Profits Rocket At Concord EFS

Payments processor Concord EFS, in the process of selling itself to First Data Corp., said second quarter earnings surged 36% to $86.1 million, or 17 cents a share, from $63.2 million, or 12 cents a share, for the same period last year, on the strength of a 29% rise in transaction volume.

Results for the second quarter include $6.1 million of expenses related to the First Data merger.

Second quarter revenues rose 17% to $570 million, with revenue from the company's core payment services growing 22% to $05.9 million, compared to the same quarter last year. Revenue from Concord's network services unit, which includes the STAR systems network, rose 6% to $164.1 million for the quarter, which was spurred by a 19% growth in STARsm PIN-secured debit transactions.

For the first half of the year Concord reported a 20% rise in revenues to $1.1 billion, and a 40% increase in earnings to $163.8 million, or 33 cents a share, from $117.4 million, or 22 cents a share, for the first half last year.

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