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Berkeley Group: A residential housebuilder with a high percentage of its developments on brown field land. Established in 1976, the company now includes the Berkeley Homes, St George and St James brands, with important exposure to the high value London property market.
Shares in issue 131.28m (Oct '10)
Currently no dividend (Oct '10)
Forecast PE apr '11 13.2, to apr '12 11.6.

StockMarketWire.com
Berkeley Group posts strong first half results with pre-tax profits up 35.8% at £533.3m.

The group has increased its five year pre-tax profit guidance starting 1 May 2016 to £3.3bn from £3.0bn.

Revenues of £1,607.7m for the six months to the end of October were up by 13.7% from a year ago.

The group said the 2017/18 full year results would represent a peak for Berkeley, before returning to more normal returns in 2018-19 and guidance of £1.5bn of pre-tax profit for these two years would be approximately 60% weighted towards the current year.

Berkeley's objective is to be London's leading place-maker, balancing strong operational performance with a desire to produce homes of a high quality in fantastic places for all Londoners, playing a key role in delivering the 300,000 new homes this country needs each year.
The group said operational highlights included:
- 2,117 homes delivered - includes more than 10% of London's new private and affordable homes

- £300 million of subsidies provided to deliver affordable housing and committed to wider community and infrastructure benefits in the period

- Over 12,000 people working across its sites, including over 850 apprenticeships in the six months

- The Berkeley Foundation has added three new strategic partners to its four enduring partnerships, with over £12 million committed to more than 100 charities since the Foundation's inception in 2011

Chairman Tony Pidgley said the results reflected Berkeley's disciplined execution of its unique operating model which places product quality and financial strength at its heart, allowing for investment at the right time in the cycle.

Pidgley said: 'Most major development opportunities today involve complex brownfield sites that require a huge amount of time, expertise and capital to bring them forward and a commitment on all sides to share the risks and rewards, often over one or more decades.

'Berkeley has the requisite expertise and capital to undertake these complex developments that carry high operational risk, which others are usually not willing or able to take on.

'It is from this foundation that we can create beautiful, sustainable places where people love to live.

'While the political context for housebuilding is turbulent, where there is stability, the potential for growth and delivery remains strong.

'The London Mayor, Sadiq Khan, has set out his priorities very clearly.

'We support the increased target in the draft London Plan of 66,000 new homes a year.

'In our experience, the Mayor is open for business and prepared to fast-track sites that achieve the threshold of 35% affordable housing.

'We are also pleased with progress in our newest business, St Joseph, which acquired two sites in the period.

'The new West Midlands Mayor and Birmingham City Council are showing real leadership and a willingness to make decisions and enable developers to get on with building more good homes.

'We welcome the focus on housing in last month's Budget; particularly the help for small developers and measures to get more land into development.

'It was good to see action on Stamp Duty in respect of First Time Buyers.

'However, other changes to SDLT and mortgage interest deductibility in recent years remain a constraint on transaction levels and social mobility.

'This is felt most keenly in London where all housing transactions are down 18% since last year and new starts remain more than 30% down on 2015.'

StockMarketWire.com
High-end housebuilder Berkeley Group reaffirmed its full-year guidance, but continued to express caution over the London housing market amid concerns about the impact of Brexit.

Berkeley reaffirmed its guidance to deliver at least £3.375bn of pre-tax profits in the five years from 1 May 2016 to 30 April 2021, with at least £1.575bn pre-tax profit to be delivered in the two years ending 30 April 2019.

The housebuilder continued, however, to express cautions over its key market in London, which remains constrained by high transaction costs, restrictive income multiple limits on mortgage borrowing and prevailing economic uncertainty, accentuated by Brexit.

Berkeley said it expects that net cash at the half year would be above the year-end position of £687.3m.

Add:

As announced on 16 August 2018 a dividend of £44.0 million, or 33.30 pence per share, will be paid to shareholders on 14 September 2018 with the remainder of the £139.2 million return for the six months ending 30 September 2018 having already been satisfied through share buy-backs of £95.2 million. The Company also announced that the next six-monthly return of £139.2 million (£1.06 per share) will be made by 31 March 2019, with the amount to be paid as dividend to be announced in February 2019, taking account of any share buy-backs in the intervening period.

Chart looking a bit negative a the moment. For those who are holders of the stock do you wait for the special divi's but risk a capital correction downwards or take profit & sacrifice the special divi's?

Unfortunately, don't know the answer.

I hold far too many Householders and Constructions shares.

But trying to find a suitable bolt hole is difficult and cash with future probable devaluation is not very attractive.

I have charted BKG against Ftse 100 and Households and Construction etc since 94 and except for short-term blips (3mnths to 12mths approx) has done reasonably well.

I had it down to dump but will hold for a while longer.

(I am hopeless at dumping.)

Prefer to dealing costs.