Cadbury Nigeria 9-month pretax profit falls 57 pct

 

Cadbury Nigeria said on Friday its nine-month pretax profit was 2.39 billion naira ($14.54 million), down 57 percent from the same period a year ago, sending its shares tumbling.

The local unit of Mondelez International Inc, said in a filing with the Nigerian Stock Exchange that turnover declined to 23.31 billion naira in the nine months to Sept. 30, compared with 26.54 billion naira in the same period a year ago,

Shares in Cadbury, down 42.8 percent so far this year, were down 4.78 percent at 49.90 naira at 0952 GMT.

Russia seizes banned EU meat disguised as chewing gum

 

Russian customs officers are struggling to digest a new smuggling scam after some 600 tonnes of banned meat from Europe were discovered disguised as other items such as chewing gum.

Russia has imposed sweeping bans on food products from the EU.

Officials in the country's agricultural safety agency said on Friday that northwestern Russia made the finds in refrigerated containers shipped from Antwerp, Hamburg and Rotterdam.

The agency said in statement that while searching 26 refrigerated containers whose accompanying documents said they contained frozen mushrooms, juice, fruit jellies and chewing gum, they discovered meat and fatback pork produced in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Poland.

Russia this summer imposed sweeping bans on food products from the European Union in retaliation for tough sanctions imposed on Moscow over its meddling in Ukraine.

MTN bleeding subscribers in Nigeria

Africa’s largest mobile operator MTN has cut its full year forecast for Nigeria by almost a third as it loses tens of thousands of subscribers

MTN’s Nigeria business is feeling the pinch following the loss of 80 000 subscribers for the quarter ending September, in its top performing market.

Reuters reports that the SA telecommunications giant has been struggling to fight off competition in Nigeria from the likes of United Arab Emirate’s Etisalat, India’s Bharti Airtel and privately owned local firm Globacom.

The company cut its growth forecast for new customers in Nigeria from 5 million to 3,5 million users. It currently has 58,4 million subscribers in Africa’s largest economy.

MTN group CEO Sifisa Dabengwa attributes the decline to “stringent” regulatory restrictions, which prohibit the company from offering significantly lower tariffs compared to their competitors. Stiff competition and ongoing instability in Northern Nigerian regions affected by Boko Haram insurgency also contributed to the drop. The Islamist group is reportedly behind some of their radio masts being burnt down.

MTN and two other mobile operators were fined a combined $4 million (R44 million) and banned from selling SIM cards, for poor service.
“These regulatory actions are quite severe and it will be hard for MTN to resume anything close to double-digit growth again. At best, it will be single-digit positive revenue growth for the next while in Nigeria,” Mohammed was quoted saying.

 Calabar, Ilorin, Maiduguri airports record zero passengers in Q1, says NBS

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has revealed that about seven international airports in Nigeria have recorded no passengers at all in the first quarter of 2014 while Lagos and Abuja airports recorded highest.

The airports with zero patronage include International airports in Calabar, Ilorin, Kaduna, Sokoto, Maiduguri, Minna and Katsina.

However, a total of 3,416,977 passengers travelled using Nigerian airports in the first quarter of 2014. Out of this number, 2,352,224 or 68.84 per cent of them travelled locally, whereas 1,064,753 or 31.16 per cent  travelled  overseas.

Murtala Mohammed Airport, Lagos,  was rated the busiest airport in the country with  1,683,375 passengers or 49.27 per cent  followed by Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja,  with 907,989 passengers, or 26.57 per cent.

According to the NBS report, this was very similar to the share of 68.81 per cent  observed for domestic passenger traffic on average in 2013.

International passenger traffic is even more dominated by Lagos, with 784,479 passengers or 73.68 per cent of all overseas bound passengers passing through this airport. Abuja still ranks second, although with a lesser number of 205,740 passengers or 19.42 per cent  of the total. Only Kano and Port Harcourt international airports had portions of the total of over 1 per cent, with 37,261 passengers or 3.50 per cent of the total flying through Kano and Port Harcourt.

Alex Otti resigns as Diamond Bank MD

The board of Diamond Bank Plc has announced the voluntary resignation of Alex Otti, the group managing director/chief executive officer, from the bank. Uzoma Dozie will take over from him subject to the approval of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

In a statement released by the bank’s corporate communications department, Igwe Nnaemeka Alfred Achebe, chairman of the board of directors and Obi of Onitsha, announced the changes in the management team.

Speaking on the outgoing GMD/CEO, the chairman said he would be sorely missed, adding that Alex Otti achieved enviable landmarks during his time. He described his tenure as “the brightest years of Diamond Bank’s 24-year history”.

Under Alex Otti’s stewardship, Diamond Bank made a remarkable return to profitability and has continued to record impressive growth across all performance indicators year-on-year.

After writing off toxic risk assets which resulted in the loss of N16 billion in 2011, the bank posted a profit before tax of N28.36 billion in 2012 and N32.5 billion in 2013. The bank also saw its total assets rise from N564.9 billion in February 2011 to N1.18 trillion by December 31, 2012 and N1.52 trillion on December 31, 2013.

 Naira Gains First Week in Nine on Nigerian Intervention

Nigeria’s naira gained, heading for the first weekly gain in nine, after the central bank pledged to intervene to support the currency hit by lower oil prices.

The naira strengthened 0.3% to 164.68 per dollar as of 1:45 p.m. in Lagos, the commercial capital. It reached a 7-month intraday low of 166.42 yesterday before Sarah Alade, a deputy governor at the central bank, said the institution would use foreign reserves to defend the value of the currency.

Since mid-September, the Central Bank of Nigeria has sold dollars to banks outside of its regular auctions on Mondays and Wednesdays, according to Standard Chartered Plc.

CBN To Continue Naira Tightening

 

The Central Bank of Nigeria says it will continue to support the naira after the currency approached a record low amid declining oil prices and the end of United States monetary stimulus that bolstered emerging-market assets.

Deputy governor, CBN, Sarah Alade, told Reuters that the apex bank will  increase dollar supply in the market.

The CBN had since mid-September used the country’s reserves to sell dollars outside of regular auctions held Mondays and Wednesdays, according to Standard Chartered Plc.

The bank will keep using the auctions and direct dollar sales to banks to preserve the value of the currency, Alade was quoted as saying. The naira strengthened 0.2 per cent to 164.90 per dollar by 2:29pm in Lagos. It earlier weakened as much as 0.8 per cent to 166.42, a record low on a closing basis.

The naira weakened 0.9 per cent this month as Brent crude fell to the lowest level in more than four years last week.

The company said it expected the continuous intervention by the CBN to curtail the downward pressure on the value of the naira through dollar sales to be constrained by the slowdown in the rate of accretion to the nation’s stock of foreign reserves.