Mortgage plan gives lift to Money Supermarket
ONLINE price comparison site
Money Supermarket had more to reveal yesterday than the scantily clad city workers on its ‘Epic Strut’ TV adverts.
The firm announced that it was launching a new mortgage comparison website, called Podium, in collaboration with two tech entrepreneurs who built comparison engines for loans and credit cards still used by the site.
Though a number of start-ups have already been trying to crack the digitisation of the mortgage market, £1.7bn Money Supermarket muscling in on the action marks the biggest move so far.
Managing director Andy Hancock said: ‘The goal is an easy-touse comparison service which at the touch of a button on a mobile phone will empower consumers with the information and knowledge they need to do a fairer comparison of mortgages.’
Investors seemed to think the idea was ‘epic’, as shares climbed 6.2pc, or 19.1p, to 328.4p.
Money Supermarket will own 50pc of the venture, while entrepreneurs Matt Denman and Mark Hawkins will hold the other half.
Money Supermarket has had a mortgage comparison section for some time, pulling in 16m people or 25pc of all mortgage search traffic per year, but it said Podium would work in a different way.
While the current site refers customers to a broker soon after they begin a comparison, Podium lets them complete the whole decisionmaking process online.
Money Supermarket also reported revenue growth of 5pc for the first six months of the year and a rise in operating profit of 7pc.
Elsewhere in the FTSE 250, engineer was suffering due to delayed Government spending on submarine projects.
The defence, emergency services and nuclear specialist sank by 8.8pc, or 70.4p, to 732.6p as it announced that although profit expectations were unchanged, revenue would be £120m lower than expected for the year.
It blamed £70m of this on the restructuring of the Government’s defence equipment and support organisation, which manages the purchase of equipment and services for the Armed Forces.
Babcock said the new Submarine Delivery Agency had spread out its spending on projects, including the Dreadnought submarine facilities, a successor to Trident, which meant cash would be coming in later than planned.
Another outsourcing firm, Capita, was trying to take the initiative as it announced a £30m five-year contract with Southern Water.
It already provides Southern with front-office services such as sales personnel, but it will now be in charge of billing and handling correspondence. But after losing its finance director and becoming embroiled in a school pupil information mix-up scandal this week, the announcement did not quite have the effect Capita might have hoped for, and shares were down 0.2pc, or 0.25p, to 163.7p.
The FTSE 100 ended the day fractionally higher, up 0.1pc, or 7.69 points, at 7683.97 as a weaker sterling from poor retail sales helped boost the companies with international exposure, such as Unilever and Royal Dutch Shell.
Miner Anglo American was the biggest loser on the blue- chip index, as it released second-quarter production statistics and shares fell 4.1pc, or 69p, to 1622p.
On the junior market in London, marketing group Be Heard caused a stir in the wrong way, plunging 38.2pc, or 0.72p, to 1.18p as it lowered its earnings guidance due to increased costs.
Although it had won major contracts with Aviva, Glaxosmithkline and Equifax in the first half of the year, it said it would have to increase investment to be able to meet these deals.