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- Q2 net profits worth THB 245 billion, 11.83 pct rise from a year earlier
- Total sales down 4.52 pct y-o-y at THB 2.51 trillion, but up 5.46 pct from Q1
- Lower costs boost gross profit margins to 25.62 pct
Companies listed on The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) reported a net profit of THB 245.25 billion (approx. USD 7.03 billion) in the second quarter of 2016, growing 11.83 percent from Q2/2015, and up 5.27 percent from the first quarter. Although sales decreased 4.52 percent y-o-y to THB 2.51 trillion (approx. USD 72.09 billion), lower operating costs pushed up gross profit margins to 25.62 percent.
SET Senior Executive Vice President Santi Kiranand said aggregate earnings for Q2/2016 were compiled from 558 SET listed firms, or 93.94 percent of the total 594 companies (including property funds, real estate investment trusts and infrastructure funds and excluding non-compliance and non-performing groups), as of June 30, 2016. There were 418 companies making net profits, representing 74.91 percent of the total listed companies already disclosed their financial statements. Their total sales in the second quarter of 2016 dropped by 4.52 percent from the same period in 2015, resulting from sales decrease of Energy & Utilities, affected by low oil prices. However, their net profit increased by 11.83 percent y-o-y, boosted by net profit rise of companies in services and consumer products industries, such as Transportation & Logistics, Steel, Food & Beverage and Energy & Utilities.
Nevertheless, if excluding net profit of companies in Energy & Utilities sector affected by falling oil prices, the sales of listed companies in Q2/2016 could be seen a 3.32 percent increase, while net profits could jump by 13.75 percent compared to the same period last year. The other side of the coin is that this has benefited other companies on lower production cost. Therefore, the total gross profit margin in Q2/2016 rose to 25.62 percent from 22.85 percent from the same period a year earlier.
Comparing to Q1/2016, the net profit of listed companies recorded 5.27 percent increase, while sales had 5.46 percent increase. The continuous recovery resulted in H1 net profits increase by 6.13 percent year-on-year to THB 479.35 billion (approx. USD 13.75 billion).
The healthy capital structure of listed firms showed the debt-to-equity ratio (excluding those in Financials industry) in Q2/2016 at 1.24 times, slightly up from 1.22 in Q2/2015.
“Thai listed firms have seen some recovery signs in Q2/2016 including the continue growth of net profits and their total sales have recorded positive growth from a quarter earlier. Significantly, the growth of listed firms related to service and consumption in Agribusiness, Food & Beverage, Fashion, Home & Office Products, Transportation & Logistics, Automotive, Paper & Printing Materials and Steel recorded positive gross profit margin growth, net profit growth and sales growth, in line with the overall economy,” added Santi.
Meanwhile, companies listed on Market for Alternative Investment (mai), reported sales of THB 33.41 billion (approx. USD 958.35 million) in the second quarter of 2016, a 1.65 percent increase from the same period a year earlier, while net profit rose by 25.38 percent to 2.33 billion (approx. USD 66.90 million). Their Q2/2016 gross profit margins increased to 25.00 percent compared to 23.83 in Q2/2015.
