Lastminute.com fell back into the red in the first quarter as a seasonal lull in sales and one-off charges hit the balance sheet at the online retailer.
Having reported its first quarterly profit in November (see
City News), losses totalled £1.58 million before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation in the three months to December.
However, the Christmas period is traditionally a quiet period for the travel industry and the deficit represented an improvement on the the £5.1 million underlying loss made in the same period a year earlier.
“Lastminute.com continues to make progress,” said the company’s chairman Allan Leighton. “Despite the uncertain political and economic environment that Europe is facing, our business model allows us to anticipate 2003 being another year of sustained and improving performance.”
Encouragingly for the online sector, revenues at Lastminute more than doubled from £4.8 million to £11.8 million as customer numbers hit 1.5 million. However, goodwill charges accruing from a number of acquisitions (e.g. Travelprice) and the cost of integrating these businesses and upgrading technology resulted in a net loss of £11.3 million for the December quarter.
Shares in Lastminute were up 0.25p at 91.75p at 11am today.
