Spoornet turnaround boosts Transnet profits

Leonard Neill TRANSNET HAS given the thumbs up to the efforts of both Spoornet and Portnet for delivering big profit-making figures for the past financial year and boosting the annual financial report to its best figures in the past decade. Announcing the figures last week, managing director Mafika Mkwanazi said Transnet had overcome a changing and challenging operating environment and the ongoing cost of restructuring to record a net profit of R3,287 billion for the financial year which ended in March, against the figure of R779 million for the previous year. Headline earnings rose R838 million against a previous loss of R288million. The group attributed its performance largely to the turnaround at Spoornet, the largest division within Transnet, which produced its best profit in more than five years. The rail utility posted a net profit after finance costs of R604million, an increase of R520million on the previous year. At the same time the restructuring of Portnet saw a net profit after finance costs of R1,9billion which is R578 million higher than the previous year. While Petronet and Metrorail contributed to the profit margins, the establishment of the Freight Dynamics division was hurt, he said, by the cost of amalgamating business units, which saw a loss of R115 million being posted, but which he was confident would be turned around in the year ahead. South African Airways, while reporting a headline loss of R735 million, still contributed R400 million in profit to the parent company, assisted largely by the sale of the airline's assets, while the sale of Fast Forward to the post office took more than R100 million in losses off Transnet's books.