SOUTH Derry concrete group FP McCann has bounced back from a £25 million price-fixing fine to record its best ever year.
A new set of accounts published by Companies House show the firm, which employs 1,600 people, posted a pre-tax profit of £34m for 2021.
It puts FP McCann among the north’s most profitable companies.
Headquartered at Knockloughrim, near Magherafelt, the group is also involved in quarrying, ready mix concrete, road surfacing, construction and home-building.
The latest financial report shows group revenues surged by £83m to £342m for the year ending December 31 2021.
It helped increase the family-owned company’s equity to £202.4m.
The report indicates a dividend of £4m was paid out in 2021, with the group paying a £5.3m tax bill for the same period.
It comes just over a year after FP McCann settled a £25.5m penalty imposed by the UK’s Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA).
The fine wiped out the group’s £20.6m pre-tax profit from 2020, leaving it with a loss of £4.8m for the year.
It followed a CMA investigation into the Derry firm and two other suppliers of pre-cast concrete drainage products, which determined the trio engaged in price-fixing over a seven-year period.
It ultimately saw directors Eoin McCann (64) and Francis McCann (51), handed bans of 12 years and 11 years respectively.
FP McCann paid the fine in full in February 2021.
Looking ahead, the group latest report shows it expects to see growth in demand within the construction industry for its off-site manufactured modular products.
The strategic report signed by director Joan McCann, which accompanied the accounts, states: “We have continued to invest in our facilities and people and are confident that this strategy will ensure that the company will be able to capitalise on the growing demand from the construction industry to provide modular solutions to meet its needs in an environment of a declining skilled labour market.”
