Conveyancing giant reveals loss while takeover talks continue
Smoove made an EBITDA loss of £4.8 million in the last year, as it waits for a possible bid from a rival firm.
Conveyancing giant Smoove has announced a loss in its full-year results while it waits for a possible takeover bid from Australian rival PEXA.
There was a 7.4% increase in revenues to £20.6m (2022: £19.2m) in the year to the end of March, and a gross profit of £7.8 million (2022: £7.8 million).
But Smoove revealed an underlying EBITDA loss of £4.8 million (2022: £3.7 million loss), which it says “reflects investment in the core eConveyancer business and in new product areas”.
There was also an underlying loss before tax of £5.6m (2022: £4.9m loss).
“The effect of previously announced cost reduction initiatives was seen at the end of the period, and will be more impactful in the current financial year to 31 March 2024,” the company says.
Conveyancing completions grew 44% to 53,224 (2022: 36,965). This is made up of transactional completions of 18,382, and remortgage completions of 34,842 (2022: 15,128).
Offer deadline
Smoove recently reached a deal with leading mortgage broker MAB to provide home-buying comparison services.
It revealed in April it was in talks about a possible takeover of the company by PEXA, which now has until 14 July to make an offer or withdraw.
Last year, the company launched a digital onboarding platform called Smoove Start, and it said 30 branches across 18 firms were signed up.
The growth in our remortgage volume demonstrates our ability to adapt to market conditions.”
Jesper With-Fogstrup, CEO at Smoove, says: “The growth in our remortgage volume demonstrates our ability to adapt to market conditions, while the development of a new user interface and APIs for eConveyancer provides a strong platform for future growth of that business.”
The Smoove brand with a pink logo and hellosmoove.com website were created a year ago when the firm decided a new look was needed.
