By NKIRUKA NNOROM

Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc led other top performing equities on the Nigerian Stock Exchange, NSE, last week with the share price rising by 20.80 per cent or N1.25 to close at N7.26 from N6.01 per share. Skye Bank Plc trailed closely behind, rising by 17.59 per cent or N0.35 to close at N2.34 from N1.99 the previous week.

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Wema Bank, Forte Oil and Guinness Nigeria Plc closed as the last three on the top five gainers’ list as their share prices rose by 11.25 percent or N0.09, 9.27 per cent or N21.19, and 6.73 per cent or N8.01 to close at N0.89, N249.89 and N127.01 respectively.

Fidelity Bank emerged the sixth most active, adding 4.80 per cent or N0.06 to its share price to close at N1.31 from N1.25; Stanbic IBTC Holdings Plc ranked seventh, appreciating by 3.94 per cent or N0.71 to close at N18.71 from N18.00; Paints and Coatings Plc, which led the pack last week, followed with 3.64 per cent or N0.04 to close at N1.14 from N1.10, Associated Bus Company, ABC Plc gained 1.89 per cent or N0.01 to close at N0.54 from N0.53, while Costain (West Africa) plc advanced by 1.75 per cent or N0.01 to close at N0.58 from N0.57 per share.

Dangote Sugar Refinery (DSR), which led the pack last week, has been struggling with depressed financials. The half year financial statement to June 2015 in the public domain was a continuation of the losing streak. The company’s profit before tax for the period fell by 4.5 per cent to .8 billion, as against N10.3 billion in 2014, while profit after tax was N6.3 billion, compared with N6.8 billion in 2014, representing 7.4 per cent decline

However, its revenue for the same period increased marginally by three per cent to N51.1 billion in 2015 from  N49.6 billion posted in the corresponding period of 2014. With half year sugar production at its Savannah Plant at 6,610 tonnes, up from 6,245 tonnes, while refinery production at Apapa was 361,083 tonnes, the company said its main target in the second half of the year is to increase production and improve distribution to match the increasing demand from customers. The company recently got the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON) food safety management systems certification (NIS ISO 22000:2005). The certification is the third in the series of ISO certification on Quality, Process Safety/Security and Food Safety, achieved by the Sugar Refinery, and thus making it the only sugar organization in the country with three ISO certifications.

Skye Bank, the second on the list, announced recently that it has gone into a consultancy partnership with International Finance Corporation (IFC) to evolve an effective lending framework for medium, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).

The objective of the partnership, according to the bank, is to produce a new lending framework for SMEs that de-emphasises reliability on collateral by focusing primarily on evaluating business viability. Based on the new framework, when a business passes the viability test, the bank can consider non-traditional collateral options outside real estate to reduce the difficulty faced by business owners in their bid to secure credit facilities from banks. Its available half year financial reports and accounts showed that the bank grossed N85.2 billion for the half year ended June 30, 2015.

The result shows an increase of 33 per cent over the N63.9 billion recorded during the corresponding period in 2014. Along with other positive fundamentals, the bank’s shareholders’ funds grew from N131 billion in 2014 to N141 billion during the period under review, representing a growth of seven per cent. The profit before tax grew from N7.3 billion in the preceding year to N10.7 billion in the year in review, representing an increase of 47 per cent. Also, its net interest income grew to N30.2 billion as against N25.5 billion in 2014, representing a growth of 18 per cent.
Wema Bank, the third on the list, is suffering from a dwindling financial position as shown in its half year financial report for the period ended June, 2015.

The bank’s net interest income fell by 6.7 per cent from N9.71 billion in the six months in 2014, to N9.06 billion in 2015. Profit before tax at N1.17 billion, was 31.2 per cent decline over N1.70 billion recorded in the same period in 2014, while the other operating expenses, put at N4.98 billion, showed a N24 million cost reduction, compared to N5.04 billion in the same period in 2014.

However, its gross earnings rose marginally to N20.87 billion, up from N20.82 billion in the corresponding period of 2014.