WARRINGTON (dpa-AFX) - United Utilities Group Plc (UUGRY.PK, UU.L) reported full-year pre-tax profit of 280.4 million pounds, down from 327.1 million pounds last year.
The company said comparative figures have been re-presented to include loss on disposal of property, plant and equipment of 2.7 million pounds within other operating costs rather than other income, as previously presented, as this better reflects the nature of the expenditure.
On a per share basis, earnings dropped to 46.4 pence from 67.2 pence in the previous year.
Underlying profit before tax was 327.0 million pounds, lower than last year.
Revenue for the year was up to 1.57 billion pounds from a year ago, principally as a result of the impact of the regulated price increase for 2011/12 of 4.5% nominal partially offset by the ongoing impact of customers switching to meters and lower commercial volumes.
Steve Mogford, Chief Executive Officer, said,
'Our business improvement initiatives are progressing well and we remain on course to meet our regulatory outperformance targets. Alongside this, we increased capital investment in our assets to £680 million for the year, providing benefits for our customers, the regional economy and the wider environment. This investment included £154 million of infrastructure renewals expenditure, an increase of £24 million on the previous year, which helps maintain and improve the resilience of our network...
We are pleased with the recent progress we have made and believe there is plenty of opportunity to deliver further improvements..'
The board has proposed a final dividend of 21.34 pence per share, an increase of 6.7%. This gives a total dividend of 32.01 pence per share relating to the 2011/12 financial year.
Looking forward, the company said that its business improvement initiatives are progressing well and it remains on track to meet its regulatory outperformance targets, with substantial financing outperformance already secured.
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© 2012 AFX News
