Just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse at SembMarine...

SINGAPORE (Oct 26): Sembcorp Marine’s announcement that it had sunk to a net loss of $21.8 million in 3Q while 9-month earnings of $44.5 million made up just 25% of consensus full-year earnings came as a surprise for market watchers already expecting a poor set of results.

To recap, SembMarine’s 3Q was hit by $18.8 million in forex losses and $27.7 million of associate losses from Cosco Corp. Maybank Kim Eng analyst Yeak Chee Keong notes that excluding the forex loss, operating profit would have come in at $51.8 million, barely meeting expectations.

While Yeak has cut earnings forecasts for FY16 to FY18 by between 29% and 43% to account for forex losses, he is more worried about SembMarine’s poor sales orders. As of end Sept, the group’s order intake was $320 million and with no new orders in 4Q. That’s way below Yeak’s $1.6 billion forecast for FY16.

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