W. R. Carpenters Pay

9 Per Cent.

Parent Co. Is Now Purely A

Holding Co.

HAVING made a profit of £75,655 for the year ended June 30 (compared with £71,043 in the previous year).

W. R. Carpenter & Co., Ltd., have rais:d their annual dividend to 9 per cent.

This company now has an issued capital of £775,000; reserves, used generally in the business, of just over £500,000; and funds supplied by subsidiaries of about £180,000—in other words, it employs over £li millions. (All figures in Australian currency.) Of that, however, nearly £232,000 is in Australian War Loans, and over £400,000 is in cash.

The company’s subsidiaries now operate, quite independently, in New Guinea, Fiji, ' tilbert Islands and Solomon Islands.

Operations in New Guinea and Fi„i are reported as satisfactory: but, in the other two territories, “it has been found im possible to resume activities owing to lack of transport and absence of labour.”

South Pacific Insurance Company, estab lished by Carpenter interests before World War I, is now doing well and paying 8 per cent. The Canadian Company, estab lished just before the war to crush copra in Canada, is not a member of the group centred in Sydney—it is owned inde pendently by the Carpenter family, and is believed to be highly profitable.

W. R. Carpenter & Co., of Sydney, for so many years an active trading company, very shrewdly and capably managed, is now purely a holding company. It re ceives profits from its various subsidiaries which, in due course, are divided among the shareholders of the parent company; but each subsidiary now is self-contained and locally managed. All the company’s Fiji interests have been transferred to a holding company, Pacific Products Ltd.

Capital To Be Returned

IT was announced on October 6 that, as the company now has too much surplus cash, £375,000 will be returned to shareholders, and the Directors re commended that the uncalled liability of 1.5/- on 100,000 shares be cancelled. By this means, the subscribed capital of the company will be reduced from £775,000 )in 750,000 £1 shares, and 100,000 paid to 5/-) to £400,000, in 1,600,000 5/- shares.

The company’s shares now become very valuable. There is nothing to suggest that profit will not be maintained: while there is now only half the capital to share the profits. The £1 shares have been worth around 46 -. The 5 - shares may easily go to 16/- or 18/-.

Sir Walter Carpenter, founder of the group, who has spent most of the last eight years in Canada, presided at the annual general meeting in Sydney on October 6, and received many congratu lations on the successes of the companies.

The new issue of New Caledonian stamps has not yet been put on sale in Noumea, but Paris reports say they are in several colours and that they are criti cised for resembling designs associated with foreign packets of cigarettes. When they replace the present wartime issue, philatelists expect the older issues to increase in value. It seems that the wartime issue overprinted Wallis and Futuna which is to-day being sold for 2,137 francs is never likely to be put into use.