NAHL Group trims dividends as it increases investment

Shares in National Accident Helpline operator NAHL Group tumbled in early trading on Tuesday as the group cut dividends as a result of a decline in annual profit and planned to "accelerate investment" in the business.

The legal services-focussed marketing firm declared a final dividend of 10.6p, making a total dividend for the year of 15.9p, a 16.54% decrease year-on-year.

Pre-tax profits fell 22% to £12.4m, "as expected", despite revenues ticking ahead 2.5% to £51.9m, and underlying profits dropped 19.4% to £14.5m.

The AIM-listed group maintained that its trading performance was still in line with expectations and that while earnings per share fell 20% to 21.7p it was still ahead of market forecasts.

Last year NAHL was granted an Alternative Business Structure (ABS) license by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, allowing the firm to have an ownership interest in a company providing legal services, leading to NAHL setting up the Your Law joint venture with Cardiff-based personal injury solicitors NewLaw, a subsidiary of Redde Plc.

NAHL will participate in the Your Law venture, which began trading on 1 July 2017, and take a share of profit from work processed by the ABS. A second ABS was added in November via a partnership with Lyons Davidson as NAHL looked to grow its share of the personal injury market, providing legal advice to consumers and marketing services to its panel of law firm partners.

On Tuesday, CEO Russell Atkinson said: "2017 was a year of change and progress for NAHL as we continued to evolve our Personal Injury (PI) division. We are particularly pleased to have successfully delivered the key elements of our PI strategy with the launch of two ABS ventures, the relaunch of our brand and the delivery of an improved digital capability. These initiatives have given us the insight and experience to lay out a confident vision for the future."

NAHL now plans to accelerate investment by establishing a third ABS to capture the growth opportunity which exists for NAH and further enhancing both our brand and technological capability. Simultaneously we will continue to work closely with our panel law firm partners whilst building in more flexibility into the way we process enquiries helping us to better manage demand," he added.

As of 0910 GMT, shares had 17.08% to 142p.