LIME offered highest returns to investors last year

BY STEVEN JACKSON Business reporter jacksons@jamaicaobserver.com

Friday, January 09, 2015    

Loss-making telecom LIME offered the highest returns to investors in 2014 based on its 200 per cent price gain on the Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE).

But some stock analysts are unsure of the precise impact on LIME’s valuation given the announced acquisition by its parent, Cable and Wireless Communications Plc, of Columbus Communications, the parent company of Flow.

“We credit this performance to the steadily improving commercial story that we are developing at LIME, characterised by solid market share and revenue improvements across most lines of business and a continued focus on ensuring our operating model is optimally structured to meet the demands of our constantly changing, extremely competitive environment,” said LIME Chief Executive Officer Garfield Sinclair in an e-mailed response to Jamaica Observer queries.

“When the proposed C&W Communications (CWC)/Columbus merger is also considered, investors would obviously anticipate additional future growth,” added Sinclair, who sits on the boards of the three top-earning stocks of 2014.

Concurrently, the Fayval Williams-led Kingston Properties Ltd, of which Sinclair is chairman, offered the second highest gains on the JSE, up 66 per cent between January and December. Sinclair also sits on the board of the Chris Williams-led Proven Investments, which gained 46 per cent in 2014.

But LIME’s share price increased at a greater pace, starting 2014 at $0.16 and closing at $0.48. Even without the announcement, LIME led the market by mid-year, gaining 103 per cent at the end of June before doubling that gain with the announcement.

In November, CWC announced that it would acquire Columbus Communications for US$3 billion pending regulatory approval.

“LIME Jamaica’s stock price has reacted positively during 2014,” Ryan Strachan, fund manager at Stocks and Securities Limited (SSL), noted in an e-mailed response to Caribbean Business Report queries. “However, LIME is not on our buy list, and it has traded erratically between 17 cents and 70 cents during the 2014 calendar year. Also, we are [un]sure if and what the financial benefit will be from the acquisition, if any, to the local company. Lastly, LIME continues to make losses, and the parent company has to continue to make guarantees re going concern.”

Wade Mars, assistant vice-president, asset management at Mayberry Investments Limited, also acknowledges that the acquisition benefits remain unclear.

“It’s a little strange — the rationale that people would use to buy… However, what I can say is that the volumes traded and the different number of purchasers over a time period are not one-off. [There is] genuine demand out there,” Mars reasoned. “For that acquisition to benefit Jamaica there has to be some reorganisation of the group structure itself. And you really don’t know how it’s going to end up, if and when they do that reorganisation.”

In December, LIME Jamaica Chairman Chris Dehring told the Observer that LIME Jamaica expects to grow annual revenues to US$281 million with the Flow acquisition. It was a signal to investors vying to evaluate possible earnings arising from the local leg of the regional merger. The increase would equate to a two-thirds jump in LIME Jamaica’s $18.4 billion (US$170 million) total revenues earned at its March year end. The merger would not affect mobile revenues but augment other revenues currently at $12 billion (US$110 million) per annum.

Mars, however, added that LIME’s rise was commendable despite its losses. “LIME’s movement was impressive. They have made moves to turn around the company. But still, they are in the red. The majority of the price movement occurred after the Columbus acquisition announcement,” Mars said.

For the September second-quarter 2014, LIME grew its total revenue 15 per cent, and its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) jumped 95 per cent year-on-year. Additionally, its mobile customer base grew 13 per cent and its mobile service revenue grew 42 per cent year-on-year.

However, the company made a $612 million net loss. Over 12 months ending March 2014 it made a net loss of $3.5 billion.

View the original article here

LIME offered highest returns to investors last year

GOP blasts Obama plan to tax highest earners - VIDEO: What to expect in address

FILE: May 22, 2010: President Obama outlined a foreign policy vision at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y. (AP)

Congressional Republicans on Sunday pummeled President Obama’s plan to increase taxes on America’s highest wage earners, dismissing the proposal as not serious and a “non-starter.”

The plan was released late Saturday by the White House and attempts to increase taxes on the top earners and others to pay for cuts for the middle class.

The president is scheduled to further explain the plan on Tuesday night in his State of the Union address.

“The notion … that in order for some people to do better, someone has to do worse is just not true,” Florida GOP Sen. Marco Rubio told CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “Raising taxes on people that are successful is not going to make people that are struggling more successful. … It would also be counter-productive.”

Among the other Obama proposals are increasing the investment tax rate, eliminating a tax break on inheritances, giving a tax credit to working families and expanding the child care tax credit — in total roughly $320 billion in tax hikes over the next 10 years.

The president also wants to impose a financial fee on some of the country’s largest financial firms. His full fiscal 2016 budget is scheduled to be released to the GOP-led Congress next month.

However, the centerpiece of the proposal is to increase to 28 percent the capital gains and dividends rate on couples making more than $500,000 a year. The top capital gains rate has already been raised from 15 percent to 23.8 percent during Obama’s presidency.

Rubio on Sunday also criticized Obama’s recent proposal to offer some Americans free community college tuition.

“I’m all for reforming our higher education system,” said Rubio, a potential 2016 presidential candidate. “In the 21st century, to have the skills you need for a middle-class job, you need higher education of some form or fashion. It may not be a four-year degree. The problem is he just wants to pour that additional money into the broken, existing system.”

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, called the plan “a non-starter.”

“We’re not just one good tax increase away from prosperity in this nation,” Chaffetz, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told CNN’s “State of the Union.”

He also argued that elected officials need to “quit spending this money that we don’t have.”

White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer appeared on Sunday talk shows to support the plan, which he argues is an effort to further stimulate economic recovery.

“Now that the economy’s in a stronger place than it’s been in a very long time, we need to double down on our efforts to deal with wage stagnation and declining economic mobility,” Pfeiffer told CBS.

He also said the “simple proposition,” or solution, is to ask the wealthy to pay a little more and invest more in the middle class.

Obama also got support from leading House Democrats, including Rep. Chris Van Hollen, Maryland, and Sander Levin, Michigan.

“It’s clear that President Obama and Democrats are focused on reducing the economic squeeze being felt by the middle class,” said Van Hollen, the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee. “I’m pleased that pieces of this proposal overlap with the plan I recently outlined.”

Levin, the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee, said the president’s proposals “focus right where we need to — creating opportunity for middle-class families and those struggling to join the middle class.”

The offices of GOP congressional leaders also criticized the plan.

A spokesman for Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, chairman of the chamber’s Ways and Means Committee, which writes federal tax law, said the proposal was “not a serious plan.”

“We lift families up and grow the economy with a simpler, flatter tax code, not big tax increases to pay for more Washington spending,” said spokesman Brendan Buck.

Ryan said last week that he was focused on broader tax code reform and that his committee would not pass a tax increase to fund transportation infrastructure projects, amid talk Congress will pursue such an increase.

“It’s not surprising to see the president call for tax hikes, but now he’s asking Congress to reverse bipartisan tax relief that he signed into law,” a top staffer for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told The Hill newspaper.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

View the original article here

GOP blasts Obama plan to tax highest earners - VIDEO: What to expect in address

Guyana, Suriname among countries with World’s highest suicide rates

WASHINGTON D.C., United States, Friday September 5, 2014, CMC –Two Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries have some of the highest suicide rates in the world, according to figures released by the World Health Organization (WHO).

It said that in the Americas, the average estimated suicide rate is 7.3 per 100,000 inhabitants, which is lower than in other WHO regions and lower than the global average of 11.4 per 100,000.

“However, Guyana has the highest estimated suicide rate for 2012 in the world, and Suriname has the sixth-highest.”

The WHO said that data from the Americas show that suicide rates first peak among young people, remain at the same level for other age groups, and rise again among older men.

(Credit: WHO)

According to the WHO first global report on suicide prevention published on Thursday, more than 800,000 people around the world die from suicide every year – around one person every 40 seconds.

The WHO report titled “Preventing suicide: a global imperative” seeks to make suicide a top priority on the global public health agenda.

It has been launched a few days before World Suicide Prevention Day is observed on September 10.

Click here to receive free news bulletins via email from Caribbean360. (View sample)

The report noted that an estimated 75 per cent of suicides occur in low- and middle-income countries.

“Unfortunately, suicide all too often fails to be prioritized as a major public health problem,” said WHO Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan.

“Despite an increase in research and knowledge about suicide and its prevention, the taboo and stigma surrounding suicide persist, and often people do not seek help or are left alone. And if they do seek help, many health systems and services fail to provide timely and effective help.”

The report notes that, globally, rates of suicide are highest in people aged 70 years and over. In some countries, however, the highest rates are found among the young.

The WHO noted that suicide is the second-leading cause of death in 15- to 29-year-olds globally.

In general, more men die by suicide than women. In countries of the Americas, rates range 2 to 6 times higher for men than for women.

It said pesticide poisoning is one of the most common methods of suicide, especially in low- and middle-income countries, and accounts for one-third of cases globally.

“The relatively high proportion of suicides by firearms in high-income countries is primarily driven by high-income countries in the Americas, where firearms account for 46 per cent of all suicides; in high-income countries outside the Americas, firearms account for only 4.5 per cent of suicides.

“Evidence shows that limiting access to the means of suicide can help prevent such deaths, as can a commitment by national governments to the establishment and implementation of coordinated plans of action,” the Who reported.

“The most important message is that suicide can be prevented, especially if we identify people at risk and intervene early,” said Dr. Jorge Rodriguez, chief of the Mental Health Unit at the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), Regional Office for the Americas.

“People who have attempted suicide are at higher risk of attempting it again, he noted, making it important for health personnel to provide follow-up of such cases, with family and community support.”

The new WHO report identifies a series of measures that can help prevent suicide, including creating national strategies for suicide prevention; restricting access to the most common means of suicide, including pesticides, firearms and certain medicines and providing medical follow-up for people who have attempted suicide.

In addition, the WHO is advocating that countries should incorporate suicide prevention as a central component in health services, identify and treat mental health and substance abuse disorders as early as possible and that there should also be responsible reporting on suicide by the news media.

View the original article here

Guyana, Suriname among countries with World’s highest suicide rates

Kingston makes UN highest murder rate survey

Andr? Williams, STAR Writer

Kingston, Jamaica’s capital, has been listed among an international survey of world cities with the highest murder rates, The WEEKEND STAR understands.

According to www.theguardian.com, who published the top 10 list on Tuesday, data from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) shows the most up-to-date available homicide rates per 100,000 people for the most populous cities of 137 countries.

The WEEKEND STAR gathered that the Americas overtook Africa as the region with the highest murder rate in 2012, with eight of the world’s 10 deadliest cities found there.

Kingston sits on the list at number 10.

The data shows that Kingston, Jamaica, has a murder rate of 50.3 per 100,000 people in 2011.

The UNODC numbers capture intentional homicide, defined as ‘unlawful death purposefully inflicted on a person by another person’.

Additionally, the report stated that a total of 328 people were murdered in Kingston in 2011, significantly down on previous years.

View the original article here

Kingston makes UN highest murder rate survey