20th May 2015 06:59
LONDON (Alliance News) - Pennon Group PLC Wednesday said it had delivered a "resilient" set of results for the last financial year after reporting a rise in pretax profit as both its South West Water business and Viridor waste to energy business experienced a lift in earnings.
The FTSE 100 company reported a pretax profit before exceptional items of GBP210.7 million in the year ended March 31, up 1.6% from GBP207.3 million a year earlier, whilst pretax profit after exceptional items rose to GBP197.0 million from GBP158.7 million.
The South West Water division reported a 3.3% rise in profit before tax and exceptional items to GBP167.9 million whilst Viridor experienced a 0.4% increase to GBP27.7 million.
Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation rose 0.9% to GBP411.0 million compared to GBP407.3 million with South West Water reporting a 0.1% rise in Ebitda to GBP331.3 million whilst Viridor experienced a 5.4% lift to GBP80.4 million.
"The group has delivered a resilient set of results for 2014/15. South West Water's Ebitda was higher than last year despite the tariff freeze, thanks to a strong focus on cost efficiency, and as expected Viridor's Ebitda exceeded last year," said Chairman Ken Harvey.
"Viridor has made excellent progress in its energy business bringing five new Energy Recovery Facilities on stream in the year. Pennon is well positioned to continue to deliver profitable growth and consistent, sustainable cash returns to shareholders," said Harvey.
Revenue for the year was up 2.7% to GBP1.35 billion compared to GBP1.32 billion, with South West Water revenue rising 0.4% to GBP522.2 million from GBP520 million whilst Viridor generated GBP835.9 million in revenue, a 4.2% rise from GBP802 million.
Pennon increased its dividend by 4.9% to 31.80 pence per share and reiterated that its dividend policy is to grow year on year by a minimum of 4% of retail price index inflation until 2020.
At the end of March, the company's net debt stood at GBP2.19 billion, which Pennon described as "stable". That represents a gearing level of 61.9% which it said "reflects Pennon Group's efficient financing", it said.
By Joshua Warner; [email protected]; @JoshAlliance
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