Italy's Nexi speeds up share buyback, says more to come

MILAN (Reuters) - Italy's Nexi will use rising excess cash to buy back its own shares faster than planned, it said on Wednesday as second quarter core profit slightly exceeded forecasts.

Europe's biggest payments group by transactions processed stuck to its full-year targets after quarterly revenue rose 5.8% year-on-year to 879 million euros ($950 million), fractionally ahead of an 873 million euro average analyst forecast provided by the company.

Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation grew 7.5% to 465 million euros, beating the 6.2% forecast by analysts.

The group, which counts Italian state investor CDP and a number of private credit firms among its shareholders, booked 189 million euros in one-off costs in the first half of the year, mostly to fund voluntary staff exits.

The bulk of the one-off hit was non cash, leading to a reported 33 million euro net loss while excess cash generation jumped 42% from a year earlier.

Nexi said it expected it would be able to return a significant part of its excess cash to shareholders on a regular basis through share buybacks or dividends.

It added that it would complete a 500 million euro share buyback launched in May, and originally expected to last 18 months, by the end of the year.

($1 = 0.9252 euros)

(Reporting by Valentina Za; Editing by Kirsten Donovan)