BANKNOTE printer De La Rue has announced plans to buy back up to ten per cent of its shares - worth about £95m, but said it still had a war chest of £200m for acquisitions.

Ian Much, chief executive of the Basingstoke group, which employs 150 staff at its cash systems division on the Team Valley in Gateshead, said: "We have been saying for the past 18 months to two years that we have got £200m to spend on acquisitions going forward, and we are still saying that.

"This is essentially a very cash- generative business. We can do the buy-back and still spend £200m over the next couple of years."

Yesterday, the group bought an 85 per cent stake in US election services group Sequoia Voting Systems.

The £15.8m deal will expand its voting services business - which helped run the South African election at the election of Nelson Mandela in 1994 - from paper-based to technology-based services.

The business is expected to benefit from the shake-up in voting systems following the November 2000 election problems in Florida, as the US moves to increasingly automated voting systems.

Pre-tax profits at De La Rue came in at £100m for the year to March 30, against £70.6m last time.

Turnover rose from £524.8m to £651.2m.

Profits were boosted by an "excellent performance" from its cash systems division, where sales were up by more than one third and profits nearly doubled.

The division, which provides cash processing products, was boosted by the launch of the euro on January 1. Its currency division also benefited after printing an overspill order of 500 million euro banknotes at its Gateshead site.