13th Mar 2020 10:24
(Alliance News) - Ocean Wilsons Holdings Ltd on Friday reported higher annual profit on a "strong" performance from its investment portfolio but warned 2020 may be a "difficult" year.
The stock was trading 0.8% lower at 744.00 pence each on Friday morning in London.
The company, which operates through its Brazilian maritime services subsidiary and holds a portfolio of international investments, reported pretax profit of USD82.5 million, up from USD60.2 million posted in 2018. Revenue was down 12% to USD406.1 million from USD460.2 million.
The increase in profit was attributed to positive movement in returns from the investment portfolio, reduced foreign exchange losses on monetary items, and better results from the company's joint ventures
Ocean Wilson's investment portfolio - including cash under management - increased 12% to USD285.3 million from USD258.9 million, outperforming its benchmark the MSCI ACQI + Frontier Markets NR Index, which rose by 5.3%.
Ocean Wilsons declared a dividend of 70 US cents per share, unchanged year-on-year.
Looking ahead, the company expressed concern about the new coronavirus outbreak, adding that could already see a reduction in forecast container volumes to be received from China at its container terminals in Brazil in March and April.
Ocean Wilsons added that it expects 2020 to be a difficult year for the Brazilian offshore oil and gas market as the oil price has dropped and the Brazilian real has devalued "substantially" against the dollar. It warned that if the weakness in the Brazilian currency is continues in 2020, bottom-line earnings would be hurt.
"Stock markets have already slumped on investor concerns about how Covid-19 is affecting consumer demand, manufacturing supply chains and major economies around the world, with its full impact still unknown. Importantly whilst growth is still subdued, we do not see the factors in place which are normally associated with a recession."
"We continue to see value offered by a number of the emerging markets with attractive valuations by historic standards. Emerging market central banks cut interest rates during 2019 in many cases and we expect to see further rate cuts in the current year, as growth remains low and inflation pressures are modest. However any disruption to global supply chains could have an adverse impact on commodity prices with associated consequences for emerging markets."
By Ife Taiwo; [email protected]
Copyright 2020 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
Related Shares:
Ocean Wilsons