Acomo: healthy margins on healthy products

Acomo, the Amsterdam-listed trading house in conventional and organic food products and food ingredients, delivered strong results in the first half of 2025. Revenue grew by 14% to €758 million, driven by a small acquisition and higher prices. REBITDA (adjusted EBITDA) rose by 85% to €68 million — an impressive achievement with which the company appears to have completed its successful turnaround over the past twelve months. Acomo is therefore back on the right track and can now focus on achieving the targets it set out at its first Capital Markets Day in April 2025: revenue of €2 billion at a 9% REBITDA margin by 2029. Acomo expects to reach this revenue target through approximately 5% organic growth per year, supplemented by targeted acquisitions.

These positive results also mark the end of a difficult period at Tradin Organic, Acomo's organic ingredients division. In recent years, this division struggled with sharply higher cocoa prices, leading to disappointing results and a temporary loss of confidence. The situation there is now under control, and Acomo is once again showing healthy margins. Notably, the company is even outperforming some of the world's largest cocoa processors in this respect, several of which have seen their volumes decline.

We view Acomo as a solid company with a clear position in a number of attractive niche markets. The company benefits from structural trends such as growing demand for alternative proteins, spices, tropical fruits and organic products. For example, its Catz International division is among the world's largest buyers of coconut products and spices, while Tradin Organic is the largest trader in organic ingredients. These niches within soft commodities are largely served by smaller, specialised trading houses that, due to their limited scale, are less attractive to major players such as Louis Dreyfus and Cargill. Within this competitive dynamic, Acomo has managed to secure a leading role in several of these niches, backed by deep market knowledge and the right networks — crucial in markets with limited transparency and public information. These factors form a sustainable competitive advantage in markets where transparency and scale are limited. The result: a trading house that achieves a good return on capital together with solid organic growth.

We view Acomo's outlook positively. We believe in the company's strong position within its value chain, which has improved further over the past year following the changes at Tradin Organic. Trends for the company are positive, and the holding's management team has also been strengthened with the appointment of Mirjam van Thiel as new CFO. We therefore expect Acomo to be able to continue its good performance in the coming years and have confidence in its stated targets.

Acomo is an important position in the portfolios of both Teslin Participaties and Midlin, currently ranking among the largest holdings in both funds. We continue to support the company with confidence in achieving its long-term objectives.