Vodafone prompts 34% collapse in UK plc profits

Leading UK companies' profits dropped 34% over the year to end-March, according The Share Centre's Profit Watch UK research report.

The quarterly report revealed companies posted a collective £16.6bn in profit after tax for the period, £8.5bn lower than a year previous, with some leading names responsible for the falling figures. Vodafone's struggles alone wiped out almost a third of the headline figure, calculated from the 62 companies reporting their annual results between April and June 2013. The company saw revenues struggle and made huge write-downs of £7.7bn, mainly reflecting the poor performance of its businesses in crisis-hit Spain and Italy. Tesco too made large write-downs, which knocked £1.5bn off i...