Travis Perkins shows “confidence” with profits hike

Northants builders merchants Travis Perkins has posted hikes in both revenues and profits for the year ending 31st December 2015.

Revenues rose to £5.9bn, up 3.8 per cent on 2014, whilst profits also rose by 8.7 per cent to £389m.

The full-year dividend increased 15.8 per cent to 44.0p per share.

John Carter, CEO, said: “The Group has delivered a good performance in 2015 despite the weaker than expected RMI market in the second half of the year. We made very good progress on our key strategic priorities; modernising General Merchanting, transforming Wickes and re-segmenting the Plumbing & Heating division, and we continued to improve our customer propositions, delivering access to greater ranges with better availability. The increased capital and operational investments are enabling us to leverage the scale of the business and exploit structural advantages in sourcing and supply chain, driving our continued outperformance.

“We believe that the growth drivers in our markets remain strong and welcome the return to growth of mortgage approvals and secondary housing transactions in the second half of 2015. This has supported good growth in RMI sales for the Group in January and February 2016. This gives us further confidence that through our strategy we will successfully deliver against our medium-term targets of sales outperformance, low double-digit profit growth and improving returns.”