Date: Wednesday 12 Nov 2014
LONDON (ShareCast) - Mears shares dropped on Wednesday after the social housing support services provider revealed that it had continued to experience a lower level of new Social Housing bidding opportunities.
It said this had resulted in 96% visibility of the £864m market consensus revenue forecast for 2014 and more than 86% visibility of the £934m market consensus revenue forecast for 2015.
Chief executive David Miles said: "Our Social Housing business has long been recognised as the market leader in terms of operational performance and customer satisfaction. We have increased our focus upon positioning us for future market growth in Housing Management and on continuing margin improvement. I believe the opportunities for us in Social Housing remain very strong as our clients seek broader solutions to their increasingly complex housing challenges."
Overall, the group continued to deliver a solid trading performance across both core divisions and is pleased to report ongoing strong margin progression, which it said was driven primarily by continued efficiencies within the ex-Morrison business.
The board expects earnings to be generally in line with its expectations for the 2014 full year.
"In Care, as a robust high quality provider at the forefront of change in the sector, we remain very well placed strategically to take advantage of the longer term opportunities," Miles continued.
"I am delighted at the success we have achieved in new contract bidding and importantly, we continue to see a positive move in the structure of tendered opportunities with new contracts being awarded to fewer providers with increasing contract lengths. There has been a marked move away from frameworks towards Strategic Partnerships; this will benefit us disproportionately given our long-term partnership ethos.
"We will continue to develop further our services provided at the higher end of the acuity chain, with an increased focus upon organic growth supported by in-fill acquisitions, extending the Nurseplus model across our client base. This will increase our ability to respond to growing opportunities from health and social care outsourcing and the implementation of new localised commissioning models."
Shares had declined 11.79% to 381.50p.
388.00p
