Bibby Financial Services (BFS) is eyeing "sustainable profitability" after completing a major restructure which included cutting hundreds of jobs.
BFS, whose parent company is Bibby Line Group, has undergone a significant overhaul in recent years which also included a raft of cost cutting measures and a major sell off.
The company has now revealed a rise in its turnover from £132.4m to £150.5m for 2022 while its pre-tax profits increased from £255,000 to £9.4m.
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The wider group was founded in Liverpool in 1807 and is one of the º£½ÇÊÓƵ's oldest family-owned businesses.
BFS has 8,500 business clients around the world and employs people in 27 offices across Europe and Asia
The company announced in January 2020 that it was to close its city office and make redundancies.
During 2022, BFS employed an average of 936 people around the world, up from 920 in 2021. However, that number is significantly down from the 1,329 it employed in 2019.
The news came months after Bibby Line Group moved its HQ to Liverpool’s Exchange Flags.
In a statement signed off by the Bibby Financial Services board, chief executive Jonathan Andrew said: "Our 40th year of trading, 2022 saw the continued strengthening of our business following a transformation initiated in 2020.
"Our executive leadership team and organisational structure introduced in 2021 are now well established and I am pleased to report the turnaround measures taken have had a positive impact on our business units, customers, colleagues and performance.
"Against a backdrop of macroeconomic uncertainty and rising pressure on SME customers around the world, our reshaped business delivered strong results in 2022.
"Testament to the confidence in our business was the renewal and increase of our º£½ÇÊÓƵ and EUA facilities in 2022, providing us with total funding capability of more than £1.3bn, ensuring we are optimally positioned to address our customers' financing needs while continuing to grow BFS sustainably.
"Our invoice finance business reported improved performance as we welcomed more than 1,000 new customers globally, processing more than 2.5 million invoices to support the cashflow needs of SMEs around the world.
"We achieved strong growth in debts factored as SME demand for third party financing continued to recover following the unwinding of Covid-19 support measures.
"We reported significant growth in our foreign exchange division as well as greater synergies between our invoice finance and asset finance businesses, allowing us to structure a wider range of transactions to support customers.
"Combining Bibby Line Group's shipping heritage and expertise with BFS's SME financing capability, we announced plans to launch BFS Marine Finance in 2023.
"Broadening our product range to support a greater number of SMEs around the world is a key part of our strategy and the launch will see us bolster our support for businesses throughout Europe, providing further growth opportunities.
"Overall, our BFS 4.0 strategy is driving a return to sustainable profitability, allowing us to plan our investment portfolio for new capability to increase our long-term competitiveness.
"We remain alert to macroeconomic conditions and the challenges and risks facing SME customers in 2023 and beyond."
The group's latest financial results have not yet been filed with Companies House.
