Scottish & Southern profits jump:
UK utility Scottish & Southern Energy Plc posted a 35 percent jump in first-half profit on Wednesday, boosted by strong returns from its coal, hydro and gas assets and said the outlook was "very good indeed". The firm said adjusted pretax profit rose to 455.4 million pounds ($863.8 million) in the six months to end-September from 336.3 million pounds the year before. Five analysts polled by Reuters had expected SSE to report a pretax, pre-exceptional profit of between 424 million pounds and 453 million pounds for the six months to end-September. The average forecast was 437 million pounds. Scottish & Southern, which is raising gas and power bills on Jan. 1, said it had 7.5 million customers at the start of this month, 1 million more than the year before. The company, which has 10,000 megawatts of generation capacity, said adjusted earnings for the half-year rose almost 38 percent from 28.4 pence per share to 39.1 pence per share. It proposed an interim dividend of 15.1 pence per share against 13.8 pence in the previous year, a rise of 9.4 percent. SSE said it expects to achieve its overall target for the full year dividend in 2006/07 of at least 4 percent real growth. The company's domestic customers will pay an extra 9.4 percent more for electricity and 12.2 percent for gas from the start of next year. However, SSE said that even after the price rises, the cost of buying gas and electricity combined would still be the lowest in Britain. "The outlook for sustained real growth in the dividend is, therefore, very good indeed," said SSE Chairman Robert Smith in a statement. SSE shares closed at 1,403 pence per share on Wednesday, valuing the business at around 12 billion pounds. 15.11.06