(Alliance News) -Â Alfa Financial Software Holdings PLC on Wednesday lifted its full-year revenue outlook and declared a special dividend after a strong start to 2021.
Shares in Alfa Financial were up 13% at 178.00 pence in London Wednesday morning.
The asset finance industry software firm said the first half of the year saw good progress across the business and a strong financial performance. Revenue for the first half of 2021 rose 8% to GBP41.1 million while pretax profit increased 9% to GBP11.0 million.
It highlighted it has continued to reduce its dependency on key customers, with its top five customers representing 43% of revenue in the period, compared with 55% a year ago and 64% two years ago.
"While the underlying asset finance market did initially see a dip in activity following widespread Covid-19 lockdowns, it has broadly been recovering during H2 2020 and continued to do so through H1 2021 and we now see favourable market conditions," Alfa Financial said, adding that it stands to benefit from increased remote working.
Success converting its late stage pipeline led the company to lift its expectations for 2021, and it now expects to beat previous market revenue forecasts by around 4%.
It also declared a special dividend of 10p per share, bringing total dividends over the last 12 months to 26p.
"An encouraging early stage pipeline and strong growth in subscription revenues give us increased confidence in next year's performance. Looking more strategically, we have made excellent progress in the key areas of subscription, Alfa Start and partnership as well as ensuring a continued focus on those technologies that have the potential to create step change for our customers," said Chief Executive Andrew Denton.
By Lucy Heming;Â lucyheming@alliancenews.com
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Alfa Fin (ALFA)