23rd Feb 2016 08:17
LONDON (Alliance News) - Construction and regeneration company Morgan Sindall Group PLC on Tuesday said it swung to a pretax loss in 2015 due to one-off charges booked on troublesome legacy contracts, though revenue rose and it proposed a rise in its total dividend.
The group said its pretax loss for the year was GBP14.8 billion, due to a rise in one-off costs it booked from loss-making legacy contracts in its construction business. Stripping this out, however, adjusted pretax profit rose to GBP34.3 million from GBP25.2 million, up 36%.
Revenue for the group increased 7.0% to GBP2.39 billion from GBP2.22 billion, with a strong performance in its Fit Out business and a good contribution from its Urban Regeneration unit. Morgan Sindall said its Affordable Housing unit also performed well and is well-placed for the coming year, while its Construction & Infrastructure arm also delivered a better performance as it made progress on working through older contracts in London and the south of England.
The decent underlying performance prompted Morgan Sindall to push its final dividend up to 17.0 pence per share, up from 15.0p, meaning its total dividend rises to 29.0p from 27.0p.
The group expects the positive momentum it has seen across its divisions to continue in 2016, with a continued recovery in the Construction & Infrastructure unit and further strong performances in Fit Out, Urban Regeneration and Affordable Housing.
"We are pleased with the year end result which is evidence of the strategic and operational progress made across the group during the year and this, together with a positive outlook going into 2016, has enabled us to raise the final dividend," said John Morgan, the group's chief executive.
Shares in the company were untraded early Tuesday, having last traded at 705.00p.
By Sam Unsted; [email protected]; @SamUAtAlliance
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