African Bank faces huge losses

South Africa's largest unsecured lender African Bank Investments Limited (Abil) said it expected to report a headline loss of between R3.1bn and R3.3bn in the six months to the end of March and had decided not to declare an interim dividend for the period.
African Bank's profits have dropped sharply and it is now expecting to make a loss of us much as R3,3bn for the six months to March. Image:
African Bank's profits have dropped sharply and it is now expecting to make a loss of us much as R3,3bn for the six months to March. Image: Fotolia

This is a swing to an interim loss compared with the restated headline earnings of R604m reported by the group in the six months to end March last year. Its headline loss per share in the six months to end March 2014 was expected to be between 239c and 254c compared with a restated headline earnings per share of 62.3c in the previous interim period.

Abil said it was working towards the disposal of its struggling furniture retailer Ellerines and would in the meantime focus on returning it to profitability. Earlier in the year Abil made some senior appointments in Ellerines. It hired Mano Moodley as the Chief Executive and Alan Schlesinger as Non-executive chairman of the furniture retailer.

In February Abil said the appointments highlighted its commitment to Ellerines and labelled the furniture retailer a major subsidiary.


 
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