Aitken Spence sustains profitability in first quarter

SRI LANKA’S leading diversified blue chip conglomerate Aitken Spence released its first quarter financial results to the Colombo Stock Exchange on Tuesday, revealing an increase of 11. 6% in profit before tax compared with the corresponding period last year.

It recorded Rs. 584m as profit before taxation and Rs. 341 m profit attributable during the first three months of operation.

Group turnover in the first quarter has increased significantly by 32.9% to Rs. 5.8 b up from Rs. 4.4 b last year. However, the group showed only a marginal increase of 1.4% in the profit attributable to the equity holders of the parent, for the period concerned.

Contribution from the hotel properties in Sri Lanka has continued to be poor due to the tourism downturn in the country, which in turn negatively impacted the group’s performance in the quarter. However, the hotels sector figures were strengthened by the healthy performance of the group’s Maldivian resorts which go under the Adaaran brand.

Deputy Chairman and Managing Director J M S Brito commenting on the results said: “Our strong business portfolio has ensured sustained profitability during the first quarter in spite of an extremely challenging domestic tourism environment. However, we are confident about the future performance of the hotels sector as our most recent investments in the Maldives and India should be bringing in healthy profits.”

Sri Lanka’s leading resort operator increased its presence in the Maldives with Adaaran Select Huduranfushi commencing operations during the last financial year. During the reporting period two resorts in India, Barefoot Resort in the Andaman Islands and Poovar Resort at Trivandrum commenced operations under Aitken Spence management.

The group has signed management contracts for several more properties in India and operations should commence in a few in the very near future.

In the Shipping and Logistics sector, the group’s venture into port efficiency improvement, training and container terminal management overseas and the acquiring of the Hapag-Lloyd shipping agency contributed well to the profits.

Aitken Spence became the first Sri Lankan company to venture in to the above maritime services overseas with its operations in the Port of Durban- the busiest in Africa. Conversely, the group reported that its freight forwarding operations was unable to record the expected results due to the adverse economic environment.

Group’s recent investment in inward remittance market through MMBL Money Transfer (Pvt) Ltd marked healthy results during the first quarter.