Wilmington profits hit by higher finance costs

published 28 February 2012

Wilmington Group, a professional information and training group, is sticking with its full year guidance despite a sticky half year for its Training and Events division.

"Whilst economic conditions remain tough generally, most areas of our business have been resilient," claimed company Chairman, Mark Asplin. "The cost savings and management initiatives which have already been implemented in response to this should result in an outcome for the full year in line with our expectations," he added.

The group reported a rise in group revenues for the half year ended December 31st, but a fall in pre-tax profit.

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Group revenues rose 5% from £39.7m to £41.6m, while pre-tax profit fell from £6.1m to £5.5m after the bank facility renewal led to higher finance costs.

The Publishing and Information division's revenue rose 11.9% to £19.9m from £17.7m the year before, boosted by a full six month contribution from Axco, which the company acquired in the second half of 2010. Excluding Axco, like-for-like revenues grew by 1% despite the closure of 16 print products in July 2011.

The division's profits before non- recurring items, central overheads, share based payments, amortisation, net finance costs and tax grew by 8.6% to £5.2m (2010: £4.8m).

The Training & Events division delivered, by the group's own adission, a mixd performance. Revenues were more or less unchanged at £21.8m (2010: £21.9m) but profits before non-recurring items, central overheads, share based payments, amortisation, net finance costs and tax were 6.2% lower at £2.9m (2010: £3.1m).

This decline predominantly reflects the movement in revenues in the highly operationally geared legal training business and the continued investment in the compliance training business, where the group expects to see revenue growth in the second half of the financial year.

Adjusted earnings per share dipped from 4.86p by 4.67p.

The company has been investing in the business as it chases higher margin and higher quality business and the benefits of this investment are expected to continue to feed through over the medium term.

The firm also pointed out that deferred revenue is at a seasonally adjusted high of £17.4m (2010: £16.8m), which it says is an indication of the early success of its strategy to focus on operational efficiency, develop new training programmes and invest in subscription-based information businesses.

The dividend has been retained at the same level as last year, at 3.5p per share.

The share price rose 4.65% to 90.00p by 14:38.