Pearson sees sales rising in 2020 as adjusted profits rise
Publisher buys £500m pension insurance policy
Pearson
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16:40 28/03/24
Publishing group Pearson said underlying full year adjusted operating profit rose 8% to £546m for 2018, in the in the upper half of guidance range, as it said it expected sales to grow again in 2020.
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The company also revealed it had purchase pension insurance buy-in policy from Legal & General for £500m.
Underlying sales fell 1% to £4.1bn with declines in US Higher Education Courseware of 5% and in US K12 Courseware largely offset by the rest of the business growing in aggregate at more than 1%.
Pearson forecast 2019 adjusted operating profit of £590m - £640m and adjusted earnings per share of 56.5p - 62.0p including our US K12 Courseware business, which it sold last week for £193m.
On a statutory basis, sales fell by 9% in headline terms primarily due to portfolio changes reducing sales by £216m and currency movements decreasing revenue by £134m.
Statutory operating profit for the year was £553m, up from £451m, with the increase primarily due to profit on disposals of the Wall Street English and UTEL units.
Cash flow grew 15% to £547m as well net debt was slashing by £432m to £143m.
A final dividend of 13p was declared, up 8%, which equated to a full year dividend of 18.5p.
Chief executive John Fallon said he expected sales to stabilise this year, and “grow again in 2020 and beyond".