Partner Article

SSE reap 38.3% profits

Energy firm SSE have posted a 38.3% rise in profits over the half-year, despite reductions in operating profit brought about by “difficult market conditions.”

The company raised energy prices by 9% in August of this year, but said it would cap prices for households until the second half of 2013 at the earliest.

Profits were bolstered by a 27.9% rise in gas consumption, which SSE said was down to below average temperatures, particularly in April; at its coldest since 1989 according to the Met Office

.Performance across SSE’s “network” business, the distribution of electricity, was good with a 19.3% increase in operating profits.

Ann Robinson, Director of Consumer Policy at uSwitch commented: “Consumers will be bitterly disappointed to see profits soaring so shortly after being asked to swallow a 9% price hike. And while SSE has pledged not to increase its prices again until at least the second half of 2013, whether this will be enough to satisfy customers in the face of these headline profits remains to be seen.

Lord Smith of Kelvin, Chairman of SSE, said: “While some observers may choose to criticise SSE for making a profit and paying a dividend, I believe that profit and dividend allow SSE to employ people, pay tax, provide services that customers need, make investments that keep the lights on and create jobs, while providing an income return that shareholders like pension funds need.

“SSE’s balanced model of market-based and economically-regulated businesses, and the robustness of its strategy of focusing on operations and investment in each of those businesses, continues to prove its worth.

“Its commitment to the dividend remains the hallmark of a company that takes a disciplined and long-term approach to business here in the UK and in Ireland. For this reason, there can be every confidence that SSE will extend further its record of annual above-inflation dividend growth, and it is targeting a full-year increase of at least 2% more than RPI inflation, to around 84p, for 2012/13 and annual increases that are above RPI inflation in the following years.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .