The world’s largest advertising group by revenue, WPP, which moved to Ireland last year, said today like-for-like revenues fell 8.7 per cent in the third quarter.
The revenue decline markes an improvement on the 10.5 per cent fall reported for the second quarter.
WPP's performance also compares favourably to many of its rivals, including Omnicom and Interpublic Group, which have been hit by the downturn in corporate spending.
The group, which relocated to Ireland last year in protest at planned changes to the British tax system and to take advantage of the country’s low corporation tax rate, said it expected the improvement in trading to continue and result in a flat revenue performance for 2010.
The company has reduced its headcount by 10 per cent over the last nine months as part of its cost-cutting plan.
WPP's chief executive Sorrell said today he expects there to be some positive growth in the first half of 2010 but overall he expects the year to be around flat.
WPP said conditions had eased in July, August and September compared to April, May and June and said they now expected to deliver a flat margin performance in the second half compared to last year.
Reported revenues were £2.01 billion.
The results follow similarly tough trading from other agencies. Omnicom saw a 10.7 per cent decline in the third quarter as key clients cut back on ad spending and Interpublic posted a 14.2 percent fall. France's Publicis reported organic sales down 7.4 per cent.
Additional reporting: Reuters
