By Jaime Llinares Taboada

Ashtead Group PLC on Tuesday reported a higher profit for the second quarter of its fiscal year, and said it expects full-year performance to be ahead of its previous expectations.

The U.K. equipment rental company made a pretax profit of $474 million for the three months ended Oct. 31, up from $405 million a year earlier.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization rose 12% to $971.9 million. Revenue was up 15% at $2.03 billion.

"Notwithstanding the volatility that continues to arise from Covid, the fundamentals of our business are strong and we now expect full year performance to be ahead of our previous expectations," Chief Executive Brendan Horgan said.

The company declared an interim dividend of 12.5 cents a share, up from 9.76 cents a year earlier.

Write to Jaime Llinares Taboada at jaime.llinares@wsj.com; @JaimeLlinaresT

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

12-07-21 0226ET