Comments from the CEO
Net inflow doubled
”Net inflow continued to be strong in this quarter with SEK 4.6 billion, a doubling compared with the same period last year, and implying a total inflow of SEK 14.1 billion since the beginning of the year. Behind this strong net inflow each quarter compared with the previous year, is found a number of activities and initiatives which are beginning to bear fruit. These include our new website, the investment in CRM and a more customer-driven communication, a new trading room and successful product launches. For example, the Super Mortgage is not only generating many new customers but also new savings capital from existing customers. Everything taken together, these activities resulted in 12,800 new active customers during the quarter, an increase of 49 percent compared with last year, and we acquired 38,800 new customers since the beginning of 2014.
At the end of June, we could calculate our share of the total growth in the savings market at 8.0 percent during the past 12 months. This exceeds our long-term goal to achieve at least 7 percent.
Repo rate decreases press net interest items – scalability produces positive results
The dramatic repo rate decrease at the beginning of the quarter negatively impacted our quarterly results by SEK 8 million, something which our increased volumes cannot compensate for in just one quarter. With that in mind, we are satisfied that our focus on cost efficiency now begins to give results, which is of major importance if we are going to be able to deliver high margins regardless of the interest rate situation. We have decreased the cost to savings capital ratio by 18 percent to 31 basis points during the last twelve months, which is clear evidence of the scalability of the operations.
The earlier than planned investment in mobile services and VAT impact results
During the summer months, we experienced explosive growth in the demand for our mobile services. In July more than 50 percent of all logins were from mobile units. Consequently, we have determined to move forward development of our mobile platform to have it in place no later than next summer.
We have also reported a one-off item of SEK 8 million concerning VAT referring to the period 2010 to 2012, as we indicated in our second quarter report.
The investment in mobile services, together with the one-off cost for the VAT, is the reason that cost increases are estimated at 7 percent for 2014, slightly higher than the 6 percent forecasted in our second quarter report. However, the planned cost increase rate of 6–8 percent for 2015 remains, as does the growth target I mentioned in the interim report for the second quarter of 30,000–40,000 new customers per year and a minimum share of 7 percent of the net inflow to the Swedish savings market.
Continued expansion within pensions
Our pension operations continue to be successful. Since the beginning of the year, we have doubled our sales personnel through new recruitment in Stockholm and through the opening of an office in Gothenburg, which has seen a flying start with a strong inflow of occupational pension customers. As a result of this success, we will also open an office in Malmö, a strategically important location for us, in early 2015. We thus continue, as planned, to successively build the pension area as one of our stable revenue streams to counteract our sensitivity towards market volatility. Within the private pension and insurance savings area we have during the past 12 months achieved a 4.5 percent share of the total premium inflow in the market.
Focus in the near future
In forthcoming quarters we will strengthen our leadership within savings and investments. In addition to improved functions on the website and further improvements of efficiency in various back office and administrative functions, we will start managing our surplus liquidity more actively to improve capital efficiency and create capacity to expand the Super Mortgage.
The focus will also be placed on recruitment for and the completion of our new office in Malmö, while at the same time we will continue to work with our user-friendly and mobile solutions.”
Stockholm, 16 October 2014
Martin Tivéus, CEO Avanza
