Two companies release statements of account

Accra (Greaster Accra), 10 March, '99 - The Social Security Bank (SSB) has released its annual report and account for 1998 that saw the bank recording an income surplus of 79.257 billion cedis. The report released in Accra on Wednesday said this amount is an improvement over the previous year's surplus of 63.5 billion cedis. Its profit after exceptional item and taxation stood at 29.9 billion cedis down from 1997's 32.7 billion cedis. Proposed dividend went up to 200 cedis from the previous 150 cedis. Retained profit fell from 22 billion cedis in 1997 to 15.7 billion cedis in 1998. Total income was 106.9 billion cedis, up from 90.3 billion cedis in 1997 while other income stood at 330.1 million cedis. In its report, Pioneer Tobacco Company Limited (PTC) declared a turnover of 102 billion cedis compared with 84.9 billion cedis in 1997 while trading profit was 9.2 billion cedis compared with 6.9 billion cedis. A statement from the company said these improvements were made despite difficult market conditions and persistent smuggling of cigarettes. It said profit before tax was 10.123 billion cedis, a 17.5 per cent rise over that of 1997 figure of 8.6 billion cedis. Profit after tax was put at 8.2 billion cedis, a 19.6 per cent rise over the 1997 figure of 6.8 billion cedis. The proposed final dividend for the year is 38 cedis, compared with 32 cedis in 1997, from a total dividend of 3.420 billion cedis.