By Rhys Jones
LONDON (Reuters) - Forth Ports Plc
Forth, owner of the Tilbury container port east of London, says the 612 million pound bid from Northstream -- made up of infrastructure investors Arcus, Deutsche Bank's
"We have agreed to meet the (bidding) consortium in their capacity as shareholders and we have a number of one-to-one meetings this week where we will provide details on the potential the company has to move forward and grow," Chief Executive Charles Hammond told reporters on a conference call.
His comments came as Forth said cost cuts had partly offset sluggish world trade in the year ended Dec 31.
The company, which also owns five ports on the Firth of Forth near Edinburgh, said underlying pretax profit fell 8.5 percent to 33.2 million pounds on revenue 6.4 percent lower at 173.9 million.
Traffic through Forth's ports fell 6.5 percent to 45.8 million tonnes during the year, partly offset by cost cutting at its ports in the south of England.
Analyst Gerald Khoo at brokerage Arbuthnot said the results were "relatively robust considering the economic conditions."
Forth said the market value of its land bank -- the wild card in the company's valuation -- rose to 74 million pounds from 60 million in 2009, after collapsing a year earlier.
Hammond said its board had carefully considered the Northstream proposal, increased from an initial 1,285p, but it still fell far short of the company's value.
Forth Ports, which owns 400 acres of land for possible development including most of Edinburgh's waterfront, held the full-year dividend at 28.6 pence and said 2010 had started well.
"January and February were ahead of the equivalent period last year and that's an encouraging start to this year," said Hammond.
Shares in Forth, which jumped more than a fifth in value earlier this month after a the bid approach, were up 0.7 percent at 1,393 pence by 8:50 a.m., valuing the company at around 635 million pounds.
(Editing by Paul Sandle and David Holmes)
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