29th Apr 2014 12:55
LONDON (Alliance News) - Gresham House PLC Tuesday said it swung to a pretax loss in 2013 while its net asset value per share decreased.
In a statement one day after saying Chief Executive Derek Lucie-Smith has resigned due to ill health, the property and early-stage investment trust said its net asset value per share decreased to 378.5 pence in 2013 from 445.1 pence a year earlier.
"The reduction in asset value is largely due to the revaluation deficits on investment properties of GBP1.4 million and on the value of our shareholding in Memorial Holdings Ltd of GBP1.5 million, together with the revenue loss for the year of GBP1.5 million offset by the increase in value of our holding in SpaceandPeople PLC amounting to GBP1.3 million," Gresham House Chairman Tony Ebel said in a statement.
Shareholders approved the orderly realisation of the group?s assets at the 2011 annual general meeting. Gresham House has been pursuing a strategy to achieve this and utilising the majority of the sales proceeds to reduce bank borrowings.
The company is reviewing alternative proposals for its future, which may provide for a return of capital to shareholders sooner than the scenario above, Ebel added, but said the process is far from simple given that one of the most active considerations is to ensure that proceeds are received by shareholders in the most tax efficient way.
Gresham House said it made a GBP3.4 million pretax loss in 2013, compared with a GBP996,000 pretax profit in 2012.
Total income fell to GBP1.3 million from GBP1.8 million, while operating costs were also up as property outgoings increased to GBP1.2 million from GBP989,000 and administrative overheads were broadly flat.
Losses on investments held at fair value widened to GBP504,000 from GBP280,000, while the company was also affected by a negative GBP1.4 million movement in fair value of property investments compared with a positive GBP2.1 million in 2012.
Gresham House shares were Tuesday quoted at 130.76 pence, down 1.7%.
By Samuel Agini; [email protected]; @samuelagini
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