Trading for the nine months to 30 November from Trainline (TRN) saw revenues jump 26% to £198m, with net ticket sales up 18% at £2.86bn.
The company, which sells train tickets in the UK and across Europe through its website and app, also stuck to its annual guidance given its ‘continuing strong progress’ in its year to date. Revenue growth is expected to be in the ‘low to mid-20% range’ and net ticket sales set to be in the ‘high-teens’ percentage wise.
Analysts at Megabuyte said market consensus for the firm’s full year revenue growth is 25%, implying to £261m. Adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) is expected to be £82.6m, which would represent a 57% increase on last year.
Despite the implied impressive growth Trainline’s shares are struggling on Tuesday, nudging 1% down at 505p.
TRAINLINE BENEFITS FROM ‘BORIS BOUNCE’
This lacklustre stock performance today will not surprise those investors that have closely watched the reaction of the UK stock market since Boris Johnson's comprehensive victory at the polls.
The UK's benchmark FTSE 100 has shot up more than 200 points, or over 3%, since the Conservative win was confirmed. The more UK domestic-facing FTSE 250, of which Trainline is a constituent, has done even better, rallying more than 1,000 points and roughly 5%.
Individual stocks have outperformed even these impressive returns, and Trainline is firmly among them, its share price jumping from 446p to yesterday's 510p all-time high close, a stunning 14%-plus ‘Boris bounce’.
Trainline joined the stock market in June at 350p per share.
Megabuyte senior analyst Robert Warensjo said Trainline’s growth was driven by its ‘usual suspects’; the UK consumer and international divisions. The company has even been able to shrug-off the impact of strikes in France.
Warensjo calculates that before today's modest decline Trainline shares valued the company at 26.3-times current year enterprise value/EBITDA and 8.8-times current year forecast sales.
‘Investors are showing relief over the result of the general election, including no prospect of railway nationalisation’, Warensjo said.
