12 March 2020 – final results and acquisition
Results for the year ended 31 December 2019 have been released. Revenue was 4.7% higher at £556m (2018: £531m) and underlying EBITDA was up 5.0% to £136.0m (2018: £129.5m). Profit before tax jumped from £24.3m to £39.8m and underlying earnings per share increased from 17.8p to 18.1p. Total dividends for the year were 5.49p per share (2018: 5.32p). Net debt was reduced slightly to £343.6m from £352.0m a year earlier. There was also news of the acquisition of Monidee, an employee share plans technology business based in Amsterdam. Monidee is said to be a highly complementary share plans business. It services more than 200,000 employees across 210 corporate clients in 50 countries. The acquisition will provide a fully-functional and scalable share plans solution for Equiniti’s clients in the global employee share plans market. The financial terms of the transaction are not disclosed but this looks to be a good fit. The shares remain a LONG TERM BUY.