Thomson Reuters (NASDAQ: TRIN) is beginning to reap the benefits of one of the biggest company mergers of recent years, today reporting eight percent better Q3 revenues of $3.3 billion (£2.2 billion), with operating profit up 17 percent to $676 million (£414 million). In the first full quarter since the pair’s merger, those leaps come directly from the pair’s £8.7 billion marriage this June and are helped by $550 million of savings from integration-related activities - like laying off hundreds of staff globally… no final figure on casualties has been given, but CEO Tom Glocer said the process is “ahead of schedule”.

Glocer said, while it’s “certainly mathematically possible” that the company will begin 2009 negatively if it has a disastrous November and December, in reality all the various components of the business were holding up well. The dreaded credit crunch is biting, but “there has already been a silver lining in the disruption… the demand for financial news, for pricing data, for data feeds, for infrastructure is strong,” said Glocer. Still, it’s hard to imagine that the financial crisis—and more specifically the dramatic shrinkage of the investment-banking industry in the U.S.—won’t affect the demand for Thomson Reuters’s financial products. It’s that enterprise business that accounts for the bulk of the company’s revenues; the media side makes up less than 10 percent. 

“It’s a very volatile period …but we feel very good about how our business has held up in the most wrenching time I’ve seen certianly in my 15 years with the business.” But it’s not all rosy, though; Glocer continued: “That does not mean we’re not going to suffer, it’s painful out there, we are losing business, we are losing clients, especially on the investment banking side. 

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By 2011, the company plans to have saved £1.21 billion through integration, with costs of $100 million.

—2008—so far, so good:  Thomson Reuters revenues increased by 11 percent to $10 billion (£6.12 billion) for the first nine months of the year and were split between the Americas with 57 percent, EMEA with 33 percent and Asia with ten percent of the total share. Operating profit was up to $2 billion (£1.22 billion), a 21 percent rise year on year. These number are somewhat misleading - the earnings release assumes that Thomson’s acquisition of Reuters took place on January 1 last year and combines revenues and profits from the two. In any case, on Glocer’s assessment, TR is riding out the downturn better than smaller rivals may be.

—Subscriptions up, not for investment banks: Glocer said there was no evidence of the slowdown hitting its data and newsfeeds subscriptions hard at all – for the tax and accounting division, subscriptions were up nine percent. Asked whether the merger had made Q308 a distorted picture for TR, Glocer said he preferred to look at monthly average net sales figures as a guide – and they are going up for all TR divisions. Glocer told analysts on the earnings call today that if TR was simply geared towards serving the collaterised debt market and the trading of CDOs and CLOs around the world “I really wouldn’t have much to tell you about today”.

—Markets and media: TR’s markets division increased its revenues by seven percent on a like-for-like basis to $2 billion, with revenue up two percent of that coming from foreign exchange rates. It helps when you’re so big: in the earnings call Glocer said it was a key to capitalise on growth around the world wherever it happens. The markets divison reported an 11 percent growth in Asia, with EMEA up six percent and the Americas up just four percent. Operating profits were up 20 percent compared to the same period last year to £346 million. TR’s media division reported a five percent revenue increase on Q307 – two percent organic and the rest from favourable foreign exchange rates. Revenue growth from the news agency business – up five percent—was offset by the replacement of Thomson Financial News with Reuters News.