smartTrade UK Unit Lifts Profit 22% to £3.39m on Flat Sales

smartTrade Technologies' UK subsidiary raised net profit 22% to £3.39 million in the year to March 31, 2026, while revenue slipped 0.9% to £19.55 million. The London-based software unit filed the full-year accounts with Companies House on Monday. Operating profit rose 44% year over year to £4.97 million, and gross margin — calculated by Finance Magnates — widened to 33.1% from 27%.

The filing is the first to reflect smartTrade's purchase of kACE, the derivatives pricing business it agreed to buy from BGC Group for up to $119 million in December. BGC said smartTrade paid $80 million upfront, with up to $39 million more tied to performance targets, and completed the sale on January 6. The UK unit booked a £5.21 million investment in Kace Financial Limited.

What changed in the cost base?

Cost discipline drove the profit gain, not top-line growth. Cost of sales fell 9% to £13.08 million and administrative expenses dropped 20% to £1.5 million. Currency moves added a small tailwind: the unit booked a £58,178 exchange gain after a £58,620 loss — stated as £586,620 in the accounts filing detail — in fiscal 2025.

Headcount rose to 12 from nine, with staff costs up 22% to £1.51 million. Fees paid to smartTrade's French parent fell 13% to £10.98 million, according to the related-party note.

Where did sales grow and shrink?

Geographic mix shifted toward continental Europe. UK customers generated £7.82 million, down 7.9% from a year earlier. Sales to the rest of Europe rose 10% to £6.57 million, while revenue from the rest of the world slipped 1.8% to £5.16 million.

David Vincent, smartTrade's chief executive and the unit's sole director, credited sales in Europe and Britain and a reorganization aimed at regions where the company is expanding. He "foresees no specific risks or uncertainties," he wrote in the accounts. The unit develops and licenses software for foreign exchange and fixed income trading across Europe and the EMEA region.

How does the profit run compare with prior years?

Profit has grown every year since a slump in fiscal 2022. Net profit stood at £2.13 million in fiscal 2021 before falling to £206,885 a year later, when gross profit dropped to £1.1 million from £3.78 million. It recovered to £1.3 million in fiscal 2023 and £2.22 million in fiscal 2024 — the year operating profit doubled to almost £3 million.

Fiscal 2026 profit is more than 16 times the 2022 level. Dividends to the French parent have scaled with it: the unit raised its payout 46% to £2.73 million this year, after paying £1.29 million and £1.87 million in the two prior years, and nothing in fiscal 2023. Vincent recommended a further £3.3 million.

The three dividends total £5.89 million, about 70% of the £8.39 million the unit earned over the same period, by Finance Magnates' calculation.

What does the kACE deal mean for the balance sheet?

The £5.21 million covers Kace Financial Limited, a company incorporated on December 1, 2025, that passed from BGC's Fenics Software to the UK unit on December 31, Companies House records show. Its first accounts are due by September 2027.

The acquisition coincided with a swing in the intra-group balance. At year-end the UK unit owed smartTrade's French holding £13.61 million, after being owed £12.56 million a year earlier, and it paid £269,699 in interest at a rate of 4.44%. That left net current liabilities of £1.26 million, against net current assets of £3.55 million in March 2025. Cash rose to £1.83 million from £1.29 million.

The unit's ultimate parent is Dreamstart Holding SAS of Aix-en-Provence, the accounts show. TA Associates became smartTrade's main investor in 2025, when Hg sold its stake. With kACE now folded in and the parent funding the group's expansion, the next filing — due after September 2027, when Kace Financial's first accounts land — will show whether the derivatives pricing bet adds revenue rather than only intercompany debt.