Michelmersh Brick Holdings PLC
03 July 2007
Michelmersh Brick Holdings plc
('Michelmersh' or 'the Company')
Increased stake in Baggeridge Brick Plc
Trading Update
The Board of Michelmersh announces that it has today acquired 809,000 ordinary
shares in Baggeridge Brick PLC ('Baggeridge'). Following this transaction
Michelmersh holds 10,356,869 ordinary shares in Baggeridge representing 25.1 per
cent of the issued share capital of Baggeridge. This will strengthen the
Company's options with regard to this strategic stake.
Consideration for the Baggeridge shares is to be satisfied by way of the issue
of 1,998,230 Michelmersh new ordinary shares (the 'New Shares') to the vendors.
The New Shares are expected to be admitted to trading on AIM on 6 July 2007.
On 3 May 2007 Michelmersh reported that sales for the first four months of the
year were 17% ahead of the same period in 2006 and the Company was seeing strong
demand for its products across all the group companies. The Board is pleased to
announce that sales in the six months to 30 June 2007 continue to show similar
improvement over the first half of 2006. The Company has also enjoyed the
benefit of energy costs having stabilised at significantly lower levels than
last year and from improved production efficiencies, particularly at the
Blockleys and Michelmersh works. The Board anticipates that underlying
operating profit for the six months to 30 June 2007 will be significantly higher
than the comparable period in 2006 and will be ahead of budget for the period.
The Company is also pleased to announce that planning consent was granted last
week for the application to extract clay on the eight acres of land held under
option at the Company's Michelmersh plant. This will secure the clay necessary
for production at this plant for the foreseeable future.
Enquiries:
Michelmersh Brick Holdings plc
Eric Gadsden 01494 758 055
Martin Warner 01442 870 227
Charles Stanley Securities 020 7149 6000
Russell Cook
Anthony Noakes
Tavistock Communications 020 7920 3150
Jeremy Carey
Richard Sunderland
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange