Barry Group changes strategy - sheds assets
Canada: There are rumors floating around that the privately held fish and seafood company Barry Group in Newfoundland is in trouble. Company official denies this, claiming the company's balance sheet is in great shape.
In an online article in The Telegraph, a St. John's, Newfoundland daily newspaper, Barry Group's vice president, Karl Sullivan, is quoted as saying that "rumors of any possible trouble at the Barry Group are just that - rumors". "Our balance sheet is excellent - in great shape", he continued.
The rumors stems from activities over the past year when the company has shed a number of assets, from plants to fish quotas to aquaculture operations. Mr. Sullivan told The Telegraph that this was all part of a strategy the company started in 2007 in an attempt to become "lean and mean" and reduce their debt to a minimum. This was, according to Sullivan, a reaction to the trouble they saw brewing on the horizon for the entire industry.
The rumors could also be linked to last months collapse in the Icelandic banking industry. The Barry Group, according to The Telegraph article, registered CAD 40 million worth of demand debentures to the Icelandic bank Glitnir at the provincial registry of deeds, at a nominal interest rate of 15 per cent per year.
Mr. Sullivan claimed that the numbers being reported by The Telegram last month in a story on the implosion of the Icelandic banking industry "conveyed the wrong impression of Barry's debt to Glitnir. Supposedly, Barry Group's borrowing was less than half of the registered amount of CAD 40 million.
