LUXEMBOURG (dpa-AFX) - The ailing real estate group Adler Group has again suffered a loss of billions in 2022. The bottom line was a loss of almost 1.7 billion euros due to a devaluation of the real estate portfolio as well as the value adjustment on receivables, as the Adler Group announced in Luxembourg on Tuesday. A year earlier, the company had already reported a loss of just under 1.2 billion euros. The value of the rental portfolio at the end of 2022 was 1.9 percent below the previous year's figure at 5.2 billion euros, according to a valuation by independent appraisers. The business figures for 2022 are unaudited as the company has not yet found a new auditor.

Last year, the auditing firm KPMG terminated its mandate due to differences of opinion. The restructuring plan calls for Adler Group to publish an audited annual report for 2022 and 2023 by the end of September 2024. Rödl & Partner now intends to take over the audit for the German subsidiary Adler Real Estate. The share price rose by around 2.5 percent in midday trading.

Rödl & Partner is out of the question as auditor for the entire group. "We are based in Luxembourg, Rödl & Partner does not have sufficient capacity and licenses to audit capital market-oriented companies in Luxembourg," explained Supervisory Board Chairman Stefan Kirsten in a conference call. Therefore, another auditor will continue to be sought for the Luxembourg activities and for the Group as a whole. However, he does not expect an auditor to be found by the time of the Annual General Meeting in May.

It was only in mid-April that a British court gave the real estate group the green light for a planned restructuring. "The agreement reached with Adler Group's bondholders in November 2022 was a decisive milestone on the road to securing the group's financial stability," said company director Thierry Beaudemoulin. Following the decision of the London High Court, the company is now in a position to implement its restructuring plan, he added.

Adler plans to pay off its multi-billion-dollar debt without a complete breakup of the company. "We are not doing a breakup," Chief Financial Officer Thomas Echelmeyer said in the conference call. The company will have to sell real estate to pay down debt, he said. The goal, he said, is to keep a Berlin portfolio, with a much smaller scale and a much smaller project development portfolio.

Adler's operating targets were met in 2022, the company added. Net rental income fell to €244.5 million, down from €346 million a year earlier. The company thus exceeded its own forecast. After the property sales, operating profit from rental (FFO 1) shrank to 86.8 million euros from 137.1 million euros previously, meeting the company's own forecast. In the current year, net rental income is expected to decline to between €207 million and €219 million.

According to the restructuring plan, Adler Group is not entitled to pay a dividend to shareholders for 2022 and beyond. This also affects Germany's largest real estate group Vonovia./mne/tav/mis