REG - Christie Group PLC - Trading Statement

ChristieAnnouncement

18/09/2024 07:00

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RNS Number : 5949E  Christie Group PLC  18 September 2024

18 September 2024

 

Christie Group plc

("Christie Group" or the "Company")

 

Trading Update

 

The Board of Christie Group plc (CTG.L) continues to expect to report a
profitable full year performance. However, continuing volatility means that
the Board now anticipates the full year profit to be lower than previously
expected.

Performance for the six months ended 30(th) June 2024 ("H1")

 

The Group expects to report a H1 operating loss of £0.6m (2023 H1: £1.4m
loss) when issuing its Interim Results. This first half operating loss is
principally a result of weak invoicing in its International brokerage
operations as previously announced and insufficient growth in its visitor
attraction software business. H1 operating losses from its retail stocktaking
operation are less than H1 2023.

 

Current trading & outlook

 

We have invested to build and retain a team which is required to support and
sustain future growth and while this has helped boost transactional pipelines
across our brokerage business the completion of those transactions is slower
than we anticipated. The volume of business we are working on and continued
enquiry levels give us confidence in the future success of the brokerage
business.

 

While some volatility has continued into H2 - the Company has just received
confirmation that a significant disposal mandate within our agency and
advisory business, which had been expected to successfully conclude during Q3,
has been aborted at an advanced stage and the vendor has no current plans to
pursue a sale with an alternative buyer - transactional pipelines in both our
UK and International agency businesses are, nonetheless, encouraging.

We ended H1 with a UK transactional pipeline 24% higher than a year ago, and
16% higher than at the start of 2024. New instruction activity from clients
across all our specialist sectors seeking to buy and sell businesses remains
robust. UK transactional activity has recovered well following the
disappointing volumes achieved during 2023, and we anticipate returning to
brokering the sale or purchase of over 1,000 businesses in 2024 (2023: 820)
with average fees likely to be higher in the second half than H1 due to the
sector mix of business.

 

In our international operations, we have grown transactional pipelines
significantly, but experienced weaker than anticipated H1 invoicing. This,
together with the continued investment to strengthen our teams on the
continent, has served to offset an otherwise robust performances from our UK
agency, advisory and finance brokerage operations. H2 invoicing in those
international operations is expected to be far more positive than H1 from a
range of ongoing mandates.

 

Summary

 

As a result of the above, overall group revenues for the full year are
expected to be relatively robust and at a level which is at least 95% of
previous expectations. However, the mitigating effect of our incentivised pay
schemes will not fully offset this revenue shortfall, resulting in a reduction
of our full year operating profit expectations. As such, the Board now
anticipates reporting a full year operating profit between £0.5m and £1.0m,
with this profit range reflecting the ongoing uncertainty on transaction
timings.

 

The Group expects to issue its Interim Results on Monday 30(th) September
2024.

Enquiries:

 

Christie Group plc

Dan
Prickett
07885 813101

Chief
Executive

 

Simon Hawkins
 
07767 354366

Chief Financial Officer

Shore Capital

Patrick Castle
 
020 7408 4090

Nominated Advisor and Broker

 

Notes to Editors:

Christie Group plc, quoted on AIM, is a leading professional business services
group with 37 offices across the UK and Europe, catering to its specialist
markets in the hospitality, leisure, healthcare, medical, childcare &
education and retail sectors.

 

Christie Group operates in two complementary business divisions: Professional
& Financial Services (PFS) and Stock & Inventory Systems &
Services (SISS). These divisions trade under the brand names: PFS - Christie
& Co, Pinders, Christie Finance and Christie Insurance: SISS - Orridge,
Venners and Vennersys.

 

Tracing its origins back to 1846, the Group has a long-established reputation
for offering valued services to client companies in agency, valuation
services, investment, consultancy, project management, multi-functional
trading systems and online ticketing services, stock audit and inventory
management. The diversity of these services provides a natural balance to the
Group's core agency business.

 

The information contained within this announcement is deemed by the Company to
constitute inside information under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No.
596/2014.

 

For more information, please go to www.christiegroup.com.

 

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