SIX, the Swiss stock exchange operator, had higher sales last year thanks to a boom in security trading. Profit by contrast lagged behind due to the level of investments the company made.
SIX Group had sales of 1.94 billion Swiss francs in 2017, up 5.8 percent year-on-year, the company said in a statement on Wednesday. Major factors behind this rate of growth were revenues from exchange trading and securities deposit fees.
Net income fell 6.2 percent to 207.2 million francs and operating profit dropped 8.2 percent to 273.2 million.
Drop in Profitability
The drop in profitability had a number of reasons, the company said. In 2016, SIX had sold a property with a profit that boosted its net. But the main reason for the decline were substantially higher costs in 2017.
Operating costs were up 7.3 percent, mainly because of investments in new services and the acquisition of the card recognition and processing unit of Aduno.
Regulatory Requirements
While a higher volume of transactions on the exchange boosted sales at SIX, profit was actually down due to higher costs. They were incurred by the introduction of MifidII and Mifir as well as the Swiss financial infrastructure law.
The sale of the payments division is still pending. SIX is looking for a strong partner for the business.
