Total dividends distributed by companies quoted on the Cabo Verde stock exchange, the BCV, for the financial year 2020, increased by 45.7% compared to the previous year, to over €4 million, according to official data consulted by Lusa.
According to the BCV’s full 2020 report, now released by the institution, only two of the exchange’s four quoted companies – , oil company Enacol and tobacco company Sociedade Caboverdiana de Tabacos (SCT) – announced the distribution of dividends to shareholders.
The two listed banks, Banco Comercial do Atlântico (BCA, part of Portugal’s Caixa Geral de Depósitos group) and Caixa Económica de Cabo Verde (which is state controlled) followed instructions issued by the central bank to strengthen reserves to deal with the economic consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic, and did not distribute dividends from 2020 profits.
Three of the four quoted companies (all except BCA) had paid dividends from 2019 profits, totalling 314,673,420 escudos (€2.8 million), but relative to 2020 the total swelled 45.7% to 458,598,420 escudos (€4.1 million), although only two companies paid ot.
Enacol, 35% of whose shares were quoted on the stock exchange at the end of 2020, distributed almost 386 million escudos in dividends, up 162% on 2019, while SCT paid just over 72.6 million escudos, the same as the previous year.
BCA, despite not distributing dividends, recorded profits of 1.482 billion in 2020, up 26.7% over the previous year, according to the institution’s report and accounts, in which it states that the result was the best in 28 years.
Caixa Económica de Cabo Verde, which also did not distribute dividends, reported profit down by over 25% in 2020 to 702.3 million escudos, according to its report and accounts.
The BCV was established in May 1998, with trading in four quoted companies, and other operations.
Shareholders of Cabo Verde Telecom (CV Telecom), the country’s main telecommunications operator, in 2018 approved the company’s listing on the stock exchange, but this has not yet taken place.
