Iress posts strong half-year profit
Strong half-year growth by Iress’ wealth management software business in Australia and New Zealand has helped the listed technology group post a 27.5 per cent increase in profit for the half year to June 30.
Iress posted an adjusted after tax profit of $23.3 million for the half-year ended June 30, 2008, up from $18.2 million in the corresponding half-year in 2007. The reported after tax group profit for the half-year to June 2008 was $18.1 million.
The contribution by wealth management in Australia and New Zealand lay in a revenue increase of 7.2 per cent in the half, and an increase in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation of 14.2 per cent.
This revenue increase reflected the “success of the business in being able to achieve consistent organic growth while continuing the process of integrating the first-half acquisitions”, according to Iress managing director Peter Dunai.
“These (three) smaller but important acquisitions during the half-year demonstrate our resolve to leverage our company’s unique distribution scale.”
He added that the “combination of strategic gains from these acquisitions and internal developments provide a strong pipeline of exciting initiatives to support growth into the medium term”.
Iress’ core Australia and New Zealand information and trading systems division “held up well despite the sharply changed conditions in financial markets, achieving revenue growth consistent with recent years”, he said.
“However, the company is not immune to the difficult environment facing our client base, and in the last few months we saw lower revenue growth than the average in recent years.
“Trading into the second half continues that trend, leading us to expect a reduced but still material profit in the second half,” he said.
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