Bradford-based door-to-door lending specialist Provident Financial gave an upbeat message to the stock market today after seeing "modest" growth at home and rapid expansion overseas.

The group, which also owns car finance business Yes Car Credit, said its UK home credit operation had seen some growth in profits with customer numbers up.

But it said its overseas arm, which now operates in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary, was delivering "excellent" results with substantial growth in profits.

The group said that plans to launch a pilot home credit operation in Mexico were already well advanced. It said it was still on track to make its first loan in the country in later this year.

Provident said that it was expecting the international division to achieve "substantial growth" in its profits contribution this year.

In the UK, the home credit business saw modest growth in profits. Although bad debts have increased as expected and credit issued is currently lower than last year, customer numbers and revenues are up.

The company said that Yes Car Credit, the car loans operation taken over by Provident in December, had sales and profits up in line with Provident's expectations. But its motor insurance sales were down against expectations.