Tea and coffee company DE Master Blenders 1753 on Tuesday announced a drop in profit to €118m, compared with €267m in the year-earlier period.

The fall in profit was mainly due to the discovery earlier in August of fraud in the book-keeping of its Brazilian subsidiary, according to the Financieele Dagblad.
Turnover rose 10% to €2.7bn, but this is below the expectations of analysts.
These are the first figures published by DEMB since it floated on the Amsterdam stock exchange in June by Sara Lee.
Price rises
The fraud in Brazil is currently under investigation by the company which says it has found no further irregularities.
CEO Michiel Herkemij said in a statement that the results are good, despite the price rise in coffee beans and the continuing economic uncertainty.
DEMB is still in talks with shareholders’ lobby group VEB about the omission of the fraud case in its share flotation prospectus.