NYSE Euronext Has Second-Quarter Loss After Severance Payments

By Nandini Sukumar and Edgar Ortega

July 30 (Bloomberg) -- NYSE Euronext, the world’s largest owner of stock exchanges, reported a second-quarter loss after severance payments and a one-off charge to end a post-trade contract eroded earnings.

The net loss was $182 million, or 70 cents a share, in the period ended June 30, compared with net income of $195 million, or 73 cents, a year earlier, the New York-based company said in a statement today. Second-quarter results included a $442 million “negative impact from merger expenses and exit cost,” the company said.

Reduced fees at NYSE Euronext’s seven equity exchanges eroded gains from increased trading as the MSCI World Index staged its biggest quarterly rally in a decade. Chief Executive Officer Duncan Niederauer has stemmed market-share losses to London-based Chi-X Europe Ltd. and U.S. rivals including Bats Global Markets of Kansas City, Missouri. Niederauer told shareholders in April that he will seek to sustain profit by cutting an additional $100 million in costs this year.

NYSE Euronext declined 0.7 percent to $27.02 in New York trading yesterday. For the year, the stock has slipped 1.3 percent, compared with a 39 percent jump in the FTSE/Mondo Visione Exchanges Index that tracks 18 bourses.

Chicago-based CME Group Inc., the world’s largest exchange operator by market value, reported a 10 percent increase in net income last week. Deutsche Boerse AG, the No. 2 exchange operator, is scheduled to report earnings next week, along with NYSE’s smaller rival Nasdaq OMX Group Inc.

To contact the reporters on this story: Edgar Ortega in New York at ebarrales@bloomberg.net; Nandini Sukumar in London at nsukumar@bloomberg.net.