Lucky Cement consolidated earnings at Rs26.53 billion in 9 months

KARACHI: The Lucky Cement Limited reported consolidated profits of Rs26.53 billion of which Rs5.81 billion is attributable to non-controlling interests for the nine months ended March 31, 2022.

This translates into the earnings per share (EPS) of Rs64.07, compared with Rs56.36 share reported during the same period of last year.

On a consolidated basis, the company achieved gross turnover of Rs265.70 billion which is 31.2 per cent higher, compared with the turnover of Rs202.46 billion during the same period of last year.

During the period under review, the company’s consolidated net profit attributable to owners of the holding company, increased 13.7 per cent, compared with the same period of last year.

Despite the challenges due to increasing production costs across all segments, the Group has been able to secure double-digit growth in its profitability.

The Group’s polyester segment showed a growth of 30.4 per cent, pharmaceutical 56.7 per cent and animal health segments was able to secure growth of 95.9 per cent on the back of enhanced volumes, better sales mix and new product launches in the pharmaceutical segment.

This increase is in addition to the one-off unrealised gain on the acquisition of controlling shares in NutriCo Pakistan amounting to Rs1.85 billion.

The Group’s joint venture cement production facility in Samawah, Iraq, which started its commercial production in March 2021, has also added healthy profits to the Group’s profitability.

During the outgoing quarter, Lucky Electric Power Company Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lucky Cement, achieved the Commercial Operations Date (COD) of its 660MW coal-fired power project on March 21, 2022.

On an unconsolidated basis, the company’s local sales volumes posted a decline of 3.4 per cent to reach 5.51 million tonnes during the nine months of 2021/22. The marginal decline for the company versus negligible change in the industry numbers was mainly due to other cement plants becoming operational in the current period.

Moreover, the export sales volumes of the company declined 18 per cent to 1.56 million tonnes, compared with 1.90 million tonnes during the same period last year on the back of continuous volatility in the international coal prices and exorbitantly high freight costs globally.

Hence, the company’s overall sales volumes declined 7.1 per cent to reach 7.07 million tonnes during the nine months of 2021/22.

The company’s unconsolidated gross sales revenue increased 19.6 per cent, compared with the same period last year. Per tonne cost of sales of the company increased 49.1 per cent, compared with the same period last year due to substantial increase in coal prices along with other input costs, which was a direct result of the international commodity super cycle followed by the continuing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

Lucky Cement recorded a net profit after tax of Rs11.31 billion. It includes an amount of Rs1.48 billion as fee for provision of technical services to Nyumba Ya Akiba, company’s joint venture in Democratic Republic of Congo during the current financial year. The standalone EPS of the company is Rs34.97, compared with the same period last year’s reported EPS of Rs36.14.

Lucky Cement continued its patronage on Education and Scholarship, Women Empowerment, Health, Environment Conservation and reassured its commitment for the development of society and the communities in which it operates.

A recent testament of its commitment for energy conservation and promotion of green energy resources was the launch of a 34MW captive solar power project with a 5.589MWh Reflex energy storage to be installed at Pezu plant in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.