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The shareholders of TotalEnergies Marketing Nigeria Plc have given their approval for a dividend of N8.49bn for the 2023 financial year, amounting to N25 per share.
This decision was made during the company's 46th Annual General Meeting held in Lagos on Friday.
As outlined in the company's annual report, the board proposed a dividend of N25 per share for 2023, consistent with the previous year.
Originally scheduled to be paid on Monday, the chairman of the board of directors, Jean-Philipe Torres, announced during the AGM that the dividend would be paid after the meeting, following a request by the chairman emeritus of the Independent Shareholders Association of Nigeria, Sunny Nwosu.
During the AGM, Torres acknowledged the challenging economic conditions in 2023, stating that the company's profitability was impacted.
He highlighted a 32% increase in revenue, but also noted a corresponding increase in the cost of goods.
The company experienced a significant exchange loss of over N11bn and struggled to maintain the previous year's level of profit due to nearly 30% inflation.
In response to these challenges, Torres revealed that the company had enlisted the expertise of a renewable energy specialist to explore opportunities in the sector and enhance its product offerings.
Discussing the company's performance in 2023, Torres stated that due to foreign exchange challenges, TotalEnergies did not import PMS and relied on NNPC Limited for supply.
He mentioned that in 2023, TotalEnergies, along with other marketers, did not import PMS due to forex unavailability, leading NNPC to be the sole importer of PMS.
As a result, the company and other marketers purchased PMS and AGO from NNPC, and there were multiple PMS outages during the year, which impacted activities at their stations nationwide.
Although AGO and Jet A1 remained fully deregulated, access to foreign exchange for marketers continued to be a challenge, hindering imports.
Torres also noted that the price of AGO started the year at N850/L and closed as high as N1,200 per litre.
In the year under review, TotalEnergies Marketing Nigeria's revenue increased to N635.95bn from N482.47bn.
However, its profit after tax decreased by 20 percent to N12.91bn from N16.12bn in 2022. The parent company, TotalEnergies Marketing Service, based in France, holds 61.72 percent of the shares in the Nigerian business, while other shareholders hold 38.28 percent.
