Yesterday, Hays, UK's biggest and foremost staffing firm had 124 Million Pounds stripped from its stock market value, after the company posted a 70% decline in underlying half-yearly earnings, and warned that many of its markets have continued to remain fragile.

Hays shared that while many of its international markets, particularly in Asia, are growing strongly once again, Britain, which makes up for almost 50%of its net fees, has continued to face problems, with demand for its services in the public sector starting to trail off.

Earnings for half-year feel sharply by a whopping 97%, to 3.4 Million Pounds, in part because of a one-off hit of 27 Million Pounds, mainly related to a fine which was imposed by the Office of Fair Trading in September of last year, against which Hays is apparently appealing, over charges of price-fixing and forming a cartel.

On an underlying basis, before-tax earnings slipped by 70% to 30.4 Million Pounds.

On the news, shares of the company dropped by 9.1 pence to 104.1 pence.

While calling the period "the toughest recruitment market on record”, Chief Executive Alistair Cox did sound a upbeat chime for the coming times. "We are seeing improved candidate and client confidence across the business in most of our private sector markets. Asia Pacific and parts of continental Europe have continued to deliver modest rates of improvement", he said.