Bidvest chief Lindsay Ralphs announced yesterday a 3% increase in trading profit

THE BIDVEST Group managed to shake off the tough market conditions in the southern African region and reported a 3 percent increase in trading profit for the year to end June.

Bidvest, which unbundled its food services unit in May and listed Bicorp as a separate entity, said yesterday that its trading profit climbed to R5.8 billion for the year from R5.6bn last year, with commercial products, financial services, electrical and services coming in as contributors to the surge in profits.

Bidvest was restructured into automotive, commercial products, electrical, financial services, freight, office and print and services divisions during the year.

Investments Bidvest continues to hold investments in Bidvest Namibia (52 percent), other assets and investments including Bidvest Properties, Adcock Ingram (38.4 percent), Comair (27.2 percent), Cullinan Holdings (19.5 percent), OnTime Automotive (100 percent) and the DH Mansfield Group (80 percent) in the UK, and Mumbai Airport (6.75 percent), as well as other listed and unlisted investments.

Chief executive Lindsay Ralphs said: “The successful and value-enhancing unbundling has allowed our management team to move forward with a refocused platform from which to pursue growth. Our stakeholders will benefit in future from a greater visibility of our continued operations and their potential values.”

The group’s turnover grew by 3.5 percent to R91.8bn from R88.6bn reported last year. Headline earnings per share from continuing operations improved 2.5 percent to 1 054.1c compared with 1 028.9c in the last period.

Operating expenses increased 6.3 percent, while the operating expense ratio at 21.4 percent edged up slightly as compared with 20.8 percent of last year.