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22 Apr 2025
Carr's Group : Completion of Engineering disposal - Buy

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Carr's Group : Completion of Engineering disposal - Buy
Carr's Group PLC (CARR:LON) | 137 13.7 7.4% | Mkt Cap: 70.8m
- Published:
22 Apr 2025 -
Author:
Matthew Webb, CFA -
Pages:
6 -
CARR has completed the sale of its Engineering division to Cadre Holdings for £75m, in line with the previous announcement on 16 January. The price represents 7.1x FY24 EBITDA, implying FY24 EBITDA of £10.6m. Revenue was c.£51.1m. With a healthy order book of £54m, CARR believes that this is a good time to sell Engineering and focus on Agriculture. The disposal excludes Chirton Engineering, which is subject to a separate sale process that is “progressing positively” according to today’s announcement.
With the deal having completed, we now incorporate it fully into our forecasts. We had previously treated the Engineering division as discontinued, consistent with company disclosure, but had not incorporated the proceeds. CARR intends to use up to £70m of the net proceeds for a tender offer. We assume that this takes place in early July at a price of 145p, a 10% premium to the current share price of 132p. This would allow CARR to retire 48.3m shares, or 51% of its current share capital.
CARR will now be focused on Agriculture, where the new divisional management team is focused on margin improvement, accelerating organic growth in existing markets, and pushing into new markets (possibly including acquisitions). It expects to be supported by an ongoing improvement in UK market conditions, and better US industry conditions from 2026 as strong consumer demand for beef encourages a herd rebuild. The impact of tariffs should not be material on the US beef industry, with any negative impact on the US economy and exports to Canada offset by lower imports from Mexico.
Our new dividend forecasts reflect the company’s target to offer a dividend yield of c.4%. Our new target price of 175p is based on 12x CY27E PE.