The parent company of Firepay, a provider of payment processing services for the online gambling industry, announced its results for the third quarter demonstrating continued strong growth.
Revenue increased 90 per cent to $20.0m in the third quarter of 2005, compared to the same period the year before; profit before tax increased 83 per cent to $8.6m in the third quarter ( $21.9m for the nine-months ended September 30).
Net profit for the third quarter was stable at $2.9m, while over the nine months it increased over 40 per cent to $11.0m.
Payment volume increased 62 per cent to $316m in the third quarter of 2005, of which $196m from the Firepay wallet offering (+81%) and $120m from the credit card offering. Payment volume over the nine-months was of $860m ($515m, +73%, from Firepay).
“As a leading service supplier to the entire online gaming industry, this confirms our belief that all areas of the industry (poker, sports betting and casino) are continuing to experience strong growth. We continue to pursue expansion opportunities and feature enhancements to meet the needs of our merchants. An example of this is
our recent FirePay launch in Canada, which has shown early signs of success. Our plans to add additional geographies and currencies to the FirePay wallet continue to advance. We remain confident about FireOne\’s future growth prospects,” said Mitch Garber, the company\’s Executive Chairman.
In separate news, two of Neteller\’s founders, Chairman Stephen Lawrence and Director John Lefebvre reportedly sold shares worth £218m, reducing their holdings to 20.7 per cent from 49.8 per cent.