{"id":351364,"date":"2026-03-27T23:17:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T23:17:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/351364\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T23:17:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T23:17:10","slug":"whats-going-on-at-kathmandu-owner-kmd-brands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/351364\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s going on at Kathmandu owner KMD Brands?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/4MSIL3T_copyright_image_232286\" width=\"1050\" height=\"656\" alt=\"Kathmandu Head Office in Christchurch CBD\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"photo-captioned__information\">\nKMD has delayed the release of its financial results.<br \/>\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Nate McKinnon\n<\/p>\n<p>Over the course of this week, one of the country&#8217;s most well-known retailers has delayed the release of its financial results, not once, but twice.<\/p>\n<p>The moves by KMD Brands &#8211; owner of well-known outdoor goods brands Kathmandu and Rip Curl &#8211; have been called &#8220;unusual&#8221; by one investment expert, with questions being raised about what is going on behind the scenes.<\/p>\n<p>Leading up to this week, on 16 March, the dual NZX and ASX-listed firm indicated it was working with investment bank Goldman Sachs to help with its treasury and capital management strategy.<\/p>\n<p>It said &#8220;no decision&#8221; had been made around measures to raise capital, and it had not reached an agreement on refinancing its long-term debt facilities.<\/p>\n<p>On 18 March, KMD said it intended to release its half-year results on Wednesday, 25 March &#8211; a fairly standard announcement by listed companies.<\/p>\n<p>Fast-forward to Tuesday this week, a day before the results were due to be announced, and KMD made another statement to the stock exchange.<\/p>\n<p>This time, it revealed it had rejected a proposal by US firm Stokehouse to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rnz.co.nz\/news\/business\/590456\/rip-curl-de-merger-bid-rejected\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">de-merge Rip Curl<\/a> into a separate listed company and then merge it with Stokehouse, saying it created &#8220;no value for shareholders&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Then came results day on Wednesday, and around half-an-hour before the scheduled investor briefing at 10.30am, KMD made another announcement.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;KMD is not presently in a position to release its results as intended today. We expect to release our HY26 Results on Thursday, 26 March 2026 and no later than Friday, 27 March 2026,&#8221; the company said.<\/p>\n<p>Just over a couple of hours later, KMD made another statement, revealing its intention to launch a capital raise by way of a placement and AREO.<\/p>\n<p>AREO stands for accelerated renounceable entitlement offer &#8211; a fast-tracked offer allowing existing shareholders to buy more shares.<\/p>\n<p>KMD shares were also placed in a trading halt, having last traded at 19.5 cents on the NZX.<\/p>\n<p>Later that afternoon, it gave a few more details about the capital raise.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;KMD has commenced a confidential wall crossing process with select investors. KMD is continuing discussions to finalise the terms of the capital raising,&#8221; the company said.<\/p>\n<p>The statement indicated the company had approached a small number of large investors privately.<\/p>\n<p>No result was announced on Thursday and, on Friday morning, KMD requested a further trading halt on the NZX and a voluntary suspension on the ASX until Monday 30 March.<\/p>\n<p>KMD said it was still working on launching the capital raise and finalising terms for a refinancing of its existing bank loans.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;KMD is not presently in a position to make an announcement regarding the capital raise and refinance, as the final details, including pricing, are still being determined. Discussions regarding these matters remain ongoing.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>KMD said those matters needed to be sorted before the half-year results could be finalised.<\/p>\n<p>Unusual move by a listed company &#8211; investment expert<\/p>\n<p>Speaking after the initial announcement of the delay, Craigs Investment Partners investment director Mark Lister said the timing was &#8220;interesting&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The timing suggests that something has caused the company to rethink what it needs or how it will approach this and adjust the timing of what it had in mind,&#8221; Lister said.<\/p>\n<p>He said it was hard to know without more detail.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Whether the company was intending to raise capital at some point and it&#8217;s brought that forward, or whether some of the current uncertainty around the world has made it adjust its plans.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Lister said that while it was difficult to say, it would be &#8220;interesting&#8221; to see what led KMD to change its plans.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The timing is unusual &#8211; I&#8217;m sure KMD Brands didn&#8217;t intend to release the result [date] then delay it,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>KMD has been going through a difficult few years amid a sharp downturn in the retail sector.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, the company announced a full-year loss of $94 million, nearly doubling the previous year&#8217;s loss of $48m as its margins came under pressure amid tough trading conditions.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/radionz.us6.list-manage.com\/subscribe?u=211a938dcf3e634ba2427dde9&amp;id=b3d362e693\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KMD has delayed the release of its financial results. Photo: RNZ \/ Nate McKinnon Over the course of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1435,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[48,138,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45],"class_list":["post-351364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-audio","tag-business","tag-current-affairs","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=351364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=351364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=351364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=351364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}