13th Sep 2019 07:44
(Alliance News) - Pub chain JD Wetherspoon PLC on Friday reported a rise in annual earnings and said that it anticipates a reasonable outcome in the current financial 2020 despite continuing political problems.
For the year ended July 28, the company reported 7.2% rise in pretax profit to GBP95.4 million from GBP89.0 million in the year ago period. Revenue rose by 7.4% to GBP1.82 billion from GBP1.69 billion.
Same store sales for the period increased by 6.8%, with bar sales rising 5.8%, food sales by 8.3%, slot & fruit machine sales by 10.3% and hotel room sales by 3.9%.
Stripping out exceptional items, pretax profit fell 4.5% year-on-year to GBP102.5 million from GBP107.2 million.
Exceptional costs tumbled to GBP6.9 million in financial 2019 from GBP17.0 million. This was particularly due to a sharp fall on disposal losses to GBP1.6 million from GBP9.7 million. During the 2019 financial, eight pubs were sold, compared with 19 the year before.
Operating costs, in contrast, rose by 8.0% to GBP1.69 billion from GBP1.56 billion. The company warned of a year-on-year rise in operating costs when it released its interim earnings in March.
The company held its full-year total dividend at 12.0 pence per share, after proposing a unchanged final payout of 8.0p.
"Despite continuing political problems, stemming from the transfer of democratic power to a technocratic elite, Wetherspoon continues to perform well. Like-for-like sales for the six weeks to September 8 were up 5.9%," said JD Wetherspoon Chair Tim Martin.
"We currently anticipate a reasonable outcome (pre IFRS16) for the current financial year, subject to our future sales performance," Martin added.
Shares in Wetherspoon closed flat at 1,550.00 pence each in London on Thursday.
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Wetherspoon (J.D)