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* Raises outlook after easily beating third-quarter
forecasts
* Flags strong demand from the U.S., Britain and Germany
* Shares up 4%
(Adds details)
By Kate Holton
LONDON, Oct 28 (Reuters) - WPP, the world's biggest
advertising company, raised its sales guidance again on Thursday
and said that much better than expected third-quarter trading
showed a structural change to its growth rate, sending its
shares up 4%.
Advertising giants such as WPP and France's Publicis
have been in the vanguard of the global corporate
recovery from the coronavirus crisis as companies spend on new
brand campaigns, digital advertising and e-commerce to tap
renewed consumer spending.
Chief Executive Mark Read told Reuters that the strength of
demand - driven by clients in the United States, Britain and
Germany - compared with its performance before the pandemic
showed that this was much more than a cyclical recovery.
"This gives us confidence that there's momentum in the
business," he said.
WPP said its core metric, known as like-for-like revenue
less pass-through costs, jumped 15.7% in the quarter, well ahead
of forecasts of 9.5% and almost 7% up on its performance in the
same quarter of pre-pandemic 2019.
The British group raised its full-year outlook for growth to
a range of 11.5% to 12%, up from the 9-10% increase it had
announced in August.
That many parts of the world, such as the Asia Pacific
region and the Middle East and Africa, have not recovered yet,
indicates that there will be further good growth in 2022, Read
said.
Analysts at Citi said the trading update should increase the
sense that WPP's recovery is "not just cyclical but structural,
creating a platform for a rerating".
WPP said in August that it had returned to 2019 business
levels a year ahead of plan as clients rushed to benefit from a
global economic recovery from the pandemic.
(Reporting by Kate Holton
Editing by Jason Neely and David Goodman)
