Western Union Digital Now 10 Percent Of C2C Business

Western Union reported third-quarter results Thursday (Nov. 2) that showed strong digital growth, up 23 percent year on year, with an overall beat on both top and bottom lines.

The company said its consolidated top line came in at $1.4 billion, up two percent from a year ago, and up three percent on a constant currency basis.

The earnings per share was 53 on an adjusted basis, which topped Wall Street by eight pennies and was a boost from last year’s 47 cents a share.

Online money transfers were up 23 percent, comprising 10 percent of the consumer-to-consumer business. The online presence is now in 40 countries, enabling the transfer of funds to 200 countries worldwide.

Drilling down a bit into quarterly segment performance, the consumer-to-consumer segment saw overall revenues up one percent and transactions up two percent. Transaction declines in oil-producing countries in the Middle East and Africa were more than offset by growth in transactions originating in Latin America. The company’s business solutions earnings saw one percent growth on a constant currency basis.

The other revenues segment, which is tied to bill payments activity in the United States and Argentina, was up nine percent, or 13 percent as measured by constant currency. This growth came from the Speedpay U.S. electronic payments activity and from Pago Facil Argentina walk-in bill payments business.

In commentary during the earnings conference call, Hikmet Ersek, CEO, said that the firm remains “satisfied with our transaction growth and with our business…we don’t see a lot of price pressure there.”  And in reference to transaction flow, Ersek stated that countries such as Argentina, Brazil and Russia, traditionally “inbound” recipients of funds, were seeing “outbound” activity as well.