The world's largest hotel group, InterContinental Hotels Plc, reported a 30 percent rise in half-year profits and healthy current trading, but its shares slipped on a lack of news about a cash return to shareholders.
The British-based group, which operates InterContinental, Crowne Plaza and Holiday Inn hotels, said on Tuesday its outlook for 2006 was positive as it shrugged off the threat of an alleged plot to blow up airliners and Middle East conflict.
The company, which operates more than 3,600 hotels and 540,000 rooms globally, said it saw "excellent" trading across the world in the first six months of 2006 and now had more than 1,000 new hotels in its world-wide development pipeline.
The company, which has returned cash to shareholders for the past three years, said further returns of funds would be made as part of its hotel asset-disposal programme, but a decision on the timing and amount may not come until as late as February 2007.
The hotel group posted a first-half 2006 operating profit from continuing operations of 107 million pounds ($203 million), just above analyst forecasts of 96 million to 104 million. It added that it had seen no signs of a slowdown in the United States and no weakness in worldwide forward bookings.
"We have traded well in July, and we are not seeing any softening in forward bookings. Our outlook for the rest of the year remains positive," Chief Executive Andrew Cosslett said on a half-year results conference call.
He expected the impact of alleged threats to transatlantic airliners would be minor and he had seen no impact in the Middle East outside the conflict area of Lebanon and northern Israel.
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