LIC full year result

LIC full year result

Farmer-owned co-operative, Livestock Improvement Corporation (NZX: LIC), has announced its result for the year ending 31 May 2015.

The result is summarised below, with more information attached in the Chairman’s letter to LIC shareholders.

Revenue: LIC revenue from ordinary activities was $228 million. Adding $4 million of other income from grants gives total revenue of $232 million. This is 10% ahead of the total revenue of $211 million achieved in 2013-2014. All profit is returned to LIC’s 10,500 New Zealand dairy farmer shareholders as products, research and development or dividends.

NPAT: LIC net profit after tax was $13.7 million, down $4.4 million from the previous year. This decrease largely reflects the continued spend on core technology and infrastructure to ensure the co-op’s technology is up-to-date, supported and able to provide a stable platform for delivering new products to farmers. Net profit after tax for LIC includes the annual revaluation to fair value of the biological elite bull team which, this year, was an increase net of tax of $2.7 million compared to a decrease of $0.57 million last year.

The fluctuations on fair value of the elite bull team are excluded for the purposes of dividend for LIC and are not considered as a key indicator of trading performance. For this reason, LIC also reports Underlying Net Earnings (NPAT excluding the increase or decrease on fair value of elite biological assets and the related tax effect) which decreased from $18.6 million to $11 million this year. This flows through to a dividend to farmer shareholders of $6.58 million compared to $11.168 million last year.

Strength of balance sheet: LIC continues to operate a strong balance sheet with total assets including cash, software, land and buildings and bull teams of $302 million, an increase of $17.7 million over the previous year with a strong equity ratio of 73%. Bank loans were $10 million at year end.

Cash flow: Cash flows from operations were $34.8 million, compared to $37.0 million in 2013-2014, with higher sales and strong cashflows on-farm from the high milk payout. Purchases of both tangible and intangible assets increased from $34.6 million to $45.7 million as the co-operative increased its investment in development of innovative products for farmers and continued investment in technology and building upgrades.

Dividend: LIC will pay a dividend of $6.58 million, representing 60% of underlying earnings, to its Co-operative and Investment Shareholders. In 2014 the dividend paid was at 60% being $11.17 million. The 2014-2015 dividend translates to 9.15 cents per Co-operative Control Share and 20.26 cents per Investment Share and represents a gross yield of 6.25% on Investment Shares compared to 6.94% last year. The fully imputed dividend payments will be made to shareholders on 21 August 2015.

ENDS

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