Amira Nature Foods Ltd Announces Full Year Fiscal 2016 and Six Months Ended March 31, 2016 Financial Results

Amira Nature Foods Ltd (the “Company,” “Amira,” “us,” “we” or “our”) (NYSE: ANFI), a leading global provider of branded, packaged Indian specialty rice, today reported financial results for its fiscal 2016 full year and six months ended on March 31, 2016.

FY 2016 Financial Highlights:

• Revenue of $563.4 million
• Adjusted EBITDA of $74.7 million
• Adjusted EBITDA margin of 13.3%
• Net debt to Adjusted EBITDA of 2.6x
• Profits after tax and adjusted profits after tax of $32.9 million and $41.9 million, respectively
• Earnings per share and adjusted earnings per share (“EPS”) of $0.90 and $1.17, respectively

Six Months Ended March 31, 2016 Financial Highlights:

• Revenue of $331.7 million
• Adjusted EBITDA of $44.2 million
• Adjusted EBITDA margin of 13.3%
• Profits after tax of $23.7 million and adjusted profits after tax of $28.4 million
• Earnings per share of $0.65 and adjusted earnings per share (“EPS”) of $0.79

Bruce Wacha, Amira’s Chief Financial Officer, stated, “We are pleased to report our results for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2016. As we noted previously, 2016 was a challenging year due to a number of factors that we believe to be largely temporary in nature. Nonetheless, we maintained margins at historical levels – generating adjusted EBITDA of $74.7 million and adjusted EBITDA margins of 13.3% for the year. We have grown our business substantially since the time of our initial public offering in 2012 and we increased revenues by more than 60% since that period. We continue to maintain strong relationships with our major customers and now that we have reported our results for fiscal 2016 we look forward to returning to our growth model in 2017 and having a deeper engagement with our investors. Going forward, we continue to see many opportunities in India and around the world to further expand our business and create value for our shareholders.”

Full Year Fiscal 2016 Results

Revenue for the full year of fiscal 2016 was $563.4 million compared to $700.0 million in fiscal 2015. The revenue decline was primarily driven by decreases in volumes for the Company’s international emerging markets business that management believes to be short term in nature, as well as macro effects on the Company’s business such as the impact of currency translation on its India business and lower prices for its global Basmati rice sales following decreases in its input costs. Sales in India were $245.9 million, a decrease of 14.2%, or a decrease of 8.1% in INR compared to the prior year. International sales, or sales outside of India were $317.5 million compared to $413.3 million in the prior year. The decline in international revenue was primarily driven by the Company’s international emerging markets business, with its German, UK and US businesses sales generally flat to marginally up year-over-year.

Adjusted EBITDA for fiscal 2016 was $74.7 million compared to $99.9 million the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA margin was 13.3% for fiscal 2016 compared to 14.3% the prior year and 13.0% average margin over the previous five years. Adjusted profit after tax was $41.9 million compared to $56.1 million in fiscal 2015. Adjusted EPS was $1.17 per share in fiscal 2016 compared to $1.56 per share the prior year. The Company’s effective tax rate was 13.0% for the period compared to 13.9% for the prior year period. A reconciliation of adjusted EBITDA, adjusted profit after tax and adjusted EPS is provided in the “Non-IFRS Financial Measures” section of this release.

Six Months Ended March 31, 2016 Results

Revenue for the six months ended March 31, 2016 were $331.7 million compared to $419.8 million in the prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA was $44.2 million for the final six months of 2016, compared to $61.1 million. Adjusted profit was $28.4 million compared to $36.3 million in the prior year period. Adjusted EPS was $0.79 per share for the final six months of 2016, compared to $1.01 per share in the prior year period. A reconciliation of adjusted EBITDA, adjusted profit after tax and adjusted EPS is provided in the “Non-IFRS Financial Measures” section of this release.

Balance Sheet and Cash Flow Highlights

As of March 31, 2016, the Company’s cash and cash equivalents were $17.4 million, not including $3.6 million of short-term investments, which were available on demand. Adjusted net working capital was $420.3 million. Net debt (after deducting cash and cash equivalents) was $192.0 million and Net debt/Adj. EBITDA was 2.6x. As of March 31, 2016, inventories were $239.0 million compared to $262.9 million as of March 31, 2015, trade receivables were $189.7 million(a), an increase of $59.3 million from $130.4 million, and trade payables were $14.5 million, a reduction of $19.8 million from $34.3 million. Total debt was $209.4 million, a reduction of $1.6 million from $211.0 million. Reconciliations of adjusted net working capital and net debt to the IFRS measures of working capital and total current and non-current debt, respectively, are provided in the “Non-IFRS Financial Measures” section of this release.

Outlook

As reported in its Form 6K filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission on January 25, 2016, the Company noted that as a result of the three years of audits, certain litigations and other related business disruptions, 2016 was an extremely challenging year and it looks forward to a return to normalcy and growth for the business for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2017. It continues to see many opportunities in India and around the world to further grow its business and create value for its shareholders.

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About Amira Nature Foods Ltd

Founded in 1915, Amira has evolved into a leading global provider of branded packaged specialty rice, including Basmati and other food products, with sales across five continents around the world. The Company primarily sells Basmati rice, which is a premium long-grain rice grown only in certain regions of the Indian sub-continent, under its flagship Amira brand as well as under other third party brands. Amira sells its products through a broad distribution network in both the developed and emerging markets. The Company’s global headquarters are in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and it also has offices in India, Malaysia, Singapore, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Amira Nature Foods Ltd is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) under the ticker symbol “ANFI.” For more information, please visit www.amira.net.

Safe Harbor for Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains statements of a forward-looking nature. These statements are made under the “safe harbor” provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. You can identify these forward-looking statements by words or phrases such as “may,” “will,” “expect,” “anticipate,” “aim,” “estimate,” “intend,” “plan,” “believe,” “is/are likely to,” “future” or other similar expressions. We have based these forward-looking statements largely on our current expectations and projections about future events and financial trends that we believe may affect our financial condition, results of operations, business strategy and financial needs. There is no assurance that our current expectations and projections are accurate. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to:

• our goals and strategies;
• our operations and expansion plans;
• our future business development, results of operations, financial condition and financial statements;
• our ability to protect our intellectual property rights;
• projected revenue, EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA, profits, adjusted profits, earnings, adjusted earnings and other estimated financial information;
• our ability to maintain strong relationships with our customers and suppliers;
• governmental policies regarding our industry; and
• the impact of legal proceedings.

You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements and you should read these statements in conjunction with the risk factors disclosed in “Risk Factors” appearing in Amira’s Annual Reports found on the SEC’s website located at www.sec.gov. Those risks are not exhaustive. We operate in a rapidly evolving environment. New risk factors emerge from time to time, and it is impossible for our management to predict all risk factors, nor can we assess the impact of all factors on our business or the extent to which any factor, or combination of factors, may cause actual results to differ from those contained in any forward-looking statement. We do not undertake any obligation to update or revise the forward-looking statements except as required under applicable law.

Note: Reported results and other information herein are preliminary and not final until the filing of the Company’s annual report on Form 20-F with the Securities and Exchange Commission and therefore remain subject to adjustment.

Note: Reported results and other information herein are preliminary and not final until the filing of the Company’s annual report on Form 20-F with the Securities and Exchange Commission and therefore remain subject to adjustment.

Note: Reported results and other information herein are preliminary and not final until the filing of the Company’s annual report on Form 20-F with the Securities and Exchange Commission and therefore remain subject to adjustment.

Note: Reported results and other information herein are preliminary and not final until the filing of the Company’s annual report on Form 20-F with the Securities and Exchange Commission and therefore remain subject to adjustment.

Note: Reported results and other information herein are preliminary and not final until the filing of the Company’s annual report on Form 20-F with the Securities and Exchange Commission and therefore remain subject to adjustment.

Non-IFRS Financial Measures

In evaluating our business, we consider and use the non-IFRS measures EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA, adjusted profit after tax, adjusted earnings per share, adjusted net working capital and net debt as supplemental measures to review and assess our operating performance. The presentation of these non-IFRS financial measures is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with IFRS. We define: (1) EBITDA as profit after tax plus finance costs (net of finance income), income tax expense and depreciation and amortization; (2) adjusted EBITDA as EBITDA plus non-cash expense for share-based compensation for fiscal 2016, fiscal 2015 and fiscal 2014, respectively, other one-time legal & professional charges for fiscal 2016 and one-time expenses related to proposed Senior Secured Second Lien Notes offering for fiscal 2015; (3) adjusted profit after tax as profit after tax plus non-cash expense for share-based compensation for fiscal 2016, fiscal 2015 and fiscal 2014, respectively, one-time expenses related to proposed Senior Secured Second Lien Notes offering for fiscal 2015 and other one-time legal and professional charges; (4) adjusted earnings per share as the quotient of: (a) adjusted profit after tax and (b) the sum of our weighted average number of shares (including dilutive impact of share options granted) for the applicable period and the ordinary shares subject to the exchange agreement between us and the non-controlling shareholders of Amira India, during the applicable period; (5) adjusted net working capital as total current assets minus: (a) total current liabilities (b) cash and cash equivalents and plus current debt; and (6) net debt as total current and non-current debt minus cash and cash equivalents.

We use both EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA as measures of operating performance to assist in comparing performance from period to period on a consistent basis, as a measure for planning and forecasting overall expectations, for evaluating actual results against such expectations and as a performance evaluation metric, including as part of assessing and administering our executive and employee incentive compensation programs. We believe that the use of EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA as non-IFRS measures facilitates investors’ assessment of our operating performance from period to period and from company to company by backing out potential differences caused by variations in items such as capital structure (affecting relative finance or interest expenses), the book amortization of intangibles (affecting relative amortization expenses), the age and book value of property and equipment (affecting relative depreciation expenses) and other non-cash expenses. We also present these non-IFRS measures because we believe they are frequently used by securities analysts, investors and other interested parties as measures of the financial performance of companies in our industry.

These non-IFRS financial measures are not defined under IFRS and are not presented in accordance with IFRS. These non-IFRS financial measures have limitations as analytical tools, and when assessing our operating performance, investors should not consider it in isolation, or as a substitute for profit/(loss) or other consolidated statements of operations data prepared in accordance with IFRS. Some of these limitations include, but are not limited to:

• it does not reflect our cash expenditures or future requirements for capital expenditures or contractual commitments;
• it does not reflect changes in, or cash requirements for, our working capital needs;
• it does not reflect the finance or interest expenses, or the cash requirements necessary to service interest or principal payments, on our debt;
• it does not reflect income taxes or the cash requirements for any tax payments;
• although depreciation and amortization are non-cash charges, the assets being depreciated and amortized often will have to be replaced in the future, and adjusted net profit and EBITDA do not reflect any cash requirements for such replacements;
• other companies may calculate EBITDA differently than we do, limiting the usefulness of this non-IFRS measure as a comparative measure.

We compensate for these limitations by relying primarily on our IFRS results and using EBITDA only as a supplemental measure.

We present adjusted EBITDA, adjusted profit after tax, adjusted earnings per share, adjusted net working capital and net debt because we believe these measures provide additional metrics to evaluate our operations and, when considered with both our IFRS results and the reconciliation to profit after tax, basic and diluted earnings per share, working capital and total current and non-current debt, respectively, provide a more complete understanding of our business than could be obtained absent this disclosure. We also believe that these non-IFRS financial measures are useful to investors in assessing the operating performance of our business after reflecting the adjustments described above.

In the following tables we have provided reconciliation of non-IFRS measures to the most directly comparable IFRS measure:

1. Reconciliation of profit after tax to EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA:

2. Reconciliation of profit after tax to adjusted profit after tax:

3. Reconciliation of earnings per share and adjusted earnings per share:

4. Reconciliation of working capital (total current assets minus total current liabilities) and adjusted net working capital:

5. Reconciliation of total current and non-current debt to net debt:

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