Western Union profits fall 22%

Pre-tax profits at the main Irish arm of Western Union decreased by 22% to $35.15m (€24.76m), last year.

According to accounts just filed with the Companies Office, revenues at Western Union International Ltd declined by 5% — from $2.3bn to $2.18bn — in the 12 months to the end of last December.

The firm paid a dividend during the year of $78m. In Ireland, Western Union employs over 100 people at its offices at Clonskeagh in Dublin.

Consumers transfer money to more than 500,000 Western Union agent locations in over 200 countries worldwide.

According to the directors’ report within the accounts, “revenues in the EU/EEA region fell by 28% due to the continuing migration of agents in this region to another Western Union group entity, Western Union Payment Services Ireland Ltd.”

The report states that revenues from US inbound money transfer activity increased by 7% while other international revenues remained flat. Administrative expenses grew by 22%, primarily due to an increase in service fee payable to another group company — Western Union International Bank GmBH.

The firm’s shareholder funds at the end of December last year totalled $529m with the firm’s cash pile totalling €214.8m.

On the company’s future development, the directors state that “Western Union is actively growing its business, which focuses on increasing the number of locations and transactions, whilst also investigating new initiatives to enhance its existing services and to provide its customers with access to an expanding portfolio of payment and other financial services”.

The firm last year recorded $1.6bn in money transfer fee revenues, with $570m generated from money transfer foreign exchange revenues, gross profit of €74.9m, and a post-tax profit of €30.76m after tax of €4.3m.

The number of people employed by the firm last year totalled nine, with salaries amounting to $935,000 — an average of over $100,000 each.