Formosa Plastics Group’s (FPG, 台塑集團) four major units will have their lowest bonus payouts ever for their employees because of falling earnings for last year, the group announced yesterday.
“With average earnings per share for the four FPG units standing at NT$1.04 last year, the group is planning to provide employees with annual bonuses equal to 2.83 times their monthly salaries, the lowest levels in the group’s history,” FPG general administration director Ho Shui-wen (侯水文) said.
All four units of FPG — Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑), Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化), Nan Ya Plastics Corp (南亞塑膠) and Formosa Chemicals & Fibre Corp (台灣化纖) — yesterday attributed their declining profits to the weakened global economy last year, which dragged down prices for their products.
Formosa Plastics Corp, the nation’s largest maker of polyvinyl chloride, posed a pretax profit of NT$16.28 billion (US$559.35 million), or NT$2.66 per share, last year, down 59.9 percent from a year ago, which Formosa Plastics Corp president Jason Lin (林健男) blamed on the impacts of low prices and the rising raw material costs.
Furthermore, Formosa Plastics Corp’s investment income posted a year-on-year decline of NT$6.93 billion because of the reduced profit at its plant in Ningbo, China and in Formosa Petrochemical, Lin said.
Nan Ya Plastics, the nation’s largest plastics maker, posted a pretax profit of NT$4.63 billion (NT$0.59 per share) last year, down 83.6 percent from a year ago on falling product prices and investment losses in Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技), Nan Ya president Wu Chia-chau (吳嘉昭) said.
Formosa Chemicals, which produces aromatics and styrenics, posted a pretax profit of NT$7.11 billion (NT$1.25 per share) last year, down 80.5 percent from the previous year, while Formosa Petrochemical saw pretax profit fall by 90.1 percent to NT$2.44 billion (NT$0.26 per share).
Although the FPG recorded a declining profit in China, the group still maintained that its project in China will continue and the economic prospect will turn positive there.
As for this year, all four FPG units expressed optimism that their product prices are likely to rise in the first quarter this year and the performance of the group will be higher.
Formosa Plastics Corp’s shares closed up by 1.01 percent to NT$79.8 per share yesterday, while Formosa Petrochemical’s rose 0.57percent to NT$88.5 per share, Nan Ya Plastics’ was up 4.24 percent to NT$59 and Formosa Chemicals’ increased by 3.18 percent to NT$77.8 per share.
For the whole of last year, Formosa Plastics Corp’s shares dropped 2.72 percent, Formosa Petrochemical’s fell 8.32 percent, Nan Ya Plastics’ was down 6.82 percent and Formosa Chemicals’ was down 6.13 percent.
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