Zoopla revenues up 34pc

PROPERTY website Zoopla hailed a ‘transformational’ year after its revenues soared to more than £100m despite the launch of an online rival.

The company, which is 31.32pc owned by DMG Media, the parent company of the Daily Mail, reported a 34pc jump in annual revenues to a record £107.6m.

Profits rose 17pc to £33.6m despite the launch of OnTheMarket, which was set up earlier this year by a group of estate agents to challenge the dominance of Zoopla and market leader Rightmove.

Zoopla, which listed on the stock market last year and also owns PrimeLocation, has benefited from the purchase of uSwitch and raised its final dividend from 1.1p a share to 2.5p.

‘It has been another transformational year for the business,’ said founder and chief executive Alex Chesterman.

‘We have made great progress towards our vision of becoming the consumer champion at the heart of the home with the acquisition of uSwitch.’ Shares fell 4.8p to 234p at the close yesterday. Anthony Codling, an analyst at Jefferies, said that he expects the share price to improve in the coming months on the back of a strong performance from uSwitch and OnTheMarket’s failure to topple Zoopla as the country’s number two property website.

He added: ‘Two catalysts are likely to lead to a material re-rating of Zoopla’s shares in the coming months: challenger portal OnTheMarket failing to live up to its own hype of being the UK’s number two portal by January, leading to customers returning to Zoopla, and uSwitch continuing to perform ahead of expectations.’