China Merchants Group has (CMG) made a rare disclosure of its financial performance, saying its revenue and profit were growing at a “steady pace” despite macroeconomic uncertainty.
The Chinese state-owned conglomerate, whose assets are mainly in the maritime and banking sectors, said that its revenus grew 7.2% year-on-year to CNY 319bn ($46.3bn) between January and June.
Net profit rose 12.3% to CNY 63.2bn during the same timespan.
“In the first half of this year, there were strong volatilities in the business environment,” chairman Li Jianhong said. “The level of uncertainty was growing.”
“The group will need to closely watch the [market] development and take a proactive approach, so we can operate in a stable and sustainable way.
Wholly owned by the Chinese central government, CMG is not required to release its financial results in full and seldom discusses its business performance in details.
Via its listed subsidiaries, CMG controls the world’s largest VLCC and very large ore carrier fleets as well as a top 10 container port operator globally by handling volume.
China Merchants Energy Shipping, which owns the VLCC and VLOC fleets, reported net profit OF CNY 281m on revenue of CNY 3.14bn in the first quarter of the year.
The Shanghai- and Hong Kong-listed company is due to report its half-year results on 29 August.
China Merchants Port Holdings, whose throughput of containers handled reached 109 million teu in 2018, has yet to report any financial results this year. Its interim report is expected to be released by the end of next month.
China Merchants Bank, another CMG subsidiary that is one of the top 10 banks in China by net asset size, said its net profit increased by 13.1% year-on-year to CNY 50.6bn in January-June. Revenue rose 9.65% to CNY 138bn.
