Morses Club PLC Acquisition of U Holdings Limited (1059D)

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RNS Number : 1059D

Morses Club PLC

24 June 2019

24 June 2019

Morses Club PLC

Acquisition of U Holdings Limited

Morses Club PLC ("Morses Club", or the "Company"), the UK's second largest home collected credit lender, announces that it has acquired U Holdings Limited ("U Account"), trading as U Account, through its fully owned subsidiary Shelby Finance Limited (the "Acquisition").

The acquisition of U Account is an important step in the Company's strategy of building a digital offering to allow its customers to access credit flexibly in a significant growth segment of the market. Furthermore the Acquisition follows the recently announced addition of certain assets of CURO Transatlantic to the Company's product offering with the enhanced breadth of capability highly beneficial to the Company's credit strategy.

The consideration for the Acquisition comprises initial cash consideration of GBP5.8m, financed from existing Morses Club cash and debt facilities, and deferred consideration of up to GBP5m, payable in cash over the next four years to February 2023, conditional upon certain net profit criteria having been met.

Based in Sheffield, U Account is a leading digital current account provider offering an alternative to traditional banking by providing a fully functional agency banking service. As well as providing card services with its current accounts through contactless Mastercard debit cards, U Account also offers in-app features and functionality to help customers manage their finances more effectively.

U Account focuses on customers who are underserved by traditional banks, offering a current account banking service that enables customers to receive wages or benefits directly, manage their outgoings, and avoid unnecessary bank charges. U Account customers can also deposit cash at one of PayPoint's 28,000 terminals across the UK and earn rewards from recognised retailers.

As part of the transaction, Morses Club has acquired U Account's technology and e-money banking platform, as well as its 20,000 current active customers.

Many of Morses Club's existing 235,000 customers have expressed interest in opening an online current account, making U Account's digital platform particularly complementary to Morses Club's existing offering. Morses Club plans to leverage its proven expertise in lending to the non-standard credit market to offer U Account customers new lending products and services to meet their financial needs.

Whilst U Account has historically been loss-making (in the year ended 28 February 2019, U Account (then trading under the ownership of Ffrees Family Finance Ltd) generated unaudited revenue of GBP1.7m and an unaudited operating loss of GBP4.0m), management expect that post integration and restructuring, the losses incurred in the remainder of FY20 will be in the range of GBP1.4m to GBP1.7m. Management are confident that the Acquisition will be earnings accretive thereafter.

The Board intends to continue its progressive dividend policy and, in respect of the year ending February 2020, to at least maintain the current level of dividend of 7.8p.

Paul Smith, Chief Executive Officer of Morses Club, commented:

"This acquisition represents a fantastic opportunity to enter the rapidly growing online banking market. U Account features the full suite of digital banking services and has grown its customer base to c.20,000 active customers. U Account's offering is highly complementary to that of Morses Club, and through this acquisition we expect to deliver significant synergies and cross selling opportunities.

"This is another exciting step for Morses Club as, consistent with our stated strategy, we continue to diversify our product offering to serve a broader range of customers across the non-standard credit space. Our differentiated use of technology and innovation enables Morses Club's customers to access a broader range of more flexible and suitable credit."

The information communicated in this announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) No. 596/2014.

For further information

 
 Morses Club PLC                                     Tel: +44 (0) 330 
  Paul Smith, Chief Executive Officer                 045 0719 
  Andy Thomson, Chief Financial Officer 
 Panmure Gordon (UK) Limited (Nomad and Joint        Tel: +44 (0) 20 
  Broker)                                             7886 2500 
  Fabien Holler / Atholl Tweedie (Corporate 
  Finance) 
  Erik Anderson (Corporate Broking) 
 finnCap                                             Tel: +44 (0) 20 
  Jonny Franklin-Adams / Anthony Adams (Corporate     7220 0500 
  Finance) 
  Tim Redfern / Richard Chambers (Corporate 
  Broking) 
 Camarco                                             Tel: +44 (0) 20 
  Ed Gascoigne-Pees / Jennifer Renwick / Kimberley    3757 4984 
  Taylor 
 

Notes to Editors

About Morses Club

Morses Club is the second largest UK Home Collected Credit (HCC) lender with 235,000 customers and over 1,900 agents across 95 locations throughout the UK.

The Company offers a range of loan products to its customers through its extensive self-employed agent network. The majority of the Company's borrowers are repeat customers and the Company enjoys consistently high customer satisfaction with scores of 97% or above(1) .

The Company is using technology to broaden its offering and provide new products to ensure customers can access credit with the flexibility they require. In April 2016, its cashless lending product, the Morses Club Card, was introduced, enabling its customers to buy online as well as on the high street. Dot Dot Loans, the Company's first online installment product, was launched in March 2017.

Morses Club successfully listed on AIM in May 2016.

About the UK non-standard credit market

The UK non-standard credit market, of which UK HCC is a subset, consists of both secured and unsecured lending and is estimated to comprise around 10 million consumers(2) .

Non-standard credit is the provision of secured and unsecured credit to consumers other than through mainstream lenders. Lenders providing non-standard credit principally lend on an unsecured basis and the market is characterised by high frequency borrowing.

Since February 2014, unsecured personal lending has grown from GBP161 billion to GBP216 billion in February 2019(3) .

(1 Independent Customer Satisfaction Survey conducted by Mustard 2 FCA High Cost Credit Review Technical Annex 1: CRA data analysis of UK personal debt - July 2017 3 Source: Table A5.2, Bank of England Money and Credit Bank stats February 2019)

About UK Home Collected Credit

UK HCC is considered to be a specialised segment of the broader UK non-standard credit market. UK HCC loans are typically small, unsecured cash loans delivered directly to customers' homes. Repayments are collected in person during weekly follow-up visits to customers' homes.

UK HCC is considered to be stable and well-established, with approximately 1.6 million(2) people using the services of UK HCC lenders.

(2 High Cost Credit Review ANNEX 1 - July 2017)

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June 24, 2019 02:00 ET (06:00 GMT)