Instalment payments provider Splitit Payments Ltd has reported strong revenue gain in April following a soft March quarter.

"While March saw a brief period of decline in transaction volumes related to COVID-19, late March through [to] April 26 has been exceptionally positive," the company reported in its quarterly update to investors.

Splitit is headquartered in New York, and listed on the ASX, with most of its business running in the US and Europe. Its platform allows buyers to use their own credit cards to buy now and pay in instalments, which the company claims will lead to lower rates of "cart abandonment" on ecommerce sites.

Growth in North America and Europe has been driven by new merchants signing up to Splitit during the first quarter of the 2020 calendar year, with the company maintaining a focus on ecommerce merchants. It said that "over 90 per cent of transactions [were] ecommerce or phone based payments".

This quarter, Splitit also saw a 20 per cent shift in payment mix towards credit cards over debit cards for transactions, along with an increase in the average number of monthly instalments from five to seven, over the previous 12 months.

"This also contributed to sharp revenue growth towards the end of the period as merchant fees increased with longer instalment plans," the company said.

Cash receipts from customers for the period were US$670,000 million, up from US$430,000 in the previous quarter. Nevertheless, the company is still burning cash, albeit at a slower rate. Splitit had a net operating cash outflow of US$1.81 million for the quarter, a US$2.95 million improvement on the previous quarter (Q4 FY19: US$4.76 million outflow).

Splitit securities will remain in a trading halt until the commencement of normal trading tomorrow (Thursday 30 April 2020) pending an announcement.