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Stock Commentary

Quick takes on the market

Merkado Barkada
Quick takes on the market
This company is firing on all cylinders, and it doesn’t even rely on the political winds in the Philippines to fill its sails, considering how thoroughly diversified it is from a regional perspective.
Merkado Barkada

International Container [ICT 187.90 1.57%] [link] Q2 profit surged 42% y/y to P8.4 billion (24% q/q), driven by a 19.6% increase in gross revenues, which ICT attributes to “volume growth, favorable container mix,” plus “higher revenues from ancillary services”, and also “contribution of news businesses.”

ICT said that if the revenues from new businesses were removed, its gross revenues would still have been up 17.4% in Q2 y/y. ICT experienced the highest growth in its “Americas” segment (32.8%), with “Asia” coming in second (15.2%).

MB BOTTOM-LINE

ICT is a company that saw its annual net income reduced nearly 70% per year during 2019 and 2020, but has come back with a vengeance in 2021.

Annualized, ICT’s H1 profit of P16.3 billion puts its on pace to earn (very roughly) around P32 billion this year in annual profit, which would exceed its 2021 figure by around 60%.

This company is firing on all cylinders, and it doesn’t even rely on the political winds in the Philippines to fill its sails, considering how thoroughly diversified it is from a regional perspective.
 

Semirara Mining and Power [SCC 40.90 0.12%] [link] released its Q2 earnings report, but did not provide any context for the stark decline in shipments to China in Q2 due to China’s so-called “pivot” to cheap Russian coal.

SCC noted that total shipments of coal dropped 24% in Q2, but provided additional segmented information to show that total shipments to China, SCC’s largest customer, dropped by 71%.

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SCC says that this is “owing to its COVID-19 lockdowns and pivot to Russian coal”, but it didn’t provide a break-down of how much of that massive decline is due to either factor, nor did SCC provide any guidance on how the pivot to Russian coal might evolve over time, or now long it might take for the situation to normalize.

SCC did say that it expects global demand for coal to remain strong due to the “full effect” of the EU ban on Russian coal taking place on August 22.

Could that also incentivize Russia to dump even more of its pariah coal on China?

The only thing standing in the way is the lack of infrastructure to move that cheap coal from Russia to the end-users in China that need it.
 

Nickel Asia [NIKL 5.83 0.34%] [link] released a Q2 teaster, reporting H1 profit expanded 41% to P3.83 billion, driven by “higher nickel prices” and “favorable exchange rates”.

NIKL said that the weighted average nickel price for H1/22 was 18% higher than the same period in 2021, and that its revenues were 7% higher than the previous year despite the lower ore volumes mined due to days lost to bad weather.

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The Zamora Family is in the right place at the right time, with global factors pushing nearly all commodities up to incredibly high prices relative to their previous averages.

This seems like a situation that has legs, so the family (and NIKL shareholders) should be able to profit from this situation for many more months.

This is (hopefully?) a unique situation, though; perhaps the name of the game for NIKL is figuring out ways to minimize mining time lost to bad weather; it’s not like we all haven’t noticed the increase in extreme weather events in the country over the past few years.

Seems like “weather’ might be NIKL’s prime limiting factor.
 

Robinsons Land [RLC 17.90 0.56%] [link] penalized for a Section 13.1 violation, which is usually the case if a company fails to disclose (within 5 trading days) when an insider buys or sells shares, or when a director or officer is first appointed.

RLC was also penalized in the same disclo for a Section 9 violation, which requires the timely disclosure of a company’s plan to buy or sell its treasury shares.

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Unfortunately, due to the PSE’s “no context” policy, we can’t know for sure what these penalties were for, nor do we know the size/nature of the penalties themselves. Unless, of course, the PSE is going after DITO CME [DITO 3.77 0.79%] for “pulling a DITO”, because then the PSE gets downright wordy!

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Merkado Barkada is a free daily newsletter on the PSE, investing and business in the Philippines. You can subscribe to the newsletter or follow on Twitter to receive the full daily updates.
Merkado Barkada's opinions are provided for informational purposes only, and should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any particular stock. These daily articles are not updated with new information, so each investor must do his or her own due diligence before trading, as the facts and figures in each particular article may have changed.

INTERNATIONAL CONTAINER TERMINAL SERVICES INCORPORATED

NICKEL ASIA CORP.

PHILIPPINE STOCK EXCHANGE

ROBINSONS LAND INC

SEMIRARA MINING AND POWER CORP.

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