RUNAWAY FIRST HALF FOR PADDY POWER - Paddy Power's first-half results this morning show the extent to which the bookies can steal your shirt. Unfavourable results for the punters helped Paddy Power rake in a 108% increase in its pre-tax profits to €40.8m across the business. The Irish picture was even healthier with profits from Ireland up 131%.
Paddy Power chief executive Patrick Kennedy said sports results had been 'very favourable', particularly at the Cheltenham race meetings.
He said its UK betting shops made a trading profit for the first time after a €6m loss last year. Mr Kennedy said this was due to a focus on improving existing shops rather than opening new ones.
He said Paddy Power had looked at entering the US market, but had decided for legal and commercial reasons against it. The company has launched financial spread betting and a Spanish language betting service.
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KERRY NAMES FRIEL'S REPLACEMENT - Kerry has announced that its chief executive Hugh Friel is to retire at the end of the year, to be replaced by Stan McCarthy.
This came as the company said pre-tax profits came in at €132.5m, around 5.5% up on the same period last year. Revenues increased by around €66m.
Chief executive High Friel said Mr McCarthy was a veteran of the company, who had been with the company for about 30 years and had plenty of international experience as head of the US business.
On the results, Mr Friel said Kerry had taken a shorter focus in the last few months because of rising raw materials costs, following years of static or falling prices. This meant more frequent revisions in prices for customers.
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NEWS IN BRIEF - Tullow Oil says production was up 11% in the first half of the year though operating profits dropped 31% to €111m.
Qualceram Shires says the housing slowdown had led to an 11% fall in turnover, but operating profits rose by 9% to €2.4m.
