Hot stock: OSIM shares surge on Friday morning despite lower earnings

SHARES in lifestyle products group OSIM International was trading 10 cents or 10.64 per cent higher at S$1.04 on Friday morning, despite reporting a 66 per cent plunge in Q4 profits.

Trading volume was light with about 1.45 million shares changing hands by 10.31am. The stock is trading cum dividend after OSIM proposed a final dividend of two cents per share.

The counter hit a high of S$1.075 in trading on Friday morning.

In a report on Friday morning, OCBC Investment Research said it was taking a "cautious stance" on OSIM, despite the cheaper valuations at current price levels. It downgraded its rating from "hold" to "sell", and has a fair value estimate of 82 cents.

On Thursday, OSIM reported a 66 per cent drop in net profit to S$9 million for the fourth quarter ended Dec 31, 2015, which is traditionally a strong quarter for retail.

Lower profits were also due to a one-off S$5.6 million loss from the closing down of underperforming nutrition subsidiary ONI Australia, and legal fees of S$3.4 million related to luxury tea segment TWG Tea.

Revenue fell 5 per cent to S$169 million from S$178 million a year ago.

Meanwhile, for FY2015, revenue fell 10 per cent year-on-year to S$620 million, while net profit halved to S$51 million.