LONDON (Alliance News) - Millennium & Copthorne Hotels PLC on Thursday said its pretax profit rose in the third quarter, broadly in line with a rise in revenue, but said it continues to be impacted by the strength of sterling.
The FTSE 250 hotels company said its pretax profit in the three months to the end of September was GBP50.2 million, up 6.6% on the GBP47.1 million posted a year earlier. The rise was broadly in line with the 6.2% increase in revenue during the period to GBP215.9 million from GBP203.3 million the year earlier.
But for the nine months to the end of September, the group saw pretax profit fall 6.1% to GBP108.6 million on a reported basis, owing to the strength of sterling. Nine-month revenue was up 1.9% on a reported basis to GBP596.5 million, but was 7.6% higher on a constant currency basis.
RevPAR for the group in the third quarter was GBP77.7 million, up from the GBP73.7 million posted a year before. Occupancy increased to 78.3% from 76.5% last year and its average room rate rose to GBP99.26 from GBP96.35. On a constant currency basis, RevPAR was up 9.9% in the period.
The company said its maintains its outlook for the full year.
"Our newly acquired hotels contributed to revenue and profit in the third quarter, together with the return of refurbished rooms to inventory and stronger trading in regional US and New Zealand," said Millennium & Copthorne Chairman Kwek Leng Beng.
"Together, these factors helped to improve performance for the group as a whole despite challenges and economic uncertainties in some of our key markets and the continuing negative impact on reported currency results of a strong pound sterling," he added.
Shares in Millennium & Copthorne opened trading on Thursday amongst the worst performers on the FTSE 250, down 1.1% to 560.5 pence.
By Sam Unsted; samunsted@alliancenews.com; @SamUAtAlliance
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