Mr. Thiraphong Chansiri, president of TUF — Thailand’s major processor and exporter of canned and frozen seafood, stated, “Sales in dollar term for the third quarter were USD544.9 million, up 35% from USD403.3 million of the same period last year while sales in Thai baht term surged by 34% from Bt13,723.6 million a year ago to Bt18,430.7 million. Also, the company’s total revenues reached Bt18,548.5 million, up 35% from Bt13,778.6 million last year. Net profit rose by 116% from Bt422.4 million of the same period last year to Bt911.9 million while operating income was up strongly by 84% to Bt1,119.5 million from Bt610.3 million. We are very satisfied with this result that showed growth in sales and net profit as well as setting a new benchmark in our corporate history”.
According to the sales breakdown by product during the third quarter, tuna products continued to lead with the biggest share accounting for 46% of the group’s total sales, followed by frozen shrimp at 20%, canned pet food 9%, other seafood 9%, shrimp feed 6%, domestic sales 5%, cephalopod 3% and canned sardine / mackerel 2%. The biggest market remained the United States 53%, followed by the EU 15%, Japan 10%, Africa 3%, Oceania 3%, Middle East 2%, Asia 2%, Canada and South America 1% each.
Mr. Thiraphong added, “Our performance has shown continual growth indeed since the beginning of this year where our sales (in dollar term and Thai baht term) rose every quarter. During the first half this year, we encountered many negative factors that impacted our business, but we managed to pull it through and stayed profitable. This is mainly thanks to our management team’s efforts in closely monitoring the market situations and making timely implementation of appropriate measures to ensure continual growth and profitability. Going into the third quarter, with some of these negative factors waning, our continual sales growth allowed us to book a net profit which set a historic high.”
He further commented, “Quarterly sales (in dollar term) grew almost across all product categories as canned tuna sales increased by 38%, shrimp 26%, cephalopod 21% canned pet food 57% and canned seafood 41% respectively. Negative factors that affected our profitability during the first half became less significant. For instance, Thai/USD exchange rate has become stable with a weakening trend while oil prices and tuna raw material prices also declined. While we continued to improve our internal production efficiency, all these developments helped make cost control easier. At the end, it led to a huge improvement in operating profit, compared with the same period last year as well last quarter.”
“Looking at the first 9 months of 2008, our business showed our ability to grow. Sales in dollar term during the period increased to USD1,541.4 million (up 33% from a year ago) while sales in Thai baht term also expanded by 26% to Bt50,638.6 million. Net profit rose by 37% from Bt1,380.3 million a year ago to Bt1,893.4 million this year.”
“The global economic slowdown as a result of the recent financial crisis has no impact on our business so far, probably due to the consumer staple nature of the majority of our products. They are viewed as basic necessity food items which consumption often remains stable during recessions. Despite this, we are closely monitoring the situations here and abroad to make sure that we are ready to adjust whenever changes are needed. We had no plan to revise our sales target yet because we are still confident about our business and its growth potential. Our sales should reach USD2,000 million this year and we target it to grow by 12-13% per annum going forward to attain USD3,000 million in 2012,” Thiraphong commented.
Recently, TUF successfully issued a Thai baht bond (the second since the first one last year) worth Bt2,000 m to local institutional investors with a very positive response despite a challenging capital market caused by the global liquidity crunch. HSBC is the firm’s adviser on this issue (as well as last one). The bond, rated A+ (stable outlook) by TRIS, was divided into two tranches (2-year and 5-year). The subscribed amount of the 2-year tranche was Bt1,500 m and Bt500 m for the 5-year tranche. The coupon rate for the 2-year tranche was set at 4.7% and 5.5% for the 5-year tranche.
Thiraphong explained, “The objective of this issue is primarily to support our continual business expansion, diversify our sources of financing and re-balance our short and long term funding in a time of uncertain financial markets.”
For more information please contact:
Corporate Communications Department
Thai Union Frozen Products PCL
Tel. 02-2980024 ext. 675-678