FRANKFURT (dpa-AFX Broker) - No new bad news is sometimes good news. The shares of Hellofresh rose by almost eleven percent to 7.46 euros on Friday after the presentation of final annual figures - despite critical voices on customer development. Investors were generally relieved that the annual report did not bring any major negative surprises after the recent upheavals.

The recovery was enough to lift the share price to its highest level for a week. Last Friday, the shares had fallen by almost half at times, partly due to the mid-term targets being canceled, bringing them to their lowest level since the beginning of 2019. On Friday, a Borsian emphasized the desolate situation at the cooking box supplier, which he compared to "scorched earth".

"Our key insight is the sharp decline in active customers despite the sudden increase in marketing costs," said William Woods from Bernstein Research at the end of the week in an initial reaction to the new details. Between October and the end of December, the number of active customers fell by 6.5 percent year-on-year to 6.6 million.

According to Woods, the other key figures published on Friday were largely in line with the previously announced key data. However, experts did not see any good news in the final annual report to justify the share price recovery. According to JPMorgan expert Marcus Diebel, the number of customers continues to develop weakly, especially in international business, which is a negative surprise.

At best, the development of the free cash flow was seen as pleasing. This was positive again in 2023 at 78 million euros and, according to Woods, this was due to a favorable development of working capital. In its press release, Hellofresh emphasized that the fourth quarter in particular had made a positive contribution of 33 million euros.

Despite the recovery on Friday, Hellofresh shares are still down almost 50 percent in 2024. A week ago, they slipped to their lowest level in five years.

During the pandemic, investors were still paying prices close to 100 euros at the end of 2021. Since then, Hellofresh shares have lost more than 90 percent of their value. In times of lockdown, the cooking boxes were in high demand due to closed restaurants, and at times Hellofresh even managed to become a member of the DAX. In the meantime, however, this has had no effect and the shares have fallen below the level at the beginning of the pandemic./tih/ngu/mis