LONDON -- TUI Travel
The travel company, which narrowly missed out on promotion to the FTSE 100 this month, confirmed its forthcoming annual results would show "improved margins and load factors." Profits will be in line with City expectations, too.
Peter Long, TUI's chief executive, said today:
We are very pleased with our Summer 2012 performance, with most of our programs now almost fully sold. High demand in the peak Summer period, driven by our strategy of differentiated and exclusive product distributed online, has resulted in strong lates margins and load factors.
We remain on track to meet our full year expectations, with strong underlying trading offset by the impact of retranslation of fourth quarter eurozone earnings. Our continued outperformance in a challenging macroeconomic environment demonstrates our robust strategy is delivering clear results.
Looking ahead, TUI said winter 2012/13 activity had been "encouraging." In particular, bookings in the U.K. and Germany were up 3% and 9%, respectively, on last year.
For summer 2013, TUI stated U.K. bookings were up by 10%, with average selling prices up by 3%.
Following today's statement, it seems TUI's shareholders might expect a further lift to the travel group's dividend. The first-half payout was lifted 3% back in May and the trailing 11.4 pence per share income currently supports a 4.8% yield.
Right now, TUI is just one of a number of shares that offer dividend incomes well ahead of what you can expect to receive from a standard savings account.
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