27 October 2015

Admission to trading on the London Stock Exchange


Further to its announcement of 22 October 2015, Ibstock plc (the "Company") is pleased to announce that its entire ordinary share capital of 405,500,000 ordinary shares has today been admitted to the premium listing segment of the Official List of the UK Listing Authority and to trading on the London Stock Exchange's main market for listed securities under the ticker "IBST".



Ibstock plc is a leading manufacturer of clay bricks and concrete products with operations in the UK and the United States. Our principal products are clay bricks, brick components, concrete roof tiles, concrete stone masonry substitutes, concrete fencing, pre-stressed concrete products and concrete rail products. Our range of products are manufactured, marketed and distributed by Ibstock Brick, Supreme Concrete, and Forticrete in the UK, and Glen-Gery in the United States.

Ibstock Brick is the number one brick manufacturer by volume of bricks sold in the UK where approximately 80% of new build houses use brick in their construction. Glen-Gery is a major regional brickmaker in the US, and Supreme and Forticrete also hold strong positions in their respective markets. Subsidiary operations include Ibstock-Kevington, a leading manufacturer of brickwork components and Anderton Concrete, a specialist in the manufacture of concrete rail and infrastructure products.

The businesses are major manufacturers of products for the new build housing and domestic repair, maintenance and improvement markets (RMI).

We operate from 33 main sites in the UK and ten sites within the United States. We also have over 150 million tonnes of clay reserves across 23 active quarries in the UK and 29 active quarries covered by 20 active permits in the US.

Bought some @ 164.79p,
asking for premium on a long settlement and not many shares 741 on the order book at 164.80 offer

reasons: Had a large drop from 183p after a placing last week, should be ready to bounce from here as it gets some equilibrium at those lower prices. Current price target is 207p and EPS of 19p so on a forward PE of 8.67

166.10 v 166.70p

Still early days but the share price is up from the price I bought and for the day, but most important the order book is now stronger on the bid side

DEPTH 27 v 24

was 18 v 25 earlier

167.10p 1.20p (+0.72%)

What have change the direction on today's share price, a large buy early this morning delayed, just appeared on the ticker

09:48:55
175.2625
600,000

Finishing with a Candlestick "hammer" would be very bullish

170.10p +3.00 (+1.80%)

The bounce is on and is strong

166.25p

moving ahead very strongly this morning after holding around lows lately
strong order book
DEPTH 27 v 20
Showing a clearly double bottom shape on the chart .... W



useless MAM charts, with spikes everywhere

Britain sets out 5 billion-pound homebuilding boost - Reuters

Britain launched a 5 billion-pound homebuilding stimulus package on Monday, including plans to borrow 2 billion pounds to help address a long-term housing shortage that has become a major economic problem.

The announcement comes on the second day of the ruling Conservative Party's annual conference, which the government is using to set out how it wants to leave the European Union and tackle social divisions exposed by the June Brexit vote.

Appealing to voters who have been shut out of the housing market by years of rising prices and tight lending conditions, the government said it wanted to spend 2 billion pounds to boost housebuilding by using surplus public land and helping new homebuilders into the market.

"We'll use all the tools at our disposal to accelerate housebuilding and ensure that over time, housing becomes more affordable," finance minister Philip Hammond said in a statement before his speech to the conference.

Hammond will also promise to deliver a new economic plan next month, citing a need to balance the competing demands of fiscal discipline and long term investment as Britain comes to terms with its EU exit.

The government also outlined how a 3 billion pound stimulus fund, made up of money already earmarked for housing, would be used to fund 1 billion of short-term loans to small homebuilders and 2 billion in long-term infrastructure projects.

The new fund would help build 25,000 new homes by 2020 while the plan to use public land would enable the building of a further 15,000 in the same period.

Those targets are modest compared to the estimated 300,000 homes per year that a committee of lawmakers estimate Britain needs to meet demand and cool price growth. The country has not built more than 200,000 homes in single year for a decade.

Although the housing market has shown signs of cooling since the vote to leave the EU, a chronic shortage of properties keeps prices out of the reach of many young and low-income Britons.

Hammond's predecessor, George Osborne, made several attempts to speed up home building during his six years in the job.

Trading Update
RNS
RNS Number : 1769U
Ibstock PLC
16 January 2017
 
 
 
 
Ibstock plc
Trading Update
 
 
 
Ibstock plc ('Ibstock' or the 'Group'), a leading manufacturer of clay bricks and concrete products with operations in the United Kingdom and the United States, today issues a trading update for the year ended 31 December 2016.
 
The Group continues to trade as anticipated with adjusted EBITDA in line with expectations.
 
Group revenue for the year ended 31 December 2016 was up 5%.
 
Revenue from clay and concrete products in the UK, which represents approximately 80% of Group revenue, was up 2% for the full year compared to 2015. The increase in revenue in 2016 reflects low single digit volume growth for clay brick and further volume and price growth in the concrete businesses. Despite the release of brick inventory by distributors as previously reported, particularly in the first half of the year, brick sales volumes for the full year exceeded 2015. Growing house builder activity supported a stronger second half and national brick imports declined significantly over the year.
 
Revenue in the US was up 18% (4% at constant exchange rates) for the full year compared to 2015, principally reflecting a combination of higher average prices and the benefits from a more favourable product and end use sector mix.
 
As at 31 December 2016, net debt declined compared to prior year despite significant spend on previously announced major projects, and was in line with management expectations.
 
During 2016 the Group progressed with the construction in the UK of an additional clay brick factory in Leicestershire which will expand Ibstock's UK clay brick capacity by c.13%. This project is making good progress and will commission in the second half of this year.
 
Installation of a new concrete roof tile line at the Leighton Buzzard facility was completed within budget and commissioning commenced during August 2016 adding c.5% to UK concrete roof tile market capacity. First projects using the new tiles, which broaden the Group's concrete tile product range, have been completed and have been well received by key customers.
 
Price negotiations for 2017 with all our major UK brick customers have now been concluded and are in line with management expectations.
 
In the UK, following a full consultation process with affected members, the Ibstock defined benefit pension scheme will close to future accrual with effect from 31 January 2017. All scheme members have agreed to join the company's defined contribution scheme with effect from 1 February 2017.
 
The Group will announce its preliminary results for the year ended 31 December 2016 on 7 March 2017.
 

Peel Hunt Hold 183.00 175.00 190.00 Downgrades

Berenberg today:
"Ibstock (Buy, 34% upside) – our top pick: As the leading manufacturer of bricks in the UK, Ibstock is well placed to take advantage of these strong fundamentals. Its new SM3 plant should help the group take market share and lower its cost base while its US exposure will continue to be supportive to growth. Strong FCF generation will aid its bolt-on strategy and increase the probability of further shareholder returns.
Valuation: 11.7x 2017 P/E; 8.9x EV/EBITDA."

15 May
Barclays...
285.00
Overweight

AGM Trading Update
RNS
RNS Number : 0183G
Ibstock PLC
24 May 2017
 
24th May 2017
Ibstock plc
 
AGM Trading Update
 
 
Ibstock plc ('Ibstock' or the 'Group'), a leading manufacturer of clay bricks and concrete products with operations in the United Kingdom and the United States, today provides a Trading Update for the four months ended 30 April 2017 ahead of its Annual General Meeting, which is to be held at 2:00 pm today at the offices of Citigate Dewe Rogerson, 3 London Wall Buildings, London Wall, London EC2M 5SY.
 
Trading Summary
 
The Group has shown encouraging trading momentum in the first four months of 2017.
 
Our UK brick sales have continued to progress in the first four months of 2017 principally reflecting good volume growth into the new build residential housing market and a return to normal levels of sales through Builders Merchants. Price increases by sales channel have been achieved in line with expectations with average pricing year to date reflecting the increased new housing volumes.
 
The UK concrete businesses have achieved a good start to the year, whilst in the US an unusually mild winter boosted sales in the early months of the year however activity in March and April has fallen back to more traditional seasonal levels.
 
We continue to progress our organic growth investment projects with the commissioning of our new 100 million brick per annum soft mud factory in Leicestershire anticipated to commence in the fourth quarter of 2017. Forticrete's new concrete roof tile manufacturing line is now in production and the new innovative roof tiles have been well received by the market. The new kiln project at Lodge Lane is also progressing to plan.
 
Outlook
Market fundamentals in UK remain robust with the demand for new housing in particular continuing to underpin activity levels in both our clay and concrete businesses. At this early stage in the US building season we anticipate a steady performance in our US business.
 
The Board expects another year of progress for the Group and its expectations for the full year remain unchanged.
 
The Group's results for the six months to 30 June 2017 will be announced on 10 August 2017.

A good steady sp climb.

19 Jun
Peel Hunt
265.00
Hold

Interim results

09:20 06/12/2017
Broker Forecast - Peel Hunt issues a broker note on Ibstock Plc
Peel Hunt today upgrades its investment rating on Ibstock Plc (LON:IBST) to buy (from hold) and raised its price target to 285p (from 265p). Story provided by StockMarketWire.com

Ibstock PLC (IBST:LSE) set a new 52-week high during today's trading session when it reached 265.00. Over this period, the share price is up 45.13%

8 Jan
Deutsche Bank
292.00
Buy

Sharecast - Analysts at Numis Securities took a look at the current position of the brick industry in the UK on Tuesday, concluding that while sales volumes across the nation were expected to remain "broadly flat", supply and demand dynamics remained attractive, and forecast higher prices too.
"Looking to 2018, despite an expected increase in UK production, we believe that sales volumes by UK manufacturers will be flat (as 2017 was augmented by sales from inventory, which we do not think can repeat). We, therefore, expect demand growth to be met by an increase in imports, and this dynamic has historically led to higher brick prices," the report read.
Indeed, Numis added it would "not be surprised" to see average 2018 brick price inflation in the mid-single digits, indicating share price upside for the likes of Ibstock and Forterra.
Christen Hjorth, along with the co-authors of the industry review, said she believed that it was likely that growth for UK brick producers would be a mirror image of 2017, but noted that there were important mix dynamics to account for.
In the same report, Numis indicated that Ibstock would likely outperform the industry with sales growth of 1%, projecting 5% growth at Forterra, driven by planned increases in available capacity. In parallel, the firms were expected to achieve average price increases of 4% and 4.9% over the year, respectively.
"Driven by our peer group analysis, we believe that an average 2019 P/E ratio of 12.5x for the brick sub-sector is attainable on a one-year view. Based on this and an assumed 5% P/E ratio discount for Forterra (to reflect Ibstock's larger scale/liquidity), we set our target price at 288p/share for Ibstock (from 270p) and 335p/share for Forterra (unchanged). This suggests 15% and 19% upside, respectively, and we, therefore, maintain our Add recommendations for both companies."

Final results

Financial Highlights:

n
Strong growth in revenue and adjusted EBITDA in line with management's expectations
n
Net debt1 to EBITDA at 1.0x
n
Continued strong underlying cash conversion1
n
Successful refinance of debt in March 2017
n
Final dividend of 6.5 pence per share (2016: 5.3 pence per share) making the 2017 full year dividend 9.1 pence per share (2016: 7.7 pence per share)
n
Announcement of the Group's supplementary dividend policy

Operational Highlights

n
Ibstock Brick benefitting from good activity levels within the UK new build housing sector with brick volumes ahead year-on-year supported by stock reductions
n
Continued growth in UK Concrete
n
Investment in additional UK brick capacity to meet demand

‐
New 100m capacity brick plant in Leicestershire commenced commissioning in Q4 2017 and will expand the Group's UK brick capacity by c.13% when in full production in FY2019
‐
Replacement of the brick kiln at the Lodge Lane blue brick plant in Cannock on schedule, with commissioning well advanced

n
New roof tile project at Forticrete now completed with good demand take-up from major housebuilders
n
US performance down year-on-year with a slowdown evident from the Spring continuing through the second half of 2017
n
Joe Hudson joined the Group as CEO Designate in January 2018 and will take up the CEO post as part of an orderly succession process

13:20 05/04/2018
Broker Forecast - Exane BNP Paribas issues a broker note on Ibstock Plc
Exane BNP Paribas today reaffirms its outperform investment rating on Ibstock Plc (LON:IBST) and raised its price target to 310p (from 280p). Story provided by StockMarketWire.com Broker Forecasts data provided by www.sharesmagazine.co.uk