THAMES Water yesterday pleased its shareholders when it announced it would seek powers to buy back up to 10 per cent of the share capital as it revealed its full year profits had risen in line with forecasts. The group also said its talks with London Electricity were proceeding well "on a series of bilateral cooperation agreements".

Thames made "clean" pre-tax profits of £324 million sterling in the year to March 31st compared with £303.7 million in the previous year. The final figure was reduced to £228.1 million by exceptional costs.