Douglas Orane, chairman & chief executive officer of GraceKennedy Limited

Douglas Orane, chairman & chief executive officer of GraceKennedy Limited, returns to “The List” ranked #4, a repeat of his performance from two years earlier, when in 2007 he was ranked #4.

His return to prominence came as GraceKennedy saw $57.4 billion in revenues, a 7.38 percent increase over revenues from 2008. More impressively, the company registered $2.7 billion in after tax profits, a dramatic 52.89 percent over the 2008 profits. The net profit attributable to owners of the company was $2.57 billion, up 59 percent over the prior year $1.67 billion.

“The Group has pursued investments in a wide range of industries in which we have core competences and, more recently, expanded internationally to increase geographic diversity,” Orane said in the company’s 2009 financial statement. “This has served to cushion the effects of the volatility, which businesses worldwide have experienced in the last year.”

But for Orane and GraceKennedy this was not just about the destination; it was about his company’s journey to a very profitable year given the drastic downturn in the global economy, lower consumer demand and financial misbehavior in one of the group’s subsidiaries.

“The year 2009 was one of the most turbulent in decades as the world grappled with the severe global recession. Despite these uncertainties, the GraceKennedy Group was able to weather the storm and all our major business segments showed improvements in their performance over the prior year,” the company said in its nine-month financial statements in September 2009.

“We had engaged in scenario planning in order to ensure that we were prepared for any eventuality and in response to the disruptions in world markets in late 2008 we undertook a series of actions to prepare our businesses for the resulting turbulence.”

That is a gross understatement in terms of turbulence. In 2009, GraceKennedy reported a $1.76 billion loss as a result of unauthorized trading in U.S Government Treasury Bonds by a senior employee at the First Global Bank Limited, a subsidiary of GraceKennedy Limited. Of those losses, $842 million was charged to 2009 and $926 million to 2008. In September 2009, the parent company injected $900 million to prop up the bank.

A trained engineer, Orane holds a degree in mechanical engineering from Glasgow University and a Harvard University MBA. He began his career at GraceKennedy in 1981 as corporate planner. Since then he has held several leadership positions in almost all areas of the highly diversified Group. He was appointed CEO in 1995 and three years later assumed chairmanship of the consumer products and services company. In 2002, the Jamaican Government named him a Commander of the Order of Distinction (C.D.) in recognition of his contribution to commerce and the private sector. In 2009, he was appointed to Jamaica’s Privy Council by Governor General, Sir Patrick Allen and is one of the leading philanthropists in the country.

Despite the turbulence internally and internationally, Orane, one of the region’s most respected executives, remained bullish about his company’s prospects. In a May 2009 speech in Trinidad, reported by the Trinidad Guardian, Orane said he saw an advantage in the global financial crisis

According to a report of the speech, Orane said GraceKennedy had “identified new financial options, like using private issue of commercial paper,” which was oversubscribed and “re-deploying surplus cash across the group to keep the company’s cash flow healthy, while looking at new opportunities to grow the group, thereby avoiding the credit crunch that has affected companies globally.”

“The GKL and GK Group are positively hedged against foreign exchange depreciation,” he said according to the Trinidad Guardian. “And GK remains a consistent supplier of hard currency to the FX market. We continue to re-deploy surplus cash across the group to optimise liquidity,” Orane said. Quoting then-White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel, Orane said: “Rule one: Never allow a crisis to go to waste. They are opportunities to do big things.”

Based on GraceKennedy’s 2009 results, Orane has not wasted his opportunity to do big things.