Agribusiness Elders has fallen to an annual loss of $505 million, but says big costs from its restructure are behind it.

The $505 million loss, which the company had previously flagged, was a result of charges related to the company’s moves to narrow its focus on agriculture.

Challenging seasonal market conditions also contributed, as well as accounting discrepancies related to the value of live cattle for export.

It compares to a loss of $60.6 million in the prior year.

Managing director Malcolm Jackman said the company had made the last of the major writedowns related to its transformation from a conglomerate to a company focused solely on rural services.

“The cynic would say there’s not much left to write down,” he said.

The company has sold its automotive interiors and insurance businesses, and has nearly finished selling its forestry assets, as it nears the end of a five year process of rationalisation and restructuring, Mr Jackman said.

As a result, Elders had substantially reduced its debt.

But the company also made an underlying loss in 2012/13, excluding one-off items, which Mr Jackman said was extremely disappointing.

The underlying loss reflected seasonal conditions and accounting discrepancies, an issue announced to investors in early October.

“A hot spring and an extremely dry summer really impacted livestock prices over the past 12 months,” Mr Jackman said.

“And then of course, out of the blue, we get smacked with this accounting irregularity.”

Elders’ rural services business took a $24.2 million hit to earnings from the discrepancies in the live export business.

The charge was needed to restate the global livestock trading balance sheet, after the company identified that trading results had not been recorded in line with accounting policies.

Investigations were continuing into the accounting irregularities, but Elders said current evidence pointed to likely inappropriate, and potentially fraudulent, activity.

Mr Jackman said the rural services business had experienced a strong start in October and November, and was tracking well as more rain fell on the east coast of Australia and across the top end.

The company was still in talks with parties interested in re-capitalising the company, but no binding or complete proposals had been received, Mr Jackman said.

Shares in Elders were steady at 12 cents at 1420 AEDT.