Sydney Fish Market posts losses but stays afloat
Sydney Fish Market remains financially afloat despite writing off more than $17 million in impairments over the past two years as it prepares to move to a purpose-built site in the New South Wales capital.
Concerns about the company’s solvency have flared in recent weeks after it failed to lodge its 2024 accounts on time, and amid rising costs, delays and design complexities at the new facility.
But the Sydney Fish Market’s auditors have given its finances a clean bill of health, despite the market posting losses over two consecutive years. The auditors signed off on the fish market as a going concern in accounts that were filed with the corporate regulator late last week.
The company’s annual report was also released on Friday. In an email to stakeholders, chair Craig Davison said the report was “delayed due to circumstances related to our transformation impacting the finalising of our financial statement”.
The new market, nearby the current site on Blackwattle Bay, was initially scheduled to open in 2023, but a series of delays have pushed that date back to later this year. It was initially unveiled as a $250 million government investment, but the costs of the project have more than tripled since it was announced in 2017.
“Given the media interest in our financial position, I wish to clarify with certainty that Sydney Fish Market has always been, and remains, solvent; and that we received an unqualified audit opinion on our accounts,” Davison said.
The company posted a $10.6 million loss for the 2024 financial year, bigger than the $6.3 million loss the previous year. Most of those losses can be attributed to non-cash impairments.
“A transformation of this size requires significant investment over many years. We have taken a conservative approach to write off capital costs incurred for planning work associated with operational aspects of the new fish market,” Davison said in an email.
Despite over the cloud over its finances and its impending move, the fish market’s traders powered on, selling a record $163 million of seafood in the 2024 financial year.
The market’s revenue rose to $30 million from $28.8 million as it collected greater commission on those sales, more rent from its retailers, and more income from its carpark. The seafood school also contributed more income.
Davison said the market was cash positive from its underlying operations in the 2024 financial year, and in the current year-to-date.
Work is progressing at the nearby Blackwattle Bay site for the state government-funded, $836 million new market. The new fish market is due to be up and running by the start of next year.
Until then, the market would operate on a “business-as-usual” basis, its auditors noted in the 2024 accounts. Detailed operational plans and cash flow forecasts have been drawn up ahead of the big move, with those forecasts showing the market would have sufficient cash to pay its debt as they fell due, the auditors wrote.
However, that expectation is based on a number of critical assumptions, including that the Sydney Fish Market sign a lease for the new site after the fit-out is finalised. It currently has an agreement for lease.
The market’s continued solvency also relies on it being able to sign up enough tenants, with some traders yet to commit.
A spokesman for the NSW state government welcomed the lodgement of the 2024 accounts and the reported cash flows, noting that “the question of insolvency” had not been raised by the Sydney Fish Market with Infrastructure NSW.
