image

Authoritative Independent Monthly Share Selections Using Technical & Fundamental Analysis

Latest issue now available

Northgate - Earnings to increase 20% this year

August 2006

Investing in shares may lose you all or some of your money. Past performance is no indication of future performance. Some of the shares recommended here may be small company shares, which can be relatively illiquid and hard to trade and this makes such shares more risky than other investments.

  • Epic Code:
  • NTG
  • Price:
  • 963p
For the year ended 30 April, van rental firm Northgate saw pretax profit increase 7% to £59.9m from a 10% rise in turnover to £373m. Earnings were up 6% to 65.7p. Following the acquisitions of Arriva Vehicle Rental (AVR) and a 49% stake in Record Rent, net debt increased by 22% to £525m. Given its decent long-term record, this was a below par performance, mainly because its mature UK business saw its profit, before a £2.6m exceptional charge, fall from £62.5m to £60.6m. Although utilisation again averaged 90%, the problem was a fall in residual values for vehicles sold at the end of their life and also a 2% decline in hire rates due to increased competition and together they crimped operating ma ...

To access our archive of articles and to receive current issues you need to subscribe.

Subscribe now

Already a subscriber? Login

With small companies there is an above average degree of risk compared to buying blue chips. Please be aware that we have not assessed the suitability of any of these investments for you. The newsletter simply states a personal view and diarises the editor’s investment decisions. Please speak to your stockbroker or other qualified individual to ascertain whether any of these companies mentioned would form useful additions to your own portfolios. Past performance is no indication of future success.

All material on this website is protected by copyright. You may use Information retrieved from the www.scsw.co.uk website for your own personal non-commercial use which means that you may not sell or copy this information to any third party without prior written consent. ISSN 1358-183X