Chime is World Cup winner

The Football World Cup gave an unsurprising boost to first-half numbers at sports marketing group Chime Communications. But even after bumper gains on these better-than-expected figures, there's clearly potential for more here.

Underlying operating profit surged by half to £17.2 million, pushing earnings per share (EPS) up by a quarter to 11.4p. A confident Chime acted for 1,340 clients in the first half and increased its average fee per client by £16,000 to £73,000. The interim dividend jumps by 15% to 2.53p, too.

"We have had a strong first half driven by our involvement in the Winter Olympics, the FIFA World Cup and the Commonwealth Games," said chief executive Christopher Satterwaite. "There remain significant opportunities for Chime to continue developing all areas of the business, growing market share and positioning the group for future growth."

Sport & Entertainment doubled profit to £9.7 million, up 56% on a like-for-like basis, but Advertising & Marketing Services rose sharply, too - up 39% and 17% like-for-like - as the ASDA account came on stream. This easily offset falling profit at both the PR and healthcare divisions.

And the pipeline certainly underpins confidence in earnings forecasts for the next few years. In 2015, there's the Rugby World Cup, The Ashes and Cricket World Cup, and the year after sees the Rio Olympics and Euro 2016 football tournament. Chime says it's already negotiating contracts for Rio.

On Cannacord's forecasts, Chime trades on less than 12 times forward earnings - a big discount to the sector - and on an EV/EBITDA multiple of 9 times. There's regular takeover talk, too. Rumours regularly do the rounds that largest shareholder, media giant WPP, will gobble up the rest of the business it doesn't already own. It's worth noting that William Morris Endeavor and private equity partner Silver Lake coughed up 13 times EBITDA for IMG Group last year.

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