DÜSSELDORF (dpa-AFX) - The perfumery chain Douglas, which only recently returned to the stock market, increased its sales in the second quarter (to the end of March). Based on preliminary figures, revenue rose by 11.5 percent year-on-year, as the company announced on Monday afternoon. The store business and online retail contributed to this in almost equal measure. At the same time, the company announced a refinancing. This is expected to reduce annual interest expenses by up to 100 million euros.

Following the listing on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange at the end of March, the company had already used the proceeds and a capital increase to repay some of its existing financing of 675 million euros ahead of schedule. The leverage ratio - debt in relation to adjusted operating profit (EBITDA) - has now fallen from 4.0 times at the end of 2023 to around 2.7 times, it was reported on Monday.

According to the announcement, the new financing now announced includes longer and medium-term loans totaling 1.25 billion euros. In addition, there is a revolving credit line of 350 million euros, of which Douglas has already drawn 50 million euros. The new financing will reduce interest rates from around 8 percent to between 5.5 and 6.5 percent.

The Douglas share price rose slightly following the news and closed the trading session up a good one percent at 19.82 euros. It thus continued its recovery attempt from Friday. Nevertheless, the share price has remained poor since the stock market collapse at the end of March: the shares were issued at 26.00 euros each and subsequently went straight down.

Douglas plans to publish its full financial figures for the second quarter and the first half of the year on May 29. Then there could also be statements on the outlook for the year.

In the previous financial year, the company had grown by 12 percent and achieved record sales of 4.1 billion euros. Following a loss in the previous year, Douglas was also in the black at the bottom line./mis/stw/he