MSI passes dividend

Press, 12 September 1981, Page 19

MSI passes dividend

MSI Corporation. Ltd. is passing its final dividend payment after incurring a major profit setback in the year to June 30. The company's trading activities and its associate company earned a net profit of $610,000. However, this figure was cut to $71,000 by extraordinary losses because of a reorganisation of activities and the ending of certain unprofitable manufacturing businesses. In 1980 the net profit fell 3.1 per cent to $3,027,000. The passing of the final dividend makes the 5c share (10 per cent) interim the only distribution for the year. In 1979 and 1980 the company paid a 10c a share annual dividend rate. The directors said in a preliminary report that the downturn in profit, indicated in their half-yearly report (the interim profit was down 34.1 per cent to $810,000), continued throughout the full year. Sales were down in real terms and competition intense in the largely depressed markets. “Despite expenses having been subjected to very close

control, these have escalated 18.7 per cent." The extraordinary charges against profit amounted to $539,000. These included losses through the reorganisation of business and the stopping of some manufacturing amounting to $1,038,000. which were partly offset by a $499,000 profit on the sale of land and buildings. The benefits of the restructuring costs w'ould show in next year’s result, the directors said. The profit was after export tax credits amounting to $359,000. In 1980 there was a tax charge of $1,001,000. Regarding the recent purchase of a 24.9 per cent interest in the company by Repco. Ltd. of Australia, the directors said that this should materially enhance MSl’s medium-term recovery by introducing new trading activities in both the domestic and export markets. The new Repco interest was a “positive and logical development in view of the long association between the two companies and the prospects of closer economic relations with Australia.”