Reduced earnings for NBL

NAMIBIA Breweries Limited (NBL) will this year again see reduced earnings per share and headline earnings for the financial period ended June 30 2005.

The company’s financial results for the year ended June 2005 will be released at the end of the month. In a trading statement to shareholders, NBL said it expected earnings per share for the financial period under review to be drastically reduced by between 40 per cent to 50 per cent below the 17 months ended June 30 2004.The company attributed this decline to the closure of Hansa Brewery in Swakopmund, saying the majority of the one-off restructuring charges had been written off during the period ended June 30 this year.The closure of Hansa Breweries is scheduled to be completed towards the end of the third quarter of 2005 and is expected to help NBL achieve its profit growth objectives and ensure the sustained long-term success of NBL.NBL also justified the loss due to having changed its financial year-end from January 31 to June 30; and hence NBL is comparing the financial results for the 12-month period to end of June with that of 17 months which ended June 2004.NBL’s share price has been on a steady decline since the beginning of the year.It stood at N$2,90 on January 3, was down more than a dollar to N$1,85 on July 21 and stood at N$1,90 yesterday.NBL is partly owned by Dutch Heineken and Britain’s Diageo.In a trading statement to shareholders, NBL said it expected earnings per share for the financial period under review to be drastically reduced by between 40 per cent to 50 per cent below the 17 months ended June 30 2004.The company attributed this decline to the closure of Hansa Brewery in Swakopmund, saying the majority of the one-off restructuring charges had been written off during the period ended June 30 this year.The closure of Hansa Breweries is scheduled to be completed towards the end of the third quarter of 2005 and is expected to help NBL achieve its profit growth objectives and ensure the sustained long-term success of NBL.NBL also justified the loss due to having changed its financial year-end from January 31 to June 30; and hence NBL is comparing the financial results for the 12-month period to end of June with that of 17 months which ended June 2004.NBL’s share price has been on a steady decline since the beginning of the year.It stood at N$2,90 on January 3, was down more than a dollar to N$1,85 on July 21 and stood at N$1,90 yesterday.NBL is partly owned by Dutch Heineken and Britain’s Diageo.