Croatia the better playing team in the world cup match. demolished a Cameroon team that fell apart as one of its player effectively gave himself a red card and departed play, minutes before the end of the first half. At the end of an entertaining world cup match, the Cameroon team not only lost but will be heading home as they are without a point, with only one game to play. Things deteriorated for the Cameroon team when two players were virtually in a fight close to the end of play.
Croatia has a chance to move forward to the next round but would need to beat Mexico or if they draw they would have to rely on Cameroon pulling off an unlikely win against Brazil when they play next week.
Croatia 4-0 as Cameroon players fight
June 18, 2014 by
T-bill rates drop sharply
June 18, 2014 by
The average rate for the 90 day Treasury bill instrument came out at 7.66 percent at today’s auction, down sharply from the May auction which came out at an average of 8.2 percent as Government sought to raise $400 million for this time frame but the auction saw $851 million chasing after the amount available. The 180 day instrument which averaged 8.932 percent in May plummeted to 8.365 percent as $877 million chased after the $400 million available.
Also on offer was a 30 day instrument to raise $400 million which provided an average rate of 6.797 percent as $534,303,700 chased after the $400 million that was available. The previous 30 day Treasury bill issued cleared at an average rate of 6.99 percent, in May this year.
Lasco Distributors staff share plan
June 18, 2014 by
Lasco Distributors Board approved the rules of the 2014 Stock Option Plan for the Employees of Lasco Distributors. The amount of shares available in the option plan is 168,321,556 units or 5 percent of the total of 3,366,431,150 shares currently issued pursuant to a resolution passed at the 3013 annual general meeting which gave the directors powers to set the terms of the options.
The resolution passed states “THAT the directors be and are hereby authorized to enter into a stock option plan for up to but not more than 5% of the issued ordinary shares of the Company with such of the employees of the Company as the directors might determine upon such terms and conditions and subject to such rules and regulations as the directors shall in their absolute discretion determine and to execute such deeds agreements documentation or other assurances as might be required and to enter into such engagements and arrangements as might be necessary for the due operation and administration of such a plan.”
The company has been very successful with profit for the year to March this year increasing to $587.46 million versus $506.8 million in 2013. The company is expected to benefit from the distribution of Salada Foods products which it started to handle at the start of 2014 as well as from additional products from the expanded Lasco Manufacturing factory, a sister company.
Share buy back for Kingston Properties
June 18, 2014 by
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Kingston Properties advises that the Board of Directors authorized a buy-back of up to one percent (1%) of the company’s shares in issue for up to one year following the expiry of 21 days from the date of notice to the Stock Exchange. The repurchase of the shares will be conducted on an open market through the Company’s Stockbrokers. The Company’s cash flows will be the source of funds for the purchase of shares. Kingston Properties will advise its shareholders of the details of the purchase within 30 days of the repurchase of the shares. The total number of shares issued amounts to 68,800,102 units. One percent of the issued shares amounts 688,000 units. The stock last traded at $4 after it had fallen to $3.50 a few trading days before but the net asset value of the shares is around $12.
Inside trades – Director buys into D&G
June 17, 2014 by
Trade by insiders can be a good indicator about the future prospects of a company’s performance but not every inside trade will be informative and can be relied on. The latest insider trades include a relative big purchase that of 1,971,000 Desnoes & Geddes shares by a Director of the company that was carried out on June 13, 2014.
An Executive of Scotia Group purchased 239,106 shares under the company’s Executive Long Term Incentive Scheme on June 9, 2014 for settlement on June 12, 2014. Over at Pan-Jam Investment Trust a Director purchased 10,000 Pan-Jamaican Trust shares on June 10, 2014.
Sagicor Group concludes RBC purchase this month
June 16, 2014 by
Regulatory approval has been granted for the Sagicor Group Jamaica to acquire full control of RBC Royal Bank (Jamaica) and its subsidiary – Securities Jamaica Ltd. Sagicor In a release stated that “ we expect to complete the process of acquisition and transfer of business by the end of June. We will be taking steps to combine the operations of both banks to operate under the Sagicor Bank branch, which will involve rebranding all RBC Jamaica branches to Sagicor Bank branches. Our Teams at Sagicor Bank and RBC Jamaica will be working to ensure a smooth transition for all our new and existing customers. Over the next 12 months, we will be working to integrate our technology platforms so that customers will be able to bank at any of our branch locations”.
RBC Royal Bank (Jamaica) has been incurring large annual losses which led to its parent taking the decision to divest themselves of the local operation making it the second time that the company has exited the local market. In the 1990s Royal Bank of Canada sold out its remaining local interest to Jamaica Mutual life who subsequently sold it to National Commercial Bank.
Sagicor Group earlier in the year confirmed the acquisition of RBC Royal Bank Jamaica’s operations for a price of $9.5 billion with the book value at $9 billion at the end of March.
Pooling Sagicor Bank with that of RBC will create a combined banking group with assets of nearly $76 billion with loans of $38 billion with $28 billion coming from RBC and revenues around $12 billion
This will not be the first time that Sagicor Bank would have entered in merger arrangements having absorbed Manufacturers Merchant bank and Trafalgar Development Bank some years ago.
The RBC operation was been bleeding around $500 million per quarter the book value. For the twelve months to September last year the RBC lost $1.7 billion and $456 million between July and September according to central bank’s data. For the year ending October 2012, RBC reported a loss of $2 billion before tax which was down from $3 billion in 2011. In 2012 loan losses contributed $650 million to the loss and income was inadequate to cover housekeeping expenses. Most likely the NDX in 2013 that cut interest rates would have negatively affected them thus reducing the net interest margin. Royal Bank’s problem apart from heavy loan losses is the fixed operating cost that the income generated cannot match. The Group will embark on cost cutting some of which is expected to flow from branch closure where branches overlap.
Inflation jumps 1% in May
June 16, 2014 by
Inflation jumps 1 percent in May, the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (Statin) stated in a release today, compared to the index for April. An increase of 0.7 percent in ‘Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages’ and 3.6 percent increase in the index for the division ’Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and other Fuels’ were the major reasons for the sharp climb. The movement in the index for May 2014 resulted in a calendar year-to-date inflation rate of 2.4 percent. Inflation declined in April by 0.7 percent compared to March this year.
According to Statin, the division ‘Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages’ was impacted by increases of 1.9 percent and 1.6 percent in ‘Bread and Cereals’ and ‘Milk, Cheese and Eggs’ respectively. There were declines of 0.4 percent and 0.3 percent for the classes ‘Fruit’ and ‘Vegetables and Starchy Foods’ respectively. Within the division ‘Housing Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels’ the advance in the index for ‘Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels’ of 7.3 percent was moderated by the fall of 3.4 percent in the index for ‘Water Supply and Miscellaneous Services Related to Dwelling’
The other divisions that recorded increases in the All Jamaica ‘All Divisions’ index were: ‘Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco’ 0.5 percent, ‘Clothing and Footwear’ 0.2 percent, ‘Furnishings, Household Equipment and Routine Household Maintenance’ 0.5 percent, ‘Health’ 0.2 percent, ‘Transport’ 0.4 percent, ‘Recreation and Culture’ 0.1 percent, ‘Restaurants and Accommodation Services’ 0.5 percent, and ‘Miscellaneous Goods and Services’ 0.5 percent.
Jamaica Producers top inside trades
June 10, 2014 by
Jamaica Producers Group advises that a director purchased 433,941 shares in the company on June 6, 2014 while the Gleaner Jamaica advises that a senior manager sold 100,000 shares on June 3, 2014 and National Commercial Bank advises of the purchase of shares by Directors on May 30, 2014 and June 3, 2014 amounting to 37,208 units.
Operating profits up 81% at JMMB
June 6, 2014 by
Jamaica Money Market Brokers (JMMB) had their best year ever in the period leading up to the end of March this year, chalking up at 80.7 percent increase in ongoing earnings. The market is not impressed as the stock has been trading down on both Trinidad and Jamaica stock exchanges recently and after the posting of the results. With profit after tax coming in at $2.8 billion including a $362 million for gains form the purchase of the shares in its fully owned subsidiary which it acquired fully in 2013, the group earned $1.74 per share for the year, placing the PE at 4 times last year’s earnings and around 2.7 times IC Insider projected 2015 earnings. In 2013 JMMB reported $3.74 billion but that was helped considerably by a $2 billion gain from the acquisition of the shares of Capital and Credit Group, without that gain earnings would be just $1.7 billion in that year.
Financial & Related Services contributed profit before tax of $2.62 billion and Banking & Related Services $443 million, these are up from $1.66 billion and just $33 million respectively reported for 2013.
Revenues grow| In a year when they took over the balance of the shares not previously owned by them in Intercommercial Bank in Trinidad, revenues climbed to $15.75 billion from $12.9 billion in 2013 or a 22 percent increase but staff and administrative cost rose from $4.6 billion to $5.67 billion in 2014 for a 12.3 percent increase, well below the growth in revenues but interest cost climbed only 6 percent.
According to the audited financial statements “In the six month period ended 31 March 2014, Intercommercial Bank contributed revenue of J$794,210,000 and net profit of J$156,445,000 to the Group’s results. If the acquisition had occurred on 1April 2013, management estimates that revenue would have been J$1,436,439,000, and net profit for the year would have been J$106,459,000”.
Assets|Total assets climbed to more than $200 billion for the first time ending at $207 billion versus $167 billion at the end of March 2013. A fair bit of the growth came as a result of the acquisition of the shares in the Trinidad bank which contributed $24 billion but with equity capital of just over $18 billion there is some amount of exposure as leveraging is at a high level with customer deposits at $36 billion and repos payable of $143 billion.
JMMB has operations mainly in Jamaica, Dominican Republic and Trinidad and Tobago. This stock stills carries IC Insider Buy Rating.
Jamaica’s inflation falls
June 5, 2014 by
A fall in the price of electricity lead to a 0.3 percent drop in the inflation rate for April this year, according to data released by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica, on the Consumer Price Index. Statin says “this was the lowest inflation rate recorded since July 2012, when the rate fell by 0.3 percent”.
This decrease was as a result of a decline in electricity rate, represented by a fall of 7.5 percent in the index for the group ‘Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels’ but was moderated by the 4.0 percent increase in the index for the group ‘Water Supply and Miscellaneous Services Related to the Dwelling’ as a result of a the rise in water and sewage rates for the period. The division, ‘Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages’ recorded an increase of 0.3 percent.
The calendar year-to-date inflation rate for April 2014 was 1.4 percent, the point-to-point 7.6 percent. The other divisions that recorded increases in the All Jamaica ‘All Divisions’ index were: ‘Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco’ 0.2 percent, ‘Clothing and Footwear’ 0.1 percent, ‘Furnishings, Household Equipment and Routine Household Maintenance’ 0.3 percent, ‘Health’ 0.5 percent, ‘Transport’ 0.4 percent, ‘Recreation and Culture’ 0.3 percent, ‘Restaurants and Accommodation Services’ 0.4 percent, and ‘Miscellaneous Goods and Services’ 0.2 percent.
