Wilmington PLC on Monday upped its interim dividend, after seeing both revenue and earnings rise over its first half.

For the six months ended December 31, the London-based provider of information and training for governance and risk & compliance reported pretax profit of £10.1 million, up 1.0% from £10.0 million a year prior.

Revenue was £59.1 million, up 3.0% from £57.4 million.

During the half, operating expenses widened to £37.4 million from £35.8 million the year before.

Basic earnings per share were 8.00 pence, down from 9.40p year-on-year, while adjusted basic EPS were 9.17p, up from 8.11p.

‘H1 was another period of strong sustainable organic growth, both for revenue and profits as well as continued good cash generation, across all of our continuing businesses. We have a notably strong balance sheet which leaves us well placed to continue to invest across the business, in both organic and inorganic opportunities,’ said Chief Executive Officer Mark Milner.

The firm declared a dividend of 3.00p, up 11% from 2.70p.

‘Our strategy is clear: to grow the business profitably across the rapidly expanding GRC landscape by a combination of acquisitions, which provide attractive returns on investment, and investing in our operations and infrastructure, as well as actively managing our portfolio in line with our required characteristics,’ Milner added.

Looking ahead, Wilmington said that trading in the current financial year ‘continues to be in line with expectations’.

Wilmington shares were trading 2.7% lower at 334.70 pence each in London on Monday morning.

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