THE TRAVEL agency business that Minoan Group is looking to offload in order to pay off its debts has reported solid first-half figures, with revenues showing double-digit percentage growth and profits more than doubling.
Over the six months to the end of April travel agency turnover at the group rose by 17 per cent to £4.9 million while pre-tax profits from the arm increased from £170,000 to £455,000.
This is in sharp contrast to the Greek resort business Minoan will be left with when the travel arm is sold. The firm’s intention is to develop a luxury resort on a 6,000 acre plot on the island of Crete, but while chairman Christopher Egleton said that “the momentum of our discussions and negotiations with prospective partners and investors continues to increase” work on the site has yet to begin.
While that part of the business has not generated any revenues, the losses it made increased by 67% in the first six months of the year, up from £839,000 in the same period last year to £1.4m.
Minoan first announced the planned sale of its travel division last December. Mr Egleton said he expects to be “able to report in more detail on this transaction in the near future”.
If a deal is not agreed by the end of August a loan Minoan took out with British Virgin Islands business Hillside International Holdings in October 2013 will be called in.
Originally Minoan was given three years to repay the £5 million facility but the term was extended to June 2017 then to December 2017 and again to June this year.
Last month Minoan confirmed that the term on the loan had been extended to the end of August but that the debt had now passed to a business called Zachary Asset Holdings and could be called in “on demand”.
Jersey-based Zachary Asset Holdings is understood to be run by the family of brothers Robin and Alexander Haller, who are both directors of Hillside.
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