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South32 Ltd on Thursday announced another special dividend as the global miner continued to benefit from a significant tailwind of commodity prices.
The Perth, Australia-based diversified miner's pretax profit multiplied to $3.69 billion for the financial year that ended June 30 from just $42 million in financial 2021. Attributable profit after tax was $2.67 billion, swung from a $195 million loss.
Revenue surged by 69% to $9.70 billion from $5.48 billion, helped in part by record production at Worsley Alumina, while Hillside Aluminium and Mozal Aluminium continued to test ‘maximum technical capacity’.
South32 declared a final dividend of 14.0 US cents, raising the total ordinary payout for the year to 22.7 cents, up from just 4.9 cents the year before. It also declared a special dividend of 3.0 cents, up 50% from 2.0 cents last year.
Basis earnings per share soared to 57.4 cents from 3.0 cents, while headline earnings per share jumped to 59.5 cents from 9.5 cents.
‘We delivered record earnings and cash flow in FY22 as our stable operating performance and recent portfolio improvements enabled us to capitalise on the significant tailwind of commodity prices,’ South32 Chief Executive Graham Kerr said.
Free cash flow from operations grew to $2.24 billion from $639 million.
Kerr said South32 is well positioned to navigate the current economic uncertainty, with net cash climbing to $538 million from $406 million.
The group expects copper equivalent production to increase by 14% in 2023.
Worsley Alumina's annual alumina production is projected to decline to 3.9 million tonnes in 2022 from 4.0 million tonnes in 2023, while alumina output at Brazil Alumina is likely to slip to 1.2 million tones from 1.3 million tonnes.
Hillside's aluminium production is seen falling to 714,000 tonnes from 720,000 tonnes, and at Mozal, aluminium output is expected to decline to 278,000 tonnes from 370,000 tonnes.
Shares in South32 were up 1.9% at 254.48 pence on Thursday morning in London, while its Johannesburg shares were 2.1% higher at R 50.87.
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