ZENITH BANK PLC :  Zenith bonus expected
By Agency reporter
Published: Sunday, 1 Jul 2007

The stock recorded a new all time-high price of N66.14k on Thursday June 28, 2007. Investors are forward-looking to the bank’s full year results for the financial year ended June 2007.

Analysts posit that Zenith Bank’s earning per share for the year ending June 2007 will soar well above N2.00 against the trailing value of N1.90. This is premised on its outstanding performance in Q3-2007 with gross earnings of N62.66bn and PAT of N15bn as against N42.12bn and N8.86bn recorded in the prior year. Given the bank’s current shares outstanding of 9.256bn, a forecast EPS of N2.10 and above is easily achievable with a conservative growth rate of 45 per cent in earnings over. It will be recalled that the bank gave a dividend of N1.10 in the last financial year, representing the highest payout in the industry.

In the same vein, another market opinion holds that Zenith will surpass its peers with bonus declaration in addition to a very good dividend. They argue that the bank is well positioned and has the wherewithal to declare a good bonus, given its robust accumulated share premium, which stood at N67.76bn in the prior year 2006.
We speculate a target price of N70 and above given a good market sentiment and the anticipated results for full year ended June 30, 2007.

http://www.punchng.com/Articl.aspx?theartic=Art200707015384976

I’m expecting a N1.20 kobo dividend per share and a bonus share of 1:2.