Capital One Beats Estimates on Revenue Growth

The credit card company posts top- and bottom-line growth on a new marketing focus.

Author:: Michael Dunn
Publish date:: Apr 17, 2002 9:41 AM EDT

Capital One

beat Wall Street's estimates, posting revenue and profit increases driven by an expansive new marketing campaign.

The consumer services company earned $188.0 million, or 83 cents a share, up from $143.6 million, or 66 cents a share, in the year-ago quarter. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial/First Call had been expecting 81 cents a share.

Capital One's revenue rose to $2.1 billion from $1.9 billion in the fourth quarter of 2001 and $1.506 billion a year ago, led in part by 2.8 million new accounts, bringing the total to 46.6 million.

The company also launched an aggressive marketing campaign, raising its marketing expenses to a record $354 million. In a press release, the company said it believes the brand name recognition that comes from this expense helps fuel its earnings momentum.

Shares of Capital One were recently trading down 0.4% to $63.50 on the news in Instinet premarket action.