July i, 1900.1 THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
17 
A BATCH OF CEYLON TEA COM- 
PANIES RESULTS. 
(Investors' Bevieic, Api'il ■21st.) 
The reports of the smaller Ceylon Tea 
Companies so far published show 
MUCH MORE SATISFACTORY RESULTS 
for 1899 than for the preceding year. Gene- 
rally speaking, there is a good deal of 
variation in the experience of these lesser 
companies, their ])lacking ai'ea being so small 
that they ai'e more likely to be influenced 
severely by accidents and climatic condi- 
tions than the larger concerns, whose wide 
area enables the principle of averages to 
come into stronger play. 0n this occasion, 
however, the trend has been almost entirely 
in one direction, and that favourable, as the 
following figures will show : — 
Plucking Price per 
Area. Crop. lb. 
1998. 1899. 189S 1899.1898.1899. 
acres 
aores. 
lb. 
lb. d. 
(1. 
Bauda,rapoIa 
478 
576 
395,270 
524,259 Hi 
65- 
Barnside 
l,13i 
356,455 
378,608 6i 
7 3 16 
EierapoUa 
853 
996 
4ri7,026 
466,149 6§ 
6 15-16 
Hia;hlaiiil 
6U3 
585 
212,415 
259,233 9 
84 
Kelani "Val- 
ley 
1 ,200 
1.211 
578,169 
575,255 6A 
7 
Ptinawal 
077 
590 
293,933 
3U,922 6g- 
PoonagalUi 
1,1.80 
261,104 
302,614 81-16 7i 
Poitraore 
474 
483 
241,686 
242,740 9i 
85 
Yatiyaiuota 2,2i ) 2,376 1, 135,704 1,843,387 5it 5 U-lSf 
* Not stated, f Net prices ; inothere cases prices 
are gross sale prices. 
According to this statement, almost all 
the companies sliowed a nuich larger out- 
put, partly owing to larger plucking areas 
and partly to a better 5'ield per acre. Move- 
ments in the average prices obtained varied 
to a greater extent, but only three out of 
the nine companies saw their average prices 
reduced, and in two of these cases the re- 
duction in price was more than compensated 
by the increased quantity produced. We 
ought to lay stress on the fact that the pri- 
ces obtained by the 
yatiyantota company 
are strictly net prices, as that company only 
returns its average price in that form in 
consequence cf the fact that it disposes of 
a large part of its crop in Colombo. Freight, 
dock charges, insurances, and other forms 
expenditure are not included in this price, 
and this represents quite -|d to Jd per lb. 
at the lowest estimate. Little has been heard 
of the Yatiyantota Company until lately, 
but it promises to become an import.iisl con- 
cern later on. W ith 2,990 acrc-s" under plan i, 
its revenue last year had to bear the cnst 
of 63(5 acres not in full bearing and v.: ii: 
fully earned a dividend of 7 per per cent, 
although its selling price was so low. 
THE SECRET OP ITS PROSPERITY 
is to be found in its low cost of produc- 
tion, which did not exceed 'Shd per lb last 
year, which if Jd per lb. is added for Lon- 
don charges, would bring up the cost of pro- 
duction to 4id per lb., a figure that should 
make many of the older managed concerns 
squirm in their hide-bound system ofmanage- 
meuw 
We are particularly glad to be able to 
note that almost with one accord these 
3 
SMALL CEYLON COMPANIES 
have taken the opportunity presented b7/ 
larger profits to increase their accumula- 
tions, a statement borne out by the following 
table :— 
Sums put to 
Net Profits. Depreciation, Dividend. 
1898. 
1898. 
1898. 1899. 
1898. 
1899. 
Biudarapole 
£ 
£ 
£ £ 
per ct. per ct. 
I 1,488 
3,924 
432 1,823 
5 
10 
Burnside 
395 
1,276 
43 300 
2 
5 
Ederiipolla 
2,068 
2,921 
793 800 
5 
8 
Highland 
1,879 
3,006 
125 766 
5* 
7 
Kelaui Val- 
ley 
1,478 
2,167 
541 291 
5 
10 
Panawal 
1,814 
3,208 
750 1,135 
4 
10 
Poonagalla 
8-20 
902 
4 
5 
Portmore 
5,405 
4,559 
489 ) 59 
12 
11 
Yatiyantota 
7,666 12,117 
1,639 3:200 
4 
7 
In this 
it will 
be noted that all the com- 
panies excepting one— the Portmore— pay 
higher dividends, and that company, which 
produces a ]\igh-priced tea for Ceylon, 
suffered severely from a reduction in its 
average price, but even then its distribution 
is at the high rate of 11 per cent. Its at- 
tention, however, to depreciation and reserve 
was very slight. One other company, the 
Kelani Valley, did less in this respect, al- 
though it doubled its dividend. But it is 
relatively a strong company having a reserve 
of £1,5CK) invested outside the business. In 
other cases there is a most satisfactory 
GROWTH IN THE SUMS PLACED TO RE- 
SERVE, 
^Y^'ittenoif newextensions, or devoted toextinc- 
•^'^nof buildings and machinery accounts. This 
^Oes to show tliat the experience of the last 
le^nr years has not been without its lesson to the 
boards, and consequently we may hear less 
of fluctuating dividends in the future. The 
level of the dividends declared is really good, 
and if profits can only be kept up to the 
record of last year, shareholders should not 
have much to grumble about. These Ceylon 
companies have certainly met the rise in 
exchange 
FxVR BETTER THAN THE INDIAN TEA 
COMPANIES. 
Apart from one or two notorious examples, 
the companies were not usually over- 
capitalised, as many of the Indian companies 
have been ; and then there is less leakage in 
proflts through poor management and exag- 
gerated agency charges. The \q\w charges of 
the Colombo agents is all the more remark- 
able, as their control is much more real than 
that of the Calcutta agents over Indian 
plantations. The distance from Colombo to 
the plantations 'is less, and this probably 
accounts for the manner in which the gardens 
are regularly visited by representatives cf 
the agency firms. There are 
TWO WEAKNESSES IN THE FINANCIAL 
MANAGEMENT 
of these small Ceylon companies that must 
be mentioned before be leave the subject. 
The first is the large proportion of debenture 
capital which they have issued. Debenture 
apital may seem a cheap way of financing 
