Wednesday, April 20, 2016

South African media conglom Naspers dumps the Rand for the Dollar as its new reporting currency; is restating its financial information back to 2014.

South Africa's Naspers that incorporates Africa's biggest pay-TV operator MultiChoice, announced a change in its reporting currency, dumping the South African Rand for the American Dollar, saying that in future it will report all of its earnings in the greenback instead of the South African currency.

In a statement Naspers says that it will change the presentation currency in its consolidated financial statements from Rand to Dollar with effect from the financial year ended on 31 March 2016.

Naspers says that over the past 100 years, the group has evolved from a single-country newspaper business and early investor in pay-TV to a video entertainment leader and global internet and e-commerce group.

"Coupled with the evolution of the business, the group's shareholder base is now largely comprised of foreign investors to whom financial reporting in Rand is of limited relevance. Internally, the board also bases its performance evaluation and many investment decisions on Dollar financial information".

Naspers is also summarising and restating its financial information in dollar for the financial years ended 31 March 2015 and 2014, as well as for the 6-month interim periods ended 30 September 2015 and 2014.

Naspers dividends will continue to be declared in rand.