Delhaize’s privatization operation weighs on the profits of parent group Ahold Delhaize | Domestic

The group’s net profit fell to 394 million euros, which at constant exchange rates is almost 30 percent less than a year earlier. The biggest impact was a write-off of 153 million euros at the American online supermarket FreshDirect, which Ahold Delhaize is selling to Getir, a flash grocery delivery company.

But the intervention at Delhaize in Belgium, where all integrated stores will be made independent, also had an impact on the results. Ahold Delhaize speaks of “61 million euros in restructuring costs and related costs due to the transformation in Belgium and other initiatives”. That transformation also had “a negative net impact of approximately 0.2 percentage points on comparable group sales,” Ahold Delhaize added. An independent buyer has now been found for 51 of the 128 integrated Delhaize supermarkets.

The Ahold Delhaize group achieved a quarterly turnover of 21.9 billion euros. That is a decrease of 2.1 percent compared to the third quarter of 2022. But that decrease is the result of negative exchange rate effects: at constant exchange rates, turnover grew by 2.9 percent. In Europe there was 7 percent growth at constant exchange rates, in the United States – Ahold Delhaize’s most important market based on sales – it was 0.5 percent.

Ahold Delhaize today also revised up its free cash flow forecast for this year. It now assumes a free cash flow of 2.2 to 2.4 billion euros, compared to 2 to 2.2 billion euros previously. And the group also announced that it would buy back an additional 1 billion euros worth of its own shares from the beginning of 2024.