By Kate Holton

LONDON, (Reuters) –WPP, the largest advertising company in the world, increased its guidance for sales on Thursday. It said its third quarter trading was much more positive than anticipated and that it had seen a structural shift to its growth rate. This sent its shares up 4%

WPP (LON) and France’s Publicis are leading the corporate recovery after the coronavirus crisis. Companies spend money on digital advertising, brand campaigns and ecommerce in order to increase consumer spending.

Chief Executive Mark Read explained to Reuters the strength in demand – driven primarily by customers from the United States, Britain, and Germany – compared to its performance prior the pandemic demonstrated that it was far more than a cyclical recovery.

“This provides us with confidence that the business is on track,” he stated.

WPP stated that the core metric of like-for–like revenue, also known as pass-through cost, increased 15.7% during the quarter. It was much higher than the forecasts of 9.5%, and almost 7 percent above the performance of its quarter prior to the pandemic.

After a 9-10% rise in August, the British Group has raised its full year outlook for growth from 11.5% to 12.5%.

Read stated that the fact that many regions of the globe, including the Asia Pacific and Middle East, are still struggling to recover suggests there will be more good growth in 2022.

Citi analysts said that the trading update will increase WPP’s sense of recovery as “not only cyclical, but structural,” creating an opportunity for a rerating.

WPP stated in August that its business had reached 2019 levels one year before plan. This was because clients were eager to take advantage of a worldwide economic recovery after the pandemic.