MIG's full year profit skyrockets to $1.7bn

CEO Mr Stephen Allen said they were confident that the business would continue to perform solidly over the next 12 months, with continued EBITDA growth forecast for FY2008.

The group said they continued to see significant opportunity for toll road investments in North America, and Europe along with selected opportunities in the Australian market.

On a proportionally consolidated basis, MIG noted proforma EBITDA from its roads increased 22% compared with the prior corresponding period to $799 million.

The group said the growth reflected the benefits from the active management of the roads within the portfolio, most notably through the increase in the proportionate EBITDA margin to 72.5% from 68.3% on previous corresponding period.

“There has been solid traffic and revenue growth across the portfolio with particularly strong contributions from the roads representing the majority of our portfolio, the M6 Toll in the United Kingdom, the 407 ETR in Canada, Autoroutes Paris-Rhin-Rhône in France and Westlink M7 in Australia,” Mr Allen said.

The toll road owner said the growth on these roads represented the benefits of optimising tolling structures and robust cost control, the 407 ETR and M6 Toll have returned EBITDA increases of 27.5% and 12.7% respectively.

Mr Allen noted revenue and traffic at APRR have grown 8% and 3% respectively with a focus on operational efficiency has seen improved cost performance.

In its first year of operation as an integrated, the company said the fully electronic section of the Sydney orbital network, Westlink M7 has seen revenue and EBITDA growth of 170.4% and 275.9% respectively, with ongoing traffic ramp-up continuing.

In the US, MIG noted they were focusing on tolling structures and cost control has seen the Indiana Toll Road increase revenue by 41.2% and EBITDA by 56.3%, and improved efficiency through the integration of operations with Chicago Skyway.

MIG noted it currently has a cash balance of $1.3 billion and proportionately consolidated gearing across the portfolio has dropped over the last 12 months from 54.8% to 47%.

Mr Michael Easson has decided to retire from the board of Macquarie Infrastructure Investment Management Limited, the responsible entity of the two Australian trusts in MIG. The group noted they it have decided to reduce the size of the MIIML board to 5 directors.

In June 2007 MIG announced a distribution of 10c per stapled MIG security for the half year ending 30 June 2007, bringing the total distribution for FY2007 to 20c per stapled MIG security.

MIG has provided distribution guidance of 20c per security for FY2008.

At 1127 AEST shares in Macquarie Infrastructure Group were 12c or 3.7% to $3.40.

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