Friday, August 19, 2011

MISC falls on weaker earnings

KUALA LUMPUR: MISC BHD [] shares declined on Friday, Aug 19 after its earnings fell to RM121.07 million in the quarter ended June 30, 2011 from RM427.98 million a year ago as it was affected by losses
in the petroleum business as freight rates fell.

At 10.30am, MISC fell 21 sen to RM7.09 with 294,200 shares traded.

MISC said on Thursday, Aug 18 that revenue declined to RM3 billion from RM3.27 billion. Earnings per share shrank to 2.70 sen from 9.6 sen.

CIMB Research in a note Aug 19 said MISC's 1Q11 core net profit came in at only 12.5% of its full-year forecast and 14.6% of consensus, which was probably due to the usual suspects - tanker and liner losses - and an unusual suspect, heavy engineering.

'We are maintaining our earnings forecasts and target price of RM5.75 (1.2x P/BV) pending today's briefing but flag that we may cut earnings by 30-50% for FY11 and 10-20% for FY12-13.

'As expected, no dividends were declared for 1Q11, which is the quarter ending June 11 due to a change in the fiscal year-end from March to December,' it said.

CIMB Research said it continued to rate MISC an UNDERPERFORM, with the potential de-rating catalysts being (1) these poor results, (2) weak near-term prospects for petroleum and chemical tanker freight rates, and (3) swelling liner losses.

'We recommend a switch into the aviation sector instead,' it said.

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