I have been trying to get my head around the Ezibuy figures....

I have been trying to get my head around the Ezibuy figures. What we know is that it lost $26.4m in the period from 1 July 2022 to 3 April 2023, of which $23.2m was the impairment of assets. When the administrators were appointed, net liabilities of $27.4m (of which trade payables were $26.5m) were unpaid and left for the administrators to deal with. There was a gain of $1m on the benefit from walking away from the liabilities over the trading losses incurred.

Ezibuy has been excluded from the results this year and from the comparatives in the P&L statement. The restated P&L for 2022 shows that discontinued operations (Ezibuy) incurred a loss of $3.5m on revenue of $105m. Mosaic was managing the business at that time with a 51% shareholding and an option to buy the remainder for $11m. They exercised that option in Q4 of 2022 when they must have known how bad it was.

The balance sheet for 2022 has not been restated. Inventories of $117m included Ezibuy’s inventory which was $13.7m when the administrators were appointed. A guesstimate of Ezibuy’s inventory at 30 June 2022 would be $17m, meaning that the rest of Mosaic had inventory of $100m. At June 2023, that figure had blown out to $131.6m.

Similarly, trade payables last year would have been around the $170-$180m mark without Ezibuy. This year they are $177.6, so no real improvement there.

None of this would give anyone confidence in the management of Mosaic. If ASIC isn’t looking at the $11 payment to Alceon, I would be very surprised.