LONDON (Alliance News) - Charles Taylor PLC Wednesday reported higher annual pretax profit and revenue in 2013, as its professional services business grew despite a relatively benign claims environment for the insurance industry.
Charles Taylor, which provides professional services to the insurance industry, said it made a GBP6.9 million pretax profit in 2013, compared with GBPP6.6 million in 2012. Revenue increased to GBP113.6 million from GBP108.2 million, as lower claims and finance costs offset a rise in administrative expenses.
Charles Taylor manages claims for insurers and reinsurers, so a lower level of claims can result in less business coming through. However, this was offset by securing a steady volume of claims instead of relying on claims relating to sporadic or exceptionally large catastrophes.
The full-year dividend was flat at 10.0 pence for the fourth consecutive year, since it was re-based in 2010.
In a telephone interview with Alliance News, Chief Executive David Marock said Charles Taylor's dividend policy will be reviewed over the course of the year.
Since joining at the end of 2011, the South African has intensified Charles Taylor's focus on its professional services business, which reported a 5.5% revenue increase to GBP111.9 million and an 12% increase in operating profit to GBP10.5 million.
The improvement was driven by the adjusting services business, which provides loss adjusting services across the aviation, energy, marine, property & casualty and special risks sectors, as it benefited from a steady volume of larger and more complex claims to adjust over the whole year rather than being requested to work on a small number of exceptionally large claims.
That was backed up by a steady performance in management services which reported a GBP6.6 million operating profit and won a new client, the Offshore Pollution Liability Assocation.
However, the insurance support services business, which provides technical services to clients in the Lloyd's, London and international insurance markets, had a disappointing year amidst challenging trading conditions.
Outside of professional services, the Charle Taylor's insurers in run-off business, which owns life and non-life insurance companies which are closed to new business and runs off their liabilities in an orderly manner, reported higher operating profit, up to GBP800,000 from GBP300,000.
After last year acquiring KnowledgeCenter, Charles Taylor continues to look at bolt-on acquisitions, but Marock told Alliance News there's no need to rush into anything.
"We continue to look at opportunities across each line of the business," Marock said, "but they have to make sense strategically and culturally."
The integration of KnowledgeCenter is still ongoing, with initial sales slower than expected.
Marock said the acquisition now has a healthy pipeline in place, blaming the weaker-than-expected sales on the distraction of the acquisition process.
Charles Taylor shares, which have risen by over 40% in the past year, were Wednesday quoted at 258.67 pence, down 0.1%.
By Samuel Agini; samagini@alliancenews.com; @samuelagini
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