Enel: raises earnings targets after in-line results

(CercleFinance.com) - Italy's Enel raised its earnings targets on Wednesday as the utility group invests in renewables and grids and simplifies its corporate structure.


The company reached expectations, with a 3.4% rise in revenues for the first nine months of 2019 to 57.1 billion euros.

However, net income fell to 813 million euros, a far cry from the 3 billion euros in the first nine months of 2018, due to the impairment on a number of coal-fired plants in Italy, Spain, Chile and Russia.

Enel announced an interim dividend of 0.16 euro per share for 2019, up 14.3% compared to the interim dividend distributed in January this year.

Looking ahead, the group hopes to exceed its full-year consolidated ordinary EBITDA target, raising it to around 17.8 billion euros, aiming at a net ordinary income of about 4.8 billion euros at the end of 2019.

At midday Enel shares were down 1.2%, while the STOXX Europe 600 Utilities index was down 0.4%.

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