The decision was taken at the group's annual meeting at the weekend because the board sees little advantage in remaining a public company and there has been little activity in the flotation of shares.

The decision will come as little surprise as the group, which has worldwide seafood operations, has had a difficult time over the past two years. The company made a loss last year and is still trying to recover from a major restructuring of its seafood processing activities.

Sales in 2007 fell by 5.9 per cent to 1,384 million euros (about £1,065 million sterling), but in the final quarter (September to December) they were down by 8.5 per cent.

In March the company has posted an operating loss of 2.1 million euros (£1.6 million) for the year and a loss of 14.8 million euros (£11.3 million) in the final quarter. Earnings before interest, taxes and depreciation (EBITDA) amounted to €28.3 million in the year and €1.4 million in Q4.

Group chief executive Finnbogi Baldvinsson, described 2007 as an 'extremely difficult year' for Icelandic, with the fourth quarter showing the poorest results.

He went on: "The restructuring process that the group has continually said to be in progress has been delayed and it is now apparent that the originally targeted objectives were unrealistic.

Icelandic are not alone in stepping back from stock market listings. There are now only two Icelandic fishing companies quoted on the Nasdaq OMX Nordic Exchange compared to almost a dozen a few years ago. These are Alfesca and the trawling company HB Grandi.

The Icelandic annual meeting passed off without any other major announcements. The board recommended that no dividend will be paid this year, but the company is setting out to attract new talent to take the organisation forward.

The meeting accepted a new remuneration policy to offer competitive salaries, bonuses and stock options in a bid "to recruit first class personnel".

Meanwhile, the Icelandic economy is in less trouble than many media reports make out, says the Icelandic Minister of Finance, Arni Mathiesen, in a report by Reuters. “The krona certainly was too strong, [but] now it's too weak. In the end it will come back closer to the average,” said the minister at a recent meeting in Hamburg. Mathiesen went on to criticise ratings agencies’ recent downgrading of Iceland's credit rating, saying that the agencies are probably acting on media speculation, rather than the actual state of the Icelandic economy. “But then again the changes in the ratings aren’t dramatic,” he added.

The Icelandic economy is experiencing a slowdown at the end of an unprecedented period of growth that has seen the north Atlantic island become one of the richest nations in the world. The country owes much of its success to the burgeoning banking sector.

www.fishupdate.com is published by Special Publications. Special Publications also publish FISHupdate magazine, Fish Farmer, the Fish Industry Yearbook, the Scottish Seafood Processors Federation Diary, the Fish Farmer Handbook and a range of wallplanners.

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