26th Feb 2016 07:18
LONDON (Alliance News) - Pearson PLC on Friday said it swung to a loss in 2015 due to the huge restructuring it is undertaking to return itself to health, as sales also dipped in competitive markets and it said stability will start to return only by 2018.
The FTSE 100-listed education and publishing group said it swung to a pretax loss of GBP433.0 million for the year to the end of December, compared to a GBP255.0 million profit in 2014, primarily due to the one-off costs the group will book for the restructuring programme.
Revenue dipped 2.0% to GBP4.47 billion from GBP4.54 billion, as its Pearson VUE, Connections Education and Wall Street English business in China all performed well, but this was offset by declines in its US Higher Education, UK Qualifications and South African units.
Pearson said it will pay a final dividend of 34.00 pence per share, meaning its total dividend will edge up to 52.00p from 51.00p, in line with the level at which it set the payout when it outlined its restructuring plans last month.
2016 will be focused on Pearson's restructuring plans, including cutting costs and attempting to simplify the structure of the group. It expects to complete the majority of the actions by the middle of 2016 and said the full benefits should start to show on the profit line by 2018, when it expects stability to return to US college enrolments and the UK qualifications market.
"Our competitive performance during the last three years has been strong, but the challenges in our biggest markets have persisted for longer than anticipated," said John Fallon, Pearson's chief executive.
"Pearson is now implementing the plans we announced in January to integrate our business, reduce our cost base and focus on fewer, bigger growth opportunities. Education is a sector with large growth opportunities for Pearson, and we are committed to helping millions of learners to progress in their careers and lives," he added.
By Sam Unsted; [email protected]; @SamUAtAlliance
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