Food casings specialist Devro has become the latest company to suspend its dividend due to the uncertainty over coronavirus.
The collagen sausage skin maker it would not pay out the recommended final 2019 dividend of 6.3p per share, saving around £10.5 million. It said it expects to pay an additional interim dividend of the same amount in the second half of the year.
Derv, headquartered in Moodiesburn near Glasgow, said sales of its edible collagen products were up by around 2% year on year, driven partly by a short-term spike in demand caused by Covid-19.
Its sales in emerging markets were up 13%, driven by growth in Latin America, Russia and East and South East Asia, but weaker demand in the core markets of UK & Ireland. North America and mainland Europe resulted in a 3% decline.
In a trading update for the year so far, Devro said: "The Group has also instigated cash mitigation actions in response to Covid-19, including cutting all discretionary capital and operating expenditure. The company is currently not taking advantage of any Covid-19 UK government support schemes."
