RD Food corporate director to buy 7.37 lakh shares

Concrete and Steel Technologies Limited – a corporate director of Rangpur Dairy and Food Products Ltd (RD Food) – has announced it will buy more than 7.37 lakh shares of the listed company from the open market.

The purchase will be accomplished within this month through the Dhaka Stock Exchange at the prevailing market price, said the company in a regulatory filing with the DSE.

Its corporate director's share purchase announcement came on the back of a corporate disclosure that the RD Food is going to increase its exports, and at "Gulfood Fair-2021'' in the United Arab Emirates last February, it received a good response from buyers.

The company, already exporting products on a test basis to African countries, was awarded $1.1million export orders to Burkina Faso, the UAE, Ghana, Mali, the Republic of Moldova, Yemen, and many other countries of the world, RD Food informed shareholders on 12 April.

Export proceeds will impact company revenues in the coming days. Its turnover will increase by Tk9.13 crore, gross profit by nearly Tk1.7 crore, and its annual earnings per share (EPS) will go up by Tk0.1.

RD Food, mainly a well positioned dairy firm, is expanding its product portfolio by adding flavoured drinks, mango drinks, soft drinks, soft drink powders, chips, various snacks, and candies.

The company generated Tk31.46 crore in sales over the first half of the current fiscal year, which yielded Tk2.36 in profits after taxes and an EPS of Tk0.32, which was Tk0.31 over the entire preceding fiscal year.

With the jump in profits and the good news of exports, the RD Food stock price soared to Tk25 this week, from Tk12 five months ago.

At the end of December last year, RD Food's net asset value per share stood at Tk14.5.

RD Food entered the capital market in 2011 and almost half of its shares are now held by general investors, 31.14% by its sponsors and directors, and more than 19% by institutional investors.