Listed firms post big rise in net

This was underpinned by lower production costs and recovery of the energy and utilities sector and the petrochemicals and chemicals sector.
Aggregate earnings were compiled from 567 listed firms, or 96.1 per cent of the total 590 companies (including property funds, real estate investment trusts and infrastructure funds, and excluding non-compliance and non-performing groups), as of December 31, 2016. 
There were 461 companies making net profits, representing 81.31 per cent of the listed companies posting their financial statements.
Falling production costs pushed 2016 gross profit up 2.37 per cent to Bt2.50 trillion. In addition, the jump in net profit was supported by a lack of foreign-exchange losses and impairment, although overall sales dropped slightly to Bt10.13 trillion, especially in the energy/utilities and petrochemicals/chemicals sectors, as a result of a 20-per-cent decline in crude-oil prices in 2016.
Nevertheless, if companies in the energy/utilities and petrochemicals/chemicals sectors were excluded, the sales of listed companies could have posted a 4.15-per-cent increase in 2016 and net profits could have increase by 7.42 per cent compared with the previous year.
Meanwhile, Thai listed firms’ ability to generate profit has been growing. Their 2016 gross profit margin rose to 24.69 per cent from 22.28 per cent a year earlier, and net profit margins also increased to 8.95 per cent from 6.70 per cent, while their debt-to-equity ratio (excluding the financials industry) was 1.19 times, down slightly from 1.20 per cent at end-2015.
In the fourth quarter of 2016, combined net profit was Bt204.85 billion, up 20.15 per cent from the same quarter of 2015, but down slightly, by 1.47 per cent, from the third quarter of 2016.
SET senior executive vice president Santi Kiranand said the overall performance of Thai listed companies in 2016 had improved corresponding to growing domestic consumption. 
The business sectors that stood to benefit most from government policies were property development, construction materials, commerce, and healthcare. 
Companies in 10 target industrial groups under the “Thailand 4.0” economic policy, the government’s economic model, reported healthy performance, with 20-per-cent net-profit growth compared with end-2015.
The companies listed on the Market for Alternative Investment also reported 2016 net profit, but it was down by 8.73 per cent year on year to Bt3.89 billion, partly because of extra items booked. For the fourth quarter of 2016, they reported a net loss of Bt472 million, compared with a Bt233-million loss in the same period a year earlier.