I don't update ASW clients number as regularly as I should. To be honest, I did it much more often in the beginning, but now I only update it when I happen to remember.
Looking at my numbers, back in Nov 2015, ASW had 230 clients and in June 2016, it had 231 clients. There doesn't seem to be any big increase in the actual client numbers.
Therefore, my conclusion for the reason behind the increase in revenue in the second half of 2016 is an increase in corporate activity from existing clients. These include things such as capital raising, takeovers, extraordinary meetings, etc.
How durable this increase is, I'm not sure. I guess we'll find out in about 7 weeks time. ASW usually releases a brief Half Year profit advice at the end of December.
Back to the client numbers, it is interesting to note that back in May 2013 (at the top of the mining boom), ASW had 267 clients, about 15% more than now. Considering that ASW had just posted its best result ever (about 18% higher than in 2013), it is clear that number of clients per se is not the most important driver for ASW's profitability.
What we want is for ASW to secure clients with bigger number of shareholders who engage in relatively frequent corporate activities. This type of clients is more valuable because they generate regular revenues for ASW throughout the year. On the other hand, the typical junior explorers usually only contribute a big one-off revenue at the time of listing and then the revenue would taper off.
ASW Price at posting:
75.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
