COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s Colombo Dockyard fell back into the red in the June 2017 quarter with a loss of Rs37 million compared with a profit of Rs57 million a year ago. The firm had returned to profit in the March 2017 quarter with earnings of Rs141 million. Sales of the firm, a unit of Japan’s Onomichi Dockyard, rose 23 percent to 3.1 billion rupees in the June quarter from a year ago, according to interim results filed with the stock exchange.
Colombo Dockyard reported a loss per share of 51 cents. But its earnings per share for the six months to June 2017 were Rs1.46 with sales up 37% to Rs7.2 billion. Revenues from ship repair and ship building rose in the half-year but profits from ship building fell while earnings from ship repair rose. The yard had been hit hard by the prolonged slump in shipping, with clients cancelling new building orders or negotiating pries down. It had managed to reduce loses to 432 million rupees in 2016 from 708 million rupees the year before.
