The aftermath of the hacker attack on the active ingredient researcher and developer EVOTEC in the spring is now noticeably easing.
The company announced in Hamburg that productivity and capacity utilization were still impaired. Thanks to strong demand, EVOTEC was recently able to improve its operating result. Investors on the stock market reacted very happily. Nevertheless, investors have to swallow a big toad for this year: The management around CEO Werner Lanthaler is still preparing for a decline in profits for the year as a whole and confirmed the annual targets that had already been lowered in the summer.
The EVOTEC papers temporarily rose in price by 4.16 percent to 17.14 euros. One trader said the numbers were better than expected. Warburg expert Christian Ehmann confirmed the company’s unexpectedly good development in almost all areas. In addition, the core business continues to develop strongly, he praised. “Given the circumstances, the results point in the right direction and are encouraging.”
EVOTEC attributed the increase in earnings primarily to the group’s continued work on important collaborations. The company said that this partially cushioned the burden of the attack. For example, the Hamburg-based company works with Bristol-Myers Squibb, Bayer and the generic drug manufacturer Sandoz.
After the first nine months, sales have now reached 580 million euros, which is 14 percent more than in the same period last year. For 2023, EVOTEC continues to calculate revenue of 750 to 790 million euros, after 751 million euros in the previous year.
Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (adjusted Ebitda), which had been declining in the first half of the year, increased by 13 percent to 50.2 million euros after the first three quarters. The annual target remains unchanged at 60 to 80 million euros after 102 million euros a year ago.
The bottom line is that the deficit after the first three quarters was reduced by a good half compared to the previous year to just under 68 million euros – this was also due to lower losses from the revaluation of investments.
EVOTEC fell victim to the cyber attack in April. In response to the attack, the company initially switched off all systems connected to external sources. Most of the processes are now back in motion. The audited annual report for 2022 was also delayed, which is why the group had to leave the MDAX in the meantime.
The whole thing came at a time when EVOTEC has to cope with the costly start-up of new factories in the USA and France. As a consequence of the attack, management lowered its forecasts for 2023 in July and also implemented an austerity program. For example, EVOTEC is putting the red pen in administration and sales.
As of the end of September, the group has now put the costs that the cyber attack has directly caused so far this year at just under 44 million euros. According to earlier information, a good 39 million euros of this was already attributable to the second quarter.
The attack also had serious consequences for the share: after it became known, the stock lost almost a quarter and slipped to an interim low of 15.38 euros in May. After recovering to almost 24.50 euros at the end of July, the stock had lost around a third by Tuesday evening. Due to the current price gains, the profit since the beginning of the year has now swelled to a good 16 percent.
/tav/jha/
HAMBURG (dpa-AFX)
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