WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Payment processor Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. (FIS) said Monday that its fourth quarter profit rose 7% from last year, helped mainly by strong growth in its international solutions segment. The company's quarterly earnings per share, excluding items, beat analysts' estimate by a penny.
The Jacksonville, Florida-based company said reported net income for the fourth quarter of $117.0 million or $0.39 per share, compared to $110.6 million or $0.36 per share for the year-ago quarter.
Income from continuing operations for the fourth quarter increased to $123.0 million or $0.41 per share from $121.3 million, or $0.40 per share in the prior year quarter.
Excluding items, adjusted net income from continuing operations increased to $199.3 million or $0.66 per share in the fourth quarter from $196.9 million or $0.64 per share in the fourth quarter of the prior year.
On average, 16 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to earn $0.65 per share for the fourth quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.
Revenues for the fourth quarter rose 7% to $1.49 billion from $1.40 billion in the same quarter last year. Thirteen analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $1.49 billion for the fourth quarter.
Fourth quarter revenue from the company's financial solutions segment grew 5.9% year-over-year to $533.4 million, driven by the addition of Capco's North American operations, growth in account processing and higher services revenue. This segments offers core processing software applications to run critical banking processes; retail delivery applications for integrating customer-facing operations and back-office processes; decision and risk management solutions; applications for syndicated commercial loan origination and management etc.
The company's payment solutions segment, which provides electronic funds transfer services, item processing and output services; credit card solutions, government and healthcare payments solutions etc., reported fourth quarter revenue of $642.0 million, an increase of 2.2% from a year ago.
Fourth quarter revenue from the company's international solutions segment, which offers financial and payment processing software and services, increased 18.9% to $318.8 million, helped mainly by continued growth in all regions including within Brazil card processing and Capco's European business.
During the fourth quarter, the company repurchased 8.5 million shares of its common stock for about $218.2 million, taking the full year total to 15 million purchased at a total cost of about $399.2 million.
Separately, Fidelity National said Monday that its Board of Directors has authorized additional stock repurchases up to $1.0 billion, replacing the existing repurchase authorization under which about $361 million remains outstanding.
The company also said that its Board of Directors has approved an increase in the annual dividend from $0.20 per share to $0.80 per share. The increase is effective with the next quarterly dividend of $0.20 per share, payable in cash on March 30 to shareholders of record on March 16.
Among others in the industry, Fiserv, Inc. (FISV) last week reported a 23% rise in fourth quarter profit, as revenue grew amid an expanding client base. The company's quarterly earnings per share, excluding items, came in line with analysts' expectations. At the same time, the company forecast 2012 earnings roughly in line with analysts' expectations.
Fidelity National shares, which have traded in a range of $22.53 to $33.76 over the past year, closed Monday's regular trading session at $29.00, up 35 cents or 1.22%. The stock is currently losing 27 cents in after hours trading.
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