Switzerland’s largest online financial trading firm, Swissquote, reported a doubling of net profit year-on-year in the first nine months of ...

Switzerland’s largest online financial trading firm, Swissquote, reported a doubling of net profit year-on-year in the first nine months of 2005 to SFr9.3 million ($7.2 million). Revenues grew 24.1 per cent to SFr32.6 million. Swissquote said the number of clients grew by 25 per cent to 46,251 and client assets under custody rose by 37.8 per cent to SFr2.6 billion. The net inflow of new money of totaled SFr 419 million. The firm said in its results statement: “The steady growth witnessed by Swissquote is being largely driven by a continual increase in the number of clients, with quarterly rises in the region of 5 to 6 per cent. The number of clients increased year-on-year by 9,242 to 46,251.” Swissquote launched its platform-based online bond trading service at the beginning of September. The offering covers more than 9,000 bonds from 90 countries in 17 different currencies. “The new service is actively used by larger private clients in particular, to no small degree because of the reasonable transaction costs,” Swissquote said in a statement.