Equifax Income Drops 14% Despite 25% Revenue Rise

Consumer and commercial information provider Equifax yesterday reported third quarter net income decreased 14 percent from $78.9 million a year ago to $67.9 million. Atlanta-based Equifax said it benefited in the year-ago period from litigation when it garnered $9.5 million in a tax dispute. Revenues rose 25 percent to $492.5 million from $394.6 million.

The U.S. Consumer Information Solutions division reported revenues of $243.9 million, a slight decline from the same period in 2006. Within that division, the Online Consumer Information group saw revenues of nearly $161 million, flat from last year; the Mortgage Reporting Solutions unit had revenues of $16.9 million, down 3 percent; Credit Marketing Services revenue was $39.2 million, down 6 percent; and revenues in the Direct Marketing unit fell 1 percent to $26.9 million.

News was better for the International division with revenues of $122.9 million, a rise of 17 percent.

The North American Personal Solutions division reported revenues of $16.7 million, up 45 percent.

In May, Equifax completed its $1.4 billion purchase of TALX, a provider of automated human resources and payroll services. Total revenue in the TALX division was $70.4 million. Transaction volume for The Work Number business unit was 3.6 million, up 22 percent from the third quarter of 2006. In addition, approximately 6.6 million total records were added to the employment database, bringing total records in the database to 158.9 million.