Savills suffers through political uncertainty

With Brexit looming and ongoing protests in Hong Kong, property advisory group Savills (SVS) has seen major disruption in two of its key markets. It still managed to achieve top-line growth – sales were up 14 per cent in organic terms – but economic conditions weighed on the transaction business and exacerbated the shift towards non-transactional services seen in recent years. Underlying profits from transaction advisory services were halved from the comparable period, even accounting for a more than tenfold increase in profits from the North American business.