Compass Group PLC (LSE:CPG)<\/a>\u00a0shares steamed higher on Monday after the catering giant\u00a0raised its full-year profit guidance after reporting double-digit growth in the first half.<\/p>\nThe FTSE 100 group increased underlying operating profit\u00a012% to $1.84 billion in the six months to March, as revenue swelled 9% to $25 billion on a constant-currency basis.<\/p>\n
Statutory profit before tax rose almost 15% to $1.5 billion.\u00a0Underlying operating margin improved by 20 basis points to 7.4%, with earnings per share up 12% to 72.8 cents.<\/p>\n
Free cash flow rose 11% to $825 million, supporting a 13% increase in the interim dividend to 25.5 cents a share as well as helping fund\u00a0acquisitions in the Netherlands and Germany.<\/p>\n
Compass, which provides catering and support services to businesses, schools and hospitals, said organic revenue growth was 7.2%, supported by client retention of 96%. Organic growth was down from 7.3% in the first quarter and 8.7% in its past full year.<\/p>\n
But new business wins increased 14% year-on-year to $4.1 billion, with half of that coming from organisations outsourcing services for the first time.<\/p>\n
Chief executive Dominic Blakemore\u00a0said the company is operating in “a highly attractive market, with sectors that are expected to benefit from continued structural growth”, and a total addressable market that has historically grown at around 5% per year.<\/p>\n
“Clients face increasing complexity, such as regulation, allergens and data-led insights, and these factors are driving demand for outsourcing across all sectors.”<\/p>\n
The company said it now expects underlying operating profit growth of above 11% for the year to September, up from previous guidance of around 10%.<\/p>\n
Shares rose 3.9% to\u00a0$30.65 in early trading, continuing the recovery from the two-year lows seen in recent months.<\/p>\n
Analysts at Jefferies said the\u00a0results came with a slight beat to the City consensus forecast, despite some softer metrics.<\/p>\n
“Importantly, new wins momentum remains strong (…) and the company is confident in net new accelerating in 2H.<\/p>\n
“FY profit growth guidance is upgraded, reflecting better margin progression. We think results are solid across the board, and should be taken well on the back of cautious expectations.”<\/p>\n
\u00a0 ** UPDATE: Adds shares and broker comments **<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Compass serves up bigger dividend and profit guidance as outsourcing trend increases – UPDATE Proactive uses images sourced…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47866,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[21262],"tags":[23391,15639,24013,21166,24014,5764,20768],"class_list":["post-47865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-compass-group","tag-compass","tag-compass-group","tag-compass-group-plc","tag-guidance","tag-interim-dividend","tag-operating-margin","tag-operating-profit"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116633083976974365","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Compass](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/7aea6aa52995db7f2b5b7a6efbb73592.jpeg\")
Compass serves up bigger dividend and profit guidance as outsourcing trend increases – UPDATE Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n