Troubled Baltika to Sell Off Real Estate Holdings
Estonian clothing manufacturer Baltika has announced that it is getting out of the real estate business, selling off its office and retail center, Baltika Kvartal, in Tallinn.
The news was coupled with the company's fourth quarter results, released February 29, which showed losses of 1.9 million euros, uudised.err.ee reported.
The new figures mark Baltika's 13th consecutive loss-making quarter and put the group 5.9 million euros in the red for 2011.
The company, which produces clothing under the fashion brands Monton, Mosaic, Baltman and Ivo Nikkolo, was once the flagship of Estonian fashion production and export, but was hard hit by the economic downturn. It posted a 10.2 million euro loss for 2009 and a 6.3 million euro loss for 2010.
Baltika attributed its fourth-quarter losses to one-off expenses and said that revenue in its core business, retail sales, had actually increased by 2.7 percent compared to the same quarter of the previous year, reaching 15.5 million euros.
Steve Roman