Irish-based maritime transport group, Irish Continental Group (ICG), reported revenue increase of €31.8 mill (5.6%) to €603.8 mill.
EBITDA rose by €0.9 mill to €133.5 mill, due to a strong performance in the Ferries Division.
Cash generated from operations of €142.5 mill (2023=€136.7 mill) was used to fund capital expenditure of €15.8 mill and returns to shareholders of €33.7 mill via dividends and share buybacks.
Net debt at the year-end was €162.2 mill (2023 = €143.7 mill).
The Ferries Division saw strong volume growth across all markets. Significant progress was made in ICG’s target of returning to pre-Covid levels in passenger traffic.
The disruption at Holyhead in December, 2024 had a negative impact on the financial results. However, ICG said it was able to redeploy ships to minimise customer disruption and mitigate financial losses as much as possible.
In May, 2024, the Group chartered the ‘Oscar Wilde’ cruise ferry (ex ‘Spirit of Britain’) for an initial 24 month period with a purchase obligation at the end of charter period.
The vessel entered service in June on the Dover/Calais route and this allowed the Group to continue to grow on the Channel and improve its offering to customers.
Meanwhile, the ‘James Joyce’ (ex ‘Star’) was returned to her owners at the end of January, 2025.
Irish Ferries signed an agreement for the Dover/Calais route with P&O Ferries, allowing for space sharing on each others’ vessels for both freight and passenger traffic.
The initial focus was to introduce the space sharing for freight customers, which became fully operational by the end of last year and then the focus was shifted to introducing space sharing for passenger traffic.
While encouraging signs were seen in the Container and Terminal Division, it was a challenging year.
However, this was set against a number of years of strong growth and profitability prior to 2023.
Eucon container volumes and terminals’ lifts grew significantly last year but this volume growth, particularly in Eucon, led to higher costs.
Container rates did not fully recover, resulting in reduced profitability for the Division. However, ICG said it saw reassuring signs in the market and expected a further recovery in rates.
Chairman, John McGuckian (pictured), said; “2024 was a record year for ICG across most of our key metrics. Our ro-ro freight volumes and car volumes reached record highs, as did key financial metric of EBITDA.
“The closure of Holyhead Port in December, 2024 through to mid-January, 2025 had a serious impact on our customers at a key time of the year for both ro-ro freight and passenger traffic and clearly had an impact on our financials for 2024 and into the start of 2025.
“Irish Ferries is very well placed to benefit from the continued recovery in volumes back to 2019 levels. The Container and Terminal Division is experiencing significant underlying growth and we are excited by the extension of our container concession in Belfast for a further six years to 2032, which we see as a vote of confidence in our operational expertise.
“Capital allocation remains a key part of our strategic focus and our current balance sheet strength puts us in a very strong position to avail of opportunities as they arise. I would like to thank all my colleagues who have contributed to our journey so far and I would like to particularly thank all of those on the front line who help us satisfy our customer needs on a daily basis,” he said.
