By Adedapo Adesanya
Cement Company of Northern Nigeria (CCNN) has released its half year report for the period ended June 30, 2019 and the analysis indicated that the company recorded a whopping N7.3 billion profit after tax.
Business Post reports that this was higher than the N2.6 billion PAT recorded by the cement firm in the previous first half year, representing an improvement by 180.8 percent.
In the same vein, the profit before tax announced by CCNN, one of the big market players in the nation’s cement sector, was N9.7 billion, nearly trippling the N3.7 billion PBT achieved in the first six months of 2018.
Apart from the profit made by the company, which merged recently with Kalambaina Cement to take a huge bite in the industry, improved its revenue in the period under review by 166.12 percent to N32.2 billion from N12.1 billion recorded in the half year of 2018.
A further look at the financial statements of the cement producing establishment revealed that cost of sales ballooned to N17.8 billion as against N6.6 billion expended in HY 2018.
However, this did not stop the company from having a wider gross profit, which stood at N14.4 billion as at June 30, 2019 compared with N5.5 billion registered in the previous comparative period.
Other income brought in N84.3 million for the company in HY 2019 contrary to a lesser N17.9 million in the first six months of last year. But the selling and distribution cost increased by over 50 percent to N1.99 billion from N557 million registered in HY 2018.
It was the same for its administrative expenses which went up to N2.7 billion in the period under review as against N1.2 billion recorded at the end of the first six months of 2018, with the net finance costs rising to N45.7 million in H1 2019 from N31.0 million in H1 2018.
Dipo Olowookere