Irish marketing and distribution company DCC Plc announced healthy annual earnings today and said it was well placed for further growth, sending its shares more than three per cent higher.
The company reported pretax profits before exceptional gains and amortisation of goodwill of 87.3 million euros for the year ending March 31st, an increase of 22.4 per cent on last year.
"We have tried to position ourselves in growth markets which have afforded us the opportunity to go for organic growth, which is much more attractive for shareholders than acquisition growth," chief executive Mr Jim Flavin told Reuters.
"Operating in diverse growth markets... DCC is well positioned, in these more uncertain times, to continue to achieve strong growth and excellent long-term shareholder returns."
DCC operates chiefly in the IT, energy and healthcare markets in Ireland and the UK, and is expanding its IT and healthcare activities in Continental Europe.
At 1.38 p.m. DCC shares were up 35 euro cents in Dublin at 10.75 euros.
Group turnover was up 42.1 per cent to 1.87 billion euros for the year ending March 31st, while adjusted earnings per share were up 23.1 per cent to 84.7 euro cents.
The company could also point to a balance sheet boasting a healthy 83 million euros cash at the end of the year, despite spending 25 million euros on a share buyback during the year and more than 20 million euros on acquisitions.
"The advantage with having cash is it is always there to make opportunistic acquistions, said industrials analyst Mr John Sheehan of Dublin-based NCB Stockbrokers," which has a buy recommendation on the stock.
"We like this stock for a couple of reasons - they have delivered strong sales and growth over the past few years, and it does have good defensive qualities in healthcare, energy and food distribution."
In the energy field, DCC announced it had signed an outline agreement to acquire part of BP's commercial, agricultural and domestic oil business in Scotland and northern England.