TOBACCO PROFTFS.
Even the prosperous Tobacco companies are feeling the effects of world depression, and the report recently issued of the Imperial Tobacco Company shows that the net profit for 1982 was only £8,646,898 as compared with £9,876,064 in the previous year, while ill 1930, it may be remembered, the record profit was reached of over £10,000,000. For that year (1930) the directors were able to pay a dividend of 234 per cent., tax free, while for 1981 the dividend was 224 per cent., and for last year there is a further reduction to 20 per cent., the distribution still, however, being tax free. In spite of this reduction in profits the company is, of course, an extraordinarily prosperous one, and, more- over, the accounts display an exceedingly strong position. A further £500,000 has been placed to the General Reserve, which now stands at no less than £6,000,000, in addition to which there is a carry forward of £1,075,000. Thus the Reserve and the balance forward alone come to very little short of 20 per cent. of the Ordinary capital. There is also a liberal writing down of property and plant.
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