Today marks Ronan Cox’s first anniversary as CEO of ZTF. It’s been a busy 12 months culminating with an ambitious and well-received CMD in March 2025. Achieving the group’s mid-term targets will, by definition, not happen overnight, but today’s confident update shows that ZTF is moving in the right direction (group sales +8% and FY outlook reiterated). The narrative on tariffs is positive and management remain committed to their plans to expand in Vietnam. ZTF is a conviction BUY for us in the sector the CMD outlined a clear path to creating shareholder value by becoming a larger, higher-quality business, delivering high single-digit organic growth, operating margins trending over 18% and ROCE exceeding 20%. Yet, ongoing strategic progress and ambition are not reflected in the current valuation (9.0x FY25e PER dropping to 8.1x FY26e). BUY
