Monday’s trading in foreign currencies in Jamaican came down from the lofty heights of Friday’s trading as foreign exchange dealers bought the equivalent of US$44,006,677, in contrast to US$109,789,460 on Friday, while they sold the equivalent of US$45,314,596 versus US$86,467,457 previously.
In US dollar trading, dealers bought US$40,659,188 compared to US$104,883,104 on Friday. The buying rate for the US dollar declined 43 cents to $116.29 and US$42,723,695 was sold versus US$83,731,477 on Friday, the selling rate rose 7 cents to $116.99. The Canadian dollar buying rate fell $1.38 to $91.98 with dealers buying C$1,474,785 and selling C$633,071, at an average rate that declined 14 cents to $94.30. 
The rate for buying the British Pound lost $1.58 cents to $180.26 for the purchase of £1,100,105, while £825,122 was sold, at an average rate that climbed 17 cents to $183.88. At the end of trading, it took J$130.26 to purchase the Euro, 57 cents less than on Friday, according to data from Bank of Jamaica, while dealers purchased the European common currency at J$128.08 for 4 cents less than Friday’s rate. Other currencies bought, amounted to the equivalent of US$475,673, while the equivalent of US$783,772 was sold.
Highs & Lows| The highest buying rate for the US dollar dipped 3 cents to $117.07, the lowest buying rate and the highest selling rates remained at $$95.61 and $122.52, respectively while the lowest selling rate dropped $17.69 to $95.61. The highest buying rate for the Canadian dollar moved down 30 cents to $94.30, the lowest buying rate gained 4 cents at $74.99. 
The highest selling rate rose $1.55 to $98.10 and the lowest selling rate lost $1.45 to $90.35. The highest buying rate for the British Pound, fell 65 cents to $184.35, the lowest buying rate put on 8 cents to $147.82, with the highest selling rate rising $2.57 to $190.57 and the lowest selling rate climbed $1.60 to $178.10.
Trading low keyed on TTSE
Trading on the Trinidad & Tobago Stock Exchange remained subdued on Monday, the market ended with 10 securities changing hands of which 1 advanced, 4 declined, 6 traded firm, with a total of 134,168 units, valued at $6,531,028 changing hands.
At the close of the market, the Composite Index lost 0.15 points to close at 1,161.37, the All T&T Index fell 0.30 points to 1,969.45 and the Cross Listed Index remained at 46.36.
Gains| Point Lisas Industrial Port traded at a new 52 weeks’ high of $3.90 with just 600 units changing hands and gained 7 cents and Republic Bank closed with 37,154 shares being purchased 1 cent up at $115.01 with a value of $4,273,073.
Declines| National Flour had 10,566 shares changing hands fell 5 cents to end at $2.
Firm Trades| Stocks closing with prices unchanged at the end of trading are, ANSA McAl with 6,798 shares changing hands for $457,166 ended at $67.25. CLICO Investment Fund with 74,493 units valued at $1,683,541 changing hands at $22.60, Firstcaribbean International Bank ended trading with 1,500 shares at $5, First Citizens Bank with 1,604 shares trading to close at $35.75. Massy Holdings trading 35 shares to close at $64.34, Sagicor Financial closing with 1,100 shares at $6.26, and Scotiabank traded 318 shares to close at $62.25.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator had 3 stocks with the bid higher than their last selling prices and 4 stocks with offers that were lower.
Profit drops at Blue Power
Sales for the Blue Power to April this year increased from $1.046 billion to $1.06 billion, with both divisions showing improvement. Lumber Depot division moved from sales of $728 million to $735 million while the Blue Power division improved from $318 million to $325 million.
While revenues were flat administrative cost climbed 16 percent or $22 million to $157 million, helping to push profits down for the full year.
Profits for the financial year stood at $71 million before tax with the Lumber Depot division contributing $26 million and the Blue Power division adding $45 million in 2014 profit was $93 million. The company produced only $7 million in profit in the final fiscal quarter compared to $12.4 million in the January quarter from slightly less sales in the fourth quarter. After providing for corporate taxes $654,000 were profit for the year ended at $70 million as the company became liable to tax after completing five years on the Junior Market in the third week of April compared to net profit for the previous year of $93 million. Earnings per share ended at $1.24.
The company that will meet shortly to consider a dividend has cash of $166 million on and as of April with cash generated from operations being $55 million compared to just $13 million in the prior year.
The stock which is priced at $9.50 on the junior market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange may be fully priced currently.
Declining stocks on top Monday
Carreras drops $2.20
The JSE Market Index declined 236.68 points to 97,430.27 the JSE All Jamaican Composite index fell 264.54 points to close at 107,839.80 but the JSE combined index dropped 234.79 points to end at 100,012.08.IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading, in the main and junior markets, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator was showing a poor reading of 5 stocks with bids higher than their last selling prices and 5 with offers that were lower.
In trading, Cable & Wireless had 128,943 units changing hands at 45 cents at the close, after shedding 2 cents. Caribbean Cement had 68,775 units trading at $5.50, Carreras lost $2.20 while trading 20,000 shares to close at $48.30, Desnoes and Geddes traded at $7.56 with 35,000 shares,
Gleaner ended with 5,600 shares changing hands to gain 10 cents, for a 52 weeks’ high of $1.29. Grace Kennedy ended with 21,158 units at $63.50 by dropping 50 cents, Jamaica Broilers gained 50 cents in trading 7,605 units to end at $6, JMMB Group added 10 cents in trading 400,538 shares and ended at $7.50. Mayberry had 36,805 shares trading, to end at a $2.52, National Commercial Bank fell 47 cents while trading 99,459 shares, to close at $29.03, Sagicor Group fell 15 cents with 485,685 units trading, to end at $12.55, but only after it traded during the day at a 52 weeks’ high of $13.10, Sagicor Real Estate Fund saw trading in 6,053 units but lost 40 cents in closing at $7.30, Scotia Group had 11,027 units trading 4 cents up at $23.25.
Paramount a new high of $6
Paramount traded at a new all-time high of $6.
At the close of the market, there were 3 stocks with bids higher than their last selling prices, 4 with lower offers and 4 securities closing with no bids to buy and 8 that had no stocks being offered for sale.
Stocks trading in the junior market are, Access Financial Services closing with 21,233 shares trading $1 lower, at $11, Caribbean Flavours trading 20,496 shares to close at $2.55, Dolphin Cove trading only 811 units at $13 for a new high, after gaining 40 cents.
KLE with a small volume of 1,364 shares, lost 5 cents to close at 65 cents, the lowest price it has traded at to date. At the close KLE was offered for sale at 60 cents and had no bids posted to buy. Lasco Distributors traded 47,500 shares and gained 4 cents to end at $1.69, Lasco Financial Services 19,800 shares at $1.81 after losing 12 cents and Paramount Trading closing at a new 52 weeks high of $6, after adding 89 cents. Caribbean Cream did not traded but closed with an offer to sell 30,000 units at $1.55 with the last price the stock traded at being $1.60, the bid is someway off at $1.25.
JSE off to slow start Monday
After 60 minutes of trading on the Jamaica Stock Exchange, 14 securities traded with 
4 rising and 6 declining comprising a total volume of 519,320 shares changing hands, only 2 stocks have so far traded in the junior market with both declining.
The all Jamaican Composite index inched up 179.45 to 108,283.79 points, JSE Combined Index put on 84.53 to 100,321.40 points, JSE Index is now at 97,827.49 points after adding 160.54 points and Junior Market Index fell to 892.53, down by 7.37 points.
The most noticeable trades so far are KLE with a small volume but ended down to 65 cents the lowest price it has traded at to date, Gleaner Company with 5,600 units at $1.29 with a 10 cents gain, for a 52 weeks’ high and Sagicor Group traded at $13. Paramount Trading has a bid at $6 versus the last traded price of $5.11 as investors try to find where supply may be.
LascoMan profit jumps 78% in Q4
Lasco’s new I Cool drink where demand is resulting in an increase in the plant size.
For the financial year, revenues climbed 19.4 percent to $4.8 billion from $4.03 billion and profit of $669 million is up from $584 million. Gross profit climbed 34.7 percent well above the growth in revenues, a very positive development. Gross profit for the quarter jumped a huge 86 percent helping to deliver the stunning increase in profit for the quarter and augurs well for results for the coming fiscal year, and is a result of new products now being produced by the new plant.
Administrative expenses climbed 44 percent to $555 while finance cost moved from $73 million to $125 million. The average number of persons employed by the company during the year was fifty-one up from forty-two in 2014 helping to push labour cost from $147 million to $209 million. With the new factory facilities operational, depreciation ended at $67 million up from $27 million in 2014 but is set to jump in 2016 with only a Borrowingfraction of the annual charge booked in 2015, additionally, there are more assets to be transferred to fixed assets that will give rise to even higher depreciation charges.
Borrowing climbed to $1.64 Million from $1.49 billion at the end of March 2014, the increase helped to fund capital expenditure of $523 million during the year. A total of $329 million was paid back on loans during the year.
The last quarter numbers suggest that profit could end around $1.2 billion for the year or around 30 cents per share. While the company becomes taxable this year capital allowances coupled with tax payable at 12.5 percent, will result in little or no taxes being paid on profit for the year.
The net book value of property, plant and equipment includes assets under construction amounting to $1.34 billion. The cost will be depreciated once the property is complete and available for use. The estimated additional cost of completion of the facility is $373 million.
The company is listed on the junior market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange and last traded at $1.31 for an historical PE of just over 8 and around 4 based on IC Insider’s projected earnings. The stock should deliver a healthy increase in price during the fiscal year.
Barbados between rock & hard place
Barbados once the pearl of the Caribbean is encountering some tough times these past few years. The economy has grown only 1.5 percent since 2009 with a 0.6 percent growth in 2014 up from negative growth in the previous year.
If slow growth was the only problem it would not be so bad. The country faces mounting debt with a gaping fiscal deficit and rising interest cost. The fiscal numbers showed improvement last fiscal year to March, with higher revenues and grants and lower cost before debt servicing, but still ended with a $633 million deficit or 7.2 percent of GDP.
The data that tells of a major problem, is to be found in corporate taxes. Having taken in $521million in 2009 the take has fallen by $342 million to only $179 million in the latest fiscal year, partially offset by a 31 percent rise of $102 million in personal taxes. Vat tax took in 16 percent more in the 2015 year than it did in 2009, an increase of $125 million and that is to benefit from a broadening of items to be included as of the new fiscal year.
Good news| Wages remained at roughly the same level as in 2009 at $802 million but is down from $872 million in 2013, while the government cut subsidies and transfers by $177 million in the last year. Overall revenues rose in the year to March 2015 above that of 2014 by $171 million and just $34 million ahead of the 2009 intake. The other good news is that while the deficit is high it is down from 11.2 percent of in 2014. On the negative, the bulk of the funds borrowed is from overseas and with the credit rating downgraded recently, borrowing cost which is set to rise due to large deficit will increase move than might have been contemplated earlier.
In its 2015/16 budget presentation, the projection for the 2015/16 fiscal year is revenues of $2.539 billion with the fiscal deficit is projected at $734 million or 8.3 percent of GDP with measures that will raise B$200 million in additional taxes and excise duties in the full fiscal year announced, this could result in reduced economic activity and may negatively affect inflows.
Barbados slow Q1 growth
Image courtesy of arztsamui/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
In 2014 the country enjoyed growth of a mere 0.02 percent, slightly better than the negative growth of 0.01 percent suffered in 2013. The country has been struggling since the global economic collapse in 2008 with a 4 percent contraction in the economy in 2009. Economic growth is yet to get the economy back close to that level in 2008 with moderate growth of 1.4 percent from 2010 to 2012 and just 1.5 percent to 2014.
Barbados growth is being stunted by rising government debt with large fiscal deficit despite adjustments make in reducing wage cost and subsidies to state entities.
Huge forex trading in Jamaica Friday
NCB buys US$32.9m on Friday
Scotia Bank bought US$18.7 million and sold US$16.8 million while National Commercial Bank bought US$32.85 and sold only US$21.5 million, the next largest trade was Sagicor Bank with US$10.9 million bought to US$8.6 million sold.
In US dollar trading, dealers bought US$104,883,104 compared to US$27,666,499 on Thursday. The buying rate for the US dollar increased 50 cents to $116.72 and US$83,731,477 was sold versus US$26,103,111 on Thursday, the selling rate rose 3 cents to $116.92. The Canadian dollar buying rate rose $1.05 to $93.36 with dealers buying C$2,034,353 and selling C$1,742,563, at an average rate that rose 2 cents to $94.44.
The rate for buying the British Pound gained 48 cents to $181.84 for the purchase of £1,661,063, while £785,759 was sold, at an average rate that climbed 34 cents to $183.71. At the end of trading, it took J$130.83 to purchase the Euro, 20 cents more than on Thursday, according to data from Bank of Jamaica, while dealers purchased the European common currency at J$128.13 for 21cents more than Thursday’s rate. Other currencies bought, amounted to the equivalent of US$691,331, while the equivalent of US$93,900 was sold.Highs & Lows| The highest buying rate for the US dollar dipped 12 cents to $117.10, the lowest buying rate jumped $4.91 to $95.61. The highest selling rate remained at $122.52 and the lowest selling rate jumped $17.69 to $113.30.
The highest buying rate for the Canadian dollar moved down $1.40 to $94.60, the lowest buying rate remained at $74.95. The highest selling rate declined $1.45 to $96.55 and the lowest selling rate rose $1.50 to $91.80. The highest buying rate for the British Pound, rose 85 cents to $185, the lowest buying rate remained at $147.74, with the highest selling rate rising $1.08 to $188 and the lowest selling rate climbed $1.70 to $179.70.
