Western Union sees growth outside of transfers in 2024
Western Union’s Q4 24 revenue rose 1% to $1.1bn, with a major driver being the company’s recently launched media network business in the US. However, its consumer money transfer (CMT) revenue declined 4% in Q4 to $939m, contributing to an overall 5% CMT decline for the full year to $3.8bn, highlighting the importance of its ongoing diversification strategy.
Western Union reported total revenue of $4.2bn for 2024, down 3% on a reported basis but up 0.5% on an adjusted basis excluding the impact of Iraq, where the company saw lower-than-expected revenue due to changes in Iraqi central bank policy. This headwind also led to a decline in the company’s full year adjusted operating margin, from 20% in 2023 to 19% in 2024.
After selling its business solutions segment in 2023, Western Union is now seeing faster growth within Consumer Services, including its foreign exchange business in Europe; its retail money order business; and Western Union’s recently launched media network business, which allows companies to advertise to Western Union customers through its own digital channels.
In Q4 2024, the company’s CMT revenue declined 4% to $939m, though transactions overall grew 3% to 75 million, driving 5% growth in cross-border principal to $26.5bn. Meanwhile, consumer services grew 56% to $119.4m, and now account for 11% of Western Union’s revenue – up from 7% last year.
On a full-year basis, while CMT revenues declined by 5%, Consumer Services revenue rose by 28% to account for 10% of Western Union’s total revenue share – around double the share this segment occupied in 2021.
Within transfers, pushing digital growth remains a key part of the company’s Evolve 2025 profitability strategy. Branded digital revenue grew 7% in Q4 2024 to $235m, making up a 25% share of revenue versus 23% last year, with Branded Digital transactions growing 13% to make up 32% of total transactions. Account payout transactions that originated digitally also grew 30% during the quarter, with the company citing strong digital performance in Mexico, Japan, the UK and Chile.
Notably, the company saw CMT revenue declines across several regional segments in 2024, including North America; Europe and the Commonwealth; APAC; and the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia, though it did note 2% growth in the LACA region.
Western Union aims to propel regional growth with rollouts of its cloud-based PoS system in North America, APAC, Europe and LACA. It also mentioned targeting a number of “retail-heavy” corridors, including the US to Guatemala, the UK to India and the UAE to the Philippines. However, it is not yet seeing the impact of its acquisition of Singapore-based digital wallet Dash, which is yet to close.
Aside from growing revenue, Western Union made $60m of savings in 2024 and aims to hit its target of $150m this year, ahead of schedule for its cost redeployment program. However, for 2025, the company is forecasting a 0.5-2.8% decline in revenue on a GAAP basis to $4.09bn-4.19bn, with an operating margin of 18-20%. On an adjusted basis, it predicts revenue will be higher – between $4.12bn and $4.22bn – with a margin of 19-21%.
Western Union remains the biggest consumer money transfer player, but a slowdown in its core business is leading it to increasingly push into new opportunities beyond transfers as other digital challengers continue to grow share. We’ll be watching to see if the company’s revenue mix continues to shift this year.
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