First Derivatives announced preliminary results 

FD (AIM:FDP.L, ESM:FDP.I), a leading provider of software and consulting services, announces its results for the year ended 29 February 2016.

Financial Highlights

Revenue £117.0m (2015: £83.2m) +41%

Adjusted EBITDA* £23.3m (2015: £15.5m) +51%

Profit before tax £10.4m (2015: £17.5m) -41%

Adjusted** profit before tax £16.8m (2015: £10.8m) +56%

Adjusted** fully diluted EPS 51.7p (2015: 38.8p) +33%

Full year dividend 17.0p per share (2015: 13.5p) +26%

Net debt £15.1m (2015: £15.7m)

*Adjusted for share-based payments, profit on disposal of property and acquisition costs.

**Adjusted for amortisation of acquired intangibles, share-based payments, profit on disposal of property, net gain on disposal of investment in associate, acquisition costs, finance translation income/charges (and exceptional taxation for EPS).

Business Highlights

• Consulting revenue up 29% to £75.0m (2015: £58.3m), driven by high levels of repeat revenue and a number of new multi-year assignments within large investment banks.
• Software revenue up 69% (organic: 27%) to £42.0m (2015: £24.9m), driven by a record number of software wins during the year. These included a number of flagship wins across our range of capital markets products, the full financial benefit of which will be felt in the current financial year.
• Further investment in the business, as FD gears up to deliver continued high levels of growth in revenue in both software and consulting.
• Strategic acquisitions of Affinity Systems and ActivateClients enabling the Group to expand its software revenues beyond capital markets.
• Board strengthened through the appointments of Virginia Gambale and Jon Robson.
• Strong start to the current financial year.

Seamus Keating, Chairman of FD, commented: “This was another successful period for FD, with progress across the Group resulting in record results and positioning us strongly for future years. In consulting we are becomingly involved in client projects earlier and in a more strategic way, leading to deeper relationships and enabling us to maintain our high level of revenue visibility as we scale up. In software, technology trends continue to move in favour of our Kx technology platform, which is world leading in its big fast data capabilities. Software contract wins in capital markets accelerated through the year, driven by strong feedback from reference clients and our ability to assist our clients to address issues such as compliance and regulation. We are also pleased with developments in other markets for our software and in particular utilities and digital marketing, where we are already generating revenue. We expect another year of strong growth, at least in line with market forecasts, while continuing to invest for growth in the future.”

Source: First Derivatives

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