SFS Group Public Co. Ltd. reported an improvement in profit during the first nine months of the year, mostly on the back of a revaluation of profits on investments and share of profit from subsidiaries.
Total revenue was flat at CYP 10.98 mln for the first nine month period ending September 2005 compared to CYP 11.01 a year ago, with shipping and commercial activities contributing CYP 8.1 mln (2004 Q3: CYP 7.38m), financial services CYP 1.15 mln (2004 Q3: CYP 2.33m), other income CYP 590k (2004 Q3: CYP 882k) while revaluation profit on investments for sale jumped to CYP 1.12 mln compared to CYP 591k losses a year ago in the same period.
The drop in financial services income was blamed on the fact that SFS sold its stake in Lewis Charles Securities in the UK, while the revaluation gain followed a 35% increase in equity values in the first nine months.
Total expenses were flat at CYP 10.63 mln from CYP 10.75 mln a year ago in the same period, with only finance expenses increasing to CYP 3.61 mln from CYP 3.25 mln, while all other categories there was a decrease.
Operating profits amounted to CYP 347.188 in Q3 ‘05 compared to CYP 258.885 a year ago. SFS then saw a massive improvement in profit after adding the share of subsidiary profits (mostly investment companies) that benefited from the rebound in equity prices. The share of subsidiary profit jumped to CYP 1.169.228 compared to CYP 303k revaluation losses a year ago in the same period, which had seen a CYP 1.6 mln lift due to reduction in bad debt provisions, for which there was no movement this year.
Pretax profit was slightly down at CYP 1.52 mln from CYP 1.58 mln before while net profit after minority interest of CYP 594.340 amounted to CYP 901.291 for the first nine months of 2005 compared to CYP 742.665 a year for a 21.3% jump.
Earnings per share improved to 0.35 cent from 0.29. SFS also announced that in the third quarter, net profits fell to CYP 330.522 from CYP 404.461 in the third quarter of 2004.
Book value per share improved to 9.1 cent as per Financial Mirror calculations from 8.9 cent and is at a 28% premium compared to the 7.1 cent average traded price on the CSE.
SFS revealed that cash flow from operations improved to CYP 4.64 mln from CYP 1.25 mln, which may however deteriorate when capital repayments on the loans start in earnest from January 2006 while total assets were up 5.7% at CYP 136.5 mln. Working capital on the other hand fell to CYP 3.1 mln from CYP 7.7 mln mostly as a result of the takeover of Lemissoler Shipping earlier in the year.
