Shares in Lok'n Store (LOK) rose nearly 5 per cent after the reporting of a robust first-half performance, as the Aim-traded group continued to roll out more purpose-built storage facilities.
A total of £4.6m was invested in new stores, although net debt was only marginally higher at £25.8m, due to an extra £2m payment on the sale of its old Reading site. There was a further £3.5m from the 'sale and manage-back' of its Swindon store. The store and trading business were both sold to an institutional client, but Lok'n Store continues to manage the store and receives a standing fee as well as a performance-related bonus. An upward valuation in the portfolio helped the loan-to-value ratio to fall from 27.5 per cent to 26.2 per cent. It also secured a fresh £40m bank facility on a much lower interest rate, with the option of increasing this to £50m.
There has been strong trading reported from the Chichester store which opened in January, while stores at Southampton and Bristol have just started trading. There are a further four stores in the pipeline. Lok'n Store also pushed occupancy rates ahead by 2.4 percentage points to 63.6 per cent of current lettable space, while also pushing through price increases of 3.3 per cent.
Analysts at broker finnCap are forecasting adjusted pre-tax profit for the year to July 2016 of £3.5m and EPS of 10.3p (from £2.7m and 7.6p in FY2015).
| LOK'NSTORE (LOK) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ORD PRICE: | 318.5p | MARKET VALUE: | £84m | |
| TOUCH: | 315-322p | 12-MONTH HIGH: | 370p | LOW: 276p |
| DIVIDEND YIELD: | 2.6% | PE RATIO: | 21 | |
| NET ASSET VALUE: | 213p | NET DEBT: | 46% | |
| Half-year to 31 Jan | Turnover (£m) | Pre-tax profit (£m) | Earnings per share (p) | Dividend per share (p) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | 7.6 | 1.5 | 4.4 | 2.33 |
| 2015 | 8.0 | 3.8 | 11.5 | 2.67 |
| % change | +5 | +155 | +163 | +15 |
Ex-div: 5 May Payment: 10 Jun | ||||
