American Express reported third quarter earnings that surpassed Wall Street's expectations, on strengths in its card business and some other segments.
The financial services company’s earnings of $2.08 a share beat analysts’ expectation of $2.03 a share. The EPS was also higher than the year-ago quarter’s $1.88 a share a year ago.
Revenue increased +8% to $11 billion, also ahead of Wall Street's forecast for $10.94 billion.
Tailwinds for the quarter’s performance included higher member spending on cards, strong net interest income and card fees.
Revenue from card fees surged +17% to a record $1.03 billion, beating analysts' estimates of $1.01 billion. Consumer services revenue increased +11% to $5.4 billion, while commercial services grew +7% to $3.4 billion. Merchant and network services revenue rose +5% to $1.7 billion.
Looking ahead, the company re-iterated its fourth-quarter expected earnings-per-share growth of +8%, and expected revenue growth of +10%.
For the full-year 2019, the company expects earnings to range between $7.85 and $8.35 a share, compared to analysts’ expectation of $8.01 a share.