Rwanda Stock Exchange (RSE) has called on investors to invest in the local bourse which has managed to witness newly listed companies like Cimerwa Plc, make good profits despite of the Coronavirus impact on many businesses in the country.
Cimerwa Plc, listed (by Introduction) on the Rwanda Stock Market in August becoming the tenth local listed company to pave way for Rwanda’s confidence to gain points in the World Bank (WB) Ease of Doing Business report which required the country to have at least 10 listed companies to improve its business environment evaluation in this segment.
In the 2019 Doing Business report, Rwanda moved almost ten steps down (from 29 to 38 globally) as a result of not meeting the international standards of having at least ten private companies listed or cross listed on its stock market.
Few months on the bourse, Cimerwa on Monday December 14, 2020 announced revenues amounting to Rwf63billion against the Rwf61billion that was targeted, and Rwf16.5billions in earnings before Interest Tax and a profit after tax (PAT) of Rwf1.95billion.
Cimerwa’s sales revenues increased by 1% growth Year-on-Year compared to the previous year, espite a 40-day shutdown of cement production on accoun of the country-wide COVID-19 lockdown that was put in effect on 22nd March 2020.
However, the company made an epic sale of 55,000 tons in the month of July alone driven by demand for cement on the local market as borders remained closed due to the pandemic.
“These set of results demonstrate Cimerwa’s strong foundation, resilience and great potential. In response to the exceptional situation of Covid-19 pandemic, the team stepped up to the challenge by putting in place measures to ensure business continuity and protect performance,” said Albert Sigei the Cimerwa CEO.
In its report, the company also said it managed to put aside Rwf70million which was used to intervene in government measures to combat the impact of Covid-19 in communities support, schools construction and economic recovery plan.
On the local bourse, amidst Covid-19, Cimerwa managed to trade 205,000 shares which were largely brought and sold by local retail investors and private companies expressing interest in bids.
With this performance, Rwanda Stock Exchange CEO Celestin Rwabukumba said that this has proved that the market is promising and will attract more investors especially with an eye pegged on Cimerwa’s performance.
“With such results it is interesting to see a manufacturing company improving their revenues in a period like this. Everyone has posted losses actually, if I may say, so I think that is something to commend from our point of view,” Rwabukumba said.
With the hope of the Covid-19 vaccine being available to most countries as a serious point of rising up again, RSE said that they expect this to help in the next year to tap on investors who have eyed shares in Cimerwa but not made up their minds.
“We expect to get interest from other investors and actually what most of them been sighting is to see how they (Cimerwa) performs. The interest is there but they wanted to see the results” Rwabukumba said.
He revealed that despite a lesser interest in equities markets, the global stock market yardstick is quickly picking up interest in equities with view the Covid-19 turmoil can be contained soon.
As its mandate, RSE is expected to publish the financial statements for the stock listed and cross listed companies on the local bourse.
Other RSE listed and Cross listed companies include the Bank of Kigali, Bralirwa, Crystal telecoms, I&M Bank alongside foreign companies like Nation Media Group, Uchumi, Equity Bank and Kenya Commercial Bank and South Africa’s RH Bophelo.
