Mortgage Advice Bureau posts 13% rise in revenues

Mortgage Advice Bureau reported a jump in full-year revenue on Tuesday despite ongoing Brexit uncertainty.

In an update for the year to 31 December 2018, the company said revenue rose 13% to £123m as the average number of advisers increased 12% to 1,130. Meanwhile, average revenue per adviser was up 1% during the year, despite the uncertainty brought about by Brexit and a reduction in housing transactions overall.

The group said pre-tax profit for the year was broadly in line with the board's expectations and it had a strong balance sheet, with a cash position of over £25m, including over £13m of unrestricted cash balances.

Chief executive officer Peter Brodnicki said: "MAB has delivered another strong performance despite the uncertainty caused by the ongoing Brexit negotiations. We continue to grow our market share and invest in accordance with our very clear strategy to ensure continued and sustainable growth.

"We are looking forward to capitalising upon our recent protection initiatives to increase performance whilst also delivering the initial phase of our next generation MIDAS technology in the first half of this year. Both of these initiatives are already proving to be important recruitment drivers for Appointed Representatives, advisers and lead sources.

"This initial phase and further releases across 2019 and 2020 will benefit MAB advisers and customers, through improvements in efficiency, productivity, lead generation, product offering and customer experience. We are excited about how delivering this will help us to attract more advisers and customers into MAB, assisting our future growth plans."

At 1525 GMT, the shares were down 3.8% to 580p.