Southern Africa’s richest Black person Patrice Motsepe is scheduled to receive R1.78 billion ($103 million) in final dividends from his stake in African Rainbow Minerals (ARM) less than four months after earning $69.6 million in interim payments.
The final payout, along with the $69.6-million interim dividend that he earned this year, brings his total dividend earnings from ARM this year to $173 million.
ARM is a South African mining and minerals company with strategic positions in a variety of mining projects, covering iron, coal, copper, gold, platinum, and other precious metals.
Motsepe, who founded ARM in 1997 as South Africa’s first Black-owned mining firm, owns 39.7 percent of the company. His shareholding in the company is presently worth more than $1.18 billion, accounting for the majority of his wealth.
The $103-million payout from his stake is a fraction of the R4.49-billion ($260 million) final dividend payment approved by the company’s boards of directors. It will be deposited electronically into his bank account on Oct. 3.
In accordance with the group’s dividend guiding principles for the 2022 fiscal year, the board approved and declared a final dividend of R20 ($1.158) per share, the same amount paid to shareholders last year.
The proposed dividend payment represents a portion of the group’s profits at the end of its 2022 fiscal year, which ended on June 30.
According to figures from ARM’s recently published financial statements, its profit at the end of its 2022 fiscal year dropped by more than seven percent, from R15.47 billion ($895 million) in 2021 to R14.36 billion ($830.5 million).
The decline in profit can be ascribed to iron ore prices, which fell from more than $200 per tonne at the start of ARM’s 2022 fiscal year to $110 per tonne by the year’s end.
