Carrs Group Regulatory News (CARR)

5 Jan 2010 07:00

Tuesday 5 January 2010

CARR'S MILLING INDUSTRIES PLC 

Interim Management Statement/Annual General Meeting Statement

Carr's (CRM.L), the fully-listed agriculture, food and engineering group, is publishing this first Interim Management Statement of the 52 weeks to 28 August 2010, as required by the UK Listing Authority's Disclosure and Transparency Rules. The Statement relates to trading and events in the 18 weeks since the 29 August 2009 year end. 

The Statement is being issued to coincide with Carr's Annual General Meeting, which is being held in Carlisle at 11.30 this morning. 

Overview

The annual results announcement of 9 November 2009 stated 'In the current year, in the context of extremely difficult markets, the Board expects trading in the Group's principal activities to be broadly flat, other than for fertiliser, where a partial recovery is envisaged'. 

Eight weeks on, the Board continues to expect an improved result for the full year, although (as anticipated) trading in the first quarter was substantially below that for the strong first quarter of the previous year. Since 9 November 2009, Board expectations for fertiliser have improved, but those for flour have deteriorated by a broadly similar amount. The Board's expectations for the Group's other principal activities are substantially unchanged. 

Agriculture

Sales of fertiliser started to pick up in early December, after a slow start, as the price of fertiliser raw materials increased and farmers sought to avoid the effect of further increases. Environmentally protective fertilisers performed well, with revenue well ahead of last year. The Board is increasingly confident that last year's loss by fertiliser, which reflected a very poor second half result following substantial raw material price decreases, will be transformed into a respectable profit in the current year.

Food

Flour volumes were maintained at a similar level to the corresponding period of the previous year, but margins continue to be under pressure in a very competitive market. 

Engineering

Engineering started slowly, but recent order intake has been good, notably a €6.5m order for Walischmiller Engineering to supply robotic manipulators to a German research centre over the next two and a half years.

Indebtedness

Net debt traditionally increases in the winter months due to the requirement to finance seasonal increases to working capital in the Agriculture business. At 28 November 2009, net debt totalled £25.2m, which compares with £30.5m at 29 November 2008 and £19.3m at 29 August 2009. 

Dividend 

If approved by shareholders at today's Annual General Meeting, the unchanged final dividend per share of 17.0p will be paid on 15 January 2010 to shareholders on the register at 18 December 2009.

Enquiries:

This Interim Management Statement has been drawn up and presented for the purposes of complying with English law. Any liability arising out of or in connection with this Interim Management Statement will also be determined in accordance with English law.

This Interim Management Statement may contain 'forward-looking statements'. By their nature, forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainty because they relate to future events and circumstances. Many of these risks and uncertainties relate to factors beyond the Group's control or which cannot be estimated precisely, such as future market conditions and the behaviour of the market participants. Actual outcomes and results may therefore differ materially from any outcomes or results expressed or implied by any such forward-looking statements.