Gross profits tumble for Michael Page International

Recruitment firm, Michael Page International, that operates offices in Leeds and Manchester has reported a fall in gross profit year-on-year.

The firm have reduced their “support staff” workforce and say difficult conditions are likely to continue.

Losses were at their greatest across the Group’s Europe, Middle East and Africa markets and in the Asia Pacific region. However, the business made gains of +5.9% gross profit in the Americas.

Overall gross profit was £262m in the first half of 2013, but had been £273.9m in the same period last year.

Steve Ingham, Chief Executive Officer said: “Overall PageGroup delivered a robust performance throughout the second quarter, against a backdrop of challenging market conditions across most of our regions, reporting gross profit of £135.2m, up 6.6% on the first quarter, and down only 2.0% year-on-year.

“We have made excellent progress on our key objectives following the management changes last year: continued investment in all of our 5 high potential markets: China, South East Asia, Germany, Latin America and the United States; increased focus on consistency and efficiency in our operational support teams; and turning around our United States business, where, as a result, we are up 30% in gross profit this year.

“During the quarter we saw good performances in a number of regions, most notably in North America. Our offices in Japan, Mexico, Spain and the Middle East also performed particularly well, as did some smaller and newer businesses in Europe, Latin America and Asia. In Australia, our business experienced a challenging quarter.

“Activity levels remained strong throughout the quarter, but with difficult conditions likely to continue in several markets, we expect Q3 will be another challenging quarter.”