De La Rue ups divi by 90% as margins climb

20th May 2009 07:22

Recession has not yet dented demand for for banknotes with specialist printer De La Rue upping underlying profits by over 18% last year and its dividend by 92%.Profits rose by 18.5% to £105m, excluding a pension supplement of £15m and other one-offs of £4.5m, and from £91.2m to £96.1m if those are included. Revenues for the year to March rose by 7.6% to £502m. Operating profit margin up 2.2 percentage points to 19.2% driven by productivity, volume and foreign exchange benefits, De La Rue said, adding it has just renewed its Bank of England contract for five years. Currency operating profit rose 25% to £82.8m." As announced in March, De La Rue entered the year with good order book coverage across its businesses which is expected to continue despite the uncertain global economic environment. As a result, the board has confidence in the outlook for the current year," chairman Nicholas Brookes added.The final dividend is 27.4p, compared with 14.87p, making an total for the year of 41.1p, up 92%.