Shares in British gas, power and home services utility Centrica dropped sharply this afternoon after 2002 results left investors unclear about its strategy.
Annual profits were up sharply thanks to acquisitions and higher margins, but stock in the firm, whose main brand is British Gas, dropped more than 6 per cent. This was the biggest fall of the day among FTSE 100 index stocks, returning Centrica shares toward the seven-month lows it hit last week.
Traders cited talk that some big lines of stock were being offloaded as trading volume reached double its normal level.
Centrica shares were down 6.2 per cent at 156 pence at 11.45 a.m.Centrica has demerged from other parts of the Britain's privatised gas utility in 1997. Its businesses now range from gas production through retail of gas and power, telecoms with OneTel, financial services under the Goldfish brand, and a roadside breakdown business, the Automobile Association.
North American and European arms have also sprouted up, and pretax profit has now grown by more than 20 per cent a year for four years in a row.
But some investors had hoped that with these results it would start to focus in on certain businesses, perhaps delivering the high dividend yield of a traditional utility or else committing more explicitly to further growth.
The yield on Centrica shares is about 2.5 per cent, said dealers, compared with an average yield of about 6 per cent on British utilities at the moment, even after it raised its dividend payout 29 per cent to 4 pence today and its shares have fallen 28 per cent in the past year.