REG - Robert Walters PLC - Q3 2025 Trading Update

Robert WaltersAnnouncement

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RNS Number : 1870D  Robert Walters PLC  14 October 2025

 

 

 

 

14 October 2025

 

Trading update for the third quarter ended 30 September 2025

 

Improvement in Asia Pacific and the UK. Europe remains challenging.

 

 Q3               2025  2024  % change  % change (CC(*))

 Net fee income   £m    £m
 Group            69.6  79.9  (13%)     (12%)
 Asia Pacific     33.0  35.0  (6%)      (2%)
 Europe           18.9  25.0  (24%)     (26%)
 UK               12.0  12.5  (4%)      (4%)
 Rest of World    5.7   7.4   (23%)     (20%)

 

 Q3 year to date                  2025   2024   % change  % change (CC(*))

 Net fee income                   £m     £m
 Group                            209.6  246.0  (15%)     (13%)
 Asia Pacific (45% of Group NFI)  93.4   105.0  (11%)     (9%)
 Europe (30% of Group NFI)        62.3   81.5   (24%)     (23%)
 UK (17% of Group NFI)            36.7   38.8   (5%)      (5%)
 Rest of World (8% of Group NFI)  17.2   20.7   (17%)     (14%)

*Unless stated otherwise, all net fee income growth rates are versus 2024 and
in constant currencies. Constant currency is calculated by applying prior
period average exchange rates to local currency results for the current and
prior years.

 

Toby Fowlston, Chief Executive, commented:

"Our year-on-year fee income performance during the third quarter improved
slightly compared to the second, albeit with some divergence across our
geographic portfolio. Encouragingly, Asia Pacific, our largest segment by net
fee income, saw broad-based improvement and UK specialist recruitment grew
year-on-year. Europe, however, continued to be challenging. Whilst we are
seeing signs of sustained improvement in a select number of hiring markets,
overall conditions globally remain fragile. As such, our planning assumption
continues to be that recovery in hiring markets will develop very gradually.

 

We continue to execute against our disciplined entrepreneurialism strategy and
take further conviction from progress made during the quarter. Our costs have
reduced compared to the first half run rate, and our initiatives to optimise
our back-office functions gained momentum through early steps on our finance
function transformation. In addition, our recruitment outsourcing service line
launched the expansion of a significant volume hiring partnership shortly
after the end of the quarter. Throughout our business we are highly focussed
on continuing to take the right actions to drive a return to profitability in
2026."

 

Group summary

§  Q3 Group net fee income down 12%* year-on-year, a slight improvement on
the second quarter performance (-13%*), with fees down 9%* in September. A
sequential improvement versus the second quarter was seen in Asia Pacific and
the UK, however conditions in Europe remain challenging. Interview levels in
specialist recruitment increased quarter-on-quarter, particularly in Asia
Pacific and the UK.

o  Specialist professional recruitment net fee income of £58.5m down 10%*,
with permanent (67% of fees) down 7%* and temporary (31% of fees, being
contract and interim) down 16%*. Excluding Europe, perm and temp were down 2%*
and up 1%* respectively.

o  Recruitment outsourcing net fee income of £11.1m down 22%*, reflecting
the non-renewal of certain client contracts. Expansion of perm volume hiring
partnership with an existing customer launched shortly after the quarter end,
adding EMEA and the Americas to the existing Asia Pacific coverage.

o  Talent advisory saw good momentum in lead flow and workforce consultancy
continues to perform well.

§  Q3 Group net fee income per fee earner up 7%* year-on-year, driven by
favourable job mix and stable fee rates.

§  Q3 specialist recruitment perm placements per perm fee earner per month
increased by 8% year-on-year to 0.92, with all regions apart from Europe up on
the prior year period.

§  Continued progress towards delivering at least £10m of annualised
structural cost savings by 2027. During the quarter there was a ramp up in
activity in the finance function transformation, with a number of
transactional processes moved out of local markets into global business
services hubs. The Group's monthly cost run rate reduced to c.£24m during the
quarter (H1 2025 exit run rate: £24.5m per month).

§  Period-end total headcount of 3,029 down 3% quarter-on-quarter (30 June
2025: 3,125) and down 13% year-on-year (30 September 2024: 3,466). Fee earner
headcount of 1,758 fell by 3% quarter-on-quarter (down 17% year-on-year),
whilst non-fee earner headcount of 1,271 also fell by 3% quarter-on-quarter
(down 6% year-on-year). Whilst continuing to be highly selective in replacing
natural attrition, the Group believes fee earner levels are broadly
appropriate for the current market conditions. Work remains ongoing to
re-locate appropriate non-fee earner activities into global business services
hubs.

§  Period-end net cash of £26.6m as at 30 September 2025 (30 June 2025:
£30.1m). As communicated at the half-year results in July, the Board will
review the potential to reinstate capital returns to shareholders at the time
of the full-year results announcement in March 2026.

 

Regional summary

§  Asia-Pacific: net fee income down 2%*. Specialist recruitment flat*.
Japan (-2%*) remained stable, with trading again strongest in temp. Sequential
improvement seen in Australia (-4%*) and New Zealand (-8%*), underpinned by
stabilisation in temp volumes. In Greater China (-2%*), growth in mainland
China (+3%*) was offset by Hong Kong and Taiwan. There was a further quarter
of sequential improvement in South-East Asia (+1%*), with Malaysia and
Indonesia both up year-on-year. Recruitment outsourcing down 28%*, broadly
in-line with the second quarter and reflecting the non-renewal of a client
contract.

§  Europe: net fee income down 26%*. Specialist recruitment down 26%*.
Sequentially weaker performance seen in France (-24%*) amidst renewed
political uncertainty, whilst the Netherlands (-31%*) continued to navigate
short-term turbulence from legislative enforcement on self-employment.
Conditions remain tough in Belgium (-29%*) and Germany (-31%*). Spain  was up
1%* year-on-year as the turnaround continues.

§  UK: net fee income down 4%. Specialist recruitment up 6% (+12% excluding
impact of office closures). Growth in London (+23%) seen across both temp and
perm. Whilst conditions in the Regions (-13%, -1% excluding impact of office
closures) remain more muted, the absolute level of quarterly fees has been
stable through 2025 to date. Recruitment outsourcing down 22%, reflecting the
non-renewal of a client contract.

§  Rest of World: net fee income down 20%*. Specialist recruitment down 26%*
(-18%* excluding impact of office closures). The Middle East (-10%*)
annualised a tough comparative, whilst corrective actions to improve
performance in the Americas (-43%*, -30%* excluding impact of office closures)
continue. Recruitment outsourcing down 13%*.

 

Conference call

Toby Fowlston, Chief Executive Officer, and David Bower, Chief Financial
Officer, will host a conference call for analysts and investors at 8:30am (UK)
today. The conference call can be accessed using the below details:

 

Dial in: +44 (0) 33 0551 0200

Password: Robert Walters Q3 2025

 

Next news flow

The Company will publish a trading update for the fourth quarter ending 31
December 2025 on Thursday 15 January 2026.

 

- Ends -

Enquiries

 

 Robert Walters plc

 Dami Tanimowo - Head of Investor Relations                                  +44 (0) 7340 660 425

 dami.tanimowo@robertwalters.com (mailto:dami.tanimowo@robertwalters.com)

 Data Counsel (Media enquiries)

 Steffan Williams                                                            +44 (0) 7767 345 563

 William Barker                                                              +44 (0) 7534 068 657

 rw@d (mailto:rw@datacounsel.uk) atacounsel (mailto:rw@datacounsel.uk) .uk
 (mailto:rw@datacounsel.uk)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

About Robert Walters

Established in 1985, Robert Walters is a global talent solutions business
operating in 30 countries across the globe. We support organisations to build
high-performing teams, and help professionals to grow meaningful careers. Our
client base ranges from the world's leading blue-chip corporates through to
SMEs and start-ups.

 

We deliver three core services:

 

·      Specialist professional recruitment - encompassing permanent and
temporary recruitment, executive search and interim management.

·      Recruitment outsourcing - enabling organisations to transfer all,
or part of, their recruitment needs to us either through recruitment process
outsourcing (RPO) or contingent workforce solutions (CWS).

·      Talent Advisory - supporting the growth of organisations through
market intelligence, talent development, and future of work consultancy.

 

Our approximately 3,000 employees are passionate about powering people and
organisations to fulfil their unique potential. We take the time to listen to,
and fully connect with, the people and organisations we partner with. Our
ability to truly understand them and create and share their compelling stories
is what sets us apart.

www.robertwalters.com (http://www.robertwalters.com)

 

Forward looking statements

This announcement contains certain forward-looking statements.  These
statements are made by the directors in good faith based on the information
available to them at the time of their approval of this announcement and such
statements should be treated with caution due to the inherent uncertainties,
including both economic and business risk factors, underlying any such
forward-looking information.

 

 

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