Persimmon PLC Trading Update (4679D)
April 27 2017 - 2:00AM
UK Regulatory
TIDMPSN
RNS Number : 4679D
Persimmon PLC
27 April 2017
TRADING UPDATE
THURSDAY 27 APRIL 2017
Persimmon plc ("the Company") will hold its Annual General
Meeting ("AGM") at 12.00 noon today at York Racecourse when the
Chairman will make the following statement regarding current
trading, financial performance and the outlook for the current
financial year. This statement covers the period from 1 January
2017 to date and supplements the update given in the announcement
of the 2016 Final Results on 27 February 2017.
Persimmon's operational performance continues to be excellent,
with the Group delivering higher volumes of newly built homes in
local communities across all our regional markets, supported by the
resilience of the UK economy. The prevailing disciplined approach
to mortgage lending is enabling customers to buy newly built homes
on attractive but sustainable terms. Our focus on building family
housing at affordable prices provides a compelling choice for
potential new home buyers and has attracted 6% more visitors to our
development sites than last year at this stage.
Total forward sales revenue, including legal completions taken
to date in 2017, is currently GBP2.56 billion, c.11% higher than
last year (2016: GBP2.31 billion). As expected, despite the
particularly strong comparatives from the first quarter of last
year, our weekly private sales rate per site since reporting our
2016 Final Results on 27 February 2017 is 12% ahead of last year,
resulting in a sales rate which is now 4% ahead for the year to
date. We have 8,928 new homes sold forward into the private
ownership market with an average selling price of c. GBP229,500, an
increase of 4.1% over the prior year.
Despite the continued difficulties encountered with planning
delays, we have opened 67 of the 90 new sites planned for the first
half of the year. These new sales outlets opened across the UK
continue to support our margin progression, due to the associated
lower land cost recoveries, which has been aided further by some
modest price improvement through the Spring period so far. The
Group is currently developing 382 active sales outlets across the
UK and is building new homes on all sites that have an
implementable detailed planning consent. During the period we
continued to identify good opportunities to acquire new land to
support the future growth of the business.
The Directors are pleased to announce that the Company has
recently concluded a one year extension of the maturity date of its
GBP300m Revolving Credit Facility, out to 31 March 2022, with the
Company's five relationship banks.
Exercising capital discipline through the cycle whilst growing
the business as market conditions allow are key features of the
Group's strategy launched in early 2012. Our Capital Return Plan to
return surplus capital to shareholders over the ten year period to
2021 continues to be a fundamental element of this capital
discipline.
As announced on 27 February 2017, an additional payment under
the Capital Return Plan of 25p per share, or GBP77 million, was
paid to shareholders as a dividend on 31 March 2017. At the same
time the Board confirmed that the scheduled return of 110p per
share, or GBP338 million, will be paid to shareholders on 3 July
2017 also as a dividend. These payments will bring the total value
of surplus capital returned to shareholders at that date to
GBP1,488 million, or GBP4.85 per share. This total is GBP629
million greater than that originally planned at launch in 2012.
The successful trading performance of Persimmon has enabled the
Board to increase the value of the original Capital Return Plan by
49%, or c. GBP937 million. The total value of the Capital Return
Plan is now c. GBP2.85 billion, or GBP9.25 per share.
The acceleration and significant uplift in the value of the
Capital Return Plan has been facilitated by the Group increasing
the volume of its legal completions of newly built homes
substantially since 2012. The Group has sold over 70,000 new homes
since the launch of the plan, in part by opening five new operating
businesses, and by opening over 1,000 new sales outlets whilst
investing over GBP2.5 billion in new land. In total the Group has
generated GBP1.96 billion of free cash before the return of surplus
capital over the five years since the launch of the Group's
strategy in 2012.
The Board remains confident of the future prospects of the
Group.
We will provide a further report in our Trading Update on
Wednesday 5 July 2017.
For further information please contact:
Jeff Fairburn, Group Chief Executive Simon Rigby
Mike Killoran, Group Finance Kevin Smith
Director
Persimmon plc Jos Bieneman
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7638 9571 on Citigate Dewe
the day Rogerson
Tel: +44 (0) 1904 642199 thereafter Tel: +44 (0) 20
7638 9571
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
END
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