Punch Taverns sees 1.4% rise in pub incomes
Punch Taverns has reported a 1.4% rise in like-for-like net income across its core estate "in line with expectations".
The pub company said it had £305m of cash reserves and was on track to meet its "full year profit expectations".
Pre-tax profit was £50m, which included £30m of profits attributable to bond purchases, (2013: £26m, no profits attributable to bond purchases), while EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) fell from £117m in 2013 to £108m.
Punch also stated it was "on track" with its investment programme - 170 core pub investments completed in the first half of this year at an average spend of £90,000 per pub, while 36% of the 2,961 pubs in the core estate received £40,000 plus over the past five years - up from 23% in April 2012.
In particular, the pubco said investments were "partly structured to drive increased food sales".
"We continue to make progress supporting our partners to diversify their income streams and estimate that food sales mix has increased from 22% in 2011 to £28% of partner revenue," the report said.
"We have delivered profits for the half year in line with our expectations," Stephen Billingham, executive chairman of Punch Taverns said. "Our results reflect the significant operational changes we have made over the past 15 months, which are now embedded in the business. We have returned the core estate to growth and delivered a 4 % improvement in average profit per pub across our 4,000 pub estate.
"We are on track to deliver our full year profit expectations and start the second half of the year backed by the increased level of partner operational support that will further strengthen the performance of our pubs.
Proactive engagement on the restructuring discussions "is continuing", Billingham added. "We urge all stakeholders to support the covenant waiver requests to provide with stability and time to effect a consensual restructuring of the group's financing arrangements."