Spread betting and contracts for difference (CFD) provider IG Group Holdings expects revenue for the first half of its 2020 financial year to match the prior year's £250m (€296.4m/$328.5m) total, despite a year-on-year decline in revenue from core markets.
Revenue for the six months to 30 November 2018 amounted to £251m, but IG Group said that period benefitted from two months of trading before new European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) product intervention measures came into effect.
Revenue from core markets in the first six months of FY2020 is set to amount to £210m, down 6% decline from the prior year. IG Group said that it had improved the size and quality of its active client base in these territories during H1, however.
On average, the core business served 78,500 over-the-counter leveraged clients per quarter in core markets during the first half, 4% more than the quarterly average of the second, third and fourth quarters of 2019.
Elsewhere, IG Group said revenue for non-core and emerging markets is set to increase by £12m year-on-year to approximately £40m, driven by continued strong performance in Japan in particular.
Its German subsidiary has also benefitted from the launch of the new turbo24s trading product, which has seen promising initial uptake, with around 700 clients signed up since its launch in mid-October.
The provider is due to announce its full financial results for the six-month period on 21 January, 2020.
When announcing its FY2019 results in July, IG Group reported a 16% year-on-year drop in revenue, primarily due to the impact of the new ESMA measures. Revenue during the 12 months through to 31 May, 2019 amounted to £479.6m, down from £569m in the same period in the previous year.
