(New: Structure, share price, details from conference calls)

BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - The cooking box mail order company Hellofresh is only cautious about the current year after a strong final spurt in 2022. The group's management board can imagine both a decline and a significant jump upwards in the development of operating profit, but its forecast is below the average expectations of analysts. The caution is surprising after Hellofresh had performed significantly better than expected in terms of earnings in the final quarter of 2022. The share price slumped.

This did not bode well for the group's shares: the stock lost up to 13 percent in early trading. Although the share was able to reduce its losses somewhat in recent trading, it was still at the bottom of the MDax with a discount of almost five percent to 21.66 euros. The share price thus again approached the multi-year low of 19.21 euros to which it had fallen just last week.

This means that the share currently costs about as much again as it did before the Corona pandemic. The stock was one of the big financial market winners during the Corona crisis. In November 2021, the share price had climbed to almost 100 euros and the company's value to around 17 billion euros - at one point the stock was even listed in Germany's leading Dax index. But those days are over; after all, the share price has more than doubled since the IPO in November 2017.

In 2023, the Group's management expects a currency-adjusted increase in sales of two to ten percent, as the company announced in Berlin on Tuesday. In 2022, the company had increased its sales by almost 27 percent to 7.6 billion euros. Adjusted for currency translation effects due to the weak plus in the course of the year lower. The biggest driver in revenue growth is expected to be ready-to-eat meals in the North America segment, where Hellofresh will bundle the U.S. and Canada from 2023.

However, the Management Board is more pessimistic about the operating profit: adjusted for special effects, before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (Ebitda), 460 to 540 million euros are likely to be left over from sales, while industry experts had hoped for more on average. The company thus believes a further decline is possible. 2022 operating profit fell by almost ten percent to 477 million euros. One stock market participant even spoke of a "disaster".

Hellofresh based its cautious forecast on the fact that the company had still benefited strongly from the pandemic in the first half of 2022 - this effect is unlikely to be repeated after normalization and the discontinuation of Corona measures. In addition, the consumer environment is expected to remain subdued for most of the year.

The cooking box shipper is considered one of the strongest beneficiaries of the Corona pandemic: when people had to stay home and restaurants were not allowed to cater to local guests, ordering and delivery services came into focus. But since the restrictions have been removed, skeptics question further growth at companies such as Just Eat Takeaway, Delivery Hero and Deliveroo.

Furthermore, increased marketing costs, such as for free boxes or vouchers, are likely to negatively impact operating profits. For the current year, existing markets should become more profitable, Richter said in a conference with journalists. Opening up new markets is not on the cards, he added. Hellofresh had expanded rapidly in recent years, but had to scale back its test run in Japan at the turn of the year. It would have taken too long for the cooking box model to establish itself in the Far East, the manager said.

To ensure that business grows nonetheless, Richter wants to drive sales of additional more meals and add-on products such as appetizers, snacks or desserts in 2023. For example, Hellofresh Market is to be launched in additional countries, where customers can order breakfast items or nibbles, for example, apart from the well-known cooking boxes.

In recent years, the company has also expanded its range of pre-portioned ingredient packages. Since the acquisition of Factor in the U.S. and Youfoodz in Australia, Hellofresh also offers ready-to-eat meals, which are also to be marketed more strongly this year,

Already in the final quarter, the average order value at Group level increased by twelve percent on a currency-adjusted basis. The Group Management Board attributed this to the fact that it was able to sell more so-called "add-ons". Over the year, the average order value increased "significantly," Hellofresh CEO Dominik Richter said, according to the statement.

Sales climbed by almost a fifth to nearly 1.9 billion euros in the months of October to December. In addition, Hellofresh increased earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (Ebitda) adjusted for special effects by 22.4 percent to 160 million euros, significantly exceeding average analyst estimates.

However, fewer customers ordered in the fourth quarter in the USA - by far the company's most important market. In all other countries, which are combined in the International segment, the number of active customers increased slightly. For Hellofresh, customers are considered active if they have received at least one box within the past three months - regardless of whether consumers ordered them at full price or received them as part of trials or discount promotions.

Overall, Hellofresh fell far short of the number of active customers. This negative development is unlikely to change for the time being. CFO Christian Gärtner expects a decline in the middle single-digit percentage range for the first quarter. Over the year as a whole, the figure should be largely stable to slightly down, Richter added./ngu/zb/mis