Royal Mail PLC on Thursday reported a significant fall in profit for the first half of fiscal 2021 but raised its full-year revenue guidance.
The postal service and courier company said that for the six months ended Sept. 27 its pretax profit was 17 million pounds ($22.6 million) compared with GBP173 million for the first half of fiscal 2020.
Adjusted operating profit --the company's preferred metric, which strips out exceptional and other one-off items-- was GBP37 million compared with GBP165 million in the year-earlier period.
The company said the fall was due to costs associated with mix change, the coronavirus pandemic, voluntary redundancy and international conveyance.
The company said the U.K. parcels, international and letters sector accounted for a pretax loss of GBP133 million compared with a profit of GBP95 million the year before. The GLS business contributed GBP150 million in pretax profit, compared with GBP78 million in the year-prior period.
Revenue for the half-year was GBP5.67 billion compared with GBP5.17 billion the year before.
The company attributed the rise to strong parcel growth at both Royal Mail and GLS, more than offsetting a decline in Royal Mail letter revenue.
Revenue for the full year is now projected to be GBP380 million to GBP580 million higher year-on-year, although mix change and coronavirus costs are also expected to climb.
Dividends remained suspended in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Last year Royal Mail declared a dividend of 7.5 pence a share.
Write to Joe Hoppe at joseph.hoppe@wsj.com
