Hilton Food Group (HFG) has continued to benefit from Australia's love of meat for the 'barbie'. In December last year, the retail meat packer announced it would be working with its existing partner, supermarket giant Woolworths (au:WOW), to build a new Queensland factory, due to open in 2020. This part of the business helped volumes rise to 275,213 tonnes for the reported period, up 9 per cent at constant currencies on the previous 52-week period. This combined with favourable currency movements to push operating profit to £34.3m, up 12 per cent on the same basis.
Revenue in the group's western Europe segment was up 12 per cent to £1.15bn, driven primarily by volume growth in the UK, although performance in Ireland was also "encouraging", management said. Sales were up 7 per cent on a like-for-like, constant currency basis, driven in part by the launch of Hilton Food Solutions, a new meat trading business, during the year. Alongside this, the group expanded its product lines to include fresh pizzas and meal boxes.
Analysts at Numis are forecasting adjusted profit before tax of £35.7m, giving diluted EPS of 36.3p in 2017 (up from £33.2m and 33.2p in 2016).
| HILTON FOOD GROUP (HFG) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ORD PRICE: | 655p | MARKET VALUE: | £482m | |
| TOUCH: | 655-663p | 12-MONTH HIGH: | 686p | LOW: 486p |
| DIVIDEND YIELD: | 2.6% | PE RATIO: | 19 | |
| NET ASSET VALUE: | 120p | NET CASH: | £32.3m | |
| Year to 31 Dec | Turnover (£bn) | Pre-tax profit (£m) | Earnings per share (p) | Dividend per share (p) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | 1.03 | 24.7 | 24.9 | 12.0 |
| 2013 | 1.12 | 24.9 | 25.0 | 12.8 |
| 2014 | 1.10 | 25.2 | 25.0 | 13.3 |
| 2015* | 1.09 | 27.9 | 27.5 | 14.6 |
| 2016** | 1.23 | 33.2 | 33.7 | 17.1 |
| % change | +13 | +19 | +23 | +17 |
Ex-div: 1 Jun Payment: 30 Jun *53-week period **Year-end is 1 Jan 2017 | ||||
