Britain's "surprising" vote to leave the EU may have caused anxiety for some but the flurry of trade that followed gave the Australian Securities Exchange a boost to its bottom line.
The Brexit vote, along with a jump in capital raising in the finance sector, lifted an otherwise fairly flat year for the Australian Securities Exchange, ASX deputy chief executive Peter Hiom said as the exchange operator delivered its annual results on Thursday.
A year of volatility, capped by the June EU referendum result, lifted the ASX's profit 7.1 per cent to $426.2 million for the year to June 30, while revenue also climbed, by 4.6 per cent to $908.3 million.
The company expects market volatility to continue this year, with the US election result to add to the ongoing fallout of the Brexit vote, new ASX chief executive Dominic Stevens said.
"I have inherited a business in a very good shape and with a strategy that is focused on delivering positive outcomes for shareholders and customers," Mr Stevens said.
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Mr Stevens took over as CEO at the beginning of August, after previous chief Elmer Funke Kupper stood down amid an Australian Federal Police investigation into his previous employer Tabcorp over allegations the gaming business was involved in bribery in Cambodia.
After just over two weeks in the top job, Mr Stevens said it was hard to miss the steps ASX was taking into new technology, including harnessing market data for new products and services.
"ASX records a staggering amount of data each day and I think there are further opportunities to help our customers," Mr Stevens said.
It was unsurprising that finance market participants were eyeing new technology as a way to reduce risks and costs after the new regulations brought in in the wake of the global financial crisis, Mr Stevens said.
In particular, the company was investing in blockchain as a possible replacement to its electronic record of shareholdings and transactions. Blockchain - the technology behind Bitcoin - is a digital public ledger of transactions that uses a network of users to verify transactions rather than one central organisation.
Listings on the ASX also increased over the period, boosting listing revenue by 4.3 per cent to $149.4 million, but the value of initial public offerings (IPOs) slid in comparison to the previous financial year, dropping from $38.9 billion to $23.6 billion.
Since the start to the new financial year, listing revenue dipped as the amount of capital raised for IPOs fell 6.2 per cent to $8.6 billion in comparison to July 2015, ASX said.
The ASX share price was down 34 cents, or 0.68 per cent, at $49.85 at 1544 on Thursday.
VOLATILITY BOOSTS ASX PROFIT
* Net profit up 7.1pct to $426.2m
* Revenue up 4.6pct to $908.3m
* Final dividend up 3.9 cents to 99 cents, fully franked, taking the full-year distribution to $1.981
