Half-Year Financial Statement And Dividend Announcement

(a) Reasons for the significant increase in profit contribution from the Group's Singapore operations

The increase in profit contribution from the Group's Singapore operations was due to :

1. Our manufacturing business, which derived its income predominantly from Singapore, showed an improvement in PBT margin of 11.3% as compared to previous period of 9.0%.

2. There was a general improvement in PBT margin for our stockist business in Singapore and other countries except for Malaysia, where market conditions were more competitive and difficult.

(b) Reasons for the significant decrease in net cash generated from operations, including giving a breakdown of the changes in working capital for the six months ended 30 April 2002 and 30 April 2001.

The decrease in net cash generated from operations was attributed to an outflow of S$5.3 million due to increased stock purchases as a results of higher steel prices, increase in trade and other debtors of S$1.4 million, and reduction in trade and other creditors of S$3.6 million due to shorter terms from supplliers as a results of shortage of supply. In addition, there were also payments made in respect of interest and income tax which amounted to S$1.2 million.

Breakdown of the changes in working capital for the six months ended 30 April 2002 and 30 April 2001 are shown below:

	April'02	April'01
	S$'000	S$'000
(Increase) / Decrease in stocks	-5,341	3,767
(Increase) / Decrease in trade and other debtors	-1,368	-1,211
(Decrease) / Increase in trade and other creditors	-3,570	6,456