Misys earnings hit shares

July 19, 2001 Posted: 1043 GMT

LONDON (CNN) -- UK software company Misys on Thursday presented a 9 percent fall in annual net profits and a cautious forecast, sending its shares tumbling.

Misys said net income fell to £75.2 million compared with £81.6 million in fiscal 2000 on acquisition costs, while pretax profits rose 14 percent to £140 million compared with £123 million pounds a year ago.

The company, which makes software for the health-care and financial services markets, said revenues rose 22 percent to £849 million compared with £698 million in 2000.

Misys lost a quarter of its market value as the shares (MSY) plunged  25 percent in London to 317 pence, with investors expressing concern about Misys saying some companies were delaying decisions on large contracts.

Its software offers solutions to electronic brokering, capital markets, money management, clinical practice management in hospitals and transaction processing. About 60 percent of sales come from abroad.

"In the current, rather more uncertain economic environment, we are assuming that customers will continue to be cautious for a while about  approving larger capital commitments," Misys said in relation to falling banking software sales.

Misys said, however, that its health-care division was performing strongly.

Last month the company announced it had agreed to buy Sunquest Information Systems of the U.S., a provider of acute-care information software to hospitals, for $404 million in cash.

Misys also said it would have a £9 million write-down for the closure of two Internet ventures.

It closed its consumer financial services portal called theformula --

which was only launched in November when other companies were scaling back Web spending  – and Screentrade, a site where consumers were able to compare insurance quotes.

"Although we had established a strong foothold in the market with Screentrade, consumers have been slower than expected to adopt the Internet for buying personal finance products," Misys said.

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