Chesnara Plc (LON:CSN) has announced its 2023 results. Positive returns from equity markets and gains from acquisitions in the first half were somewhat offset by adverse changes to operating assumptions in the second. Economic Value profit of £59.1m marked a good turnaround from a loss of £85.1m in 2022. Economic Value of £524.7m was 2% higher than a year ago, reflecting the dividend payment and forex effects. The final dividend of 15.61p brought the full year up to 23.97p, a 3% increase over the previous year. Cash generation was good with base cash generation of £32.6m and commercial cash generation of £53.0m.
- Acquisitions: There was little incremental news on acquisitions, with the main item being the completion of the Part VII transfer of CASLP. The Company has been active in seeking deals, and it should be reassuring to investors that several have been rejected, as management wishes only to do the right deals.
- Estimates: A couple of operating lines were worse than expected, which has led to a downgrade to our estimates. The adjustments to new business and operating experiences/assumptions have led to downgrades of our 2024E EPS, to 33.8p from 38.6p. We have introduced 2025E EPS of 34.6p.
