Mitchells & Butlers FY Profit, LFL Sales Down; Says New Year 8-week LFL Sales Up

(RTTNews) - Mitchells & Butlers Plc. (MAB.L, MLB), an operator of managed restaurants and pubs, reported Tuesday that its fiscal 2016 profit before tax declined to 94 million pounds from last year's 126 million pounds. Basic earnings per share were 21.6 pence, down from 25.0 pence a year ago.

Adjusted earnings per share were of 34.9 pence, compared to 35.7 pence last year.

Total revenue fell by 0.7 percent to of 2.09 billion pounds from 2.10 billion pounds in the prior year, largely as a result of a fall in like-for-like sales, with a small number of acquisitions and disposals in the year.

Full-year like-for-like sales were down 0.8 percent, with improving trend through the year. Across the year, like-for-like food volumes fell by 5.7 percent, with food spend per head up 4.6 percent.

Further, the company said its Board has approved a final dividend of 5.0 pence per share, resulting in full-year dividend of 7.5 pence per share, to shareholders on the register as at 2 December 2016, to be paid on 7 February 2017.

Regarding the current trading, the company noted that in the first eight weeks of the current year like-for-like sales have increased by 0.5 percent, continuing the momentum that the firm started to build in the second half of last year.