Dangote Cement Plc, a leading cement company majority owned by Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote, delivered another resilient financial performance at the end of the first three months of its 2023 fiscal year, following a solid financial performance at the end of its 2022 fiscal year.
Despite the difficulties in its operating environments, the group’s profit at the end of the first three months of 2023 increased by 3.45 percent from N105.85 billion ($230 million) in the first quarter of 2022 to N109.5 billion ($237.8 million) in the first quarter of 2023, according to figures contained in its recently published financial results.
This resilient financial performance comes despite a marginal 1.56 percent decline in the group’s revenue from N413.18 billion ($897.3 million) to N406.72 billion ($883.3 million) during the first three months of 2023.
This slight decrease in revenue was caused by a cash crunch that limited financial transactions in the country due to the Central Bank of Nigeria’s redesign of the naira. This redesign was an effort to recover N2.7 trillion ($5.85 billion) of cash outside the banking system.
Despite having an annual cement production and bagging capacity of 51.55 million tonnes, the Aliko Dangote-led cement behemoth only sold 6.27 million tonnes of cement in the first quarter of 2023, compared to a total of 7.09 million tonnes sold in the same quarter last year, when its revenue and profit were N413.18 billion ($897.3 million) and N105.85 billion ($230 million), respectively.
As a result of its strong financial performance, the group’s total assets increased from N2.61 trillion ($5.66 billion) to N2.7 trillion ($5.86 billion), while retained earnings increased from N969.48 billion ($2.15 billion) to N1.07 trillion ($2.32 billion), cementing the group’s position as not only the continent’s largest cement manufacturer but also the most profitable.
