March 26 (Reuters) - Industrial equipment rental companySpeedy Hire Plc said on Monday its expects full-yearadjusted pretax profit to be ahead of expectations and it hadreduced its hire fleet as part of a fleet optimisation plan.
"As a result of the group's renewed focus on both SME (smalland medium enterprise) customers and services revenues, anddespite the recent liquidation of Carillion, full-year revenuesbefore disposals are expected to be approximately 6 percentahead of the prior year," Speedy Hire said.
Average asset utilisation for the eleven months to February2018 was 55.4 percent, up 4.3 percent from the previous year,the company said.
Liberum, which reiterated its "buy" rating on the stock,said the improvement in utilisation suggests that the company issuccessfully executing its strategy to optimise fleet andimprove the underlying performance of its core rental business.
The company, which works with customers in the construction,infrastructure and industrial markets, also said return oncapital employed (RoCE) for the year ending March 31 is expectedto be about 11 percent, up from 7.7 percent in the prior year.
"Crucially, not only is the 11 percent RoCE expected in FY18well ahead of our previous forecast of 9.9 percent, it is alsothe first time in a decade that the group has generated a returnat or above its cost of capital," brokerage Liberum added.
(Reporting by Radhika Rukmangadhan in Bengaluru; Editing bySunil Nair)
Speedy Hire (SDY)
