EUR 9.5 billion, up 13% from EUR 8.5 billion in 2022. Including the contribution of Avolta and Cellnex (not consolidated in the accounts), 2023 revenue would be EUR 26 billion compared to EUR 16 billion in 2022. Consolidated ebit was EUR 2.1 billion in 2023, up 48% from 2022 (EUR 1.4 billion). And the parent company's net operating result was €216.4m in 2023 from €176.2m in 2022 to (+23%), thanks to the inflow of €294m in dividends from investees, of which €100m was distributed to Edizione's shareholders (unchanged from 2022).

At the accounting level, however, the net operating result was impacted by the decision to make an extraordinary write-down of the Benetton group's equity investment of Euro 560 million. This write-down had not been carried out in previous years and therefore generated a cumulative effect, resulting in a loss of EUR 341.6 million, compared to a profit of EUR 177.6 million in the previous year.

"2023 has been a year of strong planning for the new Edizione, set in the sign of discontinuity and a look to the future full of new investments, innovations and new trajectories of growth and international development," explains Alessandro Benetton in his letter to shareholders, emphasising that "all this has also been possible thanks to the trust of all shareholders in me, the CEO and a highly qualified board of directors who have continued to believe in the project and in the ethical principles of our Founding Fathers, which I recall here: growth, partnership development, internationalisation, sustainability and innovation'. According to Edizione's chairman, who goes over the key stages of the holding company's transformation, the partnerships achieved for the various investee companies and the revision of the system's governance, "the group's economic results have been extremely solid and are important not only for creating value but because they represent the effort made by a company of over 100,000 people to achieve sustainable development and growth".