Tiger Brands' headline earnings for the six months ended 31 March 2008 have been adversely impacted by the inclusion of a provision of R53.5-million, being the cost of the settlement reached with the Competition Commission, the listed consumer goods giant said on Monday.

The settlement was a consequence of contraventions of the Competition Act in the hospital products business.

Tiger Brands achieved headline earnings per share of 756.6 cents for the six months ended 31 March 2008, which is an increase of 14.7 percent on that achieved in the six months ended 31 March 2007 .

Earnings per share increased by 10.5 percent to 690.8 cents per share for the same period.

Excluding the provision for the payment to the Competition commission, headline earnings per share would have reflected an increase of 19.8 percent on the same period in the previous year.

As announced on 9 May 2008, an agreement was reached with the Competition Commission relating to contraventions of the Competition Act by the Company's Hospital Products subsidiary Adcock Ingram Critical Care (AICC), the company said.

In terms of the agreement, AICC has agreed to pay an administrative penalty of R53.5-million.

“The agreement is required to be confirmed by the Competition Tribunal in terms of the Competition Act.,” Tiger Brands said.

A dividend of 245 cents a share was announced.

On 6 November 2007, Tiger Brands said it intended to unbundle its healthcare interests.

“The process, which was expected to have been completed by 31 March 2008, was delayed as a result of the investigation by law firm Edward Nathan Sonnenbergs, conducted at the request of the Tiger Brands board, in response to the allegations of collusive tendering and market allocation made against AICC by the Competition Commission,” the company said.

It was now anticipated that the unbundling would be completed by 30 September 2008.

Sapa