The three financial investment companies (SIF) to have announced results for 2005, Oltenia, Banat-Crisana and Moldova posted higher profits than originally budgeted.
Top profit maker last year was SIF Oltenia, which concluded 2005 with a net income of 57.5 million RON (15.9 million euros). SIF Oltenia''s profit was 17% lower than in 2004, but 15% higher than budgeted at the beginning of the year. SIF Oltenia also had the highest net earnings per share, which stood at 0.0995 RON.
This SIF managed to outrun SIF Banat-Crisana, which had made the highest profit eleven months into the year. SIF Banat-Crisana at the end of December had posted a net profit of 50.54 million RON (13.9 million euros) or 0.09 RON/share, 7% higher than budgeted and 25% higher than in 2004. This SIF had anticipated 46.99 million RON net income for the entire 2005 early last year.
The highest growth above the budgeted level was posted by SIF Moldova, which logged net profit of 48.2 million RON (more than 13.2 million euros), up 38% compared with the estimates and 5.4% higher than in 2004. SIF Moldova''s earnings per share amount to 0.0929 RON/share.
The other two SIFs that did not reveal their 2005 financials, Muntenia and Transilvania had made 51.1 million RON (14.1 million euros) and 37.6 million RON (10.4 million euros) profits by the end of November.
The three SIFs that published their 2005 earnings granted 0.05 - 0.065 RON/share in dividends last year, allocating 54% to 68% of their profits towards this purpose.
If these SIFs maintain their dividend allocation rate at the same level as in 2005, the shareholders of the respective companies will be able to get some 0.0537 RON/share in dividends in SIF Oltenia''s case or 0.06 RON/share or 0.0632 RON/share in the case of SIF Banat-Crisana and SIF Moldova.
"In my opinion, I think we will not grant a lower dividend than last year," said Tudor Ciurezu, deputy general manager of SIF Oltenia. SIF Oltenia granted 0.065 RON/share in dividends last year.
If compared against the prices at which the shares of these companies are trading on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, the dividends account for 1.8% to 2.47% yields, while the interest on banking deposits for one year currently stands at 6-7%. Because of this and especially of the very high gains the investors got from SIFs due to the rise in their prices on the Bucharest Stock Exchange last year, market analysts say the dividends to be granted by the SIFs have come to mean less and less to the active investors on the BSE. Still, for the passive investors and those that own very large stakes, these dividends continue to be interesting. SIF shares gained an average of 175% on the Bucharest Stock Exchange and were the capital market stars last year, when the investors betting on these shares managed to double their money for the second year in a row. catalin.ciocan@zf.ro
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