By Juliette Portala

(Reuters] -Worldline’s fourth-quarter results exceeded expectations. This prompted the French payments firm to declare a new “conquest” year in Europe. Shares rose more than 9%.

It processes transactions from clients, including merchants and government agencies. The goal is to prioritise acquisitions that are part of region-wide consolidation efforts.

As a result of the increasing use for ecommerce platforms on smartphones, there have been several takeover deals in the payments sector.

Gilles Grapinet, the Chief Executive of Worldline, told analysts in a conference call that he hadn’t seen so many banks undertaking deep strategic reviews on their payments activities, even though he was a senior executive.

The tipping point of 2021 was what he called it. It had changed the way some of Europe’s largest banks thought. They now have to address the question, “What should I do about my payments?”‘.

He said, “It’s unprecedented.”

REFLEXION IS A SIGH

Grapinet said that this year was one of “perfect execution” of our plans. Grapinet spoke to journalists during a review of last year’s performance. Grapinet pointed to a group he described “in movement, and in conquest”.

Worldline recorded sales of 1.04 billion euro ($1.17 billion), which J.P. Morgan claimed was 2.6% higher than the consensus. Its success was attributed to strong growth in merchant services.

While Europe remains infected by coronavirus, more Europeans are switching to digital transactions. However, payment processing businesses have started to see an increase in in-store sales.

JPM stated in a note that the results are to be viewed as a relief for the market. “Joint concerns about revenue impacts due Worldline’s exposure to DACH in Q4 raised concern,” JPM said.

By 0903 GMT, company shares had risen 9.8%. This was among the highest performing pan-European indicators.

($1=0.8853 euros)