Listed firms earnings up 80%

(chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2007-05-10 10:42

In the first quarter of this year, the weighted average earnings per share of 1,364 listed companies increased by 78.1 percent to 0.098 yuan from 0.055 yuan in the same period last year.

The number is also an increase of 42 percent from the fourth quarter last year, according to Chen Li, chief strategist at Shanghai Shenyin Wanguo Research & Consulting Co Ltd.

"In the following three quarters, listed companies may not keep the record growth rate," Chen added.

Statistics from the total listed companies show that, in the first quarter this year, the average revenue of major business per share grew 13.2 percent to 1.54 yuan from 1.36 yuan in the same period last year. The average profitability from major business is up from 15.69 percent in the first quarter last year to 18.22 percent in the first quarter this year.

According to Chen, the adoption of new accounting standards was a major factor for the high growth rate.

He also pointed out, due to a large infusion of cash into the stock market and growing Chinese economy, the change of listed companies' performance in the future will continue to see an upward trend. But the gap between highly profitable companies and those with poor performance will badly affect those low-performance companies, so the average acceleration of listed companies will slow down in the following three quarters of this year.


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