Veritas Investments Limited cited a year of significant challenge, restructuring, asset sales and refinancing as it revealed its preliminary results for FY18 – reporting an audited net profit of $4.49 million, compared to a net loss the year prior of $792,999.
The company showed profits from discontinued operations reached $4.8 million, largely made up of the gain on sale of the Mad Butcher franchise of $6.3 million weighed down by a loss of $1.45 million.
However, these numbers have not been confirmed by the company’s auditors, PricewaterhouseCoopers, according to BusinessDesk.
After the group’s sale of Mad Butcher earlier in the year to chief executive Michael Morton for $8 million in March 2018, auditors were unable to “obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to support the trading results, closure costs and gain on sale”.
The sale was made at less than a quarter of the price the business originally paid for it almost five years earlier.
The group’s Better Bar Company (BBC) enjoyed a strong year, with the British and Irish Lions Rugby Union tour cited as a determining factor according to Veritas
The BBC revenue reached $23.8 million for the year, compared to $23.6 million the year prior, though EBITDA dropped to $3.7 million from $5.9 million.
The result was impacted by changes to minimum wage leading to higher staff costs, as well as increased operating and property expenses.
Two profitable ouetlets under increased competition were marked as write-downs of goodwill, with the group considering the potential future of the outlets, from redevelopment, rebranding to sale.
