Figures extracted from companies financial reports for the year ended December 31, 2018, showed a very weak growth in revenue at 6.4 percent, though profit before tax, PBT, for the period surged 170.7 percent.
FCMB Group, Access Bank Plc and Sterling Bank emerged the top performers in terms of percentage growth in revenue, with their revenues rising by 77.7 percent, 15.2 percent and 14 percent to N177.3 billion, N528.7 billion and N152.2 billion respectively. “If you look at Lagos, for instance, some of the companies can no longer collect goods directly from Apapa Port. They have to make arrangement for the goods to be carried through the Lagoon to Ikorodu and then to where their factories are located. So, these are part of the costs the companies now have to bear. Those are factors that have reduced the turnover of the companies and their profit.”
“On a year-to-year basis, Nestle and Unilever were the only two fast moving consumer goods companies to grow revenue and profit in 2018, a performance that was largely supported by the inelastic nature of their core food segments and prior efforts at deleveraging their balance sheet.