19th Jun 2018 11:20
LONDON (Alliance News) - Gresham House Strategic PLC on Tuesday said it was ahead of benchmark in its most recently ended financial year, due to a rise in net asset value.
The investment company posted a pretax profit in the year to the end of March of GBP4.7 million. This compared to GBP2.8 million profit made the prior year. Revenue rose to GBP5.7 million from GBP3.9 million a year earlier.
The company lifted dividend by 15% to 17.25 pence, having previously paid 15.00p. This was a result of profits made on investment realisations during the year, Gresham said.
Net asset value total return was 10.7% as at the end of March. This outperformed the benchmark's, the FTSE Small Cap Index, performance of negative 0.7% return.
NAV per share grew to 1,186.20p as at the end of March from 1,072.00p on the same day a year prior. Share price at the end of the year stood at 827.50p.
The stock was trading flat on the day Tuesday at 955.00p per share.
The company notes that the deep discount of the share price to NAV has presented during the year, as it was not fully invested and remained relatively small in size.
On the other hand, Gresham said it benefited from its small size, as it managed to maintain total costs at a similar level to last year of GBP1.4 million.
"As the hard investment work of the last two and a half years starts to bear fruit, the board looks to the future with a degree of confidence notwithstanding an external environment that still has many economic and political headwinds," said Chairman David Potter.
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