27th Nov 2019 09:02
(Alliance News) - Britvic PLC on Wednesday posted a 24% decline in annual profit due to an impairment charge relating to its proposed sale of three French manufacturing sites to Refresco Group NV.
Shares in Britvic were down 2.6% at 959.50 pence in London in morning trading.
The soft drinks business, which owns the Fruit Shoot, Robinsons, and J2O brands, reported a GBP110.3 million pretax profit for the 52 weeks ended September 29, down from the GBP145.8 million profit reported for the 52 weeks to September 30, 2018.
Contributors to this decline was GBP11.5 million of other income in financial 2018 that did not repeat and a GBP31.2 million impairment charge in financial 2019 on assets held for sale as part of a disposal, versus no such charge the year before.
Britvic is to sell its three juice manufacturing sites in France, its private label juice business, and its Fruite brand to Refresco for an undisclosed sum. Therefore, part of Britvic's French business has been designated as held for sale and the fair value calculation resulted in an impairment charge.
Revenue, however, rose 3.3% to GBP1.55 billion from GBP1.50 billion year-on-year.
Britvic is recommending a 21.7p per share final dividend, taking the full year dividend up 6.4% to 30.0p from 28.2p.
During the year, Britvic completed its "GB business capability programme", a three-year effort aimed at transforming Britvic's supply chain infrastructure. This involved installing ten new production lines and three new on-site warehouses.
Going forward, Britvic believes the current macroeconomic environment is still uncertain, but is it expecting to make progress in the year ahead.
Chief Executive Simon Litherland said: "Our commercial execution, innovation agenda and revenue management continue to deliver results. Our transformational business capability programme is now complete - and importantly forms a key part of our broader commitment to building a more flexible and sustainable business model going forward.
"Building on this strong platform, I am confident that Britvic is well placed to capitalise on the future growth opportunities in the years ahead. While we anticipate conditions to remain challenging, we fully expect that we will make further progress in 2020."
By Anna Farley; [email protected]
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