John Menzies strikes upbeat note on trading

John Menzies said it was confident about hitting forecasts for annual profit and upbeat about prospects for 2018.

In an update on business since the end of June, the company said trading at its main aviation logistics business was in line with expectations. Positive underlying trading was partly offset by disruption caused by Hurricane Irma and the failure of airlines in Europe.

John Menzies said it expected to beat its 2017 synergy target from the $202m acquisition in February of ASIG, a plane refuelling business. The company said it expected to update investors on plans for its newspaper distribution arm at annual results in March after scrapping talks to sell the division to DX Group in August.

The company said: "The group has continued to trade well since the half year and the board is confident of meeting its full-year expectations. Commercially the pipeline of opportunities is strong and we look forward to 2018 with confidence."