Admiral Group PLC on Wednesday declared a deferred special dividend from 2019, as it reported a market-beating 31% rise in first-half pretax profit.
The U.K.-listed car insurance company--which houses its namesake Admiral brand and price comparison site Confused.com--said it will pay the special dividend of 20.7 pence a share which was declared at the time of its 2019 earnings but suspended due to the coronavirus pandemic. The company has also declared a dividend of 70.5 pence a share for the first half of 2020, which includes a special dividend of 15.50 pence.
Admiral made a pretax profit for the half year ended June 30 of 286.1 million pounds ($373.3 million) compared with GBP218.2 million for the same period in 2019 and a forecast of GBP245.4 million taken from FactSet and based on two analysts' estimates.
Group turnover fell to GBP1.69 billion, from GBP1.76 billion due to the company's "stay at home refund." On April 21, the company said it would repay all of its motor customers a total GBP110 million, since they weren't driving as much as they used to, due to coronavirus movement restrictions.
Net insurance premium revenue for the half year rose to GBP350.8 million from GBP349.2 million. Its solvency ratio--a measure of financial stability--stood at 186% compared with 190% the year prior.
"This year's interims benefit again from our consistently competent underwriting and conservative reserving on past years, feeding into another strong set of results in the core business and beyond," Chief Executive David Stevens said.
Write to Ian Walker at ian.walker@wsj.com
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