Property investment and development group McKay Securities PLC (LSE: MCKS) reported a wider pretax loss in the full year due to further falls in the market value of the portfolio and financial hedging instruments, while adjusted pretax showed an 11.1 percent rise to £9.31 million.
Headline pretax loss widened to £100.8 million from a 42.39 loss in the year to end-March 2007. Net rental income from investment properties inched up to £18.7 million from 18.4 million.
The company is paying a final dividend of 9.5 pence compared with 9.6p a year earlier, taking the total dividend per share for the year to 14.2p, against 14.3p.
Chairman David Thomas commented: “As anticipated, 2009 is proving to be demanding for the commercial property sector, although the pace of decline in asset values observed since 2007 has recently slowed. Other business sectors are being impacted to varying degrees, and we therefore expect our tenants to come under increasing pressure in running their own businesses. Higher vacancy levels and lower occupier demand are both indicators that the current year is likely to see downward pressure on earnings.”