Vice President of Salmones Camanchaca Ricardo García Holtz said that, despite challenges at the start of 2026, the company has a positive outlook for the remainder of the year.
Photo: Salmones Camanchaca.
After closing 2025 with a net profit of USD 25.5 million, 83% higher than in FY 2024, Salmones Camanchaca has experienced a challenging start to 2026, leading to profit plummeting in Q1. Specifically, net income after taxes was a loss of USD 3.8 million in the quarter.
Compared to Q1 2025, when the Chilean salmon company posted a profit of USD 4 million, this represents a 195% drop. EBITDA, meanwhile, fell by 52% to USD 9.3 million, with EBIT/Kg decreasing from 102 cents per kilo to 35 cents.
However, it hasn't all been negative news, as the company reported in its Q1 2026 results report that, despite the difficulties, it recorded a slight increase in revenue of 2%, reaching USD 106 million, which it explained by the higher sales volumes of Atlantic and Coho.
Regarding harvests, in the first quarter, there were 13,000 tons of Atlantic salmon, 3% higher than in the same quarter of 2025, with no Coho salmon harvests, as also occurred in Q1 2025. The increase in sales volumes of this latter species was therefore due to the Chilean company clearing out inventory.
In its statement, Salmones Camanchaca clearly identified the reasons behind the drop in profits: lower prices for Atlantic salmon due to increased global supply and health challenges at two of its sites caused by SRS (Salmonid Rickettsial Septicemia).
As for prices, according to Salmones Camanchaca, those obtained during the quarter fell 8% for Atlantic salmon, pressured by a sharp increase in global supply, while its ex-cage (live) cost fell 6% to USD 3.96/Kg, due to lower feed costs and operational efficiencies, and despite the lower harvest weight.
The price of Atlantic salmon sold by Salmones Camanchaca during Q1 2026 was USD 6.39 per kg WFE. This is 56 cents lower than in Q1 2025, a decrease that, the company said, is due to the increased global supply associated with positive biological and oceanographic conditions in the Northern Hemisphere, with a 9% increase in Norway and a 20% increase in Chile.
In addition, as mentioned, two farming sites were affected by SRS outbreaks during the quarter, which resulted in extraordinary mortalities of USD 2.8 million and forced the harvest to be brought forward, resulting in lower than desired weights.
The Chilean salmon farming company also reported that, in processing, costs rose 15% to USD 1.22/Kg WFE, pressured by lower harvest weight, currency appreciation, a higher proportion of value-added products, and a smaller scale at the primary processing plant.
Commenting on the results, despite the challenging start to the year, the company's Vice President, Ricardo García Holtz, expressed optimism regarding the company's prospects for 2026.
"We began 2026 facing health challenges due to SRS, which disrupted our original plan. This, along with increased global supply that lowered prices, explains our lower results," he said. "However, we have a positive outlook for the remainder of the year. Globally, no supply growth is expected, demand is increasing, particularly in Asia, and the health situation has normalized, all of which creates a favourable scenario for our margins."
As Salmones Camanchaca said in its Q1 2026 results report, according to figures from Kontali, the global supply of Atlantic salmon for 2026 is expected to grow by 2% compared to 2025, growth that will be more pronounced at the beginning of the year, with possible decreases for the second half of the year.
Meanwhile, in the specific case of Chile, the Norwegian seafood analytics firm forecasts 2026 harvests in line with those of 2025, with growth only in the first quarter and a decline in the rest of the year.
Regarding the company's specific prospects, based on the current stocking and harvesting plan, Salmones Camanchaca estimates harvests for 2026 between 58 and 60 thousand MT WFE of Atlantic salmon and between 4 thousand and 5 thousand MT WFE of Coho salmon.
As is customary in his quarterly results assessments, the Vice President of Salmones Camanchaca took the opportunity to also comment on the political—and therefore regulatory—landscape of Chile in the coming months.
"Looking ahead, greater collaboration between the public sector and salmon farming opens up an opportunity to grow sustainably and more efficiently, and the challenge is to respond quickly to regulatory changes as they materialize," said Ricardo García Holtz.
The Vice President of the Chilean salmon company was thus echoing the change in direction at Chile's Undersecretariat of Fisheries and Aquaculture (Subpesca) following the change of government in the country last March. The new Undersecretary of Fisheries and Aquaculture, Osvaldo Urrutia, began his term by fostering dialogue. "Our focus as a government today is to provide clarity to all stakeholders in the fishing and aquaculture sectors," he said at the time.
Announced at the end of April, one of the first measures taken by the new Subpesca management has been, in fact, to open a review process for aquaculture concession relocation requests that are not blocked by Marine Coastal Spaces for Indigenous Peoples (ECMPO) or by protected areas under management plans.
Finally, although the decision was made after the reported quarter, Salmones Camanchaca took the opportunity to announce that, in accordance with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declared the Trump administration's import tariffs unlawful, Camanchaca Inc.—importer, marketer, and distributor of Salmones Camanchaca products in the United States, among other suppliers—has submitted a request to U.S. Customs and Border Protection for the tariffs paid between April 5, 2025, and February 24, 2026. The total amount requested is USD 15 million, of which approximately two-thirds is related to Salmones Camanchaca products.
