By Federica Mileo
(Reuters) -French catering and food services group Sodexo plans to list its voucher and benefits division Pluxee early in 2024, it said on Thursday after price rises, a post-COVID recovery in tourism and staff returning to offices boosted earnings.
Sodexo's shares were up around 6% in early trade, among the best performers of France's SBF 120 index.
Full-year organic revenue growth for Pluxee was 26.9% compared to group guidance of above 20%.
Employers are turning to companies like Sodexo and Edenred to offer vouchers to staff as perks to encourage them to return to the office as well as helping them with the rising cost of living.
"The group benefited from the post-COVID recovery in the first half of the year and from a very good level of activity in the second half, with record visitor numbers in tourism and convention centres and a rise in prices," Finance Chief Marc Rolland said in a call with journalists.
Sodexo reported a full-year underlying operating profit of 1.34 billion euros ($1.41 billion), slightly higher than the 1.32 billion euros expected by analysts polled by the group.
For 2024 and 2025, Sodexo said it expected organic revenue growth of between 6% and 8% per annum and the underlying operating profit margin to grow by 30-40 basis points per year.
The proposed full spin-off of Pluxee will be put to a shareholder vote during a dedicated general meeting to be held early next year, the group said.
"The group is navigating higher inflation, no longer losing market share, and finally benefiting from industry outsourcing tailwinds," analysts at Jefferies said in a note.
($1 = 0.9488 euros)
(Reporting by Federica Mileo in Gdansk; editing by Milla Nissi, Muralikumar Anantharaman and Barbara Lewis)
