30th Jul 2015 13:14
LONDON (Alliance News) - InterContinental Hotels Group PLC on Thursday reported growth in profit in the first half of 2015 as it achieved growth in revenue per available room in all of the regions in which it operates and said it remains confident in the outlook for the rest of the year.
The FTSE 100-listed hotel operator, which owns brands including Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza and InterContinental Hotels, reported a 21.5% rise in pretax profit in the six months ended June 30 to USD458 million from USD377 million, as total revenue grew 0.8% to USD915 million from USD908 million.
IHG said that it achieved growth in revenue per available room across all of its regions, comprising the Americas, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, and Greater China. All in all, global RevPAR was up 5.1% in the period.
In the Americas, RevPAR grew 5.4%, driven by rate growth of 4.2%, while a strong performance from the UK and Germany offset limited growth in France and a challenging trading environment in Russia to achieve a 5.1% rise in RevPAR in Europe.
In Asia, the Middle East and Africa, RevPAR was up 5.4%, driven by both growth in rate and in occupancy, while Greater China saw RevPAR growth of 1.5%, led by an improvement in occupancy, although it warned that trading remains challenging in Hong Kong and Macau.
Analysts at Numis said that IHG's first-half results were slightly ahead of expectations, but said it is concerned about China and the slowdown in the rate of RevPAR in Hong Kong and Macau.
IHG said it delivered 41,000 room signings, its best first half performance since 2008, and signed the highest number of Holiday Inn rooms ever in the period. It also added 28,000 rooms to the portfolio, increasing the total system size to 724,000, representing year-on-year net system size growth of 4.5%.
It added that its major owned-asset disposal programme, including the EUR330 million sale of InterContinental Paris - Le Grand in December and the agreement earlier this month to sell InterContinental Hong Kong for USD938 million, has thus far realised gross proceeds of USD8 billion.
Panmure Gordon analyst Anna Barnfather said that IHG's asset sales provide scope for USD1 billion cash to return to shareholders in 2016.
IHG will pay an interim dividend of 27.5 cents, a 10% increase on the 25.0 cents it paid in the first half of 2014.
"Looking forward, based on current trading trends, we remain confident in the outlook for the rest of the year," Chief Executive Richard Solomons said in a statement.
Shares in IHG were trading down 1.2% at 2,591.00 pence on Thursday afternoon.
By Karolina Kaminska; [email protected] @KarolinaAllNews
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