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WPP plc (WPP)

Q1 2025 Earnings Call· Fri, Apr 25, 2025

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Transcript

Mark Read

Management

Thank you very much, and good morning, everybody. Welcome to our first quarter trading update. And thank you for joining us. I'm joined on today's call by Joanne Wilson, our CFO; and Tom Singlehurst, our Head of Investor relationships. Before we get started, please have a look at the cautionary statement, which you can see on Slide 2, and look at that carefully. So turning to the overview on Page 3, I'll quickly summarize where we are for the year. Joanne will take us through the financial performance. We'll review the strategic progress and then tackle the Q&A. So on the overview on Page 4. Firstly, in terms of the first quarter 2025 performance, when we met in February, we talked about the challenging macro environment as well as how the timing of our new business would impact the shape of growth at WPP throughout the year. And as you know, we had a challenging fourth quarter. And so we were cautious giving our guidance for the year as well as being aware of some of the tariff issues and discussions that have been taking place. We did highlight those in our release. And I'd say that our performance in Q1, we saw sales -- net sales down 2.7% is consistent with what we were saying at that time and therefore, very much in line with our own expectations. And at the same time, I don't want to give the impression that we're happy with these results. We're not. It's not where we want to be, and we have concrete plans to address the areas of competitive underperformance, including some steps like the acquisition of InfoSum that we have taken this quarter. The first quarter did include some encouraging signs. Our overall performance in the U.S. improved in Q4, albeit…

Joanne Wilson

Management

Thank you, Mark, and good morning, everyone. So let me take you through some more detail on our first quarter 2025 performance starting on Slide 6. Like-for-like revenue less pass-through costs fell 2.7% in the quarter, which is broadly in line with our expectations. Consistent with messaging at our full year results, the drivers of like-for-like performance were a continuation of the challenging and macro environment seen in the fourth quarter, coupled with the sequencing of historical client losses, a continued challenging environment in China and the mildly dilutive effect of the FGS disposal on like-for-like growth. The move in reported revenue was amplified by the full run rate effect of the FGS Global disposal, which represented a drag on reported sales of 3.3% as well as a headwind from FX moves, in particular the strong pound versus the euro in Q1. Overall, revenue less pass-through costs were down 7.6% in the quarter. Moving on to Slide 7 and looking at performance across our departments. Global Integrated Agencies saw a like-for-like decline of 2.8% for the quarter. Within this, GroupM was down 0.9%, which reflected growth in the U.S. offset by the impact of prior year client losses and performance in the U.K. and a more challenging media environment across Europe. GroupM saw good growth in India, which only partially offset continued weakness in China. Like-for-like for our other global integrated creative agencies fell 4.4% in the first quarter and compared to the decline of 6.5% in the fourth quarter of 2024. Within this, we continue to see an impact from continued weakness in project-based work, weighing on AKQA performance, a tougher comp, but there will be a further impact in a challenging environment in China. Against this, we saw a return to high single-digit growth within our production business,…

Mark Read

Management

Thanks very much, Joanne. So turning to our strategic progress on Page 12 and then Page 13. Before we dive into that, I think we do need to deal with the broader market environment. I think it's fair to say that it is challenging. We're absolutely seeing much greater economic uncertainty impacting business and consumer confidence. So at our prelims in February, we made the point that the macro environment will be challenging. We've seen that in Q4. And I think it's fair to say that since then, this uncertainty has increased. The decision by the U.S. administration to initiate tariffs has created much greater uncertainty for all of our clients whether or not they are directly or indirectly impacted. And historically, in uncertain environment, not necessarily hugely favorable for investment of any kind, whether it be longer-term capital projects or investment in brand building or short-term investment in activation. But in the time I've been doing this call, we have had COVID, Ukraine war, inflation and now tariffs. There's nothing we're not used to dealing with. And clients, I think, as well have learned how to prioritize their spending. They see it to some extent as a cost in the short term and an investment in the long term. And when they do cut, we should have the confidence to know that they will come back into the market. The impact of tariffs is also going to have an asymmetric impact both in the U.S. versus the rest of the world also by industry. If we take our top 25 clients, 5 or so are most directly impacted by the tariffs on the cost of their product. Of the rest, around half have a more minor impact and the other half have limited direct impact, but may be affected…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Nicolas Langlet from BNP Paribas.

Nicolas Langlet

Analyst

I've got three questions, please. First of all, on GroupM. So you referred in the press release to acceleration of the simplification at GroupM. So does that mean you expect increased cost efficiencies compared to the previous plan? And when do you expect to see the full benefit the initiatives at GroupM? Are we talking end of '25 or more '26? Secondly, on net new business, what was the impact in Q1? And what phasing should we assume for the next 3 quarters? You said in the past, you expect a neutral impact for the full year. Is it still the case? And finally, on margin, it seems there is a lot of headwind in H1 and then better trend for H2. So what sort of margin decline should we assume for H1?

Mark Read

Management

Okay. Well, I think I'll let Joanne take the questions from the financial business. Just one comment on GroupM. I think we are expecting strategic progress from today as a result of the actions that we've taken both last year, also this year with InfoSum. So that's ongoing. I think Joanne can talk to you about how you think about that from a financial question. And I think your first and third questions are largely related to each other, but Joanne?

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes. Thanks, Nicolas. So on GroupM, Brian set out his 5 priorities in February, and he and the team are executing against those. And that will build on some of the simplification work that we did last year to simplify both how we operate, drive more client-centric operating model and simplify our go-to-market. There will be cost efficiencies as a result of that. But I think more importantly, it sets GroupM up to deliver market and above-market growth over time. In terms of the impact on the P&L, we do expect to see an impact on the first half margin from that for the full year, we expect it to be broadly neutral in 2025. And so most of the benefits will be in 2026 just from a pure P&L perspective. In terms of the net new business impact in Q1, it was slightly down year-on-year, and that reflects some of the loss and new business activity. In terms of the next 3 quarters, I would just reiterate what I said in February, where we said that we expect in the first half net new business to be a drag, just reflecting those historical client losses that we saw in 2024 and really seeing the full impact of those in H1. In H2, we'll benefit more from the ramp-up of recent new business wins, which will help offset some of those losses. So a drag in H1 and a better performance in H2 from that new business. And then in terms of margin, there's 2 factors as you really think about margin through this year. In H1, we talked about the impact of that, but also our performance, we've talked about it improving through the year. And therefore, that H1 top line performance will have an impact on our operating leverage and on margin. So those are really 2 factors to think about in H1. But I think it's important to reiterate that we are delivering -- we expect to deliver flat margin for the year, excluding FX, and that really is driven by the full year benefit of the structural cost actions that we took last year, continue to be very disciplined around our discretionary spend and delivering back-office efficiencies, which is also enabling us to invest in open AI and data.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Simon Baker from Bernstein.

Simon Baker

Analyst

So three quick questions, please. Firstly, you mentioned the economic uncertainty has increased. I just wondered at a high level, what your thoughts are in terms of the way that the ad market behaved versus, say, the last major downturn in 2009. I mean clearly, social media is a lot more, digital is a lot more marketing funnels, et cetera. So the question really is, today, is it faster or slower to wind up and wind down in terms of marketing campaigns? And similarly, is it sort of sticky or less sticky today, please? And the second question is, any early thoughts in terms of the third quarter versus fourth quarter phasing, specifically in terms of the way that the China and net newness and improving tech spend factors all sort of interrelate whether the third quarter is sort of broadly the same as the fourth quarter or whether you would say anything in terms of the bias there. And finally, one for Joanne please, in terms of the Kantar Group tax reference base value. Have you made any comments on that? Can you give any indication on the tax reference value, please?

Mark Read

Management

Okay. Well, I'll take the first question perhaps and as I think I've been around most of that time and Joanne can take second. Look, I think you referenced 2009 as the last major downturn. I think there was COVID in between. And then I think a couple of years ago, actually exactly the same point of the year we had what happened in Ukraine, maybe that's before the prelims. Look, I think that I don't know that we sit today looking at 2025 as we would have looked at 2009. I guess there's a very broad range of outcomes where we are today and at the most severe it could be, but I don't think that, that is what people expect to happen. I mean the major banks have a range of probabilities on a U.S. recession rather than a certainty. I do think that clients have learned from COVID and Ukraine. I said in the statement that the marketing is a cost in the short term and an investment in the long term. And there's no doubt that faced by pressures, they balance it out. I think you saw the results from Unilever, Nestlé, P&G yesterday, and you can see it in our top clients, they're continuing to prioritize sort of ongoing marketing investments and the pressure. I think as we identified in Q4 is more around the discretionary areas of spend. And -- but we have to see what happens with tariffs. I don't think things will be fast or slower than -- maybe they'll be a little bit faster because people had commitments maybe because people couldn't spend, I could argue it will be faster because people have commitments before and they couldn't change those commitments. I could argue that clients are more willing to wait and see because they can pull things more quickly if they need to. So you can make the argument one way or other. I think it's really -- until we get better clarity on what's actually going to happen with tariffs, I don't think people feel we have clarity now, we're not yet going to see a major pullback in spending until we have one, clarity on tariffs or two, clarity on the direction of the economy. And so I spoke to a number of clients over the last few days ahead of this call. I think to date, we haven't seen any major step down beyond what I think for us is already a relatively cautious outlook for the year. So I hope that gives you some sort of color on what we're seeing, Joanne.

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes, Simon, we don't guide by quarter, but just as you think about H2, obviously, Q3 is a tougher comp of 0.5%, Q4 was down 2.3%. You specifically mentioned China, it's balance comps between 3 in Q4. And we'll see the impacts of net new business and that ramp-up as I've talked about as we go through the year. So overall, I think at this point, it's probably fair to assume that it will be very balanced between Q3 and Q4. And then on the Kantar tax reference, making good progress in Kantar. I think we need to see what happens with the remaining business. There will be some tax, but I don't think it will be significant just based on the structure of our business.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Adrien de Saint Hilaire from Bank of America.

Adrien de Saint Hilaire

Analyst

So a few questions or points if that's okay. So I think the link between the advertising market and the economy is pretty clear, but maybe what's less clear to me is the link between ad spending and the agency's organic sales growth. So could you just elaborate a bit in terms of how your fee structure has evolved? How much of your revenue is tied to actual media dollar spending or how much is based on retainers? Secondly, I think, Joanne, you highlighted that you assume that new business contribution would be a positive contribution in H2. But since you provided that guidance, Coke was lost. I think there were some headlines about PayPal the other day. Mars is under review, and I think you're defending that account. So what sort of elements do you have to be sure that H2 is going to be positive indeed for net new business? And then thirdly, if I look at your performance by sector, automotive was really quite strong in Q1. Do you think there was maybe some pull forward there in terms of spending ahead of tariffs or anything that you would call out because that seems a bit counterintuitive.

Mark Read

Management

Yes. Look, I think, on your last question, just to tackle that directly. I don't think there was any sort of pull forward. I think that we've had some good new business success and expanded our assignments for some of our automotive clients, and they are -- they have been spending. I think it's fair to say it's one of the sectors that could be most affected, but that may not be the pattern that goes through the year. But to date, again, even in that sector, we haven't seen any specific pullbacks, the outlook is too uncertain. I think on your first question around the relationship -- the ad market and the economy on ad spend, basically ad spend organic. I mean ultimately, they're clearly related. I mean, clients' investments with us are linked to the overall ad spending, whether our fee arrangements are linked to business success or billings or indeed retainers, clients have the ability to vary those up or down at their discretion. And so I think that if clients pull back at spending in a major way, that would clearly have an impact on our fees, whether or not we have a retainer. I don't -- no retainer sadly is forever. At the same time, as I said, we haven't yet seen a degree of pullback from clients. Although we have been maybe more cautious than some of our peers from the beginning of the year, perhaps as we reported a few weeks later and perhaps because we saw some of the impact on discretionary spend in Q4 that perhaps others didn't see for the year overall. So I think that's a way to think about it. Joanne, do you want to talk about the new business phasing.

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes. So just in terms of the comps to H2, I think I'll say a few things on this, Adrien. So first of all, we have talked about that ramp-up of new wins from H2 last year, which we'll see a fuller impact from that in H2 than we have done in H1, which will help offset some of those historical client losses. Second thing I'd say is you talked about Coke and PayPal, but we've also seen new business wins in the first quarter. So Electronic Arts, Heineken, obviously that we've shared in the release. And linked to that, I'd say the pipeline is healthy, so broadly at the same level as last year. And we have seen good momentum of VML and Burson that has come through a lot of the merger activity that they were focused on last year. So we'd expect to continue to improve that new business performance as we go through the balance of the year. And I think the final thing just to say is we talk a lot about new clients and new client wins and losses, but there are other factors. So we talked about growth with our existing clients, top 25 growing at 2.5%. There is plenty of headroom with our existing clients. We're seeing our existing clients move more towards integrated opportunities. And so we see an opportunity to continue to grow with those existing clients. I think we need to think about that as well as new business wins as we look at the second half.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Steve Liechti from Deutsche Numis.

Steve Liechti

Analyst

Yes. I've just got two left, actually. One is on GroupM in the first quarter. Can you just explain your comments on Europe a little bit more. Just I guess that minus 0.9% could be a bit by surprise. And what's the danger that European pressure continues through into further quarters. So just more clarity there. And then the second question is your comments on Healthcare like-for-like being relatively more stable. I don't know if I got it wrong, but I thought Pfizer was still a drag into the first quarter and a bit into the maybe the second quarter as well. So just help me there in terms of that better performance than I expected.

Mark Read

Management

Yes. So on healthcare, I think Pfizer was a drag in Q1. I think it stoped -- I mean amazing decision was made in May 2023 was still a drag in Q1. So I think it stops from Q2 onwards. But we have had some success with other health care clients. And so I think that's provided a better environment on healthcare. Joanne, do you want talk about GroupM in Europe?

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes. In Europe, I think if you look at Western Continental Europe rather the U.K. where the U.K. was really impacted for some of these client losses. We have a tougher comp. But in media, specifically, we saw some weakness in the environment, particularly in Germany and France. I'm not vague on, I guess, the share of clients that we have in media, and we have a weaker comp in Q2. So we'll have to see how that plays through in the second quarter. But it was really that tier where we just saw softness, which is more macro related than anything else, Steve.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Lisa Yang from Goldman Sachs.

Lisa Yang

Analyst

I have a few questions, please. So firstly, just on the cost. I mean, you mentioned the cost flexibility that will help you mitigate the macro uncertainty. Can you maybe talk about the actions you're taking currently? And what are the main sort of levers you have if the top line were to deteriorate further? Maybe you maybe quantify the size of your -- the freelancers, how much discretionary spend, the size of bonuses, I think that would be helpful. That's the first question. Secondly, just in terms of the actions taken at GroupM since the start of 2024. You mentioned you've seen some encouraging signs. Maybe can you give us a bit more detail in terms of how that has fed through in terms of client retention or expansion of scope or that new business wins, why accelerating the simplification today or this year? And how much more simplification is there to come in other years? Or do you think this is the last leg and help just to understand like how that could basically help the GroupM return to growth. And just the third question, just on the level of new business. Do you expect to see any sort of slowdown in the overall lab marketing pitch given the level of certainty? Or do you expect to see maybe a pickup going forward? And how do you think -- how do you assess potential risk versus opportunity for WPP for the rest of the year?

Mark Read

Management

Okay. Well, I’ll tackle the GroupM and new business question. And look, I think on GroupM, as you know, as a reference, Pfizer, decision made in May 2023 is still weighing on our results in the first quarter of 2025. So the impact on the business is very long term. And I think GroupM didn’t perform as we had wanted in Q1. And some of that is a result of decisions made some time ago. If you look at the sort of the big new business wins in GroupM last year, we did retain and expand our Unilever relationship. We did win J&J in North America, and we did win Amazon outside the United States. And those are 3 of the world’s 10 biggest advertisers. So we are not without our success in new business, and we did retain EA in Q1, again, competitively. We won that business against some of the toughest competition in the industry. Now it’s true. We didn’t retain Volvo after pitch. And while we’re renewing it overall Coca-Cola relationship, we won’t be working with them in North America. So it is balanced, but I do think that we are seeing more competitive success in new business, and we can beat the best when we’re at our best on the best day. And the InfoSum transaction has – is going to strengthen significantly our data proposition and we’re seeing that with clients. So I think greater clarity on that is perhaps the thing that we have been missing a little bit. And one of the reasons we brought Brian back was to strengthen the growth of proprietary media, which would drive both financial success and a little bit greater financial flexibility. So I think we know what we need to do in our media business, and…

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes. So Lisa, thanks for the question. So on -- I think in 2024, we demonstrated an ability even when the top line is softer to really manage up through the P&L, and we set the margin forward in 2024. As we look at this year, we will benefit from the annualization of the structural cost actions that we took last year. But in addition, we continue to take action on headcount where we see that softer top line. We have a flexible cost base, and I think we've demonstrated, as I said, that we do that well. You specifically asked about freelancers. Freelancers make up about high single-digit proportion of our staff costs, and we manage those tightly. We've seen improvements in that as we've gone through the last 12 to 18 months. And the other bucket to look at and that we've talked about before is the back office efficiencies. I'm encouraged by the progress that we've made in those. We've seen back office costs coming on and there's an opportunity to do more of that, and we're focused on that. And that's partly enabling us to make the right investment in our business over the medium term. And we've called out that investment in open AI and data. And finally, just as I'd say, on discretionary spend, we are very disciplined. I think we've all learned how to be disciplined as we work through COVID on discretionary spend and we carry that into the business. And we have a number of levers around discretionary spend that we can pull as we go through a tougher external environment.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Adam Berlin from UBS.

Adam Berlin

Analyst

I've still got three questions, if that's okay. My first question is when you look across now you're the fourth of the large agencies to report, the growth across all agencies on average was about 0.5%, which was the lowest quarter we've had since, I think, the first quarter 2021. Do you have any theory on why the sector was so weak in this quarter? I know there's been a lot of business changing hands, but really appreciate any thoughts you have on that and why it should improve in the rest of the year? That's the first question. Second question is another quarter where AKQA continued to be very weak and was depressed growth in creative agencies. Is this -- should we be thinking this like an R/GA Huge situation that we saw at IPG? Like do you -- is this an asset that you may need to dispose off to kind of improve the growth? Or are there some reasons that you can explain about why things should improve, and it's different from what we saw within those assets in IPG? And then the third question I had was what you're saying about Q2 is similar, so let's say, minus 2.7% again, H2 would need to be positive to get to the midpoint of the range. I'm just trying to understand, is that realistic? Should we be thinking more at the bottom end of the range? Or is the change in new business wins very material in H2 and therefore, that allows you to have a positive second half even as macro potentially toughens?

Mark Read

Management

Yes. I think on your last question, I know you've been looking at a sort of change in new business quarter-by-quarter balancing the balance of the year, but I'll let Joanne tackle that. I think on your first question, why is it 0.5% and why is it the weakest quarter since Q3? I think that's the economy. I mean you only have to look at what's going on and we saw some of it in Q4 maybe ahead of our peers weighing on discretionary spend and maybe smaller companies. We are seeing, as you've seen in our numbers, strong spend from our biggest clients. Maybe we're gaining some share with our biggest clients, but also I think that big companies continue to invest behind ongoing marketing, but things are a little bit tougher around sort of digital technology areas, more discretionary spend. . I think that links to your second question, and there have been management change to AKQA. Actually, although we haven't yet seen it in the results, AKQA had a very good first quarter in terms of new business wins. We are looking at performance of that unit improving over the year. I don't think we want to do what IPG did with R/GA and Huge. Frankly, our job and the reason we get paid is to fix businesses that we have in our portfolio. I think that AKQA is a very strong business. Joanne has built an amazingly strong agency with a very strong brand. They get amazing access to new business opportunities and talent. And the read-through from R/GA and Huge, I'd say is the economic outlook on that sector has been tough. But within that, I think that we have a really strong asset, and our job is to put the right management in place and get the business growing. And that's what we're very focused on, not just disposing of it. We're not ready to surrender yet. I mean, Joanne, do you want to talk about the guidance and expectations for the first half?

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes, our guidance for the full year, which we're reiterating today is really based on no net new business impacts. We've talked about the sequencing of that and client spending plans as they are today. And as new business ramps up, we'll see a benefit in the second half. And we also talked about existing our largest clients, the growth of the largest clients. We were very thoughtful when we set our guidance for the full year, as we talked about at the time, we started to see talk of tariff, and we exited 2024 a little bit softer than what we were expecting. And so we built a range of outcomes into that guidance for the full year. It's too early to narrow the guidance or reiterating today. I think we'll have to see how events -- recent events play through in the balance of the year before we look at narrowing the guidance.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Laura Metayer from Morgan Stanley.

Laura Metayer

Analyst

Two questions from me, please. The first one is on InfoSum. Do you mind talking a little bit about the competitive environment? Who do you consider is the closest competitor to InfoSum? And how quickly do you think you can integrate it to WPP and GroupM more specifically? And how -- like when do you expect to see benefit from it? And then the second question is more on the visibility that you have into revenues. I think you've talked about this, so it's more of a follow-up question. Is there a proportion of the revenues that are in '25 that is guaranteed today where you have full visibility? Or do you mean that all of the revenues could basically be impacted by the macro environment?

Mark Read

Management

So on InfoSum, I think that actually, their 2 biggest competitors, both been bought by cloud providers to integrate into their cloud data platform. So I think it shows the attraction of the sector. There’s not necessarily stand-alone businesses out there that do something similar. It takes a different approach to the application of data from classic first-party data systems. The classic sort of CRM-based system is you see a cookie or you see a phone number or you see an e-mail address and you try to use it identified to link one dataset to another. InfoSum takes a more AI-driven, federated learning is a technical term, approach to combining those data sets. It’s both more privacy compliant but also more nuanced. And because of that, it enables us to take that data into more premium media environment. Some of the social platforms don’t let sort of traditional systems integrate into them. So it gives us a broader range of media environments for our clients, which is important. In terms of the integration, I mean, given the relationships within the business and the CEO has taken on a role with GroupM. I think it’s pretty seamless. It’s as fast as it takes to integrate InfoSum into a client, which I believe can be done in a matter of days and weeks. So they’re already working with existing clients. I mean they work with Coca-Cola in Europe already and many of our media partners. So I think it’s really sort of integrated from Day 1 and it will only get stronger as time as we bring more data sets and more media owners into the ecosystem. Joanne, do you want to take that?

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes, of course. Thanks, Laura. So in terms of visibility, the vast majority of our clients and large global clients, and we have multiyear contracts with them. So to that extent, there is a good level of visibility into their spending plans for the year. But of course, when the macro environment changes, those spending plans cut and we've seen that in past tougher macro environments. But as we said, our guidance for the full year reflects that because we saw some of that in Q4. We also talked about project-based spend. So that really impacts some of our smaller agencies and agencies like AKQA who tend to do more digital work. And that is more discretionary spend for clients, which it is -- there's more flexibility for clients to either delay those projects or cut those projects. And that's not something that we've seen in the last 12 months or so. But obviously, good visibility into the next quarter and also in terms of the net new business that we have secured already on the pipeline and that visibility improves through the year.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Julien Roch from Barclays.

Julien Roch

Analyst

Three questions, please. Revisiting a full year new business, now that you have more clarity, is that fair to say that new business was about minus 2% last year, it should be about 0 this year based on what has been done so far and excluding future wins and losses? Second question is how bad does organic need to be before you cannot be around flat margin? Is it minus 3%, minus 4%, minus 5%? And then on kind of macro and reiterating guidance, now it's pretty obvious to everybody that you are a macro-sensitive business, right? And IPG yesterday was very clear that their guidance reiteration was based on current performance and clients not changing behavior. But if macro is weakening, it could change guidance. Now what about you? I mean, normally, the answer is pretty obvious. But you said many times during that call that you had put in some conservatism in your full year guidance because you've already seen that macro is weakening. So what kind of conservatism and anticipation of macro weaknesses in the full year guidance is kind of my question.

Mark Read

Management

Yes. Look, I think to some extent, all those 3 things are related. I think we said new business was a headwind last year and it will not make a positive contribution this year and the more negative contribution is at the beginning of the year, we'll have to see how things go throughout the year. I think that sort of tackles the first part. I think the second question is we've given the guidance as it stands. And so those things hang together. And then in terms of changing the guidance, I think you're trying to get me to say something I don't want to get. I think what we've been clear is we did build some caution. I think it's very difficult to be scientific about the level of caution we built in. But having seen where we were in Q4 and having seen where we started the year with pressure on discretionary spend, leaving that level of pressure to continue for the rest of the year is the basis on which we gave the guidance. And we're not anticipating within that a massive recovery in the second half of the year to make our guidance. And I think it's very -- I don't think you can push us to say what would cause us to change it at this point. I can only see the world as we see things today. We don't see the need to change the guidance, but obviously, there's a range of outcomes. We are, as you put macro sensitive, where it would need to change. I think that the range back to the tariffs, both positive and negative indeed. So I think like many companies, we're saying that we are where we are at the moment. And that does bake in because of when we reported in our experience in Q4 into Q1, a somewhat more sensitive macro environment, which is why we're holding our guidance as at today's date. If that helps you understand our thinking, I think.

Joanne Wilson

Management

And just on the second question on how far does it need to get before margins start to see impact... Sorry. Julien, did you want to say something else?

Julien Roch

Analyst

No, no. Go ahead.

Joanne Wilson

Management

Yes. If we just step back and look at the industry as a whole, maybe during COVID and 2008, ‘09, the peak to trough was 8% and the margin impact was around 150 to 200 basis points. But the more important thing is the margin bounces back because of that flexible cost base that exists in our industry. I mean, for us, we’ve guided 0% to minus 2%. We said we’ll hold margins flat at the bottom end. Obviously, that requires more action around that flexible cost base and given the negative operating leverage. But beyond minus 2%, I don’t really want to go there because that’s not really our guidance. And if we were in that situation, we’d have to look at what other actions made sense for us to take on the P&L. It’s important for us as well as being disciplined around our cost base, making sure that we’re investing for the medium term and making sure that we’re continuing to reallocate investment into open AI and data. So that’s very important for us as we go through this year. And we think about both the near-term and the medium-term priorities.

Operator

Operator

We currently have no further questions. So I hand back to you, Mark, for closing remarks.

Mark Read

Management

Well, thanks very much, everybody. So I think we've discussed the main points on the call, particularly related to the economic environment. I think there's no doubt that it is challenging. Overall, I think we're making good progress strategically and we'll see the benefits of that. So we look forward to updating you on the current over the coming months. Thanks very much, and we look forward to seeing you soon.