EBITDA up 130% on 40.4% revenue growth, leverage halved to 4.4x

That operating leverage halved net debt / EBITDA to 4.4x from 10.2x, classified below the historical range of 5.45x–10.20x and signalling a materially less stretched balance sheet.

The bottom line narrowed but stayed negative. PBT and NPAT both improved 80.3% to a NZ$0.4m loss (from a NZ$2.1m loss), with no tax distortion at either date (0.0% effective rate both periods). Operating cash flow rose to NZ$2.5m (from NZ$1.6m), and pre-lease free cash flow swung to NZ$2.2m versus the historical mean of NZ$-0.4m — primarily because capex fell to NZ$0.4m from NZ$2.4m.

No interim dividend was declared.

• EBITDA margin of 10.7% sits at the top of the supplied historical range, and PBT margin of -1.4% is above its historical range (mean -6.3%). Because revenue grew 40.4% while EBITDA grew 129.6%, the incremental margin on new sales is well above the trailing average — which means the business is approaching operating breakeven if revenue holds.

• Deleveraging is real but partly capex-driven. Gross borrowings fell NZ$1.9m to NZ$11.8m and total equity rose to NZ$16.9m, taking net debt / EBITDA from 10.2x to 4.4x. However, capex collapsed 84.1% (from NZ$2.4m to NZ$0.4m, just 1.3% of revenue), so a meaningful share of the cash available to repay debt came from the absence of venue investment rather than higher operating cash conversion. This matters because the 4.4x leverage ratio benefits from both higher EBITDA and a lower investment run-rate.

• The group is still loss-making at the statutory line. The NZ$0.4m NPAT loss is narrower, but management's adjusted figure of NZ$(0.1)m versus NZ$(1.7)m relies on backing out unspecified one-off restructuring and interest charges. The size of those add-backs is not quantified in the release excerpts, so the underlying earnings power is bracketed rather than precise.

Annolyse's historical baseline shows the prior year was unusually second-half weighted: HY23 was only 39.5% of FY23 revenue and 25.9% of FY23 EBITDA. If a similar 2H skew repeats in FY24, the implied annualised revenue run-rate of NZ$58.2m (doubling H1) would understate the full-year outcome materially.

That makes the HY24 read encouraging but conditional. The release does not say whether the H1/H2 split is structural (seasonality of hospitality venues) or driven by venue openings in the prior period, so the shape carrying forward is not directly supported by the disclosure.

Revenue growth of 40.4% sits comfortably within the historical range (3-period mean 16.3%, range -45.0% to 73.3%), and the EBITDA uplift is not flattered by working-capital movements — inventory days were broadly flat at 5.6 (vs 5.9), and operating working capital changed by only NZ$0.2m. Cash conversion of OCF / EBITDA at 81.8% is within Annolyse's historical range (mean 51.4%, range -20.8%–121.6%), even though it stepped down from the prior 121.6%; the prior comparable was at the top of that range, so the deterioration is from an unusually strong base rather than a deteriorated current level.

The pre-lease FCF / NPAT ratio of -512.8% is not meaningful while NPAT is negative. The cleaner read is that pre-lease FCF of NZ$2.2m is above the historical range, but capex normalisation in future periods would compress that figure even if EBITDA holds.

This briefing cannot assess the durability of the EBITDA margin expansion without venue-level or segment-level disclosure on volume, pricing, and cost-line contribution.