Matchtech sees full year in line with expectations

Matchtech said on Thursday that profit for the year was likely to be in line with its previous expectations, adding that it has not yet seen any impact from the UK’s decision to leave the European Union.

In a trading update for the 12 months to the end of July, the AIM-listed specialist engineering and technology recruiter said group net fee income (NFI) of £73.2m including the full-year effect of the Networkers acquisition completed on 2 April 2015, was up 34% on the previous year.

On a like-for-like basis, net fee income in engineering was 6% higher than the year before, with similar levels of growth in both halves of the year, up 7% and 5% respectively.

Contract NFI increased by 5%, while Permanent fees were up 9% and Matchtech said there was particularly strong annual growth in Infrastructure, Professional Staffing, and Engineering Technology offset by a weaker performance in Oil & Gas and Maritime.

NFI in the technology segment was down 6% on the year on a LFL basis.

Chief executive Brian Wilkinson said: "As I reported at the time of the interim results in April, demand for skilled engineers remains strong in the UK and, notably, we have yet to see any impact on vacancy flow in the six weeks since the EU referendum.

"We have seen strong growth in our Engineering division and, in Technology, the market segmentation and sales restructuring we have undertaken in the IT business has given us confidence for the new financial year.”

At 1215 BST, shares were up 7.5% to 363.02p.