Shares in Purple Group tumble as investors digest its interim results
The share price of Purple Group fell nearly 19% to 22c on Monday morning as the market reacted to its interim results released at 5.30pm on Friday. Purple, an investment holding company founded and chaired by Post Office CEO Mark Barnes, reported its revenue declined by 8% to R34m in the six months to end-February. Its net loss narrowed to R19.8m from R48.2m, which equated to its diluted headline loss per share improving to 1.84c from 5.27c. "Purple has turned the corner and I expect better times ahead for all of us," Barnes said in the results statement. A R100m investment by Sanlam in November into Purple’s online stockbroker Easy Equities helped the group end the reporting period with R191m cash, a net increase of R63.6m from August 31 2017. Easy Equities revenue had grown from R1.7m to R7.8m over the past two years, a compound growth rate of 113% a year, Barnes said. Funded investment accounts had grown from zero when Easy Equities was launched in October 2014 to 58,518 accounts...
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