Forte Oil Plc 2017 Financial Summary

12 Months Report FORTE OIL PLC
	2017 N'000	2016 N'000	change	Year End
Revenue	129,443,804	148,605,261	-13%	December
Profit before taxation	10,627,156	5,340,244	99%
Profit for the period	12,226,422	2,890,430	323%
Issued Shares (Units)	1,305,030,180	1,305,030,180
Basic Earnings Per Shares (Kobo)	289.00	199.00	45%
Last total dividend paid (Kobo)			#DIV/0!

Revenue N’000                                                                       PAT N’000

QI:33,003,968                                                                         QI:1,172,169

Q2:32,643,535                                                                        Q2:193,339

Q3:31,239,872                                                                        Q3:3.708.384

Q4:32,556,429                                                                        Q4:7,152,530

The above table summarizes all the activities of FO for the Financial year 2017. Looking at the performance quarter on quarter, from the first quarter to the very last.  

FO generated An average of N32,360,951,000 billion in 2017 in terms of revenue which the company kept close to the average quarter on quarter. On the other hand, the company generated an average of N3,056,605,500 in terms of PAT with a range of N6,959,191,000 billion between the best quarter and the worst. The performance in Q4 was worth noting so was the performance in Q2, as they both represents the extremes.

A closer look at the result shows that the revenue was impacted negatively by the Fuel segment that declined by 35.5% from N121b in 2016 to N78billion in 2017. Production and chemical also declined by 24% from N2.5billion in 2016 to N1.9billion in 2017. However, Power generation gave a ray of hope. It increased by 200% from N12.9billion in 2016 to N36.6billion in 2017. As the profitability in fuel continues to struggle with reality power generation can offer a respite for the company going into the future.

Forte Oil has also foray into the Ghana market and this market contributed a total of N4.7billion to revenue on all products offered by the company.

It was also noted that the company is scaling down on its debt as interest expense declined by 6.55% from N6.1billion in 2016 to N5.7billion in 2017. However, unclaimed dividend totaling N736million still remains a cash cow for the company. Although it paid out N123million in unclaimed dividend in 2017, the company still need to do more and the regulator should keep a close tap on this.

We also observed from the report that tax expense declined by 165.28% from (N2.4billion) expense in 2016 to N1.5billion write back in 2017.

As reported when 2016 result was made public that FO would remain volatile until the Market finds an equilibrium price for it considering the information available in the public domain then. The stock end up at N43.48 at the end of 2017 with a negative return of 48.50 making it one of the worst performer of 2017.

The stock had been trading between N40 and N50 since the turn of the year. With no indication of benefit in the offering in a Market that is dividend obsessed , but only promises of better years ahead, we can only hope that the Market sees the brighter side but not until Forte Oil sees blood as we enter its first trading session after making its result public.