Astral Foods pulled off a stunning turnaround in the second half of the year (JSE: ARL)

The annual growth is no indication of the volatility in H1 vs. H2

Astral Foods released a voluntary trading statement that reflects growth in HEPS for the year ended September 2025 of between 5% and 15%. That sounds so… normal? And nothing like we are used to seeing in the poultry industry, where the profit charts could give a theme park rollercoaster a run for its money.

Sure enough, if you compare the performance in the first half (H1) vs. the second half (H2), you see the craziness that we are accustomed to. For the six months to March, HEPS was down by 54% at R4.09 per share. The midpoint of the guided range for the full year is R21.12, so they generated roughly R17 in HEPS in H2!

This works out to approximately a 65% year-on-year improvement in HEPS in H2, which is exactly how they managed to offset the disastrous first half. If you’re looking for a low-stress life, stick to eating chickens rather than investing in them.

There are a lot of reasons why things got better, with higher production numbers leading to better cost recoveries. When you combine this with improved selling prices, the tight economics in the poultry sector move sharply in the right direction. We saw a similar story recently at sector peer Quantum Foods (JSE: QFH).

You may recall that some wild things happened on the Quantum Foods register in 2024, which is why the 5-year chart looks like this when we plot Astral against Quantum:

Glencore gives tighter guidance (JSE: GLN)

Copper is still down year-to-date, but has accelerated

Glencore released a production update for the third quarter. The main highlight is that copper production was up 36% sequentially (i.e. Q3 vs. Q2), helping to mitigate some of the year-on-year irritation that has been caused by lower head grades and recoveries. On a nine-month basis, copper production is down 17%.

Steelmaking coal reflects a jump of a whopping 123% year-to-date, but you have to keep in mind that the acquisition of EVR in mid-2024 is breaking these numbers. Australian steelmaking coal production is roughly flat year-on-year. Energy coal is up 1%.

Touching on other commodities, cobalt and zinc are up 8% and 10% year-to-date respectively. Lead is down 3%, nickel is down 16% and gold is down 17%, while silver is up 6%. Ferrochrome is down by a nasty 51%, a nightmare we already know about thanks to disclosure by Merafe (JSE: MRF) as the joint venture partner.

With the benefit of an additional quarter under their belt, Glencore has tightened the full-year guidance. In copper, they dropped the upper end of guidance (from 890kt to 875kt), while maintaining the lower end at 850kt. There’s no change to steelmaking coal. Energy goal is slightly higher, as is zinc, while nickel has come down.

KAP announces a forestry merger in PG Bison (JSE: KAP)

This is an effort to improve the economics in the Southern and Eastern Cape

Forestry is a tough gig. KAP owns many businesses, one of which is PG Bison, so the group has exposure to this sector that has risks ranging from global prices through to Mother Nature herself. Speaking of natural risks, fires in recent years have done nasty things to the forestry and sawmilling sector in the Southern and Eastern Cape. Bluntly, you can’t cut down and process trees that burnt before you could get to them.

This is why KAP has announced that PG Bison will merge its forestry, sawmilling and pole operations in the region with MTO Forestry, a company that also operates in this part of the world. It’s a sizeable transaction, with PG Bison’s relevant assets being valued at R713 million.

Here’s the problem: the valuation in PG Bison’s financials and the value for this deal are world’s apart, with the disposal price being set at just R251 million. Ouch. To be fair, the loss after tax attributable to PG Bison for the year to June was R18 million, so it sounds like they were struggling to actually unlock the underlying net asset value. This is a story as old as time in the forestry sector.

With some planned B-BBEE benefits in the final holding structure, the end result is that PG Bison will hold 49% of the merged entity.

This is a category 2 transaction, which means that shareholders won’t be asked to vote on it.

Another strong quarter at MTN Ghana (JSE: MTN)

There’s a deceleration, but the overall numbers are still excellent

The African growth story continues for MTN, with the next round of quarterly updates being kicked off by MTN Ghana. The business is running at a delicious EBITDA margin of 58.4% and grew revenue by 29.9% in the latest quarter. The improvement in the EBITDA margin of 220 basis points drove EBITDA higher by 34.7%. Best of all, ex-lease capex was only up by 7.8%, so capex intensity has come down and that’s great news for free cash flow.

Notably, the year-to-date growth rates for the nine months to September are actually higher than for just Q3, with revenue up 36.2% and EBITDA up 41.6%. In other words, the third quarter actually represents a deceleration from what we saw in the first half of the year.

Nonetheless, the business looks very well positioned for a strong finish to the year. Decelerating off such a high base is fine if the resultant numbers are still very good.

Nibbles:

• Director dealings:
  • The CEO of Vunani (JSE: VUN) bought shares worth R32k to add to his recent tally.

• Primary Health Properties (JSE: PHP) announced that it has received clearance from the UK Competition and Markets Authority for the combination with Assura. The process is different to what we are used to seeing in South Africa, as this approval would be a condition precedent in South Africa rather than something that isn’t finalised before the deal is done. Either way, Primary Health Properties can now focus on integrating the two businesses and achieving the synergies. Until now, they had to keep them strictly separate. Remember, the target is run-rate cost synergies of at least £9 million, so there’s much work to be done.

• If you’re interested in the Southern Palladium (JSE: SDL) share purchase plan, then the booklet is apparently available on the website. I say “apparently” because I spent a few minutes looking and then gave up. Perhaps the upload was delayed.

• Northam Platinum (JSE: NPH) announced that GCR has revised the outlook on the long-term issuer credit rating from stable to positive. That really is a sign of the times in PGMs and how much things have improved, with Northam’s relatively low-cost position referenced a few times in the announcement.

• Libstar (JSE: LBR) has renewed the cautionary announcement regarding negotiations around a potential acquisition of all the shares in the company. The share price is up around 50% since the lows in early August and has gained around 20% since the first cautionary announcement in mid-September.

• Sable Exploration and Mining (JSE: SXM)’s subsidiary Lapon Plant has entered into an agreement with Daemaneng Minerals that will see the latter take responsibility to operate and manage the partially constructed beneficiation plant and magnetic separation plant that produces magnetite. The key point here is that Daemaneng will fund all the capex and operational expenditure, thereby de-risking it for Sable and significantly improving the chances of some near-term positive cash flows. A circular will need to be issued to shareholders to get approval for this deal.

• Wesizwe Platinum (JSE: WEZ) has released an update on production ramp-up progress. It’s a short and technical update that won’t mean much to anyone who isn’t in mining. The TL;DR is that they are making progress on the infrastructure required for the underground mining ramp-up.

• For whatever reason, there are two non-executive directors at Putprop (JSE: PPR) who have decided to not make themselves available for reappointment. Those resolutions have thus been withdrawn from the AGM. The new CEO starts in the role from 1 November.