Croatia’s Fortenova Group has reported like-for-like revenue growth of 14%, to HRK 18.8 billion (€2.5 billion), in the first half of its financial year, driven primarily by the integration of Mercator, reports ESMmagazine.com. Consolidated EBITDA for the first six months of the year exceeded HRK 1 billion (€130 million), or 74% more than during the same period last year. On a like-for-like basis, the adjusted consolidated EBITDA grew by 19%. Companies from Fortenova’s food division saw the highest growth in revenue, while the agriculture unit witnessed the fastest growth in EBITDA.
To celebrate the upcoming opening of the new Aldi Ballina store, staff members have teamed up with Green Belt and local landowners John and Stella Drummond to plant over 12,000 trees in Coollagagh, Co. Mayo. Aldi highlighted that it is the first retailer in Ireland to commit to planting one million native Irish woodland trees by 2025, in partnership with Green Belt. The native trees will create a wildlife corridor for native species and enhance biodiversity while removing more than 160,000 tonnes of carbon emissions over their 100-year life span, the discounter noted. Aldi’s new store in Ballina will be situated on Bury Street and open on 1 September. The new store will be Aldi’s fifth in Mayo and 152nd nationwide.
Payment giant Visa, Inc. announced on Wednesday that it has issued over four billion network tokens worldwide, through its security technology arm, Visa Token Service (VTS), outpacing the total number of its physical cards in circulation. VTS replaces 16-digit Visa account numbers with a token that only Visa can unlock, protecting the underlying account information. “Without exposing the consumer’s account to fraud, tokenisation enables frictionless, card-free payments,” Jack Forestell, executive vice-president and chief product officer at Visa, told Reuters.
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