B.T.L. Reports Profit Performance – Figures Dismal

The Annual General Meeting of B.T.L. takes place on Thursday evening at seven o’clock to review the performance of the company over the twelve months to March 2014. As you know, shares in the company were offered to the public by the Government at the end of 2010 to a great fanfare, with promises of growth and performance, and with the Social Security Board investing fifty million dollars of the people’s money to purchase twenty percent of the company.  Well, B.T.L.’s performance has fallen short of the promises made. In this chart, we can see that Revenue has stagnated over this period, with the revenue at one hundred and forty three million dollars being ten percent less than the one hundred and sixty million promised in the sales prospectus. The most marked failure, however, is the profit performance, as shown in this chart. Profit has fallen each year, and is now thirty-eight percent lower than that achieved in 2011, and is fifty percent lower than the profit figure promised in the Share Sale Prospectus in 2010, which was used by Belizeans and the Social Security Board to make their investment decisions.  With the Government having reduced tax rates for B.T.L. and with a reported improvement in the economy, both of which have helped B.T.L., it will be interesting to see how the Government-run company will explain this massive underperformance, and the continued downward spiral.  Still five years after the nationalization, the previous shareholders have not been paid, and it is hard to see how this tarnished jewel is going to help the Government settle that debt, and where the money required is going to come from.