Construction materials firm CRH looks set to be pretty busy for the foreseeable future as the US gets set to launch a huge infrastructure programme.
“But it’s not just US spending on roads and bridges, CRH is a highly diversified business across different products, geographies and end-uses providing exposure to different sweet spots in the global economic recovery,” said AJ Bell’s Danni Hewson.
“Little wonder the company was feeling so confident as it unveiled a very strong set of first half results which inevitably benefited from the lifting of Covid restrictions which blighted numbers in the first half of 2020.
“It was particularly encouraging to hear CRH say it expects to do better than the record second half it enjoyed last year.
“The company is building up a wall of cash which it can deploy by investing organically in the business, returning cash to shareholders through dividends and buybacks and pursuing bolt-on acquisitions.
“CRH’s record on M&A is pretty strong, with a focus on easy to swallow deals, rather than big messy transactions which could give the company indigestion.
“There are two specks in this pretty cloudless sky for CRH – one is the risk of adverse weather causing construction delays and the other is the input cost inflation which is dogging many businesses right now.”
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