CEO INSIGHTS – Week Ending 16 June 2017 by NAOS Asset Management

“The only certain outcome is that it [A Channel Ten collapse] would result in even less media diversity than we have in Australia – already the world's most concentrated media market” Mitch Fifield, Communications Minister

As part of the NAOS investment process, we pay particular attention to the comments made by company CEO’s and business leaders in order to gain a greater understanding of the current investment environment and key trends that may be emerging. Below are quotes from the week which in our view detail some of the most important and prominent industry trends and economic factors impacting their businesses. (VIEW LINK)

Grocery Deflation

“It’s already an overpriced grocery market in my view and I’ve been saying that for nine years ... I still look at products here that are made overseas and they are crazy prices. We need to bring those prices down” John Durkan, MD, Coles

Logistics

“Courier services is a growing category and is working well with our customers – now we are thinking about what other opportunities there are to expand that”  Mark Ward, MD, Officeworks

Agriculture

“You look at the trading environment in grains in recent years, it has been difficult so any rationalisation [between a Glencore & Bunge merger] would not be unexpected”  Terry Enright, Chairman, Australian Export Grain Innovation Centre

“Juice suppliers have been operating on maybe an oversupply mentality for so long that they think that they think they can just pay 15-20 cents a kilo for this fruit. But the growers have had better options to send it overseas, so that's what they've done. It's just tightened up that market and dried up all the supply” Ben Cant, Director, Citrus Australia

"On the whole, the [Citrus] industry is quite buoyant and I think we've had three straight years of breaking our export records” Ben Cant, Director, Citrus Australia

Vitamins

“Our pricing strategy has not shifted since the start of the year. Any discounts in the market are managed by retailers as part of their planned promotional activity” Oliver Horn, MD, Swisse Wellness

Continue reading this weeks CEO Insights here