Kingspan expects increased revenues

KINGSPAN has “identified over €500 million in ‘new’ revenues to chase”, according to Davy Stockbrokers.

Davy analyst Florence O’Donoghue said a recent site visit to two of the company’s British production units gave them exposure to roughly 50% of this potential.

“We were encouraged by what we saw. Clearly, there is a lot of work being undertaken at present that has yet to flow through to the earnings stream. The group continues to take a pro-active approach to product development, its regulatory environment and cost leadership,” he said.

Mr O’Donoghue said the reward for this should become evident this year, with very decent earnings growth expected despite sluggish construction markets.

Kingspan’s annual accounts show 0.6% of shareholders hold 75.8% of company shares.

The company’s executive directors enjoyed increased remuneration packages in 2003 with chairman and executive director Eugene Murtagh’s total compensation hitting €713,000 up from €670,000.

Mr Murtagh, 61, owns 24% of the company, which has a market capitalisation of €736m. Surprisingly his brother Brendan, 58, who is co-founder and head of corporate development surpassed the chief executive in pay terms.

Brendan Murtagh’s package came to €729,000 up from €594,000. He holds 4.5% of the issued share capital in the company.

Dividends fell to €11.9m from €29.4m in 2002 when a special €19.773m dividend was paid.

“The dividend yield for the year was 2.7% compared to 2.4% for 2002 based on the average share price in the relevant years.”

The company said its regular dividend has grown at an annual compound rate of 25.8% over the period 2000 through to 2003.

“It is the strategy of the group to continue with a progressive dividend policy so as bring dividend cover to a level closer to industry norms,” the company said.