Look ahead to FTSE 350, other companies reporting & economic events from 26 – 30 August 2024

• Bunzl looks to deliver margin growth despite soft revenue.
• Markets are expecting another quarter of triple-digit profit growth for NVIDIA.
• Can Salesforce bounce back after a disappointing first quarter?

Bunzl, Half Year Results, Tuesday 27 August
Matt Britzman, senior equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown 
“Bunzl’s a classic ‘steady-eddy’ and June’s trading statement suggests that next week’s first-half results shouldn’t throw up any surprises. There was a small upgrade to margin guidance, so markets are looking for a slight improvement from last year. Acquisitions and an increasing contribution from the own-brand lines should prop up the top line, but organic growth is expected to drop by 5%.  

The US business is feeling the effects of weaker volumes and a slower pace of price hikes. Investors would like to see volume trends picking up over the second quarter and some positive commentary on the outlook for the rest of the year. The acquisition pipeline is also key, Bunzl relies on bolt-on business to tap into its fragmented end markets. £600mn has already been committed to new deals this year, compared to £468mn for the entire of 2023. Continued momentum here is a positive sign that Bunzl is seeing attractive areas to expand into.”

NVIDIA, Q2 Results, Wednesday 28 August
Aarin Chiekrie, equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown 

“NVIDIA’s had a strong start to the year, with first-quarter numbers coming in ahead of market expectations. Revenue shot up 262% to $26bn, fuelled by accelerating demand for its artificial intelligence (AI) focussed computing platforms. Costs are being controlled well, meaning operating profits were up almost sevenfold to $16.9bn.

Analysts are expecting this momentum to continue into next week’s results. The likes of META, Amazon, and Microsoft are all customers, each with deep pockets and a desire to build out their AI offerings with the power of NVIDIA’s market-leading chips. That’s underpinning the market’s view that second-quarter revenue and operating profits can more than double to $28.6bn and $18.7bn respectively. That looks achievable, so there will be a focus on the outlook, hoping to gain an idea of just how far ahead NVIDIA expects this rate of growth to continue.”

Salesforce, Q2 Results, Wednesday 28 August
Matt Britzman, senior equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown 
“Salesforce missed the mark back in May. It perhaps wasn’t as bad a quarter as the market reaction suggested, and the stock has recovered most of the losses since then. But when you miss expectations on current quarter performance and issue downbeat guidance, it rarely ends well.

Markets are looking for 7-8% growth in second-quarter revenue and investors will be hoping to see no downgrades to full-year guidance of 8-9%. Businesses are still being selective with their software spend, it’s down to Salesforce to keep improving its bundling proposition and start to make headway with AI tools to push through the softer macro environment.”

Among those currently scheduled to release results next week:

*Events on which HL will be updating investors