Balfour Beatty Lifts Dividend to Offer 4.7% Yield
LONDON -- Balfour Beatty (ISE: BBY.L) advanced 5 pence to 299 pence during early London trade after the infrastructure and construction firm released its half-year results.
Balfour said total group revenue climbed 7% to 4,825 million pounds and profits from underlying operations improved 12% to 154 million pounds. Excluding acquisitions and disposals of investment assets, revenue increased by just 1% and profits fell by 16%.
However, the half-year dividend was lifted by 6% to 5.6 pence per share.
The FTSE 250 mid-cap company added that it had received 5 billion pounds of new orders during the first half, to leave the current order book almost unchanged at 15 billion pounds.
Operational highlights during the first six months of 2012 included the completion of the London Olympic Aquatic Centre and being selected to manage the Olympic Park on a 10-year contract from 2013.
Other first-half activities included widening various roads in the United States, managing drainage and rail projects in the Middle East, and cabling the Humber Gateway wind farm.
Ian Tyler, Balfour's chief executive, said:
We have delivered another set of solid results in challenging markets and remain on track to meet our expectations for the full year.
We are making good progress on the early stages of our growth strategy in key industry verticals where our deep asset knowledge differentiates us from the competition.
The increase in our interim dividend, consistent with our progressive policy, reflects our confidence that we are well-placed to take full advantage of the global growth in infrastructure markets.
Right now, Balfour Beatty is just one of a number of FTSE shares that offers a dividend income well ahead of what you can expect to receive from a standard savings account.
Indeed, with the shares at 299 pence, Balfour's trailing 14.1-pence-per-share 12-month dividend supports a yield of 4.7%.
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