Publishing and events organiser Informa Group (LON:INF) is trading in line with full-year expectations ahead of the all-important end-of-year trading period.
In the first 10 months of the year, the group enjoyed an underlying revenue growth rate of 3.9% year-on-year, which means it is on target to achieve its ambition of full-year underlying growth of 3.5% or more.
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Stripping out the UBM acquisition, the underlying revenue growth rate was 4.1%.
The addition of UBM to the group contributed to a 31.8% year-on-year increase in revenues in the first 10 months of the year.
The last two months of the year are important, both for subscription renewals in Journals and for Books, Informa said.
It acknowledged the Academic Publishing arm faces tough comparable numbers after a strong performance closing out the year in 2017, but it is still aiming to meet or exceed last year's underlying revenue growth for the year of 2%.
In the Global Exhibitions business, underlying revenue growth in the 10-month period was 6.9%, slightly lower than the six-month run-rate of 7.3%, reflecting the usual seasonality of the r business.
The division is “firmly on track” to meet the group’s target of underlying revenue growth of between 6% and 6.5% for the full year, while continued strong advanced bookings into 2019 give management confident the division can continue to grow faster than the sector as a whole.
In Knowledge & Networking, underlying revenue growth in the first 10 months of the year to 1.0% from 0.5% at the halfway point of the year.
The group is looking for the division to show full-year growth of between 1% and 2% and remains confident it can achieve this.
The Business Intelligence unit’s underlying revenue growth in the first 10 months of 2018 was 2.4%, just slowly below its full-year target range of 2.5%-3%.
As for the acquired UBM brands and businesses, the 10-month pro-forma underlying revenue growth was 2.3%, up from 1.1% reported for the first six months of the year.
"With more than 60% of our revenue forward booked and recurring, we have good forward visibility. Similarly, our increased international breadth, in particular, our strong positions in the US, Asia and the Middle East, leave us well placed to meet expectations,” said Stephen Carter, the chief executive of Informa.
"As ever, the last two months of the year are important, particularly in our more retail and transactional businesses but we remain confident of delivering a further year of growth in revenue, profit, earnings, dividends and cash flow," he added.
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