Grieg Seafood's total harvest volume for the first quarter of 2021 stood at 13,600 metric tons, a 26 percent reduction year on year.

This was in part due to the loss of harvests from its Shetland operations, which are now for sale and last year yielded 2,047 metric tons in the first quarter.

Grieg's Rogaland farms in Norway harvested 5,300 metric tons, down 24 percent; while Finnmark made a recovery from last year's winter-ulcer-struck harvests, with an 18 percent rise to 7,400 metric tons.

British Columbia farms, on the other, hand produced 65 percent fewer fish, falling to just 900 metric tons.

Farming costs also varied across the regions with Canada the highest at CAD 8.90 (€5.95/$7.13) per kilogram; Finnmark stood at NOK 46.90 (€4.67/$5.60) and Rogaland at NOK 42.50 (€4.23/$5.07) per kilogram.

Grieg fell short of its ambitious 2020 goals, and while coronavirus took its toll, the company admitted that its own challenges with fish health across several regions was equally to blame.

Bergen-based Grieg ended the year with a 79 percent drop in operating profit to NOK 233 (€23.3 million/$27.8 million). Revenues fell by 7.8 percent to NOK 4.4 billion (€440 million/$520 million).

In total, Grieg posted an EBIT/kilo of NOK 3.30 ($0.39/€0.33), well below the NOK 15 ($1.77/€1.49) it pulled in the year prior.

Grieg produced record volumes last year, but the 71,142 metric tons the group harvested in 2020 fell short of the 80,000-metric-ton target, a level it believes it will reach this year.

A damning new report released this week from investment bank Carnegie is urging investors to avoid Grieg Seafood shares as the company’s finances appear to be in dire straits with “no room for error ahead in 2021."

In his report, analyst Lars Konrad Johnsen says he expects Grieg Seafood will “run out of cash” in the second half of 2021 unless salmon prices rise sharply over the coming months, which it believes is “unlikely."

“And with continued COVID-19 restrictions preventing a sale of the Scottish region, it appears to us that alternatives except highly dilutive equity raising are few,” said Johnsen.

Grieg announced in November that it will divest its assets in Shetland, Scotland, "when the time is right" to focus on operations in Norway and Canada.

But DNB Markets Analyst Alexander Aukner rejected Carnegie's findings: "We think they will manage. They had NOK 1.5 billion (€149 million/$179 million) in cash and available credit at the end of the year and a potential sale in the UK to strengthen the balance sheet," Aukner told IntraFish.

"I'm sure there is a scenario where they need some cash but that's not our base case."

Finance

Canadian harvests, costs mar Grieg Seafood's Q1