Company news in brief

Sasol ramps up output
Sasol, South Africa’s biggest fuel producer, restarted the Natref refinery it owns with TotalEnergies after delayed oil deliveries last month resulted in a shutdown.
The disruption caused Sasol to declare a force majeure on petroleum products, which remains in effect. The 108 000 barrel-a-day plant is now “online and production ramp-up is in progress,” the company said in response to emailed questions.
Natref’s shutdown also meant the whole of South Africa’s oil-refinery fleet was out of action as a series of other facilities suspended production over the past two years. The plants have faced costly upgrades to meet pending cleaner-fuel regulations.
South Africa has delayed the implementation of those rules from next year to 2027.
Sasol welcomed the deadline extension by the energy department as the company continues “to evaluate options” for the Natref plant. – Fin24/Bloomberg

Massmart warns of larger loss
Massmart, the embattled owner of Game and Makro, expects its headline loss to increase by at least 51% for the 26 weeks to end-June, to a possible loss of R974 million, from R645 million in the previous period.
Yesterday morning, its share price dropped 8% in response. It has now lost 45% over the past year.
Total group sales for the period amounted to R41.3 billion, "broadly in line with the same period last year," Massmart said.
Sales of general merchandise declined by 1.4% compared to the same period last year "as consumers prioritised non-durable goods spending in the context of rapidly increasing food, energy and transport cost inflation".
Liquor’s like-on-like sales increased by 21% over the same period last year, while food sales increased by 6.4%. – Fin24

Telkom under pressure
Telkom’s share price fell by more than 3% yesterday morning after the company reported a revenue decline and pressure on its profit margins.
In a trading statement, the company said discussions about a possible takeover by MTN "are at an early stage and still in progress".
MTN wants to buy Telkom in return for shares or a combination of cash and shares. The announcement last month triggered a sharp rally in Telkom’s share price – from around R33 to R45.50 by the end of July. Yesterday morning, Its share price declined by more than 3% to R42.65 – from around R54 at the start of the year.
For the three months to end-June, Telkom’s revenue declined by 3% to R10.3 billion compared to the previous year.
Telkom’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (Ebitda) declined by 15%, with its profit margin shrinking by 3.2 percentage points to 22.7% due in part to an annual salary increase of 6%, as well as lower data prices for its mobile customers. – Fin24

Absa gets billions for low-cost home loans
Absa will get a R2 billion loan from the International Finance Corporation, which is part of the World Bank, to help South Africa’s third-largest bank by assets expand its affordable-mortgage business.
IFC’s first social-sector loan in South Africa is targeted at lower to middle-income households, Adamou Labara, the lender’s country head, said in a statement.
South Africa, where the official unemployment rate remains the highest among 82 countries monitored by Bloomberg, has a shortfall of 3.7 million homes, according to the statement. The shortage is most acute in the lower end of the market, which faces a lack of access to financing.
The loan complies with the Social Loan Principles published by the Loan Market Association, which aims to establish best market practice for syndicated loans in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Such a loan finances projects that address key social issues including a lack of access to affordable basic infrastructure like energy, clean water and housing. – Fin24/Bloomberg

Insurer placed into provisional curatorship
The South Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg has placed Constantia Insurance Company (CICL) into provisional curatorship after it failed to find an investor to inject it with much-needed capital of at least R450 million.
The Sandton-headquartered group has also been temporarily barred from taking on new customers.
Founded in 1952, Constantia is a non-life insurance company that falls under Constantia Risk and Insurance Holdings, a subsidiary of JSE-listed Conduit Capital.
CICL offers several insurance products, including property, motor, accident and health and medical malpractice insurance.
The SA Reserve Bank's Prudential Authority (PA) has been engaging with it since June 2019 after it found that it was not holding sufficient funds to protect policyholders. Under South African law, insurers must hold a statutory reserve of money to meet their obligations to pay out claims. – Fin24