By Laura Contemori
(Reuters) -Italy’s Nexi, one of Europe’s top two payments groups, sounded a note of caution about its profit margin on Wednesday, after reporting a lower than expected core profit for the third quarter and sending its shares down as much as 10%.
Analysts have raised concerns about the business model of Nexi, which has grown rapidly in recent years through the purchase of banks’ retail payments businesses, given rapid changes in the payments industry, where new non-bank providers have emerged.
Following Spanish bank BBVA’s collapsed bid for rival Sabadell, which had halted Nexi’s acquisition of the latter’s merchants’ payments business, Bertoluzzo said Nexi remained open to exploring new partnership opportunities with Sabadell.
He stressed any future collaboration would be based on new terms and potentially different business models and that Nexi had “no commitment whatsoever” under their old deal.
TECH ADVANCES RAISE DOUBTS ABOUT INCUMBENT PAYMENTS FIRMS
Technology advances and the spread of digital currencies have called into question the role of incumbent payments firms such as Nexi and France’s Worldline, hammering their shares.
Nexi’s adjusted core profit margin declined by 50 basis points year-on-year to 56.8% in the three months through September.
The company kept a forecast for a positive core profit margin expansion this year adding however that “the magnitude would depend on the volume and revenue mix in the fourth quarter.”
CEO Paolo Bertoluzzo told analysts the difference would be only “a few million euros.”
Core profit, or earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, rose 0.9% in the period to 526.4 million euros ($614 million), missing Nexi’s own forecast of 530 million.
Bertoluzzo said the company faced “bank losses from the past and some key bank contract price negotiation effects.”
These effects are expected to peak in the current quarter and then gradually ease through 2026, he said.
Revenues rose 1.8% to 927.3 million euros, hit by “extraordinary high impacts such as banks’ merchant books M&A and banks’ contracts renegotiations.”
CONCERN ABOUT CAUTIOUS OUTLOOK
A Milan-based trader said the market was concerned about the cautious outlook provided.
In October, Paris-based Worldline, which will present its mid-term strategy at a capital markets day event on Thursday, narrowed its 2025 profit forecast following governance setbacks and client losses.
Nexi will hold its capital markets day on March 5, 2026.
($1 = 0.8575 euros)
(Reporting by Laura Contemori in Gdansk, additional reporting by Valentina Za in Milan; Editing by Eileen Soreng, Subhranshu Sahu and Conor Humphries)
