TSOGO Sun, Africa’s biggest hotel and gambling group, said on Thursday that its interim results reflected continued pressure on consumers as a result of macroeconomic environment and weak sentiment.

It said in SA, the hotel industry continued to experience a subdued recovery due to both depressed demand and oversupply.

“Overall industry occupancies have improved marginally for the period, but were adversely impacted by the visa regulations, which constrained growth,” the group said.

Tsogo Sun said the offshore division of hotels achieved total revenue of R337m, a 34% increase from a year ago. This was as a result of the division recovering from the effects that the Ebola epidemic had on trading.

In the six months to September 30 2015, Tsogo reported diluted headline earnings per share (HEPS) of 85.7c from diluted HEPS of 67.5c a year ago.

Total income for the period rose by 7% to R5.9bn while operating profit climbed 16% to R1.6bn compared with a year ago.

Tsogo declared an interim gross cash dividend of 31c per share.

The company said trading was expected to remain under pressure.

Source: BDLive – Staff Reporter