Ann: Trading Update , page-59

Lots of people seem to be talking about the high ratio of EBITDA to market cap.

However, there is very little talk of how the EBITDA actually translates to real economic earnings. The I,D and the A are always very important.

This lesson was learnt harshly in the US in the late 80s / early 90s after investors got fooled into taking EBITDA at face value without looking deeper at what it comprised. It was the buzz metric for all of the wrong reasons. EBITDA and real earnings are often worlds apart.