Group Lease announces 2Q2018 performance Reissued 2017 financial statement, three consecutive quarters of profitability

15 Aug 2018

Group Lease Public Company Limited reported 2018 second quarter revenue of 729.01 million baht and net profit of 125.98 million—3 consecutive profitable quarters after the one-time adjustment in 3Q of 2017 while also improving profitability quarter to quarter.

Mr. Alain Jean Pascal Dufes, Chief Financial Officer of Group Lease Public Company Limited, revealed that the Company continues to be profitable with 125.98 million baht in net profit for the second quarter of 2018—marking the third consecutive quarter of profitability. Revenue grew 25.9 million or 4% compared to the first quarter while service and administration expenses were reduced by 14.5 million or 4% which helped result in an increase of 18% in net profit (106.53 million to 125.98 million) and a 27% increase in operational profit (106.41 million to 134.69 million) in one quarter.

Mr. Tatsuya Konoshita, Chief Executive Officer of Group Lease Public Company Limited, stated “the Company reissued its 2017 financial per the letter of the SEC. Due to the third quarter 2017 allowance the Company originally set up, there was no change in shareholders equity for 2017 and net income for 2017 actually improved. We will continue to work with the SEC and all regulators to provide clarity to the public and good corporate governance.”

“2018 is the year we said we will increase profitability and strengthen our operations for the future. We have shown this quarter we are moving in the right direction and our profitability increased even though the size of our business did not increase much. We want to convey the message to all investors that we are focused on the stability of the company. Operationally we are focused on improving the quality of our portfolio and our business processes as this will improve our foundation for future growth after 2019. Our operational profit is already clearly improving from 106.41 million to 134.69 million—growth of 27% in one quarter.”

“All countries continue to be profitable in the second quarter with Myanmar being our growth engine. We will continue to significantly grow the portfolio in Myanmar as it presents us with a tremendous opportunity with very low NPL. In other countries, we need to strategize our resources as competition and factors such as household debt require us to focus on the best customers. In Laos we still expect moderate growth and in Cambodia, we continue to be conservative due to competition and macroeconomic factors there. We expect some growth in Thailand due to improvements in quality, but we are being conservative about our lending and not focused solely on growing the Thailand portfolio. Indonesia provides us potential growth similar to Myanmar in the way of microfinancing, but in the near future we will maintain limited growth there as we wait to see how the currency stabilizes and for a longer period of microfinance performance before putting more capital to work there.”