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Ikea cranks up speed on hotel development

The investment arm of Ikea, which in August unveiled plans for a budget hotel chain, has more than doubled its investment pace, a spokesman said on Tuesday.

Ikea cranks up speed on hotel development

“We have more than doubled the pace of our investments. It’s possible thanks to our strong financial position and having an owner who takes a long-term perspective,” Anders Bylund, a spokesman for Inter Ikea, the company which holds the rights to the company brand, told business daily Dagens Industri.

More than four billion kronor ($600 million) will be invested annually, he said without specifying the time period.

“We’re ready to incur losses for several years in our growing operations. We count on getting good long-term returns on our investments,” Bylund said.

In addition to real estate projects in Britain and Germany, the company wants to develop shopping malls in Europe and China. It is also investing in privately held businesses in Sweden.

To avoid the turbulence of global stock markets, Inter Ikea has sold its equity holdings and invested in government bonds with high credit ratings.

The company announced in September it would up the pace of new store openings to between 20 and 25 branches per year, from the current six to 10.

Together with the Interogo Foundation, which is controlled by the family of Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad, Inter Ikea has access to a 160 billion kronor war chest that will fund future investments, Dagens Industri wrote.

AFP/The Local/at

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BUSINESS

France’s EDF hails €10billion profit, despite huge UK nuclear charge

French energy giant EDF has unveiled net profit of €10billion and cut its massive debt by increasing nuclear production after problems forced some plants offline.

France's EDF hails €10billion profit, despite huge UK nuclear charge

EDF hailed an “exceptional” year after its loss of €17.9billion in 2022.

Sales slipped 2.6 percent to €139.7billion , but the group managed to slice debt by €10billion euros to €54.4billion.

EDF said however that it had booked a €12.9 billion depreciation linked to difficulties at its Hinkley Point nuclear plant in Britain.

The charge includes €11.2 billion for Hinkley Point assets and €1.7billion at its British subsidiary, EDF Energy, the group explained.

EDF announced last month a fresh delay and additional costs for the giant project hit by repeated cost overruns.

“The year was marked by many events, in particular by the recovery of production and the company’s mobilisation around production recovery,” CEO Luc Remont told reporters.

EDF put its strong showing down to a strong operational performance, notably a significant increase in nuclear generation in France at a time of historically high prices.

That followed a drop in nuclear output in France in 2022. The group had to deal with stress corrosion problems at some reactors while also facing government orders to limit price rises.

The French reactors last year produced around 320.4 TWh, in the upper range of expectations.

Nuclear production had slid back in 2022 to 279 TWh, its lowest level in three decades, because of the corrosion problems and maintenance changes after
the Covid-19 pandemic.

Hinkley Point C is one of a small number of European Pressurised Reactors (EPRs) worldwide, an EDF-led design that has been plagued by cost overruns
running into billions of euros and years of construction delays.

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