| CATEGORY: NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS SECTOR: ELECTRONIC & ELECTRICAL EQUIPMENT |
Profits down but orders up at Chloride |
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Mon 02 Nov 2009
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LONDON (SHARECAST) - Power solutions provider Chloride saw profits tumble in a six month period that saw ‘general weakness in secure power markets’.
Pre-tax profit in the half year to 30 September tumble 41% to £10.4m from £17.6m a year earlier, on sales that edged up to £152.7m from £152.3m.
The sales figure was boosted, however, by favourable exchange rate fluctuations, and with these removed, turnover was down 7% year on year. Acquisitions contributed a 3.1% increase to unadjusted sales.
Product sales were down 6.3% (13.9% at constant exchange rates) at £94.2m from £100.6m a year earlier, despite a healthy performance by the company’s Energy and Infrastructure divisions.
Service sales rose 13.1% (6.1% at constant exchange rates) to £58.5m from £51.7m a year ago.
The company said it expects to incur a charge of £6m over the full year relating to its restructuring plan. The company is targeting £1.5m of saving this year from the restructuring.
Gearing over the period rose from 18% to 22%, with net debt at the end of the period standing at £35.6m from £15.4m at the end of March, following a spate of acquisitions.
Operating margin fell to 11.5% from 13.5% due to more competitive market conditions.
On the bright side, the order book improved by 4% (5.5% at constant exchange rates) to £143.9m from £137.8m at the end of September 2008.
‘We continue to see reasonable stability in our order intake. We enter the second half with good order book coverage, and with trading in line with our expectations,’ said chief executive Tim Cobbold.
The interim dividend has been increased by 2.7% to 1.9p from 1.85p last year.
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