Safestore Holdings PLC (LON:SAFE) has hiked its full-year earnings guidance as more and more customers began filling up its self-storage facilities.
In a trading update for the second quarter, the FTSE 250 firm reported revenues of £43.7mln, up 10.9% year-on-year, as its occupancy rate jumped to 80.7% from 71.1%.
READ: Safestore focuses on filling up 1.4mln square feet of unlet space
The UK market saw particularly strong increases, with occupancy rising 11.9 percentage points to 82.4% on a like-for-like basis.
Meanwhile, the company said it has exchanged contracts for two new development sites and two store extensions in London, as well as four new development sites in Spain in Madrid and Barcelona, which it said will add around 280,000 square feet of maximum lettable area (MLA). The group added that all of its stores are operating normally despite the effects of coronavirus (COVID-19).
As a result of the improved performance, Safestore said it now expects to report adjusted diluted earnings per share for the year of between 37p and 38p, representing an increase of between 23-26% on the prior year.
“I am pleased to report that the strong trading momentum reported for our first quarter has accelerated in the second quarter of the year driven by the strength of our UK performance combined with continued robust results from our French and Spanish businesses,” Safestore chief executive Frederic Vecchioli said in a statement.
"We continue to focus on the significant upside from filling the 1.3m square feet of fully invested currently unlet space in our UK, Paris and Spain markets. Whilst the potential for disruption arising from current COVID-19 crisis has not entirely abated, the inherent resilience of our business model as well as our recent and current trading allows me to look forward with optimism. The improving momentum in our second quarter performance gives me further confidence in relation to the outlook for the full year,” he added.