Intertek share price: Group posts full-year results

Intertek (LON:ITRK) has this morning updated investors on its full-year performance, posting growth in diluted adjusted earnings per share of 6.5 percent.

**Highlights from the company statement:**
Earnings per share (‘EPS’)
The Group delivered adjusted diluted earnings per share of 140.7p (2014: 132.1p). Diluted loss per share after SDIs was (224.2)p (2014: EPS 108.8p) per share, and basic loss per share was (224.2)p (2014: EPS 109.5p).
Dividend
The Board recommends a full year dividend of 52.3p per share, an increase of 6.5%. This recommendation reflects a solid full year performance with strong cash generation, our strong financial position and the Board’s confidence in the Group’s structural growth drivers into the future.

The full year dividend of 52.3p represents a total cost of £84.4m or 37% of adjusted profit attributable to shareholders of the Group for 2015 (2014: £78.9m and 37%). The dividend is covered 2.7 times by earnings (2014: 2.7 times), based on adjusted diluted earnings per share divided by dividend per share.
André Lacroix: Chief Executive Officer statement: “The Group has delivered a solid performance during 2015 with improved revenue and profit driven by a strong performance across our product and trade-related businesses which represent 90% of the Group’s earnings.
Our organic growth momentum improved through the year and margin management remained an important priority enabling the Group to deliver a 20 basis point improvement at constant exchange rates, driven by continuous cost discipline across all businesses.
The Group remains strongly cash generative and we have delivered an operating cash flow of £466m which was up by 15% year on year. We have continued to invest in growth with capex initiatives and acquisitions targeting business lines and countries with good growth and margin prospects.
We operate in an industry with attractive structural growth prospects and looking forward we will continue to benefit from increased consumer demand for higher quality and more sustainable products, expanding regulations, technological innovations, more complex supply chains, global trade flows and the increased focus of corporations on risk management.
Intertek is well positioned to take advantage of these attractive growth opportunities. We have a global network of state of the art facilities, a powerful portfolio with leading positions, a wide range of quality assurance solutions, a passionate and entrepreneurial culture and a high margin and strongly cash generative earnings model.”
As of 07:10 GMT, Wednesday, 02 March, Intertek Group plc share price is 3,004.00p.