LONDON, June 25, 2026, 16:41 BST
- RS Group ended up 0.37% at 607.25p, while the FTSE 250 rose 0.50%.
- Buybacks came to 1.273 million shares for £8.27 million at an average price of 649.16p, according to a disclosure.
- There’s still £91.73 million left, enough to pick up 15.1 million shares at Thursday’s closing price. That’s about 3.2% of the shares outstanding.
RS Group PLC (LON:RS1) finished up 2.25p on Thursday, having moved between 600.5p and 610.5p. The shares traded roughly 7.5 million, well above the typical volume.
No new trading update. The most recent filing was the Monday report on shares bought for the week ended June 19.
RS averaged 58,877 shares a day in buybacks that week. At that rate, the buyback would have been less than 1% of Thursday’s turnover, so the programme doesn’t account for the trading volume.
RS Group spent 8.27% of its £100 million buyback in the first reported month. That’s almost the same as 8.33% per month if they stick to the 12-month plan. Buybacks are tracking nearly even with the target pace.
Thursday’s close came in 6.5% under the average price paid up to now. With shares at 607.25p, the leftover cash can pick up 15.11 million shares. If the programme sticks to its 649.16p average price, it would get 14.13 million shares. The drop in price means about 975,000 extra shares could be cancelled.
The latest share count stands at 472.776 million. If the buyback program is fully used, about 3.2% of shares could be retired. That would lift earnings per share by around 3.3%, assuming profit stays the same. This is just math on the share count, not a prediction for earnings.
Consensus compiled by the company as of June 18 points to adjusted earnings of 41.4p a share for the year ending March 2027. The stock closed Thursday at a price that values it at 14.7 times that number. The total dividend for the year is 22.9p, which works out to a 3.8% yield. There’s also an unspent buyback still in place, matching about 3.2% of the current market cap.
RS said adjusted free cash flow came in at £202 million with net debt at £329 million over the past financial year. Leverage ended at 1.0 times adjusted EBITDA. Chief Executive Simon Pryce said the group had “more than sufficient financing capacity” to fund both organic growth and new acquisitions.
Chief Financial Officer Kate Ringrose said like-for-like daily “price is up around 2% and volumes are down about 2.5%.” The average order value increased to £276 from £263. Order numbers dropped.
Factory surveys gave a mixed picture for RS’s markets. EMEA brings in 62% of its revenue, Americas 30%. June manufacturing PMIs dipped to 53.1 in the UK and 51.3 in the euro zone. In the U.S., the PMI went up to 55.7. The strongest factory reading comes from the region with a smaller share of sales.
Annual meeting comes up July 16. Shareholders will vote on the 14.2p final dividend then. If approved, the payout is set for July 24.
