Sasol projects half-year fall in headline earning per share of 20%

Petrochemical group Sasol [JSE:SOL] says it expects to report a decline of at least 20% in its headline earnings per share for the half year ending 31 December 2019:

The group, in a trading statement on Monday morning, said a detailed announcement would be published when "more certainty has been attained".

This comes a month after the group's joint CEOs, Bongani Nqwababa and Stephen Cornell, agreed to resign in the wake of an independent review of the company's struggling Lake Charles Chemicals Project in the US. The group's broad previously said it had not identified misconduct or incompetence on the part of the joint CEOs. 

The US project, which will have seven production units that deliver various chemicals including a plastics variant called polyethylene, will cost between $12.6bn and  $12.9bn (R190bn at current exchange rates) – almost double the original budgeted amount.