LONDON, April 26 (Reuters) - WPP, the world'slargest advertising group, said it had nudged its annual outlookhigher after first quarter profits and margin came in aboveforecasts and ahead of last year due to a surprisingly robustperformance in Britain.
Martin Sorrell's WPP said organic revenue for the firstquarter was up 2.1 percent. It had said it expected organicgrowth for the year to be up "around 3 percent" and Sorrell toldReuters they now expected a slight improvement on this afterreviewing forecasts following the first three months.
It does not give profit numbers in the first quarter.
"Everything is going according to plan," Sorrell said. "Thepreliminary revised forecasts after the first quarter show animprovement on the top line, but we haven't said by how much."
The group said its operations in Britain had performedstrongly, against the wider market trends. Its fast growingmarkets which include Asia Pacific, Latin America and Africaalso performed strongly in the first quarter.
The more mature markets of Europe and the United States werethe two weak spots.
The group also reaffirmed its long-term targets of aboveindustry revenue growth due to its strong geographical positionsand strength in digital media.
Analysts at UBS said the 2.1 percent growth figure wasslightly below the consensus at 2.5 percent, but they added thatcompared with the performance from rival Publicis which disappointed the market with a weak first quarter, WPP wastrading well.
"Our budgets for 2013 indicated like-for-like growth ofaround 3 percent over last year," the group said. "For the firstthree months actual performance was well ahead of theprojections for quarter one.
"The mature markets of the United States and WesternContinental Europe slowed in 2012, although the United Kingdom,against market trends, grew strongly. This pattern has continuedinto the first quarter of 2013."