KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 10): JF Apex Securities Research has maintained its Hold rating on Supermax Corporation Bhd with a lower target price of RM2.20 (from RM2.30) and said Supermax’s 3QFY14 net profit was reported at RM27.8 million, improved by 3.9% q-o-q but tumbled 22.3% y-o-y after accounting for forex loss of RM5.9 million.

In a note Monday, the research house said Supermax’s core net earnings of RM33.7 million after stripping out forex loss had improved by 25.7% q-o-q but was 5.9% lower than a year ago.

“Supermax’s 9MFY14 core net earnings was below our and consensus expectations by meeting only 65% of our full year earnings forecast mainly due to the lower-than-expected topline.

“We revise downwards our earnings forecast for FY14-15F by 5-11% following the disappointing earnings,” it said.