Moscow Exchange announces results for the full year 2024

Moscow Exchange (MOEX) today announces its financial results in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) for the year ended 31 December 2024.

Unless stated otherwise, all figures below refer to performance in 2024 and all comparisons are with the previous year.

KEY FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS FOR 2024

• F&C income totaled to RUB 63.0 bln, driven by activity of clients and issuers as well as the launch of new products and services. F&C share of operating income amounted to 43% in FY’24.
• Net interest income (NII) amounted RUB 81.9 bln, primarily driven by RUB interest rates.
• Operating income totaled RUB 145.1 bln.
• Operating expenses totaled RUB 46.3 bln Cost-to-income ratio amounted to 31.9%.
• Adjusted net profit amounted RUB 80.1 bln.

KEY BUSINESS & CORPORATE HIGHLIGHTS FOR 2024

• MOEX continued to develop the Russian equity market, hosting 13 IPOs and four SPOs in 2024.
• The number of equities available in CCP-based OTC trading mode reached 135.
• MOEX kept propelling the Russian debt market as 247 corporates, including 78 newcomers, placed 759 bond issues, raising RUB 8.4 trn in 2024.
• More than five million new retail investors opened brokerage accounts in 2024, bringing the total number of retail clients to 35.1 mln by year-end. Today, nearly 36 million people have brokerage accounts on the Moscow Exchange.
• 25 Russian-law ETFs were launched, investing in equities, bonds and money market instruments.
• On the Derivatives Market, 35 new instruments were added in 2024, and trading volume in these new contracts totaled RUB 89 bln. More than 40,000 clients traded the new instruments during the year. The range of new instruments includes premium options, futures on commodities, non-ferrous and industrial metals, ETFs tracking global indices as well as global and local equities.
• Finuslugi launched new features including the one to screen, compare, analyse and purchase mutual funds on the platform.
• MOEX START, a pre-IPO platform, went live. Access to the platform is available to all Moscow Exchange clearing participants on the Equities Market.
• MOEX released IPO recommendations, spreading best practices for efficiency and transparency of ECM transactions.

FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS

PERFORMANCE OF KEY BUSINESS LINES

• The total market capitalization of the Equities Market at the end of 2024 was RUB 53.2 trln (USD 523.4 bln). Fee and commission income from the Equities Market was up 44.7%, while trading volumes grew 43.1%. The effective fee was positively affected by the growing volumes of value-added, CCP-based OTC trading. Over 3.6 million clients were active every month during the year.

• Fee income from the Bond Market increased 24.3% while trading volumes (excluding placements of overnight bonds) improved by 14.8%. Primary market volumes (excluding placements of overnight bonds) were up 44.8%, mostly driven by elevated corporate borrowing activity. The supply of floating-rate issues propped up the primary market. However, floating-rate bonds have a lower trading velocity in the secondary market compared to fixed-rate bonds, which is why the secondary market trading volumes decreased by 9.4%.

• Money Market fee income was up 35.4%. Trading volumes grew 27.1%. The discrepancy between fees and volumes was mainly attributable to the increase in shares of value-added CCP and GCC repo in the volumes’ mix. The effective fee was also supported by the increase of average GCC repo terms. The GCC repo segment also benefits from the rising demand for Russian-law money market ETFs.

• The Derivatives Market F&C income increased by 33.5%. The trading volume added 23.7%. The volumes’ mix evolved towards higher value-added contracts on commodities and interest rates, which had a positive effect on the effective fee. Specifically, commodity derivatives’ volumes surged by 74.3%. The volumes of interest rate contracts improved by 91.9%. On the other hand, FX derivative contracts decreased by 4.3% in trading volumes. Index contracts trading volumes grew by 47.8%. Single-stock contracts increased by 21.4% in trading volumes.

• Fee income from the Depository and Settlement Services added 4.4%. Average value of assets under custody increased by 10.5%. The discrepancy between growth rates of F&C income and assets on deposit is the result of business lines beyond safekeeping, primarily clearing and collateral management services, which are a reflection of repo operations at the NSD.

• IT Services, Listing and other fee income line was largely driven by Finuslugi revenues. Sale of software and tech. services organically improved by 8.0%. Listing and other services grew by 16.5% as primary market activity in bonds improved. Sales of information services fell by 19.1%. Finuslugi revenues surged by 76.0% as the business unit develops new features, widens the product range and keeps attracting new clients. Other fee income grew by 69.3% on the back of the NCC tariff model update related to precious metals market as well as the launch of new products.

• Fee income from other markets decreased by 24.7% while trading volumes were down 22.7%.

OPEX BREAKDOWN

• FY’24 OPEX was up 61.4% YoY, below the guidance range of 65–75%.

• OPEX for 4Q’24 increased by 26.7% YoY, largely due to the growth in marketing, personnel and IT maintenance expenses.

• 4Q’24 Personnel expenses grew by 13.1% YoY on the back of new hires. LTIP had negligible contribution to YoY personnel expenses growth.

• The employee headcount in 4Q’24 added 28.8% YoY and 10.6% QoQ. New hires in 4Q’24 are related to strategic projects (Finuslugi, DFAs) and the overall strengthening of the IT function.

• Advertising and marketing costs in 4Q’24 were up 74.0% YoY to stimulate further growth of Finuslugi client base.

• The 80.5% YoY increase in 4Q’24 taxes, other than income tax, is linked to VAT following a rise in the taxable expenses, primarily in marketing.

• The 2.5x YoY increase in 4Q’24 professional services expense is mostly driven by consulting.

• D&A and IT maintenance grew 43.7% YoY in 4Q’24, while the D&A alone added 22.8% YoY. IT maintenance costs increased by nearly 2x YoY due to the implementation of the software & hardware renewal program.

• 4Q’24 CAPEX was RUB 7.52 bln. FY’24 CAPEX amounted to RUB 12.50 bln, which is broadly in line with the to end of RUB 9–12 bln guidance range. The top 5 projects account for 26% of CAPEX.

The cash position[3] at the end of 2024 was RUB 132.46 bln. The company had no debt as of the end of the reporting period.

Moscow Exchange’s consolidated IFRS financial statements for FY 2024 are available on the Investor Relations section of the company's web site.

Contacts:
Investor Relations: Public Relations:

NOTES TO EDITORS

About Moscow Exchange

Moscow Exchange Group operates Russia’s main trading platform for equities, bonds, derivative instruments, currencies, money market instruments and commodities. The Group includes the central securities depository (National Settlement Depository), and a clearing center (National Clearing Centre), performing the functions of central counterparty on the markets, which allows Moscow Exchange to offer its clients the full spectrum of trading and post-trading services. Moscow Exchange held the initial public offering of its shares on 15 February 2013 (ticker MOEX).

Disclaimers

Some of the information in these materials may contain projections or other forward-looking statements regarding future events or the future financial performance of the Company. You can identify forward looking statements by terms such as "expect", "believe", "anticipate", "estimate", "intend", "will", "could," "may" or "might" the negative of such terms or other similar expressions. The Company wishes to caution you that these statements are only predictions and that actual events or results may differ materially. The Company does not intend to update these statements to reflect events and circumstances occurring after the date hereof or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. Many factors could cause the actual results to differ materially from those contained in projections or forward-looking statements of the Company, including, among others, general economic conditions, the competitive environment, risks associated with operating in the Russian Federation, rapid technological and market change in the industries the Company operates in, as well as many other risks specifically related to the Company and its operations.