Balfour thriving as profits more than double despite Carillion hit

Profits have more than doubled at Balfour Beatty

Cate Gillon/Getty Images

14 March 2018

CARILLION’S collapse cost rival builder Balfour Beatty £44 million, but boss Leo Quinn’s turnaround of the business gathered pace today as profits more than doubled.

Quinn inherited a firm on its knees after a string of profit warnings and losses running into hundreds of millions, attracting an opportunistic bid from Carillion in 2014.

But a management clear-out, sell-offs and being pickier over the jobs it takes on has put the group on a sounder footing, lifting underlying profits from £62 million to £165 million. The UK building arm returned to the black with operating profits of £16 million. The shares rose 8.8p, to 285.7p, or 3%.

Balfour’s £44 million loss on the delayed Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route, a joint venture with Carillion and Galliford Try, should be the end of the fallout, according to Quinn. “I’m looking at a decade of infrastructure growth in the UK and the US,” he said.

AJ Bell’s investment director Russ Mould said: “it will be interesting to note if Balfour can now take advantage of the reduced competition implied by Carillion’s demise.”

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