Berger & Scotia Group jump TOP 10

June 5, 2017 by

Scotiabank jumped out of TOP 10.

The main market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange, moved forward on each day of the past week except for a fall on Thursday to sit close to the all-time high on Friday. Movement in the Junior Market was up and down but a few stocks traded at new highs during the week.
In the main market, IC Insider downgraded the earnings of Carreras to $9 after the company reported full year results, the stock jumped to a record $89 at the close of the week and is out of the top listing. Carreras exit allowed for Jamaica Broilers to return to the main market listing. Jetcon Corporation returns to the Junior Market list and Lasco Financial moves out of the TOP 10.
The week’s movement continue to be constrained by near term resistance levels which could be acting as short term restraint to a break out from current levels.
The average PE ratio for the Junior Market Top stocks is 7.5 and 6.8 in the main market, these compare favourably with 13.7 for the overall main market and 13.4 for Junior Market, based on 2017 estimated earnings. With several stocks trading below the average, the potential for more gains for the rest of 2017 seems positive, barring any major negative developments.
In the main market, decline in the prices of Seprod down to $30 and Sterling Investments to $15.50 moved them into the top list and replaced Berger Paints and Scotia Group that maintained their prices and are now some distance from the top list.
Recent TOP 10 listings that remain just below the top spots include Access Financial that hit a new record high close of $50 and Blue Power up to $55 at the close of the week.

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Cable Bahamas list on JSE Friday

May 31, 2017 by

This Friday June 2, will see the latest listing of a new company on the Jamaica Stock Exchange. The Bahamian based Cable Bahamas will see its shares available for trading on the local exchange for the first time.
Earlier this month the exchange approved the listing of the company’s shares. Information available to IC Insider.com is that the list will be on the US dollar exchange and will comprise ordinary and preference shares.
According to the company’s financials there are 43,884,754 ordinary shares and 8 different category of preference shares issued. The net asset value of the ordinary shares are around BH$2 each but the stock trades in the Bahamas at BH$4.05, with 1,000 units trading. Selling by investors is at $4.40 and above with buying interest at $4.05 and below. The 52 weeks high is $6.76 on June 9, 2016 and a low of $3.80, on the 9th of February, this year.
Revenue earned for the 2016 December quarter, was BH$47.887 million compared to BH$41.730 million and for the year to December BH$180.588 versus BH$165.678. The company reported losses of BH$9.2 million in the December quarter inclusive of a fixed asset write off of BH$5.8 million and $7.8 million for the year. Total shareholders’ equity stood at BH$91 million at the end of December 2016 and losses incurred in the March 2017 quarter of BH$7 million pushed shareholders’ equity down to BH$84 million at the end of March this year. Revenues in the March 2017 quarter rose 17 percent to $51 million up from $43.7 million in 2016 but operating cost jumped even faster by 60 percent to $46.6 million from $29 million with depreciation and amortization rising from $9 million to $16.8 million.
Two other listing should be heading to the market within weeks as Stationery and Supplies and the Musson subsidiary Productive Business Solutions with operations in the Caribbean, Central America and the USA come to the market with a US$41 million offer of ordinary shares.

Filed Under: Company News, General Business News, Initial Public Offers Tagged With: , , ,

47% surge in Access profit

May 31, 2017 by

Looking at the Access Financial results to March without dissecting it would lead to a conclusion that things have slowed with earnings per share of $2.49 versus $2.19 as the comparative reported in the audited financial statements for 2107.
Those numbers disguise the full impact of the 2017 fiscal performance that is up nearly 47 percent after tax, compared to the previous twelve months period. The company that made its name lending workers supported by employers making payroll deductions for repaying the loans, made profit after tax of $678 million versus $463 million when the 15 month period is adjusted for the extra 3 months. The growth continues the strong growth of the company as loans keeps on growing year after year and being up $514 million in the last twelve months to $$2.6 billion. Access has shareholders’ equity of $1.7 billion and should exceed the $2 billion mark during the current fiscal year as profit for the current fiscal year.
IC Insider.com is forecasting profit for the year to March 2018 to exceed $1 billion with earnings per share of $4 with $6 for the 2019 fiscal year.
Dividends paid during the year to March 2017 amounted to $178,431,396 or 26 percent of profit. The stock traded at a record high of $50 on Tuesday on the Junior Market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange.

Filed Under: Company News, Company Results Tagged With: , , ,

Berger & Scotia Group drop TOP 10

May 28, 2017 by

Image courtesy of suphakit73/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The two main markets of the Jamaica Stock Exchange, pulled back this past week as the volatility in the price of some stocks resulted in shifts in the position of some stocks in the TOP 10. Movements were not enough to change the Junior Market list, even as Caribbean Producers saw a 25 percent fall during the week with heavy volume, the stock enjoyed partial recovery by weekend.
This week’s pull back, seems to support the comment last week, “that both markets are trading close to recent resistance levels which could act as a short term restraint on upward movement.”
In the main market, decline in the prices of Seprod down to $30 and Sterling Investments to $15.50 moved them into the top list and replaced Berger Paints and Scotia Group that maintained their prices and are now some distance from the top list.
The average PE ratio for the Junior Market Top stocks is 7.5 and 6.8 in the main market, these compare favourably with 13.7 for the main market and 13.4 for Juniors, based on 2017 estimated earnings. With several stocks trading below the average, the potential for more gains for the rest of 2017 seems positive, barring any major negative developments.
Recent TOP 10 listings remain just below the top spots with Access Financial, Jetcon Corporation, AMG Packaging, Dolphin Cove, Caribbean Cream and Blue Power sitting just below, with potential gains of more than 100 percent and in the main market, Grace Kennedy and Sagicor Group are just below the Top spots with good potential gains ahead.
The history of the Top stock performance indicates that, it takes a few months for most of the stocks to reach potential targeted prices as they tend not to be the stocks favoured by a large segment of investors, in the short term.
At the close of the week, IC Insider.com’s TOP 10 Junior Market stocks now trade at an average discount of 44 percent to the Junior Market average, while those in the main market are trading at a 49 percent discount, to the average of the market, leaving several stocks with room for growth in the months ahead.
At the close of the week, bid volumes for junior market stocks remained relatively low ranging from a high of 66,436 units at $5.15 for Lasco Manufacturing with an offer of 16,685 units at $5.20, Access with a bid of 35,425 at $42.50, Caribbean Producers with 34,300 units on the bid at $3.50, with 100,000 shares on offer at $3.80. Key Insurance closed with 15,213 units on the bid at $2.90 and 51,361 offered at $3.80 and Lasco Financial ended the week with a bid of $4.05 to buy 24,000 units with 47,888 units being offered for sale at $4.40.

Seprod shares dropped from $45.10 in February to $30 on Friday.

Caribbean Cement had a bid to buy 54,903 units at $28.50 and offers of 7,850 shares at $29.95. Carreras had just 1,233 units on the bid at $77 with 4,954 shares being offered at $80, JMMB Group’s has bids to buy 8,272 units at $19.80 with an offer to sell 6,224 shares at $20, Radio Jamaica bid ended trading at $1.68 to buy 883 units with 30,000 units on offer at $1.79 while Scotia Investments closed the week with 14,753 units on the bid to buy at $36.50 and 14,049 units offered for sale at $37.85. Interest in Seprod has fallen with only 250 units on the bid at $29.50 and selling of 95,352 units at $30, this is way off from the 52 weeks’ high of $45 the stock sold at late February this year.

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Sagicor Barbados undervalued but

May 27, 2017 by

The Barbadian based Sagicor Group is reporting net profit of US$23.4 million for the first three months of 2017, compared to the prior year of US$22.3 million. Profit flowed from revenues for the quarter of US$282.5 million, compared to US $264.4 million for the corresponding period in 2016, an increase of US$18.1 million.
Profit attributable to shareholders’ of the group ended at US$13.3 million, compared to US$13.9 million for the 2016 period. Earnings per common share was 4.4 US cents, compared to the prior year of 4.6 US cents.
Net premium revenue rose t0 US$167.7 million, exceeding the prior year amount of US$157.3 million. Net investment income and other income rose to US$114.8 million compared to the prior year’s US$107 million.
Operating expenses rose to US$115 million from US$101.4 million for the same period in 2016. “Higher administration costs were incurred as a result of the expansion of cards and payments business in our Jamaica segment, along with the incurrence of some non-recurring costs also relating to our Jamaica segment”, Stephen McNamara, Chairman, stated in his report to shareholders. Policy holders’ benefits inched to US$137.2 million from US$134 million for the previous year.

Sagicor Group Jamaica a subsidiary of the Barbadian compnay.

Total comprehensive income grew to US$28.6 million, compared to US$19.9 million for the same period last year. Included in comprehensive income were net gains on financial assets of US$7.9 million. “Retranslation losses Sagicor Group Jamaica, a subsidiary of the Barbados company.[/caption] amounted to US $0.7 million, compared to US $6.4 million reported in the prior year, and resulted from declines in the Jamaica and Trinidad currency against the United States dollar”, the Chairman stated.
Total assets amount to US $6.6 billion, with liabilities of US$5.8 billion and shareholders’ equity of US$818 million. The Group’s debt, which is included in other liabilities, was US$405.3 million.
The group’s stocks traded on the Trinidad and Tobago Stock Exchange atTT$8.99 and in Barbados at BD$2.45, (around US$1.30 per share. The price puts the PE ratio around 7 times 2017 earnings. The problem is that Barbados where the company is head quartered is in the midst of major economic problems that could make investing in the stock riskier than normal.

Filed Under: Company News, Company Results Tagged With: , , , ,

Audit wrongly states ISP earnings as 32c

April 1, 2017 by

I$P Finance hits a new high recently.


ISP Finance earned $40 million for 2016 or earnings per share of 46 cents based on an average of 87 million shares in issue for the year, but the audited statement reported only 32 cents based on a non-existence average of 126.5 million.
The company only issued 105 million shares hence it is not possible for the average to be greater.
The above error along with glaring errors elsewhere in the financial system at large raise the question about the investing public being adequately protected, in spite of regulators in place to do police the system?
Auditors are required to use care and due diligence in undertaking their duties to ensure that the companies they audit maintain proper records that will give a fair view of a company’s profit and financial position. Users of audited statement is not expected to see glaring errors in them. It raises questions about the quality of the audit and the management of the company as well.
Knutsford Express’ audited reports for 2014 and 2015, were filled with errors or questionable treatment of transactions, raising questions about the accuracy of the entire reports.
The earnings per share for 2014 was overstated due to inaccurate computation of the average number of shares issued in 2013, while showing earnings per share of $1.07 for 2014. The income statement erroneously stated by way of note, that “using the weighted average number of shares at end of 2015 would result in earnings being 50 cents for 2014.” Since no new share were issued in 2015 there can be no there is no need for a computation of an average and there can be no change to the earnings for 2014 if the correct average was computed for 2014 in the first place.
The report had further stated “During January 2014, the company raised additional capital of $99,862,700 from its initial public offering of 99,999,003 shares for its enlistment on the Jamaica Stock Exchange Junior Market”. The company in fact issued 26 million bonus shares in 2013 while the public offering was for 20,000,000 ordinary shares, only 4,867,338 new shares were offered by the company while 15,132,662 shares existing shares were sold to the public in the IPO by shareholders. At the time the IPO, 95,132,662 ordinary shares were already issued, the average number of shares should be approximately 60 million rather than 46.8 million used to compute the 2014 EPS, which would have worked out around 83 cents.
According to ISP Finance prospectus, 1n January 2007 the company was incorporated with an authorised share capital of 10,000 ordinary shares at J$1 per share. In June 2007 the company’s authorised share capital was increased to 5,000,000 ordinary shares with all being subscribed for at $1 each.
On February 11, 2016 the company’s authorised share capital was increased to 105,000,000 ordinary shares. Of the 100,000,000 ordinary share increase, 51,017,500 shares were allotted to Gencorp Limited at J$2 per each being the same price at which shares were offered in the IPO. Of the balance just over 48.98 million units were offered to the general public in the IPO.

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