CapMan Oyj (CAPMAN) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Welcome to CapMan's Results Presentation for the First 6 Months of 2021. My name is Joakim Frimodig. I'm the CEO of the company. We posted a strong result for the first month of 2021. Our efforts into growth, operational improvement and value creation over recent years have resulted in this record result. The operating profit for the first 6 months is the highest in over 10 years and the second highest in CapMan's history overall. Our operating profit for the first 6 months was EUR 21.5 million. Let me start by giving you some background, some long-term development of our results and some other key metrics. You can see the numbers for 2016. That was before our current strategy period, which we started in 2017, and then a comparison of the first half of last year and the comparison of this year. If you look at the assets under management, you can see continued growth there. We are now at a new record level of EUR 4.3 billion, steadily growing and particularly strong growth seen in the last year. Also, the share of international capital under management, i.e., from investors from outside the Nordic region, is growing constantly. When we started the current strategy period, the share was around 10% of assets under management. And today, we are at the level of approximately 60%. The development in the last year has been strong in this field as well. Our operating profit, if you look at the latest 12 months or the 4 last quarters, is at a record level of EUR 36 million. And in the comparison period 2020, you can see the impact of COVID. There, we were at the low level of EUR 11 million, but the rebound and recent development has been strong. One of the key themes in our strategy has been to increase fee profitability, and the level in 2016 was around 0. That has been constantly improved and steadily growing. And now we are at the level of EUR 13.4 million and an improvement also from the first 6 months of last year. The number of employees has grown from approximately 110 persons to close to 160 persons, and what I'm really delighted about is that we have been able to attract top talent to CapMan in recent times. We have also developed quite a bit as a publicly listed company. The number of shareholders has grown from just about 12,000 at the end of 2016 to now 27,000 shareholders, market cap growing from EUR 180 million to EUR 450 million and also the liquidity in the share improving significantly. But let me now turn to the highlights of the first 6 months of this year. As mentioned, we saw continued growth in our assets under management. The current number is EUR 4.3 billion, and that has grown by 37% or EUR 1.2 billion in the last 12 months. And in the last quarter, in the second quarter, that number grew by EUR 425 million. And driving the growth is our new funds: Residential fund; Special Situations Fund; and our latest, Credit fund. We have a number of ongoing fundraising initiatives, and we foresee further growth in this field in the next 12 months. As already mentioned, we also see continued growth in the share of international investors. In just 1 quarter, that number has grown from 50% to 60%. And this is also the area where we see that largest growth in terms of assets under management is coming from in the future. The result development was strong in the fourth quarter of last year. It continued in the first quarter of this year, and happy to announce that it has also continued in the second quarter of this year. So if we look at the first 6 months, as already mentioned, our EBIT was EUR 21.5 million; and our earnings per share, EUR 0.10. Our Management Company business continues to perform well. The turnover grew by 26% in the first 6 months driven by the new funds and the increase in management fees. When we combine that with good cost efficiency and cost control, our EBIT in that segment grew even more, so by 40%. But really, the largest value driver for the first 6 months was the development in fair values. We saw a positive development in all of our investment areas, and we have several funds in or close to carry. Growing dividend distribution to our shareholders is an important part of our investment story. That has grown for 8 consecutive years. The Annual General Meeting this spring made a decision to distribute EUR 0.14 per share. That's distributed semiannually so that EUR 0.07 was paid this spring and EUR 0.07 is due to be paid in September. Here, you can see the development of turnover and operating profit compared to last year. So in terms of turnover, we are plus 12% compared to last year. Worth noting that in the first 6 months, we did not see the full impact of the latest fundraisings and the new funds that will be visible over the coming year. And also worth noting that carried interest income was very minimal recorded in the first 6 months, so there is room for further improvement in terms of growth of top line. When it comes to operating profit, you can see a significant change from last year. Last year, we saw the impact of the COVID crisis. And this year, we have seen continued recovery and strong development. So our operating profit is some EUR 23 million better than last year. Here is a bit more long-term quarterly EBIT development. And here, you can clearly see the impact of the COVID in Q1, Q2 and Q3 of last year. And then this is now the third strong quarter in a row that we are posting EBIT at EUR 10 million or above; and in the last 4 quarters, the total EBIT, close to EUR 36 million. If we then move to our business segments, we report 3 business segments. Our Management Company business, where we have our investment areas, 6 of them and also CapMan Wealth Services. From this part of the business, we earn management fee income and carried interest and other performance fee income. Our second segment is the Service business, where we have CaPS procurement services and JAY Solutions providing reporting and analytics services. And from this part of the business, we receive fees -- fee income. And then the third segment is our own balance sheet investments mainly into our own fund but also selectively into external funds. And from this part of the business, we get returns on own investments and fair value changes. And CapMan's EBIT is a sum of all those earnings components below the arrows on this slide. And if we dissect the EBIT of the first 6 months according to these segments and these income streams, you can see here that management fee profit was EUR 4.6 million, an improvement of 40% or EUR 1.6 million from last year; carried interest income, very modest, as it was also in the first 6 months of last year. And when it comes to service fee profit, we are below last year's level. But worth noting that in 2020, the figure includes the now discontinued fundraising service business. So if you look at the continuing Service business, consisting of CaPS and JAY Solutions, we actually saw an improvement in sales and EBIT of those continuing businesses in the first 6 months of this year. And the biggest improvement in the investment business, so there, EUR 17.3 million EBIT contribution. And then we have other overhead costs and eliminations slightly below last year's level. So this combined gives us the EUR 21.5 million referred to earlier. We saw continued positive fee profit trend. As I said, this has been a key theme for us and continues to be so. And the fee-based profits have almost grown 5x from the level of 2017 and the fee-based revenues' annual growth rate of 16% at the moment. And we foresee a steadily continued growth in our fee-based profitability driven by an increasing assets under management, management fees and also improving service fee income. Another key theme has been to increase the share of recurring turnover. And there, you can see the long-term growth rate of 17%. And almost all of the growth that we saw in the first half of this year is of recurring nature, so the growth, 27%, in recurring fee income in the first 6 months of 2021. Another metric that we are following is the ratio of recurring turnover to fixed costs. That has continued to improve. That is now at 137%, and you can see that fixed costs have been relatively stable in recent quarters. If you look at the total costs for the first 6 months and compare them to the same period last year, you can see a slight increase in costs. That's mainly due to variable costs and bonus accruals with much stronger results. Also, the bonus accruals are higher in the first 6 months compared to last year. Also, we see a lot of opportunities in terms of growth. Especially international growth, we want to capture those. And in order to do so, we are also making some very deliberate and controlled new recruitment into key positions. That's our investment into growth, meaning that we will see some increase in fixed costs in coming quarters. But as said, that's investing in future growth. If we then look at the balance sheet, it has further strengthened, and liquidity is still very strong. Our book equity, close to EUR 110 million; equity ratio, close to 50%; liquid assets, now above EUR 50 million; and we also have a EUR 40 million currently undrawn credit limit, which means that we have good financial stability, and we have a strong liquidity position. And if you look at our own investments, we have now sold the last market portfolio. And currently, we have private market investments and then liquid assets, in total, at the end of June, EUR 181 million, of which EUR 130 million investments into the private market and mainly into our own funds and then, as mentioned, some EUR 52 million in cash and bank. And here, you can see long-term development of our own investments. You can clearly see over this 10-year period that our balance sheet exposure has become more diversified. Currently, the largest investments are into the real estate area. And also, the growth in external fund investments is visible from this slide. But overall, you can see that our own balance sheet has developed in line with our business. We currently have undrawn commitments made of some EUR 84.5 million at the end of June. During the second quarter, we also sold some of our investments in external funds and in our Infra I fund, EUR 14 million in total, as well as associated commitments. This gives us further flexibility in our balance sheet and the ability to make new commitments into new funds and fundraisings that we are working on. We foresee significant return potential from our own fund investments. I should say that from our own balance sheet, we see a threefold function for it. We are looking for strong returns, of course, of our own investments. We are using the balance sheet to generate new fee-based income for CapMan and also flexibility to support our long-term objectives of paying an annually growing dividend to our shareholders. And if we look at the return potential with the current mix, we are looking, on average, at some 10% to 15% return annually. Last year, with the COVID situation, we were below that range. This year, with this strong performance in the beginning of the year, we are well ahead of the target. But on average, very much in line with what we are looking at. Then some words about our strategic direction and, firstly, our vision. We want CapMan to be a Nordic private asset powerhouse, and we believe that we can be so by focusing on 3 main things. We need to have top-quartile value creation in our business in Private Equity, Real Estate and Infra. We need to have access broadly to investors and especially to international capital, and we need to have an attractive offering of innovative products in the private asset space. We believe that when all these 3 blocks are in place, we are a powerhouse in Nordic private assets. And the strategy, which was first launched in 2017 and that we are working on still, has 3 main components. We are broadening the access to capital. We are introducing new products, and we are developing our offering in the private asset space by broadening it but always focusing on active value creation. And if we look at the results so far through these 3 dimensions, in terms of broadening the access to capital, I've already referred to the increased share of international capital, but you can also see the increase in Tier 2, Tier 3 investor capital. But most notable is the growth in international capital, and that's where we see, as mentioned, the largest growth going forward as well. In 2016, most of our products were closed-end funds, 96%. And at the moment, 62% of our assets under management are in such products, but we have broadened the offering by new solutions to complement these traditional products. And we have introduced a number of new products and strategies in recent years. So you can see that, today, we are broadly present in the non-listed market in Private Equity, in Real Estate and in Infrastructure. This slide depicts the development of assets under management over a long time period, and we can see that recent growth efforts are reflected positively in assets under management. We are at a new all-time high, EUR 4.3 billion; and the growth in the last quarter, some EUR 400 million plus. And looking forward, we see continued strong growth in assets under management. We have a strong fundraising pipeline. Here are the key projects that we are working on at the moment. So you can see in Real Estate, we already have products launched, Nordic Property Income, our hotel fund, which are open-ended structures where we are constantly taking in new capital. And in the second quarter, we launched a new product, Residential fund, a Nordic residential fund, where we have so far raised EUR 316 million in the first closing. And there, we are looking for further growth, and we have publicly stated that the target size we're aiming for is EUR 1 billion by 2023. We are also working on a new private -- or Real Estate product that we hope to launch within the next 2 quarters. Special Situations fund has had its first closing at EUR 53 million. Their fundraising continues. Our Nest III fund has so far raised EUR 82 million, and their also fundraising continues in the second half of this year. And then we have new fundraising, starting with our Infra II fund in the second half of this year getting off the ground. And also, when it comes to CapMan Wealth Services, we have a new Private Equity access product that we are selling to the Tier 2, Tier 3 investors and that fundraising starting this autumn, so a lot of initiatives driving further growth in assets under management. We also have significant carried interest potential. We want to realize the value development that we've seen in recent quarters. We want to make exits and realize this potential, and we have a number of ongoing processes initiatives that when finalized will help us to do so. This is high on our agenda for this year. Our dividend policy is to pay an annually increasing dividend. We have been doing so for 8 years since 2012. And this spring, our Annual General Meeting decided on a distribution of EUR 0.14 per share to be paid in 2 equally -- equal installments. The first installment was paid in March, and the second one will be paid in September of this year. Here, you can see our long-term financial targets and our recent performance. So when it comes to growth, we want to have an annual growth rate of over 10%. Over last year, we have averaged 16%. And in the first 6 months of this year, the number was 12%. In terms of return on equity, we are targeting over 20% level. Historically, in the previous years, we have been below that target. Now in the first 6 months, we are posting a number of 30%. An equity ratio over 60%, historically been close to that and still with a very strong balance sheet, close to 50% equity ratio at the end of June. And as mentioned, the dividend distribution objective: to be an annually increasing dividend to our shareholders. This is our outlook estimate for this year. That is unchanged. We do not provide a numerical estimate for this year, but we have stated that we look to grow our capital under management this year. And also, our objective is to improve the aggregate profitability of the Management Company and Service business. But as said, no changes to this. And last but not least, I want to highlight some changes to the management group that we announced today. So we are strengthening and reorganizing the management group and happy to see Heidi Sulin joining us as Chief Operating Officer. Her responsibilities will include fund administration, legal compliance, risk management, IT, ESG and other CapMan platform operations. Heidi is joining us from Hartwall Capital, where she has been working as Chief Operating Officer, and she also has a history with CapMan from before that. She will start in this position in November of this year. Atte Rissanen will take over as CFO in CapMan. He currently works as Director responsible for strategy and business development, and he will take on additional responsibilities, including -- related to financial administration and continue with corporate development. Atte will start in this role in January of next year. Our current CFO, Niko Haavisto, will leave his position in January of next year but continue in an advisory role for the rest of 2022 to ensure a smooth transfer to the new persons. Also, when it comes to our growth equity team, Antti Kummu is taking over as managing partner and, in that role, joining the management group as of August of this year. Juha Mikkola will continue in an active investment role in the growth team as a senior partner but will no longer be part of the management group of CapMan. So exciting new changes also on this front. But overall, to summarize, a strong first 6 months. I'm happy with the performance in the first half of this year. Our business is developing in the desired position, and we are in a good position to deliver further value to our customers and shareholders over coming quarters and coming years. Thank you for your attention.