LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Peel Hunt reported a widening of its full-year losses on Monday despite a rise in revenues, as it took a hit from restructuring costs.
In the year to the end of March, the loss before tax widened to £3.5m from £3.3m a year earlier due to an increase in the company's costs, mainly from exceptional group restructuring costs.

On an adjusted basis, however, the broker swung to a pre-tax profit of £0.8m from a loss of £2.7m a year earlier.

Revenue ticked up 6.4% to £91.3m despite ongoing low levels of equity capital markets (ECM) activity.

The broker said that following the challenging market conditions seen in February and March, FY26 started more positively, with the Trump administration agreeing a number of trade deals, including with the UK, and with interest rates having been cut by the Bank of England.

Peel Hunt said it was seeing a rotation out of US assets into Europe and greater institutional positivity towards the UK.

It also said that UK ECM activity remains "generally subdued" but could gain traction if macroeconomic conditions continue to stabilise. The company's M&A franchise remains "highly active with a strong pipeline of transactions," it added.

Chief executive Steven Fine said: "In challenging markets, we have delivered an improved revenue performance through our continued focus on diversifying our business and being a trusted advisor to high-quality clients.

"Ongoing uncertainty continued to weigh on equity capital markets activity during the period, driven by geopolitical risks, elections, stagflation fears and US trade tariffs. Our diversified offering meant we were able to support clients through these changing market conditions.

"Despite the backdrop, we achieved some significant milestones during FY25; acting on the most successful European IPO of the year and on our largest M&A transaction to date, as well as taking the retained corporate client base to 52 FTSE 350 companies, including five FTSE 100 companies.

"As we continue to make strategic progress, we enter our next financial year well positioned. In the year ahead we will continue to build the business and drive further efficiencies as we target sustained profitability."

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