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Halma reaches new all-time high

Profits at Halma, one of Britain’s best blue chips, have hit a new record. But could US tariffs now cloud the outlook?

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Dr Matthew Partridge

26 June 2025

in Features

The FTSE 100’s “most consistent money-making machine” has done it again, says Rober Lea in The Times. Shares in Halma, a conglomerate focusing on safety, environmental protection and healthcare, are near all-time highs.

Despite fears earlier this year that the group’s 50 companies, which operate autonomously from each other, would be hit by US president Donald Trump’s tariffs, the latest results show that there is “nothing to worry about”. Sales rose 11% and profits 16% in the year to 31 March 2025. Halma has now enjoyed “a 22nd consecutive year of profitable growth and a 46th successive year of rising dividends”.
The latest set of earning figures certainly seem “stellar across the board”, says Stephen Wright of The Motley Fool. Still, the results only cover the period until 31 March, so they don’t include any impact from Trump’s tariffs. Note that nearly half of Halma’s sales stem from the US.

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Most of this revenue comes from companies in America, and they won’t directly face tariffs themselves. But the trade barriers will create a “much more volatile trading environment”, with an increased level of uncertainty, which could make it much more “challenging” to achieve the group’s forecasts.

Halma’s strength through diversification
The knock-on effects of US tariffs on domestic companies “could eventually result in reduced corporate spending”, which could dampen demand for Halma’s products, says Keith Bowman for Interactive Investor. What’s more, currency movements are also expected to hamper progress in the year ahead.

Still, a wide array of products and geographical regions means that any poor performance in one area could be compensated for by positives in another. What’s more, the fact that health and safety related products “are arguably required whatever the economic backdrop” lends an additional degree of security to this well-managed outfit. Halma is poised to benefit from “some resilient long-term growth drivers”, says Hargreaves Lansdown’s Matt Britzman. These include “increasing demand for healthcare, tighter safety regulations, and growing global efforts to address climate change, waste and pollution”.
It even has some exposure to the AI boom, with particularly strong growth coming from one of its firms that plays a critical role in AI data centres. Halma’s ability to generate large amounts of cash has also helped cut debt, which should support future acquisitions, while there is also the company’s “stellar track record” of growing the dividend.
Still, says AJ Bell’s Russ Mould, with the stock on 36 times forward earnings, an “enormous amount of good news” is now priced in. Investors should be wary of “mistaking the reliability of Halma’s business model for safety”. The higher the valuation goes, “the less safe the shares may be, especially in the event of any unexpected, wider market convulsion”.

This article was first published in MoneyWeek’s magazine. Enjoy exclusive early access to news, opinion and analysis from our team of financial experts with a MoneyWeek subscription.

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Dr Matthew Partridge

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Shares editor, MoneyWeek

Matthew graduated from the University of Durham in 2004; he then gained an MSc, followed by a PhD at the London School of Economics.

He has previously written for a wide range of publications, including the Guardian and the Economist, and also helped to run a newsletter on terrorism. He has spent time at Lehman Brothers, Citigroup and the consultancy Lombard Street Research.

Matthew is the author of Superinvestors: Lessons from the greatest investors in history, published by Harriman House, which has been translated into several languages. His second book, Investing Explained: The Accessible Guide to Building an Investment Portfolio, is published by Kogan Page.

As senior writer, he writes the shares and politics & economics pages, as well as weekly Blowing It and Great Frauds in History columns He also writes a fortnightly reviews page and trading tips, as well as regular cover stories and multi-page investment focus features.

Follow Matthew on Twitter: @DrMatthewPartri

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