BME’s net profit in 4Q2013 reached €38 mm, up 25% from 4Q2012

• Revenues grew 22% in the fourth quarter and 3.9% in 2013
• Operating expenses in 2013 increased just 0.3% to €99.2 million
• ROE changes from 32% for 2012 to 35.9% for the 12 months of 2013, over 24 points above the sector average
• The efficiency ratio improves by 1.2 points in 2013 and over 5 points in the fourth quarter, over 12 points above the sector average
• Investment flows channeled through the stock market, including capital increases, scrips and new issues totalled €32.1 billion in 2013, up 11.9% year on year

BME reported net profit of €38 million in the fourth quarter, up 25% compared to the same period in 2012. Total net profit for the year was €143.1 million, up 5.7% year on year.

Revenues in the fourth quarter were €81.8 million, 22% higher than in the fourth quarter of 2012. Revenues for the year were €307.7 million, up 3.9% year-on-year.

Quarterly revenues increased in the majority of business units against previous year, with particularly strong performances by the Equities and Derivatives business units.

Operating expenses for 2013 were €99.2 million, just 0.3% higher than the previous year. In the fourth quarter operating expenses reached €24.8 million, 4.4% higher than in the fourth quarter of 2012.

EBITDA in the fourth quarter increased by 31.7% to €57 million whilst for the year as a whole it was up 5.7%, at €208.5 million.

Aggregate earnings per share in 2013 were €1.72, of which €0.46 related to the fourth quarter.

All of the main indicators for tracking financial management improved in 2013. Returns on equity -ROE- increased from 32% for 2012 to 35.9% for 2013. The efficiency ratio, measuring the cost to income ratio, improved by 1.2 points in the year to 32.2%, and by over five points in the quarter from 35.4% in the fourth quarter of 2012 to 30.3% in the last quarter of the year. BME is setting international benchmarks for both of these ratios, outperforming the average for the sector by over 12 points for efficiency and 24 points for ROE.

EQUITIES

Revenues for the Equity unit were €32.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2013, up 45.4% on the same period in 2012. This took accumulated revenue at year-end 2013 to €116 million, 6.8% higher than the €108.6 million in 2012. EBITDA for the quarter was €24.6 million (+70.9%), whilst EBITDA for the full year was up 10.4% at €84.5 million.

Equity market turnover totalled €219.4 billion in the fourth quarter of 2013, up 29.1% year-on-year. For the year as a whole, turnover was €704.5 billion, a 0.7% increase on 2012. The number of trades in the fourth quarter of 2012 was up 117.5% on the same period in 2012. There were 6.4 million trades in October, a monthly record. Total trades in the year increased by 19.5% year-on-year.

SETTLEMENT

The Clearing and Settlement unit’s revenues from settlement, registration and services provided to issuers increased by 3.1% in 2013 to €81.4 million, with a 5.7% increase in the fourth quarter to €19.6 million. EBITDA in the fourth quarter increased by 2% to €15.7million. EBITDA for the year as a whole was up by 3.7% on 2012, at €67.4 million.

The number of operations settled in the fourth quarter increased by 30.8% year-on-year to 13.8 million.  In total, 48 million operations were settled in 2013, up 2.4% on 2012.

LISTING

The strength of capital issues continued during the fourth quarter of 2013. Scrip dividends with a market capitalisation of €2.6 billion were issued, up 12.4% on the last quarter of 2012. Total scrip issues in the year amounted to €10.4 billion, up 17.8% on 2012.

Investment flows channeled through the stock market -including rights issues, scrips and new issues- amounted to €32.1 billion in 2013, up 11.9% on the figure for 2012, making the Spanish market one of the world leaders in channeling funding to companies in 2013.

MARKET DATA

In the fourth quarter of 2013, the Information unit’s revenues were €8.5 million, up 3.3% year-on-year. This relative improvement in revenues contributed to reducing the accumulated negative difference with respect to the previous year to 3.7%, with €33 million received in 2013. In the fourth quarter, EBITDA stood at €6.5 million, up 2.1%, bringing the total for the year to €25.5 million, down 5.2% on the previous year.

Total connection requests to the primary sources continued to increase -up by 10.7% on the previous year- with a new peak in the total number of connected clients.

DERIVATIVES

The fourth quarter saw increases in all equity derivatives, with 12.1% quarter-on-quarter growth in total contracts traded. The volume of the main product -IBEX 35® futures- traded in the quarter was 78.1% higher than the same period in 2012. The size of this increase is mostly explained by the ban on short selling of Spanish securities in force in the fourth quarter of 2012, but not in 2013, and a recovery in stock market volumes. This product ended the year 17.6% up on 2012.

In the fourth quarter the unit’s revenues increased 21.1% year on year to €7.7 million. Discounting operating expenses, EBITDA in the quarter was €5 million, up 33.5% on the previous year. The unit’s revenue from trading in the various underlyings in 2013 was €27.8 million, 9% up on 2012. EBITDA for the year stood at €16.7 million (+17.4%).

FIXED INCOME

In the fourth quarter of 2013, trading in the Fixed Income business stood at €318 billion, down 58.3% on the same period in 2012. The unit’s total for the year as a whole was €1.4 trillion euros, 47.6% down year-on-year.

Turnover traded in the Public Debt segment amounted €25.5 billion in the final quarter, up 273.2% on the fourth quarter of 2012. Over 2013 as a whole, trading in these assets reached €66.9 billion, 63.7% higher than in 2012.

The increased volume of Fixed Income trades through the electronic platform offset declines in institutional Fixed Income trading. As a result, revenues for the fourth quarter were up 3.1% on the same period in 2012, at €2 million. However, over the year as a whole, revenues were down 6.9% at €8.4 million. Quarterly and annual EBITDA were down by 14.6% and 13.6%, at €1 million and €5.2 million, respectively.

IT & CONSULTING

The IT and Consulting Unit ended 2013 with revenues up 3.9% at €17 million and costs down 1%, with EBITDA up 12.6% in the year. The fourth quarter saw the unit generating revenues of €3.7 million, a decline of 12.7% on the previous year, whilst EBITDA in the quarter was €884,000, down 46.6% year-on-year.