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(Alliance News) - Boku Inc on Thursday reported "exceptional" growth for 2019 as it assured the Covid-19 outbreak has not hurt its operations.
The stock was trading 11% higher at 71.00 pence each on Thursday morning in London.
For 2019, the mobile payments platform reported a 42% rise in revenue to USD50.1 million from USD35.3 million in 2018. Pretax loss narrowed to USD1.3 million from USD3.0 million. Adjusted earnings before
Payment volumes shot up 29% to USD5.0 billion with revenue from the payments division at USD43.5 million. Revenue in the Identity division grew by 26% to USD6.7 million.
No dividend was declared.
The improved performance was attributed to the growth of mobile wallets as a mainstream payment mechanism, digital services continuing to displace physical products in the music, film and games industries, as well as the company cross-selling into other divisions for example, being used for Office 365 subscriptions by Microsoft as well as Xbox.
Post period-end, total payment volumes for January and February increased by 30% to USD966 million. Trends have continued into March as the Boku Payments platform has seen a "significant" increase in new users particularly for streaming video services and gaming in those countries hardest hit by Covid-19.
Boku said it does not expect the virus outbreak to hurt its business, adding "the more people stay at home the more they play games, download apps and use streaming services". It said that its operations have not been affected with new implementations only experiencing minor delays at worst. However, it warned that new sales and business development are more difficult without face to face contact.
"In Payments, our existing merchants and connections will continue to perform strongly for as long as lockdown measures are in place. On Identity, demand remains strong. Identity has a greater dependence on new business to hit full year expectations and so is unlikely to perform as strongly as Payments, said Chief Executive Jon Prideaux.
"There will be a time when we can look back at the Covid-19 pandemic and take stock of its impact. For now, it's too soon to tell. We know not how long it will last nor how it will end, but at least for Boku, its employees, customers and suppliers we are able to say with confidence that Boku is well positioned in difficult times, he added.
Cash at the end of the period stood at USD35.6 million
By Ife Taiwo; ifetaiwo@alliancenews.com
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