Helical Reports Strong Progress and Capital Return in Annual Results

Helical annual results 2026: a busy year, a big asset sale and a chunky capital return

Helical has put out a very active set of annual results for the year to 31 March 2026. The headline is simple enough: this is a London office developer that has spent the year building, letting, financing and reshaping its pipeline – and it has now crystallised one major win with the sale of 100 New Bridge Street, EC4.

For retail investors, this is one of those results where the statutory profit number only tells part of the story. IFRS profit fell sharply to £5.7 million from £27.9 million, but the business also completed a £333 million sale post period end, improved lettings at The Bower, and proposed a £17 million return to shareholders.

Helical FY2026 key numbers investors should focus on

Metric	FY2026	FY2025
IFRS profit	£5.7 million	£27.9 million
IFRS basic EPS	4.6p	22.8p
EPRA EPS	4.5p	2.2p
EPRA NTA per share	351p	348p
Total dividend declared	2.50p	5.00p
Proposed additional capital return	£17 million	Not disclosed
See-through loan to value	36.5%	20.9%
Pro-forma see-through loan to value	20.7%	Not disclosed

A quick bit of jargon. EPRA earnings and EPRA net tangible assets are property sector measures designed to strip out some of the noise from valuation swings and show the underlying earnings and asset backing more clearly. Helical also uses “see-through” figures, which include its share of joint ventures.

100 New Bridge Street sale is the game changer in these Helical results

The biggest event here is the sale of 100 New Bridge Street, EC4 to State Street Corporation for £333 million, with Helical’s share at £166.5 million. That completed on 20 May 2026, just after the year end, so you do not see the full cash benefit in the year-end balance sheet.

This matters because the sale releases over £95 million of equity back into the business and gives management options. Helical plans to use the proceeds to reduce debt, return cash to shareholders and keep enough firepower for new opportunities.

The proposed shareholder return is £17 million, or 13.9p per share. That is expected to be split between £12 million via a B Share Scheme and £5 million through a share buyback programme. In plain English, that means some cash back directly and some support for the share count through repurchases.

In my view, this is the strongest part of the announcement. It shows Helical is not just building nice-looking schemes – it is actually turning development gains into cash and sharing some of that with investors.

Helical development pipeline: 700,000 sq ft under construction into a tight London office market

Management is clearly leaning into a very specific market call: best-in-class central London offices remain in short supply. Helical says new build vacancy is close to 1%, and it has two office schemes totalling 270,000 sq ft due for delivery within the next eight months.

Those schemes are Brettenham House, WC2, due in August 2026, and 10 King William Street, EC4, due in December 2026. If occupier demand stays firm, these could be the main drivers of value over the next year or so.

There was also major progress at Delta Paddington, W2. The joint venture with Places for London bought the site for £55 million, with Helical’s share at £28.1 million, and put in place a £220 million development financing agreement. Practical completion is targeted for Q3 2028.

Then there is Southwark, SE1, where Helical has gone down an “equity-light” route. In simple terms, that means less of its own capital is tied up. The 429-bed purpose-built student accommodation scheme has been forward funded, and the adjacent 44-home affordable block has been forward sold to Southwark Borough Council. Helical says this leaves the joint venture with delivery risk only, and no occupational or market risk, with a targeted return on investment of more than 3.0x.

That is smart capital allocation. It is also lower risk than building speculatively and hoping the market behaves.

The Bower lettings show demand for quality space is real

The other encouraging part of the update is leasing. At The Tower, The Bower, EC1, Helical let the fifth and sixth floors, covering 19,592 sq ft, to incident.io, then let the third floor, covering 10,022 sq ft, to a tech platform after the year end.

It has also agreed terms to let the 12th floor and agreed regear terms on three more floors. Over at The Warehouse, terms were agreed for an existing tenant to take the vacant seventh floor of 12,398 sq ft and extend leases on two current floors.

This is important because The Bower is Helical’s biggest investment asset. Vacancy on completed assets fell to 18.5% from 21.3%, and drops further to 11.3% once agreed lettings complete. At The Bower campus specifically, vacancy is expected to reduce to 3.4% once the mentioned deals complete.

That is a very solid improvement. It also supports management’s view that good offices in strong locations are still letting, even if the wider office market remains patchy.

Profit down, dividend cut and debt up: the weaker points in Helical’s annual results

It is not all rosy. IFRS profit dropped to £5.7 million from £27.9 million, and IFRS basic earnings per share fell to 4.6p from 22.8p. The total dividend declared was cut to 2.50p from 5.00p, with the final dividend proposed at 1.00p per share versus 3.50p last year.

Debt also rose during the year as Helical funded more development activity. See-through net borrowings jumped to £239.2 million from £112.8 million, and see-through loan to value rose to 36.5% from 20.9%.

Now, the company has a fair answer to that. Once the 100 New Bridge Street sale proceeds are factored in, and after the proposed return of capital, pro-forma see-through loan to value falls to 20.7%. That is much healthier, but investors should still note that the year-end leverage did increase materially before the disposal landed.

Another mild negative is lease length. The see-through portfolio WAULT – weighted average unexpired lease term, basically how long leases have left to run – fell to 2.3 years from 3.1 years. That improves to 3.3 years once agreed lettings and regears complete, but it is still a point worth watching.

What Helical shareholders should make of these 2026 results

My take is that this is a better update than the drop in reported profit first suggests. The market will probably care more about three things: the successful sale of 100 New Bridge Street, the improving leasing picture at The Bower, and the fact Helical is bringing new space to market just as supply looks tight.

The balance sheet story is mixed but improving. Debt looked stretched at the year end, but the post-period disposal changes that picture quickly. Returning £17 million to shareholders at the same time is a nice signal of confidence.

The main risk is execution. Helical now needs to let Brettenham House and 10 King William Street well, keep costs under control at Delta Paddington, and continue proving that its London office thesis is right. If it does that, there looks to be genuine upside. If leasing disappoints, the shares may continue to tread water despite the asset backing.

Overall, I’d call this cautiously positive. Not a flawless set of numbers, but definitely a company with momentum and a clearer route to value creation than the headline profit figure implies.