AWD Holding AG: Double-digit earnings growth in all core countries

HANOVER (Germany) March 25 (PROTEXT/ots) - Cross-reference:An original document is available for download in the company'spress kit at: http://www.presseportal.de/galerie.htx?type=dok -

- Revenues and EBIT even better than preliminary figures

- Revenues grow by 21.5% to 562.7 million

- EBIT quadruples to 55.5 million

- EBIT margin rises by 7.1 percentage points to 9.9%

- Earnings per share double to 0.95

- 25% growth in long-term investment and retirement concepts

- Goal for 2004: double-digit revenue growth with even better

profitability

AWD Holding AG, Europe's biggest independent provider offinancial services, significantly expanded its businessactivities in 2003 in its core countries of Germany, the UnitedKingdom, Austria and Switzerland. Both revenues and profitsincreased substantially. Group revenues increased by asubstantial 21.5% to 562.7 million last year. Operating profit(EBIT) more than quadrupled, soaring by 320.5% to 55.5 million.AWD aims to achieve double-digit profitable growth once again inthe year 2004. For this year, the Board of Management has set arevenue goal of more than 620 million and an EBIT target of morethan 62 million. The EBIT margin will thus be in double digitsfor the first time.

"Independent advice, combined with comprehensive financialplanning, is increasingly succeeding in the marketplace, makingus growth leader in the European financial-services sector, andjustifying our optimism for 2004," stated Carsten Maschmeyer,Chairman of the Board of Management of AWD Holding AG, on thepresentation of the year-end financial statements of the AWDGroup in Hanover on 25 March 2004.

All of AWD's core countries contributed to the profitablegrowth of the entire Group with double-digit earnings increases.AWD achieved its highest growth rates in the United Kingdom andAustria. The degree of internationalisation of the AWD Group, interms of the share of revenues generated outside Germany,increased compared with the prior year by 3 percentage pointsfrom 41% to 44%.

The significant increase in revenues is due in particular tothe utilisation of the growth potential of private retirement andinvestment planning in Europe. AWD's advisory focus is on long-term investment and retirement concepts, which account for 64% ofour revenues. This segment grew by 25% in absolute terms comparedwith the prior year.

This revenue development was based on a significant increasein organic growth: from 8% in the first half of 2003 to 14% inthe second half of the year. In total, AWD grew by 12.5% inorganic terms in 2003, that is, without the consolidation effectsof the acquisitions in 2002.

As the AWD Group is represented in two non-euro countries -the United Kingdom and Switzerland - the depreciation of theBritish pound and the Swiss franc against the euro resulted incurrency-translation effects. Without these currency effects, AWDwould actually have recorded revenue growth of 23.9% to 574.2million.

The number of new AWD customers increased by 23.1% to 232,000in 2003. At the same time, 155,500 existing customers maderepeated use of AWD's advisory and customer-care services.Overall, the number of customers who entered into contractsthrough the AWD Group's advisers increased from 348,000 to387,500. At the end of the year 2003, we had 4,897 financialadvisers looking after 1.2 million private customers.

The operative profitability of the AWD Group improved at amuch higher rate than our revenue growth. Due to the increase inoperating profit (EBIT) by 320.5 % to 55.5 million, the EBITmargin rose to 9.9% from 2.8% in the previous year: animprovement of 7.1 percentage points.

"Contributions to this improvement in earnings came from thesuccessful integration of the companies acquired in 2002, AWD'sstrong competitive position in its European markets, and theconsistent implementation of the Group-wide programme for theoptimisation of efficiency and costs: Pure Advice," explainedRalf Brammer, CFO of AWD Holding AG. AWD achieved earnings in2003 of twice the level attained in 2001, the year before theacquisition strategy. At that time, half of the earningsconsisted of interest income on the proceeds of the IPO. Thesefigures show that the acquisitions were worthwhile in terms ofincreasing the company's value and that the integration of thenew companies has been successfully completed.

The Group's net income more than doubled, increasing by114.2% from 16.9 million to 36.2 million. Earnings per shareamount to 0.95 after 0.45 for 2002. The shareholders of AWDHolding AG are to participate in the company's success with arecord dividend of EUR 0.75 per share: a plus of 50% comparedwith the prior year.

"In the current financial year, we will continue focusing onour core business. For the business of retirement provision, AWDwill again significantly expand its capacity to provide advice tocompanies, in order to profit from the ongoing rise in demand forcompany-pension plans. The number of company-pension specialistsis to rise by more than 25% to over 350 in 2004," pointed outFriedemann Derndinger, member of the Board of Management andChief Operating Officer of AWD Holding AG.

The AWD Annual Report 2003 is available athttp://www.awd.de/investor_relations. Figures on the firstquarter of 2004 will be announced on 13 May 2004. The AnnualGeneral Meeting will be held in Hanover on 26 May 2004.

Certain of the statements contained herein may be statementsof future expectations and other forward-looking statements thatare based on current views and assumptions and involve risks anduncertainties that could cause actual results, performance orevents to differ materially from those expressed or implied insuch statements. This release contains forward-looking statementsbased on beliefs of the company's management. The words"anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "forecast", "expect","intend", "plan", "should" and "project" are used to identifyforward-looking statements. Such statements reflect the company'scurrent views with respect to future events and are subject torisks and uncertainties. Many factors could cause the actualresults to be materially different, including, among others,changes in general economic and business conditions, including inparticular economic conditions in the company's business andmarkets, changes in currency exchange rates and interest rates,changes in national and international laws and tax regulationsand changes in capital investments and in business strategy. Thecompany assumes no obligation to update any forward-lookinginformation containedots Original Text Service: AWD Holding AGInternet: http://www.presseportal.deFor further information about the content of the press releaseand AWD please contact:AWD Holding AG

Tel.: +49/511/90 20-5387Public Relations Fax: +49/511/90 20-5330Folkert Mindermann Handy: +49/172/219 92 31Media Spokesman

mailto:folkert.mindermann@awd.deAWD-Platz 1D-30659 Hannover

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