Ancom Nylex Berhad (Ancom Nylex), a leading fully integrated chemical group, recorded a rise in their profit after tax and non-controlling interest (net profit) figure of 8.4% year-on-year (YoY) to RM81.5 million for financial year ended 31 May 2024 (FY24).

This surpassed the record RM75.1 million posted in FY23.

For FY24, the Group's revenue came in at RM2 billion versus RM2.04 billion achieved a year ago.

Meanwhile, Ancom Nylex posted its best-ever bottom-line performance for the financial year under review.

Its Agricultural Chemicals (Agrichem) segment continued to be the key growth contributor.

Earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) for this segment jumped 25.3% YoY to RM106.5 million vis-à-vis RM85.0 million in FY23. This was chiefly attributed to stronger sales of products with better profit margins.

Managing Director and Group CEO of Ancom Nylex, Lee Cheun Wei said, "While we anticipate market challenges to persist in the upcoming financial (FY25), Ancom Nylex continues to be upbeat on our growth prospects."

"For our Agrichem segment, we are charting good progress for our new active ingredient (AI). While the production trial remains ongoing, we have successfully delivered samples to our clients for their in-house quality checks. We target to start commercial production of the new AI, mainly using the intermediate produced in-house to circumvent supply chain disruptions previously encountered when importing the intermediate inputs."

On the demand outlook, Latin and North American markets continue to experience sustained demand for our core AI-related products. The Group is making headway to expand their proprietary product offerings to larger-hectare crops in Latin America.

"We are actively pursuing label registration and have completed three trials on larger-hectare crops with promising results. We have recently secured a long-term contract with a North American customer for the supply of a key AI product. This gives us healthy earnings visibility for the coming years," Lee added.

Lee explained that streamlining initiatives for their Industrial Chemicals segment have begun to bear fruit, with more benefits to performance expected to be realised in FY25.

Forging ahead, we are looking to build on the strong positive momentum and record bottom-line performance achieved in FY24 while being mindful of the global economic conditions such as elevated shipping costs," Lee added.

For the current quarter under review, the Group recorded a net profit of RM18.4 million against a revenue of RM487.0 million. This was a slight improvement from RM18.2 million and RM478.2 million respectively from a year ago.

On a quarter on-quarter (QoQ) basis, 4QFY24 net profit was lower than the RM20.1 million achieved in the immediate preceding quarter due to higher impairment of trade receivables made in adherence to prudent accounting practices.

Ancom Nylex generated yet another healthy net operating cash flow (NOCF) for FY24, amounting to RM128.6 million. The Group has been generating positive NOCF every year since FY18.