Pepe Jeans Group seems to be facing difficulties and to have started a restructuring according to a recent story by Spanish newspaper El Confidencial. However, the fashion group controlled by Lebanese group M1 has denied the accuracy of what was published.
El Confidential reported that Pepe Jeans has hired the consulting company McKinsey to start a plan of restructuring and asked Rothschild bank to renegotiate for the third time a €250 million loan due to BBVA, Santander, CaixaBank, Bankia and Barclays.
According to the newspaper, Pepe Jeans lost €13.68 million during its last fiscal year, similarly to 2017 when it registered a €13.11 million loss. Among financial results it also reported that the group’s sales counted for €566 million and registered a negative EBITDA of €12.72 million in 2018, different from 2017 when it counted a positive EBITDA of €10.49 million.
Asked to respond to the story, Pepe Jeans told SPORTSWEAR INTERNATIONAL: “We do not give any credibility or comments to articles which are published by sensationalist press like El Confidential. Our last available audited accounts show our results of yearly sales €545 million and EBITDA of €65 million which have nothing to do with the figures mentioned in El Confidencial’s article. It is true that we are optimizing our debt structure to better meet our needs and that we are using Rothschild & Co to help us with this process. We have developed a comprehensive plan to improve the group's results covering all brands and channels which we are confident will enable us to better meet the needs of our consumers and we are in the process of implementing these initiatives. Where we consider it to be necessary we employ consultants to help us with this process. Our shareholders are fully supportive of the group's plans.”
Pepe Jeans Group owns the Pepe Jeans London, Hackett, Norton Clothing and Façonnable brands, and it distributes Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein in Spain and Portugal. The Pepe Jeans brand operates 373 stores directly and 128 in franchising.
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