Euronet Worldwide Inc.’s cites growth in its Money Transfer segment as driver for its first-quarter earnings results.
As a company overall, the Leawood, Kan.-based electronic-payments processor, which conducts the majority of its operations outside the U.S., on April 26 reported revenues of $262.6 million for the first quarter ended March 31, up 5% from $250 million a year earlier. The company reported net income of $17.3 million for the period; it reported net income of $2.8 million during the first quarter of 2010.
Total transaction volume was up 15.8% during the quarter, to 454 million from 392 million a year earlier.
“I am pleased with the strong performance of our money transfer segment this quarter, driven by transaction growth in more profitable markets and value-added services, Euronet Chairman and CEO Michael Brown said in a press release. “Our EFT and epay segments performed largely as expected, with reductions in German ATM transaction fees and Polish interchange fees tempering results.”
Euronet’s EFT Processing segment reported revenues of $44.4 million, down 8.6% from $48.6 million. Transaction volume, however, was up 10.2%, to 206 million from 187 million.
Euronet attributes its transaction growth in the segment to its European cross-border and Indian CashNet operations where revenue and gross profit per transaction is significantly lower than the segment average, the company said in a release.
The EFT Processing segment operated 11,055 ATMs as of March 31, up 7.5% from 10,283 ATMs a year earlier.
Euronet’s epay segment, which processes point-of-sale transactions, reported revenues of $155.1 million, up 6.7% from $145.3 million. Transaction volume during the quarter totaled 243 million, up 21.5% from 200 million.
The company says its completed acquisition of Epay Brazilian in Brazil drove revenue expansion, while growth in some markets and in non-mobile products were offset by the weakened global economy and consumer shifts from prepaid to other products in certain markets. The company attributes the rise in transaction volume to transaction growth from markets with lower transaction-based fees.
As of the end of March 31, the epay segment supported 562,000 payment terminals at 278,000 locations in Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East, North America and South America. That’s compared to 510,000 terminals at 240,000 retailers during the same quarter last year.
The company’s Money Transfer segment reported revenues for the quarter of $63.2 million, up 12.7% from $56.1 million. It processed 5.3 million funds transfers during the quarter, up 10.4% from 4.8 million a year earlier.
Euronet attributed the unit’s transactions increase and revenue increase to growth in non-U.S. money transfers, check cashing and bill payment, according to the release. Non-U.S. money transfers grew 18% in the quarter, the company said. Economic pressures kept U.S.-originated transfers flat.
As of March 31, the money transfer segment operated in 132 countries through a network of about 107,000 locations, up from 86,100 a year earlier.
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