As the hot summer continues, so does the stream of company news in what’s set to be a busy week for share watchers. Here are three with updates today.
Cheap airline?
Airlines have been hit since the Brexit vote with fears of loss of access to Europe’s open skies being eclipsed by the fall in the value of the pound — easyJet told us last week that it had seen its costs rise by £40m in the month since the vote due to the resulting fuel price rise.
But today, Ryanair Holdings (LSE: RYA) saw its shares pick up 5.5% in morning trading to €11.50 after releasing Q1 figures. That still leaves the price down 16% since referendum day. But as the company was able to report a 4% rise in pre-tax profit and a 12% rise in earnings per share due to traffic rising 11%, and despite a 10% cut in average fares, I can’t help thinking the sell-off is overdone.
With Ryanair still expanding its routes (and staying in the EU), the long-term future for the budget airline looks rosy to me. The shares are on a forward P/E of 10.5 for this year, and that would drop to 9.6 based on 2017’s forecast EPS rise. I reckon that’s cheap.
A six-bagger with more to come?
You might not have heard of CVS Group (LSE: CVSG), but it bills itself as the UK’s largest veterinary group, and that’s big business — if you’d bought CVS shares five years ago, you’d be sitting on a gain of 550%.
Today the company gave us an update ahead of full-year results (due 23 September), telling us that revenue and adjusted EBITDA should be “modestly ahead of market expectations“. Those expectations currently suggest a 38% rise in earnings per share. Like-for-like revenue has risen by 4.8%, and the firm’s loyalty scheme membership has increased by 19%. With members contributing 16.3% of revenue, such schemes are great for tying-in future custom.
CVS is growing by buying up individual surgeries too, and acquired 67 new ones during the year as well as other acquisitions, saying: “We continue to see a significant number of acquisition opportunities“.
The 726p shares are on a forward P/E of 21, dropping to 18 for 2017, and to me that looks like reasonable value for such a convincing growth story.
A Brexit-safe bet?
XP Power (LSE: XP) has enjoyed several years of solid earnings and dividends, and an upbeat set of first-half figures suggest this year will bring more of the same. The firm, which develops electronics power supply components, reported a 12% revenue rise to £60.3m, on the back of a strong order book. Adjusted pre-tax profit of £10.2m (up 6%) led to a 4% EPS rise to 52.2p, and allowed the interim dividend to be lifted 7.4% to 29p per share.
Chairman James Peters enthused: “Reported order intake and revenues for the first six months of 2016 all set new records,” expressing “confidence that we should be able to continue to grow revenues in the second half of 2016“.
With around 50% of XP’s business done in North America and very little in the EU, the falling pound shouldn’t do it any harm at all and will make dollar earnings look a lot better. With XP’s shares at 1,622p, we’re looking at P/E multiples for this year and next of 15 and 14, with dividend yields of 4.4% and 4.6% on the cards. Looks like a decent buy to me.
