Pegasystems, S1 and Diebold are the only three companies in the Finextra50 Financial Technology Index currently trading higher than at the start of the year.
Last week's gainers
Fidessa was the index's strongest performer last week. It gained 16.67% by Friday close to finish at 560p in a week that saw it announce its connectivity to LeveL ATS, the independently run US equity dark pool platform created by a consortium of broker-dealers.
Advent Software rose 14.23% to $24.32 after it was announced that CEO and founder Stephanie DiMarco would be handing the position of company president to Peter Hess, a longstanding company executive who was most recently EVP and general manager of Advent’s Investment Management Group.
Polaris Software Lab gained 10.37% to Rs39.90, reversing losses it had seen since speculation in early November that Citibank's increasing troubles could lead it to sell some of its 40% stake in the company. CEO Arun Jain denied that this was likely.
Other companies to see significant increases include:
Last week's losers
The Innovation Group close down 14.44% down last week to 3.85p. It had risen the previous week after its cash position was revealed to be significantly stronger than expected. But the UK insurance software and outsourcing specialist had a challenging year: It posted a 27% increase in full year revenue, but swung into a pre-tax loss of 3.8 million pounds due to increased investment in new business process outsourcing products (BPO) and contract delays.
Other companies to see significant falls last week include
2008 comings and goings
The year so far has seen seven companies replaced in the index, either due to mergers, being taken private or through no longer meeting the index criteria due to revenue sources. Unlike last year, which saw four companies leave the index after acquisitions, this year only Choicepoint (Reed Elsevier) and GL Trade (SunGard) exited in this manner.
Leavers
- Choicepoint
- Chordiant
- EDB Business Partner
- Oberthur Technologies
- GL Trade
- SSP Holdings
- Firstsource
New entrants
- Yucheng Technologies
- Lender Processing Services
- Syntel
- EXLservice Holdings
- Longtop Financial Technologies
- Financial Technologies (India)
- Ffastfill
2008 gainers
The index began the year with a value of 91.24 on 4 January, and closed 12 December at 54.24 - a fall of 40.5%. So it's perhaps not surprising that only three companies look like finishing the year in a stronger position than they started - all of them US-based.
Pegasystems has been the index's best performer this year, closing last Friday up 15.88% on its 4 Jan close at $12.33. It saw a strong share price rise in May on the back of record Q1 revenue and profits. Revenue growth has continued to be strong, although its quarterly profits in the latter hald of the year tailed off a bit and missed analyst expectations.
On 12 December, S1 was still up 6.52% for the year at $7.03, despite a 9% drop that week. It has been rising steadily since falling along with the wider market in September.
Diebold posted slimmer gains this year, creeping up 3.21% to $27.67. It had a slow start to the year, but its share price rocketed on acquisition rumours in March, and it therefore had a bigher plateau to fall from when market volatility reached its peak in October.
2008 losers
Among the many companies to see big drops in share value this year, five fell more than 75%. Besides the two biggest fallers, the list is dominated by Indian fintech firms, with five of the six Indian index constituents losing more than two-thirds of their value.
UK insurance sector specialist The Innovation Group (TIG) tops the fallers. It was the biggest faller last week, and is down 88.76% for the year so far. Integration costs from its purchase of Nobilas last year contributed to a loss in the first half. And, with several subsequent smaller acquisitions to swallow, costs continued to rise, seeing the firm to a full financial year loss, despite healthy revenue gains
TIG is followed closely by Bravura Solutions, which is down 87.70% for the year so far after a confusing situation where shares owned by company management were caught up in the failure of brokerage Lift Capital; missed revenue targets and an aborted takeover by private equity firm Ironbridge Capital.
The list of the top five losers this year is rounded out by three Indian fintech firms:
Index comparison
Methodology
More information on the Finextra50 Financial Technology Index methodology and constituent stocks can be found here.