Italian state-owned postal services company Poste Italiane registered a consolidated net profit of EUR90.3mln (USD107.8mln) for 2003, compared to EUR21.6mln (USD25. 7 mln) for 2002, it was reported on May 4, 2004.
Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) stood at EUR1.175bln (USD1.403bln) for 2003, up 46 pct year-on-year.
Read MoreItalian state-owned postal services company Poste Italiane SpA expects to register a profit for 2003, the president of the postal company, Enzo Cardi, announced on April 28, 2004.
Poste Italiane will swing into profit for the first time after two years in the red, Cardi said. The financial results, which will be examined by the board of directors of the company in the week starting May 3, 2004, are expected to confirm the positive trend. Cardi expressed satisfaction with the acquisition of a 35 pct stake in Poste Italiane by Italy’s non-bank credit institution Cassa Depositi e Prestiti SpA (CDP), which took place at the end of 2003.
Read MoreIt has been interesting reading about the problems of Royal Mail, as our own Poste Italiane has also gone through years of problems. One of the most unlikely turnarounds, however, has taken place thanks to an initiative by Corrado Passera, one of Italy’s most outstanding businessmen. The long-troubled postal service is due to breakeven this year, four years after Passera agreed to take on its demoralised workers, truculent unions, inflated costs, and GBP538m annual losses. Some 14,000 post offices throughout Italy have been literally turned inside-out. The new Poste Italiane offices have a more welcoming atmosphere than many banks – and most importantly, post office staff have become courteous and extremely helpful – a big change from the surly staff of old. Key to the organisation’s revitalisation is Passera’s success at convincing unions and workers to sign up to 100 projects aimed at slashing costs and boosting revenues. His move to measure employees on performance also resulted in an exodus of some 25,000.
Read MorePoste Italiane’s auditor, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), is looking into a swap set up three years ago by the Italian postal group. The auditor has asked to show losses worth €104 million in the group’s accounts. The use of speculative derivatives is now fairly common practice for companies, which are not required by current accounting standards to add them to the balance sheets. The auditors, however, are against this.
Read MorePoints on the Poste Italiane presentation by Mostafa Elshorbagi at the IEA conference in Amsterdam.
summary by Paul Jackson
45% of revenue is now financial products, 47% postal products
direct mail market in Italy is 23% of UK and interested in developing it
their philosophy is to differentiate products by category of customer, develop tailor-made products for each sector and stimulate retail demand
they have 18% of the express courier market, growing at 3%. Very keen to develop new products and new markets.
keen to develop hybrid mail and also an electronic platform extending into direct mail marketing
would like to develop postecom abroad.
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