Western Union, the world’s biggest money-transfer business, said third- quarter profit climbed 32 percent on an increase in global consumer-to- consumer transactions. The firm raised its outlook for the year.
Net income rose to $238.4 million, or 36 cents a share, from $181 million, or 26 cents a share, in the same period a year earlier, the Douglas County- based company said Tuesday in a statement. The average estimate of 27 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg was for 34 cents a share.
“All of our regions contributed to the consumer-to-consumer transaction growth, and margins were strong,” chief executive Hikmet Ersek said in the statement. “We now expect full-year earnings per share to be higher than our previous outlook.”
Ersek, 50, last month succeeded Christina Gold, who retired.
Western Union earned 85 percent of its revenue last year from fees for consumer-to-consumer money transactions and faces increasing competition from electronic and mobile- phone money-transfer services.
Revenue rose 1 percent to $1.33 billion from a year earlier, according to the statement.
Western Union stock fell 1.1 percent to $17.91 Tuesday in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have fallen 5 percent this year.
