COMPANY NEWS IN BRIEF

Shoprite CEO earned R64 million

Shoprite CEO Pieter Engelbrecht took home a total pay package of R64.66 million (including long-term incentives, like share allocations) in the 2023 financial year - just over half of the staggering R122.4 million Woolworths CEO Roy Bagattini earned in the same period.

Even without long-term incentives, Bagattini still earned R10 million more than Engelbrecht, the annual reports of both companies showed.

This is despite the fact that Shoprite's market value of R140 billion dwarfs that of Woolworths (R46 billion). It also has a much larger footprint in terms of stores.

But market analysts point out that a host of different factors are considered by company remuneration committees when deciding on pay packages and how they are structured, including share price performance.

Furthermore, with both Woolworths and Shoprite delivering strong results of late, it is likely their shareholders will not be unhappy with the big paydays for the CEOs.

Shoprite reported in its 2023 integrated report released this week that Engelbrecht earned a total remuneration package of R64.66 million, which was 1.9% higher than the total R63.45 million he earned last year.

Excluding the long-term incentives of R26.82 million that Engelbrecht received in 2023 but earned in previous years, this leaves him with basic pay and short-term incentives of about R38 million. –Fin24

Pick n Pay holds onto dividend

Retail group Pick n Pay has scrapped its interim dividend, swinging into an interim loss after blows from load shedding and increased competition, with its core namesake brand in SA barely showing any growth.

Group turnover rose 5.4% to just over R54 billion in the six months to 27 August, it said on Wednesday, reporting a R571 million loss from just over R453 million previously. Internal selling price inflation for the period was 8.3%, below food inflation of 11.4%, but also implying a significant fall in volumes.

Pick n Pay was hit by R565 million in incremental abnormal costs in the period, including R259 million for employee restructuring, R190 million net incremental energy costs, and R116 million for duplicated supply chain losses. The latter related to its switch to a new distribution centre in Gauteng, while net finance costs jumped 47.3% to R913 million.

Including franchises, the group has a total store base of just over 2 000 SA stores, about half of which are supermarkets, said Pick n Pay SA sales grew only 0.3% to R34.6 million. Its discount chain Boxer fared better, growing sales just over 16% to R17.4 billion but grew just over 4% on a like-for-like basis.

Pick n Pay added 27 Boxer stores, bringing it to 454 in its first half, and is heavily pushing this format, planning a total of 55 by year end. It has also split its main SA brand into two, QualiSave, which is aimed at the lower-to-middle income customers and Pick n Pay, whose focus will be the middle-to-top-end of the market.-Fin24

Zeder pleased with SA's agriculture outlook

Agribusiness-focused investment holding group Zeder said on Tuesday it remains confident in part due to good winter rainfall in the Western Cape, opting to fork out more than R200 million in special dividends for its half year to end-August.

An increase in the valuation of its biggest asset, specialist agricultural seeds and agrochemicals company Zaad, helped the group's sum-of-the-parts valuation rise about 0.6% to about R4.03 billion during the six months to end-August. Zeder said the specialised agri-inputs market, and particularly its proprietary hybrid seed segment, remains attractive, while recent Western Cape floods, fortunately, resulted in little damage to its infrastructure or biological assets.

Valued at about R2.6 billion on the JSE, Zaad makes up more than 60% of Zeder's portfolio, while it recently announced plans to sell most of its other major remaining interest - fruit farmer and marketer Capespan. The company will distribute the net proceeds of the about R550 million sale to shareholders.

For its half-year to end-August, Zeder declared an ad-hoc gross special dividend of 5c per share - or R77 million - which was paid in August. In addition, a further gross special dividend of 10c per share, or R154 million, was declared for its half-year.-Fin24

Amazon's marketplace on its way to SA

The JSE is set to get a new listing, although just a secondary one, with UK property firm Primary Health Properties saying it believes SA investors are interested in its model of long-term leases for mostly government tenants. Standard Bank and agribusiness focused Zeder managed to please the market with their updates, while global e-commerce Amazon has finally confirmed its launch in SA in 2024.

US tech giant Amazon has confirmed it will launch amazon.co.za, the company's online marketplace, in 2024. Independent sellers can register their businesses on Amazon from Tuesday, with the move ending months of speculation its entry was imminent.

Amazon Web Services has been operating in the country since 2020, the company sent out job adverts for key positions for launching its marketplace in 2022, and the locations of two of its South African distribution sites appeared to have been leaked online earlier this year.

Ninety One, the asset manager spun out of Investec in March 2020, continues to experience a steady decline in its assets under management (AUM).

The group, which is listed in London and Johannesburg and publishes its results in pounds, released its quarterly AUM update on Tuesday showing the assets it oversees on behalf of clients fell 1.4% to £123.1 billion (R2.8 trillion) at end-September 2023 relative to the end of June. –Fin24