Business
GPG Half Year Results to 30 June 2013
GPG Half Year Results to 30 June 2013.
About this update from Coats Group Plc
[{"type":"text","content":"\n \nRNS Number : 5871M Guinness Peat Group PLC 28 August 2013 \n \n\n \n \n \n \nGUINNESS PEAT GROUP plc('GPG' or the 'Company')\n \n2013 HALF YEAR FINANCIAL REPORT\n \nChairman's Statement for Half Year Financial Report\n \nThe six months to 30 June 2013 has been a period of mixed events for GPG. Further progress has been made towards completion of GPG's investment portfolio realisation programme, Coats has traded positively and a new Chairman, Mike Clasper, has been selected to lead that business through the next phase of its development.\n \nHowever, the launch by the UK Pensions Regulator ('tPR') of investigations into GPG's three UK defined benefit pension schemes has introduced an element of uncertainty into the timetable for the transition from an investment group into one focussed on the global industrial thread and consumer textile crafts markets and the capital return process.\n \nDuring the current year the business model has continued to be rationalised and this is reflected in the simplified balance sheet at the period end date, more on this later. As detailed in the appendix to this statement, divestments from the investment portfolio between 1 January and 30 June 2013 totalled £172 million (NZ$338 million) with a further £4 million (NZ$8 million) realised since the period end. During 2013 we have fully exited our positions in CIC Australia, AV Jennings, Tandou, PrimeAg, Capral and Ridley and have seen a partial return of our investment in Tower.\n \nIn March 2013 the Company completed its £70 million share buy-back programme. As previously reported, further capital returns have been deferred for the present time and this is addressed in the section dealing with pensions later in the report. The Board is very conscious of the need to manage costs during this interruption in the capital return process. Actions taken and planned include:\n \n· reductions in Board fees to be implemented from 1 October in recognition of the simplification of the group, notwithstanding the need to address the pensions regulatory investigations;\n· closure of GPG's last Australian office by November 2013...