Explanation

To measure profit generated by the company's own asset base, we need to adjust the pretax profit by removing non-operating items and adding back non-cash charges:

Calculation:

• Start with Pretax profit: 15,080
• Subtract Income from associates and joint ventures (6,086) - this represents income from investments, not the company's own operations
• Add back Recurring impairment of goodwill (1,798) - this is a non-cash charge
• Add back Recurring total provisions (985) - these are non-cash charges

Calculation: 15,080 - 6,086 + 1,798 + 985 = 9,979

Rationale:

• Removing income from associates isolates the company's core operations
• Adding back non-cash charges (impairment and provisions) provides a better measure of operating performance
• This gives us €9,979 thousand as the profit generated by the company's own asset base