LONDON (Alliance News) - International Greetings PLC, which designs and makes gift packaging, cards and stationery, on Wednesday reported higher first-half profit, citing an improvement in its key US market and a positive response to new licensed products featuring the Star Wars, Minions, and Coca Cola brands.
Pretax profit rose to GBP4.9 million in the six months ended September 30, from GBP3.0 million in the corresponding half the prior year, while revenue rose to GBP119.8 million from GBP92.5 million.
The company said it will pay an interim dividend of 0.75 pence per share, following its return to paying dividends at the end of its last financial year.
Chief Executive Paul Fineman said that overall trading activities were in line with expectations with a "strong" order book in place for the remainder of the financial year and beginning to build for the next.
"We are on course to achieve targeted growth in underlying earnings per share and remain firmly focused on reducing leverage through converting profit into cash, whilst continuing to identify and implement fast pay-back investments and delivering ever improving shareholder returns," Fineman said.
Shares in International Greetings were down 5.7% at 173.60 pence on Wednesday, having more than doubled in the year to date.
By Samuel Agini; samagini@alliancenews.com; @samuelagini
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Design Group (IGR)