Company Notes
By LOT II B I.! 11 Y
THE directors of City and Country Properties Ltd. have declared an increased final dividend Which gives a total for the year ended September 30, 1964, of 23 per cent against 21 per cent. Profits have risen from £183,000 to £217,000. The company's properties are now entirely corn- Mcrcial and industrial, as it has got rid of its Unsatisfactory residential tenements, etc. The wholly-owned subsidiary of NV. A. Hills is being hived off on a rights basis-two Hills 2s. ordinary shares for every nine City and Country 2s. shares at 7s. 6d. per share. This will bring City and Country £381,000 for reinvestment in property whilst they still retain an investment of 46.4 per cent in Hills. The loss of contracting profits from Hills will be Made up by income from the newly invested money and also from the big Petticoat Lane scheme, which in twelve months will be fully let. The chairman, Mr. John Tilling, esti- mates that it will be possible to maintain the present rate of dividend for the current year. The company will now obtain 80 per cent of its income from property investment. The 2s. shares at 5s. 9d. ::(1 and xr yield 7.8 per cent, and W. A. Hills shares a little less at around 9d. premium over the issue price on a 30 per cent estimated dividend. Both have good prospects.
National and Grindlays Bank has disclosed a 14 per cent increase in profits at £771,810, which, state the directors, represents a larger proportion of 'true' profits than those published for the previous year. The final dividend is stepped up by 1 per cent, making a total of 15 per cent. It is hoped to maintain this rate of dividend, but much depends to what extent (if any) tax relief is given to overseas companies. The 15s. shares at 35s., yielding 6.4 per cent, are a very fair risk.
International Combustion (Holdings) is main- taining its 30 per cent dividend for the year ended September 30, 1964, and proposes a one- for-four scrip issue. The group profit, after tax, was slightly up at £847,474. The difficulty with a company of this nature is that it has to under- take long-term contracts and therefore it is not possible to give interim profit statements and there may be a number of these already entered into which are not showing a fair margin of profit. The chairman does, however, anticipate a rising output in the future and it is good to know that the high percentage of export busi- ness has been maintained in the past year. The 5s. ordinary shares at 25s. 6d. yield 5.8 per cent.
Sir Michael Turner, chairman of the British Bank of the Middle East, in reporting to shareholders for 1964, advised that it was due to Sir Dallas Bernard (retiring chairman, who retains his seat on the board) that the bank was acquired by the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, thus bringing the bank into the Mercantile Bank Group. As usual, the report gives detailed information regarding the bank's branches, which extend from India to the Middle East and Tunisia and Morocco. The report points out that 1964 was not a particu- larly easy one for the bank. Profits for 1964 were down by £333,600-mainly due to the bank's large investments in dated British govern- ment securities having to be written down because of the lower prices resulting from higher Bank rate. The outlook, however, is encouraging.
The great Abbey National Building Society, the second largest in the country, increased its mortgage advances last year by 22 per cent to £136.8 million. Withdrawals last year increased to 55 per cent and, accordingly, the society was forced to reduce its liquid resources in order to satisfy the demand for loans. The society's total assets are now £632 million, which is an increase during the year of 13 per cent.
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