It is of little surprise that shares in Capita (CPI) were marked down following these figures. The bad news included the impairment of assets in the group's life and pensions division, together with costs associated with a number of business exits. Disregard these one-off effects and gross profit was up 8 per cent to £1.31bn, but the market may well have noted the decline in the value of contracts secured in the early part of this year.
Capita has secured £251m of contracts so far in 2016 against £1.1bn in the same period last year, although the prior performance could be seen as exceptional. More worryingly, Capita's bid pipeline has shrunk from its December trading statement, while the average contract duration is also lower than last year's rate.