Shares digital

Clinton Cards (CC.) - Interims PTP: £24.3m (£20.6m) Divi: 0.9p (0.7p)

The results demonstrated the resilience of the greetings card market with underlying sales up by 2%. Sales were especially strong (+4.7%) at the Birthdays chain. Brokers are forecasting further modest sales growth in the seasonally less important second half..

Although net debt fell from £61.9 million at the year end to £37.5 million this was mainly due to seasonal factors. David Stoddart of Altium expects net debt to fall by only £11 million by the year end. The group is highly geared - rents are some 20% of sales.

Although the interim divi was increased by 30% this partly reflected a desire to rebalance the interim and the final. The house broker Numis is forecasting a 16% increase in the total divi to 2.8p

Shares says: At 55.8p the shares are not expensive on a PE of around eight.

by: John Marshall