Punch Taverns swings to profit

Pub operator Punch Taverns swung to a pre-tax profit in the 52 weeks to 20 August.

In its preliminary full-year results, the group said pre-tax profit came in at £60m versus a loss of £105m the year before. However, underlying pre-tax profit fell to £53m from £61m and revenue declined to £406.8m from £420.8m.

Underlying earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation fell to £178m from £196m the year before, reflecting the impact of £324m of strategic disposals completed over the last 24 months.

Average profit per pub across the entire estate was up 4%, benefiting from the disposal of non-core pubs, while core estate like-for-like net income was up 1%.

Chief executive officer Duncan Garrood said: “The business has ended the year with a solid set of results, in line with our expectations, and which reflects the completion of our strategic disposal programme.

“We have made good progress towards delivering on the strategy we set out in November 2015. In particular the roll-out of our retail division is progressing well and we are accelerating the roll-out to around 150 pubs per year.”

Punch said that while the new Pubs Code Regulations are impacting letting activity in the short term, its expectations for the longer-term growth prospects of the business remain unchanged.

At 0830 GMT, the shares were up 2.5% to 115p.