Soaring precious metal prices will result in Impala Platinum (Implats) reporting bumper profits for the second half of 2025, with the miner forecasting a fivefold increase in headline earnings.
Implats, the country’s second-largest producer of platinum group metals (PGMs), said on Tuesday it expects to report a 387%-407% surge in headline earnings for the six months to end-December.
Both headline and basic earnings are expected to be between R9.10bn and R9.45bn, and HEPS and EPS to be between 1,015c and 1,054c, respectively.
The prediction echoes a broader sector-wide recovery, buoying the hope that South Africa’s platinum heavyweights will bolster state coffers and attract a tax windfall for the fiscus in the coming months.
After three years in which supply fell short of demand, a slower-than-expected transition to electric vehicles and tariff uncertainty have more than doubled platinum’s value in the past 12 months.
Valterra Platinum, the world’s largest listed PGM miner, said last month that it expects its headline earnings to have doubled in 2025.
The rally points to a rare fiscal bright spot from the PGM sector, which faced stubbornly low prices that forced miners to cut back on production, resulting in Treasury royalties dropping a staggering 59.8% to just R3.6bn in 2024.
Implats’ own restructuring initiatives resulted in the company retrenching 4,000 workers across its operations to cut costs.
Last week, Implats said it is on track to meet production, cost and spending guidance for the year to end-June 2026 after a stable performance in the first half, with output up 1% year on year at 1.8-million ounces.
Capital spending is expected to have declined to about R2.9bn from R3.9bn in the previous first half.
Implats’ share price was up 2.87% at R297.28 shortly after 10am on the JSE.
The company will report its interim results on March 5.
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