A debt buying business increased its profitability by 29% in the first half of the year.

Cabot Credit Management, which has its headquarters in Kings Hill, near West Malling, increased earnings before interest, taxes and other charges to £117.9 million, up from £91.1 million in the first six months of 2015.

The firm, which employs 1,550 people in nine offices across Europe, has bought about eight million customer accounts.

Since launching in 1998 it has invested £1.9 billion in buying portfolios worth more than £20 billion.

It manages about £1 billion of assets on behalf of clients and collects on average over £47 million a month on portfolios it either owns or services for customers.

Bosses revealed in its half-year report it has estimated remaining collections of £2.07 billion over the next two years, up from £1.92 billion.

It increased debt purchase collections by 24% to £175.9 million.

The company also increased revenues from clients for its services by 40% to £12 million.

It comes after Cabot became the first major debt purchaser to be given authorisation from the Financial Conduct Authority in March. It has a similar application underway in Ireland.

The firm increased non-UK revenues by 138% after big expenditures in Spain and Ireland in the last year.

It has also closed a site in Stratford, merging its operations with its existing site in Brackley.

Bosses said there had been “no noticeable impact of Brexit upon collections performance”.

Chief executive Ken Stannard said: “We have continued to strengthen our footprint in Europe with active operations now in five European markets following our first capital deployment in Portugal during the quarter.

“Our non UK assets now represent 13% of total 120 month estimated remaining collections.

“Cabot continues to leverage its place in the market as the first major debt purchaser to achieve its UK FCA authorisation and is progressing well with its application for the Irish regulatory authority, the Central Bank of Ireland.”