Regular Billion Dollar Club winner ValueMax Group has gone from strength to strength. This year, the pawnbroking chain won for best earnings growth, best returns to shareholders and overall sector winner.
ValueMax’s first outlet opened in 1988 and has since expanded to 40 pawnbroking and retail outlets at strategic locations throughout Singapore and has one other pawnshop operated by an associated company.
Across the Causeway, the group runs another 14 outlets via its associated companies.
ValueMax also provides secured money lending services, as well as the retail and trading of jewellery and gold. ValueMax was the first pawnbroking chain to be listed on the Singapore Exchange’s Mainboard in 2013.
See also: ValueMax appoints its managing director's son, Steven Yeah, as its chief operating officer
Over the past three years, its weighted ROE was 13.2%; its CAGR earnings growth was 21.1% and CAGR shareholder returns were 8.8%.
For the company’s FY2020 ended last December, revenue increased by 17% y-o-y to reach $276.1 million.
Yet, earnings increased by a bigger magnitude of 33% y-o-y to $33.9 million. The company explains that higher gold prices — which started the year at around US$1,500 ($2,013) per ounce and hit as high as US$2,000 — helped lift revenue.
“The group will continue to explore acquisition opportunities and suitable locations to grow our network of pawnshops and retail outlets, and grow our money lending business,” notes ValueMax in its earnings commentary.
ValueMax is the third pawnbroker to list in Singapore after Maxi-Cash Financial Services and MoneyMax Financial Services.
In 2012, Maxi-Cash Financial Services became the first listed pawnbroker in Singapore. From its first outlet in Ang Mo Kio in 2009, it has grown to a total of 45 outlets and now claims to have the largest network in Singapore.
With a weighted ROE of 14.85 over the three years taken into consideration, the company won this year’s best weighted ROE, preventing ValueMax from making a clean sweep of the awards in this industry sector.
Photo: Samuel Isaac Chua/The Edge Singapore
