C&I Leasing grows full year pre-tax profit by 2.1% despite earnings decline

C & I Leasing Plc has released its unaudited financial results for the full year ended December 31, 2021. Despite its record earnings decline by 6.54percent to N19.88billion in 2021 from N21.27billion in 2020, the group reported a profit before tax (PBT) of N484.9million, up by 2.1 percent year-on-year (YoY) compared to N475.1million in 2020.

The group reported shareholders’ funds of N13.77 billion, up by 3.3percent from N13.34 billion in 2020. The N3.78kobo the stock traded on Friday, February 11 represents a decline of 10percent year-to-date (YtD).

Notably, there was a 6.1percent drop in personnel cost from a high of N1.37 billion in 2020 to N1.29 billion in 2021 linked to better optimisation of processes and procedures. Other administrative and general expenses dropped by 36.8percent from N1.7 billion in 2020 to N1.085 billion in 2021 majorly due to the group’s cost optimisation drive.

Commenting on the results released to investing public at the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX), Ugoji Lenin Ugoji, Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director, C & I Leasing Plc said: “On the Economic Outlook for Q1 2022 and roundup for four quarters of 2021, with only about 2.5percent of Nigerians and 10.1percent of Ghanaians fully vaccinated COVID-19’s pandemic rippling effects are still being felt by both economies and by extension in most businesses where we have our operations domiciled.”

“We saw a dull demand for some products coupled with the rising cost of goods. This affected the cash flows of a lot of businesses. However, the GDP growth rates of Nigeria and Ghana are expected to be at 2.7percent and 6.17percent respectively for 2022 and we envisage an increase in demand for products as both economies continue to open and increased recovery of oil demand,” he added.

Furthermore, inflationary pressures, as well as exchange rate fluctuations, have been issues the company continues to deal with, according to its CEO. He however noted that measures are in place to ensure C&I Leasing Plc hedges against such uncertainties “and an increased focus is now being given non-asset-based revenue options to create a counterbalance for low asset utilisation caused by shrinking demand for the assets.”

“Despite the challenges, we have remained focused on cost optimization, business process improvement initiatives, and ensuring efficiency in the management of our sales performance. We are also actively working on digitizing our value offerings across the Fleet Management, Outsourcing, and Marine businesses with increased attention on our emerging E-Business platforms. As you may be aware, people empower technology, technology empowers innovation, the business landscape changes, and this cycle continues, yielding positive results in the long run”.

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“We remain resilient; with increased vaccine rollouts, we are hopeful there will be a consistent economic recovery though fault lines such as renewed waves and new variants of the virus pose concerns for the outlook. Amid exceptional uncertainty, the global economy is projected to grow by 4.4percent in 2022, specifically the economy of Sub-Saharan Africa is projected to grow by 3.7percent in 2022 but we are confident that our business is fundamentally strong to withstand any future challenge towards enhanced performance,” Ugoji said.