General
Contingent liabilities are potential liabilities resulting from events prior to the reporting date. The liabilities are potential because the outflow of economic resources depends on the occurrence of uncertain events in the future.
Contingent liabilities can be divided into bank guarantees, Group guarantees and other contingent liabilities.
Bank and Group guarantees
|
x € 1 million |
31 December 2024 |
31 December 2023 |
|
Bank guarantees relating to: |
||
|
Execution of projects (including guarantee obligations) |
130.6 |
136.4 |
|
Tenders |
0.0 |
0.4 |
|
Other |
7.5 |
10.2 |
|
138.1 |
147.0 |
|
|
Group guarantees relating to: |
||
|
Execution of projects (including guarantee obligations) |
330.6 |
326.0 |
|
Credit and bank guarantee facilities |
1.1 |
12.1 |
|
331.7 |
338.1 |
|
|
Total |
469.8 |
485.1 |
A bank guarantee is a bank’s conditional promise to pay a beneficiary (usually the client) a specified amount. This is an independent commitment made by the bank to the beneficiary that the bank must fulfil without Heijmans’ intervention. For each bank guarantee issued, the bank requires a counter-guarantee from Royal Heijmans N.V. (meaning that any payment made by the bank to the client must be repaid by Royal Heijmans N.V.). The bank guarantees are mainly issued for the execution of projects (including warranty obligations).
Royal Heijmans N.V. guarantees the obligations of subsidiaries, joint operations and joint ventures by means of a group guarantee. These group guarantees have mainly been issued for the purpose of project realisation (including warranty obligations). The Group has guaranteed its share of the debt arrangement of various joint operations and real estate joint ventures, which amounts to a total of € 1 million (2023: € 12 million). The Group does not expect to incur material credit losses on this.
The Group guarantees issued for divested operations (Leadbitter) are not included in the above table. They amount to € 22 million (2023: € 32 million). With regard to work completed and work in progress, the guarantees have been taken over by the buyer. The buyer has provided a bank or corporate guarantee for cases where this was not possible.
Other contingent liabilities
The other contingent liabilities amounted to a total of € 343 million at year-end 2024 (2023: € 214 million) and were primarily related to commitments to acquire land at the moment that a zoning plan has been finalised or when a building permit is obtained and/or a certain sales percentage is achieved. Of these commitments, € 319 million (2023: €191 million) is expected to have a significant cash impact and € 24 million (2023: € 22 million) is expected to have a limited cash impact. Of this, € 5 million (2023: € 5 million) is included in joint operations.
No group guarantees have been issued for the other contingent liabilities (2023: none).
6.28a Contingent liabilities joint ventures
The contingent liabilities of joint ventures in which the Group participates amounted to €18 million (2023: € 34 million) and were primarily related to purchase commitments for land at the moment a building permit is obtained and/or a certain sales percentage is realised. Of these liabilities, € 4 million (2023: € 18 million) is expected to have a significant cash impact and € 14 million (2023: € 16 million) is expected to have a limited cash impact. The aforementioned amounts are the Group’s share in the joint ventures.