Semirara Mining 2016 profit at record-high

HIGHER coal and power sales boosted Semirara Mining and Power Corp.’s (SCC) profit to reach a record-high P12.04 billion in 2016, the Consunji-led company told the stock exchange on Friday.
That’s a jump of 42% from P8.47 billion in the previous year.

“We delivered a solid 2016 performance despite market headwinds and operational challenges,” Victor A. Consunji, SMPC president and chief operating officer, said in a statement.

SMPC said P6.6 billion or more than half of the consolidated income came from the power segment, of which P2.9 billion came from Sem-Calaca Power Corp. and P3.7 billion from Southwest Luzon Power Generation Corp.

Southwest Luzon started commercial operations in the second quarter of 2016, offsetting the decline in the availability and downtime of the Sem-Calaca plants. The new plant allowed the company to post a 3% increase in generation capacity to 4,292 gigawatt-hours (GWh) from 4,170 GWh in 2015.

SMPC said that its coal segment recorded P5.4 billion in net earnings, or 86% higher year on year, despite the weak global prices in the first half of last year.

“The growth was driven by record coal sales of 12.8 million metric tons, up 52% from 8.4 million metric tons in 2015,” it said.

It said the composite average price of coal slipped by 9% to P1,885 per ton from P1,943 previously. Low-grade coal supplied to Southwest Luzon more than doubled, pulling down the average price of coal.

SCC said its board approved the declaration of stock dividends amounting to P3.2 billion divided into 3.2 billion shares at the par value of P1 per share or three common shares for every one common share held from the unrestricted retained earnings as of Dec. 31, 2016.

On Friday, shares in SCC fell by 5.37% to P141 each. 

Source: <a href="http://www.bworldonline.com/content.php?section=Corporate&title=semirara-mining-2016-profit-at-record-high&id=141243">Business World Online</a>