Plus500 quarterly earnings drop as pandemic volatility wears off
Plus500 today reported a fall in core earnings for the first quarter as the online trader struggled to match up to a tough comparative last year when market volatility shot up.
The company’s quarterly revenue fell 36 per cent to $203.2m, while core earnings almost halved to $121.7m.
However, the London-listed firm added almost 90,000 new customers in the period, an eight per cent year-on-year jump.
This pushed Plus500’s number of active clients to a record 269,743.
The customer additions come against the backdrop of a so-called “GameStonk” frenzy in the markets, which has seen amateur traders coordinate through Reddit to push up the prices of beaten-down stocks.
Plus500, which lets investors trade on over 2,500 different financial instruments including equities and cryptocurrencies, expects 2021 revenue to be moderately ahead of market consensus.
Analysts expect revenue of $454.8m and core earning of $240.3m for 2021, compared to the $872.5m and $515.9m it reported last year.