Southern Sun expects the upcoming G20 Summit to be a significant boost for the company\u2019s occupancy levels. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Founded in 1969, Southern Sun was established by hotelier Sol Kerzner and South African Breweries, and has since become one of the largest hotel chains in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The group delivered a resilient performance in the six months ended 30 September 2025, achieving income growth of 5% to R3.1 billion for the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This was primarily driven by strong domestic trading, where South African operations rose 8% to R3.0 billion. This performance offset the 29% decline in offshore revenue to R147 million. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The group\u2019s offshore operations were impacted by the temporary closure of Paradise Sun for refurbishment and weaker trading in Maputo and Tanzania.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
South African hotels achieved an occupancy rate of 60.6% (2024: 59.4%) and a 6% increase in average room rates (ARR) to R1,369, lifting room revenue to R2.0 billion (2024: R1.8 billion). <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Demand was supported by conferencing, events, and group travel in Gauteng and the Western Cape. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Transient corporate and government travel was subdued due to delayed national budget approvals and the timing of Easter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Southern Sun noted that recovery in corporate and government travel is ongoing and is expected to be aided by the upcoming G20 and B20 conferences.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Over the reporting period, the group faced higher-than-expected cost pressures, which weighed on margins, primarily driven by increases in IT, utilities and channel costs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Operating expenses increased by 7% compared to the prior period, reflecting a 23% (R10 million) rise in IT costs, an 11% increase in utility costs, and a 12% rise in channel costs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n These cost pressures resulted in the company\u2019s profit for the period remaining flat at R322 million. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The company is also increasing its total number of issued shares as part of its employees participating in the Southern Sun Share Appreciation Rights Plan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Although share buybacks limited the increase in the shares, the group\u2019s basic earnings dropped slightly to 24.5 cents per share. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Southern Sun is seeing a recovery in its occupancy levels, with the G20 and B20 conferences expected to aid the recovery. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95,"featured_media":843742,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12755],"tags":[4679],"class_list":["post-843736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-property","tag-southern-sun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/95"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=843736"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843736\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":843748,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843736\/revisions\/843748"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/843742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=843736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=843736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=843736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Supplementary Information<\/strong><\/td> 2025 (Unaudited)<\/strong><\/td> 2024 (Unaudited)<\/strong><\/td> % Change<\/strong><\/td><\/tr> Income (Rm)<\/td> 3 122<\/td> 2 966<\/td> 5<\/td><\/tr> Ebitdar (Rm)<\/td> 818<\/td> 822<\/td> –<\/td><\/tr> Attributable earnings for the period (Rm)<\/td> 329<\/td> 332<\/td> (1)<\/td><\/tr> Adjusted headline earnings for the period (Rm)<\/td> 334<\/td> 334<\/td> –<\/td><\/tr> Basic earnings per share (cents)<\/td> 24.5<\/td> 24.7<\/td> (1)<\/td><\/tr> Basic headline earnings per share (cents)<\/td> 24.8<\/td> 24.3<\/td> 2<\/td><\/tr> Basic adjusted headline earnings per share (AHEPS) (cents)<\/td> 24.9<\/td> 25.0<\/td> –<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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