BUSINESS DAY TV: ‘We would prefer a stronger environment, but we can live with the one we’re in’
BUSINESS DAY TV: Cement producer PPC has reported a 93% drop in full-year headline profit to 7c as a result of high finance costs relating to bond repayment obligations. But with cement sales volumes in SA up a pedestrian 2%, tough market conditions are exerting pressure too. Joining me now in the News Leader studio is PPC CEO Darryll Castle. Darryll, group revenue is up 5% but net profit attributable to PPC shareholders [declined] 88%; we’ve had headline earnings per share down 93%, and you’ve attributed the bulk of that to the liquidity crisis following S&P’s credit downgrade of PPCs status to junk. Talk us through what that downgrade has cost you. DARRYLL CASTLE: What happened with the downgrade is that it forced us to redeem our bond programme, so we had to borrow money very urgently to be able to make an offer to bondholders. That cost us a lot of money, in the order of R168m, to do that. Then, of course, we had to do a capital raise to repay the money that we had borrowed, and...
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