Grenke AG — Earnings Release 2004

Jan 4, 2005

News Details

Ad-hoc | 4 January 2005 07:53

GRENKELEASING AG puts on spurt of growth in Q4

Ad hoc announcement §15 WpHG New Business and margin of new business for 2004 GRENKELEASING AG puts on spurt of growth in Q4 Ad hoc announcement transmitted by DGAP. The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement. —————————————————————————— Baden-Baden, January 4, 2005: GRENKELEASING closed 2004 with earnings in new business – i.e. the total acquisition costs of newly purchased leased assets – of EUR 363 million (previous year EUR 309 million). This corresponds to year- on-year growth in new business of 17.5 % for the full year 2004. The volume of new business came to EUR 106 million in Q4 2004, representing a rise of 29 % over Q3 2004(EUR 82 million) and 18.6 % over the previous year (Q4-2003: EUR 90 million). The margin of new business (contribution margin 1), from which the financial result over the life of a contract is derived and which is thus a key profitability indicator, rose correspondingly to EUR 40 million in 2004 against last year’s comparable of EUR 34 million, representing an increase of 18 %. Its new business in Germany rose by 10.4 %. GRENKELEASING’s foreign subsidiaries made a 27 % contribution to the group’s new business. The company will publish its audited annual accounts on January 28, 2005. The Executive Board Should you have any queries, please contact: Renate Hauss Tel: + 49 7221 5007-204 Fax: + 49 7221 5007-112 E mail: investor@grenkeleasing.de Internet: http://www.grenkeleasing.de GRENKELEASING AG Neuer Markt 2 76532 Baden-Baden Deutschland ISIN: DE0005865901 WKN: 586590 Listed: Frankfurt; Geregelter Markt in Frankfurt (Prime Standard); Freiverkehr in Berlin-Bremen, Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Hannover, München und Stuttgart End of ad hoc announcement (c)DGAP 04.01.2005 Issuer’s information/explanatory remarks concerning this ad hoc announcement: Explanatory text “As expected, we managed to put on a new spurt of growth in Q4. Although the increase in new business of 29 % over the previous quarter is overstated due to the basis effect caused by Q3 being somewhat weaker, the figures are nevertheless heartening. Equally gladdening was German growth of 10.4 % for the full year, 10.1 % compared to the same quarter of the previous year and 30 % over Q3 2004. We were thus able to achieve considerable growth in our domestic market and so expand our market share,” explains Wolfgang Grenke, Chairman of the Executive Board of GRENKELEASING AG. He added that the corresponding target for 2005 was a renewed double-digit increase in new business, with profits expected to follow this trend. As for the distribution side, the company has managed to expand its strategic partnerships. GRENKELEASING AG and NT plus AG recently concluded a framework agreement. As a leading ITC distributor, NT plus AG offers specialist dealers financial services under the umbrella of NT finance. Its cooperation with GRENKELEASING now paves the way for an increase in its small-ticket and medium-sized business. A cooperation agreement was concluded with Kyocera Mita Deutschland GmbH, a leading provider of economical output solutions (ECO laser printers, digital copiers and multifunction systems), which is due to commence as of January 2005. The company’s cooperation with Hewlett-Packard was placed on a new contractual footing. The previous contract covered a refinancing of the leasing business by Hewlett-Packard and expired at the end of 2003 when GRENKELEASING bought back the lease payment receivables. “Even though, in the meantime, little has changed in terms of having common distribution activities, the new agreement underscores both parties’ intention to continue to expand on their previous successes”, says Wolfgang Grenke, commenting on the concluded contract. Shortly before the end of the year, GRENKELEASING concluded a third ABCP (Asset-Backed Commercial Paper) programme. The EUR 150 million programme was arranged by SEB and increases GRENKELEASING’s financing leeway along with very favourable interest terms. The group recorded 101.691 leasing enquiries in FY 2004, leading to the generation of 51.546 new leasing contracts. The average value per concluded contract came to EUR 7,047 and is thus higher than in the previous year (2003: EUR 6,850). The company now has operations in 13 European countries. GRENKELEASING is represented in 20 cities throughout Germany. In addition to its five French branch offices, it has subsidiaries each in Switzerland, Austria, Italy, the Czech Republic, Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Ireland. A franchise system gives GRENKELEASING a presence in the UK and Poland. GRENKELEASING is the German and Swiss market leader in small-ticket IT leasing, i.e. for products such as PC’s, notebooks, copiers, printers, or software up to an acquisition value of EUR 25,000. GRENKELEASING AG is listed in the Prime Standard segment of the German stock exchange in Frankfurt and has a listing on the SDAX (small-cap) index. Information on the company and its products is available on the Internet under http://www.grenkeleasing.de . End of message (c)DGAP 040753 Jän 05