Rocket Internet buys stocks back, stock rises – Samwer writes profits, but profit of his start-ups is missing
For the start-up investor Rocket Internet, a good half year comes to an end.The holdings of CEO Oliver Samwer, however, postpone their prospects for profits.
Samwer invests in start-ups and wants to sell his shares later with a profit. Recently, the entrepreneur has succeeded in showing the Home24 stock market chart with the IPOs of the self-founded companies, showingHelloFresh’s stock market chart and showing the holding’s Delivery Hero stock market chart . Rocket itself still has a lot of capital that it can invest: 2.1 billion euros.
With the profits, Rocket buys internet stock market chartnow again show shares back. Samwer announced Thursday morning that he intends to spend up to 150 million euros over the next few months to buy up to 3.6 percent of the outstanding shares. There are then two options: Either you want to reduce the share capital with the repurchased shares, which could reduce the number of securities and thus lead to higher earnings per share. Alternatively, the company will use them for the employee option program. Rocket currently controls 37.07% of the SE.
Read also the interview with Oliver Samwer: Leadership of German industry “an illusion”
The decision of the buyback program has driven the share price on Thursday: the shares advanced by just under 4 percent. So far this year, the Rocket papers have gained a good 27 percent and are thus among the best MDax values. However, the share price is still a long way off its issue price of EUR 42.50 after its crash in 2017.
At the same time Samwer announced numbers for selected holdings. His promise made some time ago to profitably trim at least three of his key holdings by the end of 2017 remains broken. Instead, just the furniture shop Home24, the cookie mailer HelloFresh and the delivery service portal Delivery Hero have shifted the prospects for profits. For Home24 customers, it was too hot,according to start-up , to buy a lot ; the other two companies justify the move with “investing in growth”.
The only portfolio company with a marginally positive Ebitda margin is the Westwing furniture store: it was 2.3 percent in the first half of the year. Most recently, the start-up cut back three markets, apparently in anticipation of going public , which Westwing recently announced . In the first six months of this year, the start-up’s turnover increased by 22 percent to 121 million euros.
The Global Fashion Group – a group of Zalando clones in emerging markets and Australia – increased their sales year-on-year by 20 percent to 535 million euros. On a euro basis, however, the group is facing currency effects: its growth is only 5 percent. While orders increased by 22.3 percent, the loss was still at 39.1 million euros.
The core of the portfolio seems to be the African online platform Jumia, for which Rocket Internet announced only the growth in sales and no losses that were high in the past. Oliver Samwer said in a telephone conversation with journalists Thursday that the start-up will try to recapture capital in the next 24 months. Whether Rocket Internet would also participate in the round of financing, he left open.
As Samwer recently said in an interview with manager magazin , he reaffirmed that Rocket is looking for start-ups in many areas. “The sectors are more open than we were four years ago,” says the CEO. “Software, fintech, artificial intelligence and marketplaces” – you can see all that.
With material from dpa-afx
Source: http://www.manager-magazin.de/digitales/it/oliver-samwers-rocket-internet-kauft-aktien-zurueck-und-schreibt-gewinn-a-1229077.html#ref=nl-managerupdate
