Especially come Friday?
Centrica looks ahead
UTILITY group Centrica’s use of the £1.75 billion proceeds from the sale of its AA business will be the main interest alongside half-yearly figures on Thursday.
The group, spun out of the old British Gas, is likely to confirm it will be a mixture of capital investment and debt reduction.
It said at the time the sale was announced that over the next five years or so it wants to invest £4bn to £5bn in upstream assets such as gas production and electricity generation.
The company is selling the AA to a company formed by venture capitalists CVC and Permira.
The City will also want to find out whether rising wholesale gas prices will result in Centrica increasing its own gas supply price. The company has already warned that any further increase in the wholesale price would put its target for gas margins under pressure.
The consensus of City expectations for Centrica, which also owns the One.Tel telecoms business, is for an operating profit of about £750 million from £694m last time.
centrica, may be of interest
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