{"id":112747,"date":"2026-08-07T12:36:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T12:36:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/112747\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T12:36:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T12:36:11","slug":"ubs-keeps-sell-rating-on-wpp-despite-share-price-surge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/112747\/","title":{"rendered":"UBS keeps ‘sell’ rating on WPP despite share price surge"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"UBS<\/a> UBS keeps ‘sell’ rating on WPP despite share price surge Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n

UBS has kept its ‘sell’ rating on WPP PLC (LSE:WPP)<\/a> and told clients it is too early to declare the advertising group’s turnaround a success, providing a\u00a0reality check following the ad giant’s interims on Thursday, which propelled shares 25% higher. <\/p>\n

The Swiss bank raised its target price to 250p from 210p, which is\u00a0still well below the current price of 394.6p. <\/p>\n

Analyst Jo Barnet-Lamb described the first-half figures as encouraging but said execution risk around the strategic plan remains. <\/p>\n

Second-quarter organic growth, which strips out acquisitions and currency moves, came in at minus 2.8%, beating consensus by around 320 basis points and improving sharply on the 6.7% decline in the first quarter. <\/p>\n

Roughly 100 basis points of that came from one-offs and easier comparisons, implying an underlying rate closer to minus 3.8%. <\/p>\n

UBS has lifted its full-year organic growth forecast to minus 4%, from minus 6%. <\/p>\n

The 13% beat on first-half operating profit was also flattered by the phasing of investment, lower severance costs and earlier savings, according to the bank. <\/p>\n

Management has guided to second-half margins falling by up to 200 basis points as investment and incentive costs ramp up. <\/p>\n

UBS has trimmed its full-year margin forecast to 12.1% and lifted adjusted earnings per share estimates by 1% for 2026 and 2027. <\/p>\n

Barnet-Lamb pointed to signs of stabilisation, with China growing 15.6% in the second quarter and performance among the top 25 clients improving to a 3.4% decline from 9.4% in the first quarter. <\/p>\n

Autos and healthcare have returned to growth, while consumer goods and technology clients remain under pressure. <\/p>\n

WPP expects at least \u00a3200 million of cash proceeds from disposals this year, having completed more than 15 non-core sales in the first half. <\/p>\n

The shares trade on six times the bank’s revised 2026 earnings forecast. <\/p>\n

UBS said it would need to see sustained organic growth improvement and tangible margin expansion before turning more positive. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UBS keeps ‘sell’ rating on WPP despite share price surge Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock UBS has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[129],"tags":[7102,54936,9218,54937,842,27757,223,32114],"class_list":["post-112747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ubs","tag-basis-points","tag-jo-barnet-lamb","tag-organic-growth","tag-reality-check","tag-share-price","tag-target-price","tag-ubs","tag-wpp-plc"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/117054261320638165","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}