(Reuters) - British recruitment company Hays (L:HAYS) forecast full-year profit at the top end of market expectations on Thursday after reporting record third-quarter net fees as international hiring offset weakness in the UK market following the Brexit vote.
The company, which places workers in areas such as finance and IT, said it expected full-year operating profit to be at the top of a market consensus range of 199 million to 209 million pounds.
Net fees increased 10 percent on a constant currency basis in the third quarter which ended on March 31 boosted largely by strong growth in continental Europe, where Germany and France were standout performers.
Net fees from its UK and Ireland operations, which represent just over a quarter of group net fees, fell 4 percent, but showed an improvement against a 10 percent fall recorded for the preceding two quarters, Hays said in its trading update.
The recruitment sector with companies such as Hays, PageGroup (L:PAGE), SThree (L:STHR) and Robert Walters (L:RWA), is seen as a gauge of the economy's health as people tend to switch jobs more often when confidence rises.
Hays said on Thursday current conditions in the UK remained in line with the underlying trends seen in the third quarter, where it noted signs of improvement in the private sector but a tough public sector market.
It said its accountancy & finance, the largest of its domestic businesses, grew 2 percent at constant currencies, adding to mixed signs about the state of hiring in finance, a mainstay of the British economy that may see some Brexit fallout.
Smaller recruiter Robert Walters has said London banks are hiring more staff, but PageGroup said it had not seen any sequential improvement in finance hiring as companies remained concerned about their ability to sell to EU clients from UK bases.