Stocks to watch: Genting, UMW, TM, DRB-Hicom, MISC

KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 25): Heavyweights GENTING BHD [], Genting Malaysia Bhd and Telekom Malaysia would be in focus on Friday following their release of their corporate results.

Other companies which could see trading interest are UMW HOLDINGS BHD [], DRB-HICOM BHD [] and MISC BHD [].

Genting Bhd’s earnings fell 22% to RM597.19 million in the third quarter ended Sept 30, 2011 from RM765.92 million a year ago in the absence of one-off items including a net gains of RM413.60 million recorded a year ago. Its pretax profit for 3Q2011 included gain on disposal of available-for-sale financial assets of RM77.6 million.

Genting Malaysia’s earning edged up 3.2% to RM347.14 million from RM336.42 million a year ago, boosted by the leisure and hospitality business in Malaysia. The group’s adjusted earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose 38% to RM589.9 million from RM428.3 million a year ago.

UMW posted a 13.2% increase in earnings to RM169.17 million in the third quarter ended Sept 30 from RM149.39 million a year ago, boosted by its oil and gas business and also the automotive division.

Its revenue increased by 19.5% to RM3.691 billion from RM3.087 billion while earnings per share were 14.51 sen compared with 13.17 sen. It declared an interim dividend of 13.5 sen per share, unchanged from a year ago.

Telekom Malaysia reported a 31% decline in its net profit to RM302.12 million from RM438.49 million a year ago due to unrealised foreign exchange loss on borrowings. It said forex translation losses were RM122.50 million compared with forex translation gains of RM139 million a year ago.

DRB-Hicom Bhd’s earnings fell 15.9% to RM104.27 million in the second quarter ended Sept 30 from RM132.19 million a year ago due to the lower profit contribution from the associated companies following the automotive supply-chain disruption

It remained cautious about the outlook due to external factors and the impact of the severe Thai floods. Its revenue fell 10.3% to RM1.476 billion from RM1.647 billion while earnings per share were 5.39 sen compared with 6.84 sen.

MISC expects to incur losses in current financial year ending Dec 31, 2011 after it decided to exit its liner business operations, as the expected one-off costs to the income statement are estimated to be approximately US$400 million..

The company said this when reviewing its financial performance for the second quarter ended Sept 30, 2011.

MISC said its 2Q net profit fell 61.8% to RM140.96 million from RM369.36 million a year earlier, due mainly to depressed aframax freight rates in petroleum business, lower liftings in the liner business and high bunker costs. The company said its revenue for the quarter fell 15.1% to RM2.62 billion from RM3.08 billion