Bermuda Computer Services, the local IBM agent, has still not reversed its decision to suspend all shareholder dividends, despite its profits creeping up again after several years of poor results.

The company, which is listed on the Bermuda Stock Exchange and last traded for just $3 on December 20, 2001, a third of its 52 week high of $9.45, posted profits for 2001 of $256,538, more than double those posted in 2000 when it recorded $106,904.

A year earlier it had announced a loss of $181,921, its first loss since the company was set up a quarter of a decade earlier. In 1998 the company reported $721,958 in profits.

"We had an extremely difficult year, closing down parts of the business and finding new directions, like most IT business not only in Bermuda, but around the world" said Susan Wilson, president of Bermuda Computer Services.

"We have been reverting to core business. As well as keeping this core business going, we have been investing heavily in communications business with new products to be announced, but we are not forgetful of the core IBM nuts and bolts and providing service for this."

Total assets for the group as of December 31, 2001 stood at $3.9 million, including fixed assets of $2.5 million. This compares to total assets of $5.2 million in 2000 and $2.7 million in fixed assets a year earlier.

The company reported it had cash and time deposits of $527,286 at December 2001, compared with $447,199 a year earlier.

A statement from the company said: "The company did not pay dividends in the year. In July 2000, the directors voted to suspend quarterly dividends to ensure that the company had sufficient cash to fund its continuing investment in Transact Ltd."

In 2000 the company's subsidiary Transact-e-Biz.com, which changed its name to Transact Ltd. this year, made a "significant but not unexpected loss".

Difficult market conditions for dot coms and problems with AT&T Global Network were blamed for a poor year for this part of BCS, and it made a loss of over $300,000 during 2000.

It was set up in 2000 to provide e-business solutions such as hosting, data storage, Internet access through AT&T with global roaming facilities.

But last year BCS said that it would cost a minimum of $1.5 million to enter the market, and said that until this part of the company was profitable, or decide to refinance the development cost of the new business, all shareholder dividends would be suspended.

No details about Transact Ltd were made available in the three paragraph year-end posting made by BCS to the Bermuda Stock Exchange. Requests for further financial information about BCS were turned down.

Speaking about next year, Mrs. Wilson said: "We certainly feel 2002 will be a challenging year. I will not resort to talking about September 11 we already had an economic downturn in the US and certainly in Bermuda. The decline in tourists cannot but affect us all.

"We certainly would be happy if in 2002 we can match last years' results as the first half of this year is expected to be very challenging."