The Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE) has extended the deadline to 30 April 2022 for listed companies to publish financial results for the period ended on December 31, 2021 after several companies failed to meet the deadline.
Listed firms were expected to publish their financial statements by March 31, 2022 according to statutory requirement.
Due to overwhelming requests for extension of compliance by Issuers to submit year-end financial statements, the ZSE chief executive officer, Justin Bgoni said, “Companies whose half-year or full-year financial period ended on 31 December 2021 and are due for publication by 31 March 2022 are hereby granted a 30-day compliance grace period to 30 April 2022. This will allow Issuers to complete their audit processes and finalize financial statements and reports.”
He said companies that fail to meet the 30 April 2022 deadline will be penalized for noncompliance while urging those that can still meet the statutory deadlines, despite the foregoing, to comply.
It has been tough for accountants and auditors to timeously deliver financial statements owing to technical accounting matters.
This has been attributed to what some companies described as burdensome requirements of an International Accounting Standard which deals with accounting in hyper-inflationary environments such as Zimbabwe.
There are however concerns by observers that the delays in publishing of financial results by listed companies have adverse effects on investors’ capacity to make informed decisions with regards to their investments
