The company Abo Energy, one of the largest wind farm project developers in Germany, is in financial difficulties. Numerous private investors are also affected by this, because the company issued two bonds in 2021 and 2024, which were also aimed at small investors with a minimum investment of 1,000 euros.
With the first bond with a term of nine years, which is almost exclusively distributed by the social-ecological GLS Bank the company collected a good 42 million euros. The paper carries an interest rate of 3.5 percent – which was very reasonable in the low interest rate period at the time – and is not traded on the stock exchange. The second bond was worth 80 million euros, is listed on the stock exchange and carries an annual interest rate of 7.75 percent.
But then came the bad news. Last November, the company issued its first profit warning, predicting a loss of 95 million euros for the 2025 financial year. In mid-January, the company announced that management was now assuming a group annual loss of 170 million euros.
A key reason is the “currently particularly challenging national and international market environment,” explained the company. They are a factor oversubscribed onshore wind auctions under the Renewable Energy Actwhich led to significantly reduced feed-in tariffs. At the same time, due to lower expectations regarding the surcharge level of feed-in tariffs for future projects, reassessments and thus significant special depreciation had to be made.
First annual loss in Abo Energy’s history
The Wiesbaden-based company, founded in 1996, is reporting its first annual loss in its history. With 1,400 employees, the company is one of the largest project developers in the renewable energy sector in Germany. Abo Energy GmbH & Co. KGaA, which operated as Abo Wind AG until July 2024, says it has implemented projects with an installed generation capacity of 3.1 gigawatts. This mainly involves wind farms, but also photovoltaics, battery storage and substations. Abo Energy is also active in numerous countries in other European countries and overseas.
One reason: the currently particularly challenging national and international market environment, explained Abo Energy
The company’s latest figures caused a shock on the capital market. After the first profit warning in November, the price of the listed bond halved; according to the latest figures, it is now only around 16 percent of its nominal value. The company’s shares have also lost more than 80 percent of their value in the past three months.
Now a renovation concept is needed. As the company recently announced in an ad hoc announcement, it has already concluded a standstill agreement with the creditors of essential financing. This means that the banks will not terminate their financing extraordinarily as long as a restructuring concept is being negotiated. It is said that a renowned consulting company has already been commissioned to prepare a restructuring report; A first draft should be available in the first half of February.
The creditors of the 2024 corporate bond should also decide shortly whether they want to join the standstill agreement and agree to a change to the bond conditions; An information event on this is scheduled for February 5th, and a vote by creditors for February 10th to 12th. Investors in the 2021 bond are not affected because their investment conditions are slightly different.
The well-known information service for green investments, Ecoreporter currently advises investorsneither to buy nor sell the share and the bond, but to wait and see how Abo Energy develops in the next few months. Ecoreporter editor-in-chief Jörg Weber also refers to the Investor Protection Association (SdK), which advises affected bondholders to pool their interests.
The SdK has already stated that it is in contact with a business law firm and plans to request that Abo Energy convene a bondholders’ meeting in order to receive a report on the current situation from the management.
A joint representative of the bondholders should then be elected, as this representative has significant information rights towards the company. The company structure is not that easy to understand Wirtschaftswoche recently stated: “For investors, Abo Energy is a black box in key respects.”
Despite all the turbulence, the company emphasizes that it has “a significant and valuable project portfolio”. The management assumes “based on the previous negotiations with the lenders that we will be able to successfully implement the restructuring concept”. Abo Energy just gave it Sale of three solar projects in France with a total installed capacity of 85 megawatts.