by Alfredo Ballarini06   Agosto   2014

Packaging: a top class industry

The industry of packaging, made up of companies supplying the ceramic tiles manufacturers - has been observed through a representative sample of 14 companies of equal size, with a turnover not exceeding 50,000€. The survey has showed a 2.39% increase in 2012, with a turnover going from almost 225€ million  to 230.3€ million. EBITDA has grown from 5.72% to 7.07% of the produced value due to an increase of the impact of surplus value – although it has been registered a slightly higher impact of the cost of labour and of other management costs. Amortization itself has increased both in absolute value and in percentage; despite that EBIT is increasing from 7.43 to 10.5€ million, corrisponding to 4.46% of production value.  Thanks also to exceptional items, net profit keeps growing as it has during the last three years.
Financial management has improved compared to the two previous years and keeps itself at 18% of total turnover, a figure completely manageable. Free cash flow is increasing to a level that would allow to close financial exposure within the next 3 years with values unchanged.

As the chart points out, treasury management underlines the need for a time frame restructuring of the various positions and of the financial cycle: collection and payment schedule is unbalanced, with collection delayed compared to payments made.
Forecasts on profitability show that EBITDA is more likely to have a lower impact. EBITDA has a 56% chances of decreasing below 6.3% of impact on produced value, while there is just a 2% chance that it overcomes 7.9%; and there are a 42% chances that EBITDA remains between 6.3 e 7.9%.
 

Summarizing the field’s economic and financial scenario through a unified rating process we would have (by simplified calculation) a Standard & Poor’s excellent A+ rating.