Plastics Cap. Share Price (PLA)

Top Director Sells Plastics Capital (PLA) Director name: Mr Richard Vessey Amount sold: 142,809 @ 81.50p Value: �116,389

Richard Vessey, the founding shareholder of Plastics Capital, sold a slice of his stake in the niche plastics products group. Vessey, who is also a Non-Executive Director, disposed of 142,809 at 81.50p each, generating �116,389. He now holds 2.47m shares in the company, equal to 8.98% of the issued share capital. At the end of January the group said it has been trading in line with market expectations, amid stable conditions. It said that although the market in Europe has remained depressed, elsewhere sales are growing as expected. Both margins and cash generation were reported to be strong and similar to those seen last year.

14:41 A A A Plastics Capital on Tuesday posted a trading update for its third quarter, showing results in line with market expectations. The niche plastics product group said trading conditions were stable since announcing interim results and little change was expected in the near term. "Demand in Europe remains depressed, but elsewhere sales are growing in-line with management expectations," the company stated. Plastics Capital secured new businesses including LG Corporation in South Korea for paper pathway bearings, which has a potential total sales of £0.25m per annum when it commences production later in the year. The group also won a contract to supply bearings for camera lenses and established a manufacturing facility in Shanghi where it will primarily make machined plastic ball bearings to meet demand for the product in China. "Many European customers, whose demand is driven by the investment cycle, continue to be affected negatively by the weak economic conditions - elsewhere demand has been improving," Executive Chairman, Faisal Rahmatallah, said. "New business activity is going well and we are investing for growth in (full year 2013/14) and beyond. Performance should be broadly in line with expectations over the final quarter and looking into the next financial year I anticipate a year of significant progress."

http://www.investegate.co.uk/plastics-capital-plc-(pla)/rns/trading-update/201301290700075374W/

Outlook Volumes have been flat over the two quarters that made up the first half year. Since the half year end, this pattern seems to be continuing. However, the pipeline of new business which we have built up over the last two years will have an increasing impact on future revenues. That being the case, we would anticipate some improvement to trading, even if modest, in the second half year. Over the medium to longer term, we expect to see revenue growth resuming as this new business flows through. We remain confident about the direction and future growth of the Group.

CONT Profit before tax and earnings per share have both benefitted from: · Lower interest costs as our debt has continued to decrease, and · Realised profits on foreign currency debt that has been converted into sterling during the half year. Earnings per share has benefitted from a lower tax rate, which arises from the R&D tax credit and from the reduction in the rate of corporation tax. This should be sustainable going forward, barring changes in UK government policy. It is worth noting that over the last four years our first six months' results show that underlying earnings per share have achieved at a compound annual growth rate of 10% per annum. Operating cash flow has been good with £2.0m being generated for the six month period - this represents a 96% conversion from EBITDA. Working capital has been carefully managed and capital expenditure has been unusually low, mainly as key projects have been subject to minor technical delays. We would expect capital expenditure to return to normal over the full year period. Net debt has been reduced to £8.6m at the end of the half year. Over the last three years we have reduced net debt by nearly £10m, primarily from operational cash flow. Net debt is now at a level which we consider satisfactory given the cash flow characteristics of the business. The Company is pleased to announce that it intends to pay an interim dividend of 0.66p to all shareholders on 28 December 2012 in respect of the period ended 30 September 2012. The record date for the dividend is 7 December 2012 and the associated ex-dividend date is 5 December 2012.