Lend Lease H1 profit slips

Lend Lease Group (LLC) says it is in a strong position to leverage positive trends in the residential sector, despite posting a slight decline in first-half profit.

In the six months to December 31, the property and infrastructure company posted a net profit of $251.6 million, a 16.4% decrease on the $300.9 million recorded in the previous corresponding period.

Lend Lease stipulated the previous corresponding period included initial earnings from Barangaroo South, which skewed the year-on-year comparison somewhat.

In the same period, revenue was $6.509 billion, a slight 3.7% fall on the previous corresponding period's $6.755 billion.

The group will pay an interim, unfranked dividend of 22 cents on March 21 to shareholders on the register at March 7.

Lend Lease chief executive officer Steve McCann said the group's first half results were solid, and particularly noted the strength of the the group's development pipeline.

"Our Australian and United Kingdom residential businesses are performing well and our US Construction business has offset the tougher conditions in our Australian construction business," he said.

“The group finished the half year with a robust pipeline of global construction backlog revenue of $15.5 billion and a global development pipeline with an estimated end value of $38.4 billion."

He also noted Lend Lease finished the period with $2 billion of available liquidity on its balance sheet.

“Forward sales in our residential development business and embedded returns in our pipeline of opportunities clearly underpin our earnings visibility over the next three years," Mr McCann added.