30th Jul 2018 09:16
LONDON (Alliance News) - Foxtons Group PLC on Monday said it swung to a half-year loss due to a slowdown in London's property sales market. The estate agent also skipped its interim dividend.
"The property sales market in London is undergoing a sustained period of very low activity levels with longer and less visible transaction outcomes, which clearly impacts our business," Chief Executive Nic Budden said, adding that the lettings division performance improved in the interim period following a slow start and recorded another consistent result for the period.
For the six months to June 30, the estate agent recorded a pretax loss of GBP2.5 million, compared with pretax profit of GBP3.8 million in the year ago period, on a revenue of GBP53 million and GBP58.5 million, respectively.
The swing to loss and revenue drop also was attributed to planned investments in staff, brand and technology.
First-half adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation dropped to GBP100,000 from GBP7.1 million.
Foxtons has not declared a interim dividend. It paid an interim dividend of 0.43 pence per share in the first half of 2017.
The company said its future outlook remains mixed with sales pipeline recovering and sales market remaining very subdued with less visibility on exchanges proceeding. There is momentum in the lettings business, and the company remains confident in capitalising on the demand, Foxtons added.
Shares in the company were up 1.8% at 48.45 pence on Monday morning.
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