By HELEN ZULU –
ZAMBEEF Products Plc’s shares doubled in price on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) in a space of two months.
The company started the year on a positive note with its share price closing at 11.50 per cent on Monday, January 11, 2016 representing a 100 per cent rise on the closing price of 5.75 per cent on November 11, 2015.
Company joint chief executive officer Carl Irwin said the whole LSE market, both the main market and the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) were doing well over the preceding three weeks, with its share price rising by 51 per cent during the period.
This is contained in a statement released in Lusaka yesterday.
“Zambeef’s share price in London has performed particularly well and is a measure of the confidence that investors place in Zambeef and Zambia as a whole,” Mr Irwin said.
He said the company’s share performance was particularly impressive given that during the four weeks between December 14, 2015 and January 9, 2016, the AIM market as a whole lost 1.25 per cent, while Zambeef gained 34.6 per cent.
Mr Irwin said this put Zambeef in the top 100 of nearly 1,000 companies on the AIM market.
In addition to international investors, Zambeef has a substantial number of local Zambian shareholders, chief of which is the National Pension Scheme Authority (NAPSA) as Zambeef’s single largest Zambian shareholder with 24,979819 shares (10 per cent).
Others include Saturnia Regna Pension Fund, Barclays Pension Fund,Bank of Zambia Pension Fund, Zambia State Insurance Company (ZISC), KCM Pension Fund and Workers Compensation Fund and Professional Insurance Pension Fund.
He said the upswing began last year as Zambeef  announced an increase of 189 per cent in operating profits  for the financial year ending
September 30, 2015.
Mr Irwin said the company’s operating profit increased by K106 million to K162 million, from K56.2 million in 2014.
Meanwhile, profit before tax excluding exchange losses, increased by
728 per cent to K107 million, equivalent to US$15 million.
This was largely due to a strong performance in Zambeef’s cold chain food production and distribution helping to propel the profit figures.
“Our core cold chain food products division performed exceptionally well, recording an increase in gross profits of 29.1 per cent in Kwacha terms.
Our growing retail network now totals 150 outlets from the previous 139, and continues to play a vital role in enhancing operations of the division.
The division which includes production, distribution and retailing of beef, chicken, pork, fish, dairy products and eggs, is expected to drive the growth of Zambeef in 2016 with more outlets planned by the company as well as through its partnership with Shoprite,” he added.