Digestion of its acquisition of Superpartners is still proving a drag on the Link Group balance sheet, according to the company’s first half results reported to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) today.
But notwithstanding the drag, the company reported a 55 per cent increase in statutory net profit after tax to $64.3 million on the back of a 27 per cent increase in revenue to $503.3 million.
However, where fund administration was concerned, the company reported a two per cent decline in revenue which it said resulted from a rebasing of Superpartners’ contracts in March last year
It said that excluding the impact of the Superpartners contract rebasing, revenue increased by $4.4 million or 1.6 per cent through index related price increases, stable member growth and increased revenue from project-related activity.
Looking over the horizon, the company said fund administration revenue was on track to remain flat for the current financial year.
Commenting on the half-year result, Link Group managing director, John McMurtrie said the results reflected the continuing benefits being delivered from the integration of the firm’s fund administration and IDDS businesses.
Giving his view on the outlook, McMurtie said the company was pleased with its progress and was looking forward to opportunities which would evolve over coming years.
“Link Group enjoys leadership positions in each of the primary markets in which it operates,” he said. “We will continue to invest in our existing businesses to expand our pipeline of opportunities as well as retaining a disciplined approach to cost management.”
Is it just me, or did we hear he same story 6 months ago regarding the Fund administration side of the business.
You can only flog that dead horse (‘Rebasing the Superpartners contracts’) for so long before questions starts being asked.
The last of the old Superpartners funds were (very successfully) merged onto the existing Link admin platforms around 18 months ago now.
Could it be that Mr McMurtrie is losing his Midas touch when it comes to fund admin . . . surely not ?
Link does have a lot of irons in the fire at present with these recent UK acquisitions in their LAS division.