EBITDA fell $12m but NPAT rose as tax rate dropped to 28.3%

At the operating line, the business contracted. Revenue dropped to $349.6m from $378.3m, a $28.8m absolute decline, and Operating EBITDA fell to $116.5m from $128.5m, a $12.0m reduction. Global case sales were 3.2m, down 12% on FY24 per the release.

Cash generation moved sharply higher. Net cash from operating activities almost doubled to $105.7m from $56.9m, helped by a $19.9m fall in trade debtors and a $19.6m step-down in capex to $46.4m. Free cash flow before leases reached $59.3m versus negative $9.1m. Net debt fell $31.5m to $328.6m, but because EBITDA also fell, leverage edged up to 2.82x EBITDA from 2.80x. (Annolyse has flagged comparability caveats on headline growth percentages, so dollar movements are the firmer read.)

PBT moved from $61.6m to $68.4m, a far more modest improvement than NPAT suggests, with a 45.1pp gap between PBT and NPAT growth rates. The cleaner read on FY25 earnings is PBT, which improved only modestly while EBITDA declined $12.0m. The release excerpts contain no commentary on what drove the effective tax rate from 49.0% to 28.3%, so the durability of this swing is unresolved.

Cash flow strength rests on working capital and capex timing. The $48.8m OCF uplift roughly equals the combined $19.9m debtor release (receivable days fell from 73.8 to 59.0) and the $19.6m capex reduction (capex now 13.3% of revenue versus 17.4%). Both are timing-shaped contributors that will not repeat at the same magnitude.

Inventory build runs against falling volumes. Inventories rose $5.8m to $187.8m while case sales dropped 12%; inventory days lengthened to 196.0 from 175.5. That signals either a deliberate premium-tier hold or weaker-than-planned sell-through, with implications for future cash conversion.

The outlook section reiterates the FY25 actual figures (3,188,000 global case sales, Operating EBITDA of $116.5m, $31.5m net debt reduction) rather than naming forward numbers, so this result does not support a specific FY26 trajectory.

The half-on-half shape was heavily second-half weighted. HY25 contributed only 25.4% of full-year NPAT despite 51.1% of revenue and 52.9% of EBITDA, meaning the second half did most of the earnings work and most of the cash collection. For a wine producer with a fixed vintage cadence and seasonal shipping this is structural, but it means an HY26 print should not be read as a run rate.

At the operating line FY25 was weaker than FY24: case volumes down 12%, revenue down $28.8m and Operating EBITDA down $12.0m. The premiumisation strategy referenced in management commentary did not offset volume contraction in dollar terms, and the modest PBT improvement reflects lower finance and depreciation drag rather than top-line strength.

The headline NPAT lift of $17.7m is overwhelmingly tax-aided, with the effective tax rate falling to 28.3% from 49.0%. No driver is disclosed in the supplied excerpts.

The cash result is genuinely better than FY24's, but the underlying mix is mixed:

• ~$20m from a debtor balance unwind, which is one-off in nature
• ~$20m from lower capex spend, suggesting a pause in a multi-year investment cycle
• Residual operating contribution plus other working-capital effects

Inventory days extending 20.5 days to 196.0 leaves a larger balance-sheet asset that must convert through future sales. If case volumes do not recover, the inventory build will weigh on FY26 cash conversion even as the FY25 debtor release flatters this year.

This briefing cannot assess whether the 20.0c full-year dividend can be supported if FY26 cash conversion normalises while EBITDA remains around current levels.