8th Aug 2019 10:21
(Alliance News) - ContourGlobal PLC hiked its dividend on Thursday and said profit trebled in the first half of the year, largely due to increased revenue from an acquisition.
The contracted electricity generating plant owner's pretax profit for the six months ended June 30 was USD23.2 million, more than three times the USD6.9 million profit posted the year before.
Most significant in this was that revenue grew 15% to USD617.4 million from USD535.4 million. This was largely down to the acquisition of five 50 megawatt concentrating solar power plants in Spain from Acciona Energia the year before. The deal closed in May 2018, making 2019 the first full year of ownership.
If the acquisition had occurred at the start of 2018, then six-month revenue for the first half of that year would have been USD596.9 million.
Selling, general, and administrative expenses dropped to USD19.7 million from USD21.9 million.
ContourGlobal switched to quarterly dividends at the start of this year, starting with a first quarterly dividend of 3.6901 US cents per share paid in June. Another dividend of the same amount has been declared for the second quarter.
The company's 2018 payout totalled 13.4 cents per share, equivalent to 3.35 cents per share per quarter. This would put the most recent quarterly dividend 10% ahead of its 2018 equivalent and in line with its plan to raise the 2019 dividend 10% overall.
Full-year 2019 adjusted earnings before interest, depreciation, taxation, and amortisation is to be in the lower half of ContourGlobal's USD720 million to USD770 million guidance. In the first half, adjusted Ebitda rose 36% to USD357.2 million from USD261.8 million.
President & Chief Executive Joseph Brandt said: "We are pleased to announce strong first-half results, delivering on financial, operational and growth commitments. We successfully integrated the 250MW CSP facilities in the southwest of Spain which contributed to our growth. In May we completed the sale of 49% of the CSP assets to our strategic partner Credit Suisse Energy Infrastructure Partners AG for EUR134 million in cash consideration. The CHP acquisition in Mexico, signed in January 2019, received shareholder approval and is expected to close in the third quarter of 2019. It will bring high quality contracted cash flows and an expected annual adjusted Ebitda contribution of USD110 million. We continue to see attractive growth opportunities in our core markets in both the acquisition and greenfield segment. We are pleased with our pipeline and our accelerated progress towards achieving our IPO objective of doubling adjusted Ebitda by 2022 without the need to issue shares or exceed target net leverage.
Shares in ContourGlobal were up 0.2% at 164.40 pence in London on Thursday morning.
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