July 30, 2021

Lasco Financial Services (LASF), recorded for the three months ended June 30, 2021, a total of $561.71 million in Trading Income; this represents a growth of 5% relative to the $533.01 million recorded in the comparable quarter in 2020.  Other Income for the quarter amounted to $29.31 million, an increase of 393% compared to $5.95 million in 2020. LASF noted, “The 9.7% increase is largely due to ongoing growth in our money services business. Revenues generated from the Microfinance company, though incrementally improving, is still below that of the previous year. The overall performance is however in line with our targets and growth expectations.”

Consequently, this resulted in overall revenues of $591.02 million for the quarter, an increase of 10% compared to $538.96 million in 2020.

Operating Expenses for the period amounted to $432.48 million which is 23% less than the $561.01 million recorded in June 2020. Of this, Selling and Promotional Expenses decreased 43% to close at $169.09 million relative to $297.36 million in 2020, while Administrative Expenses stood at $263.39 million (2020: $263.65 million). The Company noted that, “Administrative expenses remained relatively flat but Selling and promotional expenses declined due to reduced promotional activity as well as the reduction in estimated credit losses.”

As a result, profit from operations for the period closed at $158.53 million relative to a loss of $22.05 million that was recorded in the prior period in 2020.

Finance Cost amounted to $47.74 million for the quarter (2020: $49.77 million), decreasing by 4%. Management stated that, “LFSL marginally reduced its Financing costs as we have been paying down our debts and gradually building our cash flow.”

This resulted in a profit before taxation of $110.80 million, compared to a loss of $71.81 million booked in 2020.

After taxation of $35.82 million (2020: $33.95 million), Net profit for the quarter amounted to $74.98 million versus a net loss of $105.76 million booked the prior period.

Earnings per share for the quarter amounted $0.06 relative to an LPS of $0.08 in 2020.The twelve months trailing EPS is $0.27. The number of shares used in the calculation was 1,270,094,391.  The stock price as at July 29, 2021 closed at $3.16 at a corresponding P/E of 11.90 times.

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