Count Limited (CUP) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone. My name is Doug Richardson. I'm the Company Secretary of Count Limited. Thank you for joining us today for Count's First Half FY 2026 Investor Results Briefing. The results were released to the ASX earlier today. Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we meet today, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation and pay our respects to elders, past and present. We extend that respect to all First Nations people joining us today. Today, we'll hear from our Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Hugh Humphrey; followed by our Chief Financial Officer, Keith Leung. We'll then open the line for Q&A. [Operator Instructions] I will now hand over to Hugh.

Thank you, Doug, and good morning, everyone. I'm very pleased with the outstanding financial results we've delivered in the first half of financial year 2026. These results represent the clearest and the strongest validation of our corporate strategy to date. Two years ago, I introduced you to the account flywheel, how we would generate stronger results through the interconnection of our 3 business segments, growth not only within a segment, but accelerating growth across each segment. Today, in these results, you can see the fruits of disciplined execution against that flywheel. As intended, we are seeing a much greater contribution from wealth. And pleasingly, our leverage to wealth emerges in a number of different growth drivers, financial planning revenues within the Equity Partnerships segment, partnership revenue from our advice licensee business in wealth and our Investment Solutions business in Wealth Count goes to market in 3 clear segments: Wealth, Equity Partnerships and Services. We've continued to build momentum across all 3 segments, particularly in wealth, and you can see the benefits of our integrated strategy coming through in both earnings and cash flow. At a headline level, the key highlights for the half include statutory revenue of $82.8 million, up plus 12% on the prior corresponding period. Underlying EBITA of $16.6 million, up plus 19%, with EBITA margin improving and lifting to 20%; underlying NPAT attributable of $7.2 million, up plus 45% and underlying NPATA of $9.2 million, up plus 33%. And this means we've delivered yet another increase in our dividend, which is up plus 14% for the interim to $0.02 per share fully franked. Our underlying earnings growth continues to outpace revenue growth, which is a clear indication of operating leverage in our business platform. Earnings growth and margin expansion over the half was driven by continued scaling in wealth and funds under management growth, improved adviser economics across the network, benefits flowing through from prior period and current period acquisitions and integration and a sustained focus on operational efficiency and productivity, leveraging robotics and AI opportunities whilst progressing plans to defend our business against threats from the very same technology developments. What's really driving this performance is focused execution, and we're delivering it with a sense of urgency. We're seeing the benefits of scale in wealth, stronger adviser economics across the network and the way our services and investment capabilities increasingly reinforce one another. Importantly, we've stayed disciplined on both cost management and how we deploy capital. And this is underpinning our ability to continue to invest for long-term growth in our people, in our technologies and in our capabilities, whilst we consistently enhance shareholder value. Wealth continues to remain the key focus and the growth engine for the group. It is an increasingly important contributor to both earnings quality and scale. For the 12-month period, funds under advice increased to $40.2 billion, up plus 11%. Funds under management increased to $5.3 billion, up plus 49% and CARE funds under management grew by plus $853 million over the calendar year. We now have 157 firms using Count investment solutions, and that speaks to both the relevance of the proposition and the productivity benefits that advisers are achieving and lifting their client satisfaction and engagement at the same time. Alongside good organic growth, we've closed 9 transactions in the half. That's 1 transaction every 3 weeks. And we continue to prioritize high-quality financial planning acquisitions, particularly where we can onboard quality advisers, deepen client relationships and accelerate the integration of advice, investments and services. Our M&A activity is deliberate. It's disciplined and it's highly selective. Each transaction must align to our ambition to scale advice revenue and improve earnings resilience across the group over time. Importantly, the strength in wealth has translated to improved profitability and cash flow, which you can see in the numbers, which reflects the step change we're seeing in the scale and quality of Count Group. Capturing wealth revenue in 3 parts of the value chain, client fee revenue, licensing revenue and investment solutions revenue diversifies our participation in this fast-growth market. We employ nearly 80 financial planners across our equity partnerships now, and you can expect to see further M&A and adviser recruitment into our employed advice channel. Our Made in Australia, owned by Australians business model resonates with local small and medium business owners, particularly when they're undertaking succession planning or transactions, and they are increasingly skeptical of foreign capital and their intentions. And we've continued our trajectory of increasing dividends over the last few years, and we were pleased to announce a further increase to the interim dividend by plus 14% to $0.02 per share fully franked. Now let's take a closer look at the performance across wealth, equity partnerships and services. All 3 segments delivered growth during the half, reflecting the execution of our growth initiatives, integration of quality M&A opportunities and organic growth driven by industry tailwinds. Wealth continued to perform strongly. FUM growth was supported by ongoing CARE adoption across the network and the successful transition of the account portfolios in-house. Gross business earnings growth with our advisers continues, which has translated into higher-than-expected licensee revenues, helping to appropriately reward the licensing risk -- more appropriately reward the licensing risk that we carry in this business line. Equity partnerships delivered solid momentum with revenue up plus 24% and EBITA up plus 12% Financial advice fees now represent around $0.25 in the dollar of revenue for this segment with accounting at $0.75 in the dollar, highlighting the improving mix and quality of earnings. At the same time, this continues to reinforce the latent opportunity to grow advice revenues in our Equity Partnerships segment. Again, we did see some short-term margin compression in some firms, primarily due to system upgrades and additional transaction costs associated to acquisition activity, and we expect that to normalize for those firms as those investments are absorbed and the benefits flow through, although this will increasingly be a recurrent feature of our results as we succeed with M&A into our equity partnerships model. Services continues to be stable with some modest growth, where we did see growth that was supported by increased demand for outsourcing and ongoing cross-sell opportunities across the network. Importantly, services EBITA margins remained around 30% despite incurring some integration costs associated with the McGing transaction, and that demonstrates the underlying contribution of this business. I'd also want to point out that there's around $1.1 million of intercompany services revenue that is, of course, eliminated from these segment results for accounting purposes. The role of the Services segment beyond delivering very healthy margins is to strategically enhance our wealth and accounting propositions that we take to market. It is a key differentiator for us. Stepping back, we're operating in a structurally attractive environment for advice and wealth services. There are numerous long-term wealth tailwinds that we think are particularly important. Capacity constraints across the industry driven by increasing demand for advice, coupled with adviser supply shortages, the sheer scale of the demand for advice from affluent and high net worth clients, consistent growth in small and medium businesses in Australia, our heartland, the intergenerational wealth transfer in Australia, which supports long-term demand for trusted advice, rising advice fees, improving margins as demand continues to outstrip supply, the increasing adoption of managed accounts as advisers look to scale advice delivery, manage complexity and improve client servicing and the compelling productivity advantages that robotics and AI present to both wealth and accounting processes. Count is very well positioned to capitalize on these trends through our scale, our governance, our discipline and our technology-enabled productivity. A key differentiator for us is the Count emerging adviser program, which is enabling us to attract, train and transition new advisers into the network in a structured and sustainable way. It strengthens adviser capacity. It supports succession planning in our firms and it underpins long-term growth and advice delivery. We have almost 50 future advisers in the current cohort. We'll scale up this market-leading program over the next 12 months, and I will have more to say about it in the future. Our integrated model is designed to convert demand into sustainable earnings, and you can see that playing out clearly. We do that through a scaled national network with strong adviser advocacy supported by investment solutions that enhance adviser productivity and free up capacity to focus on more clients. Overlaying that is disciplined capital deployment, investing selectively in opportunities that strengthen the platform and improve earnings quality over time. As a result, you can see that the mix of our businesses continues to shift positively. Total wealth revenues, including financial advice client fees from the Equity Partnerships segment, now represent approximately 40% of total group revenue. and approximately 46% of the group's EBITA. This is an increase from 32% in FY 2023. And it highlights the transformation underway towards more recurring, scalable and higher-quality earnings. We're leveraging our professional heritage and our accounting client base to advantage us and to accelerate growth in wealth. Across every key metric, we're seeing consistent momentum. Adviser numbers continue to grow. The contribution from wealth to EBITA is expanding. We're delivering strong FUM growth alongside continued margin expansion. And importantly, this momentum is broad-based rather than driven by a single initiative. What underpins that performance is a balanced mix of targeted acquisitions, solid organic growth across the network and disciplined reinvestment back into our business platform. That combination allows us to scale sustainably and to maintain momentum as we continue to execute our strategy. Our local community-based Australian-owned equity partnership model remains a key point of differentiation for Count and an important driver of sustainable growth. At its core, the model combines the entrepreneurial autonomy for our partners with institutional-grade governance and support. Firms are encouraged to innovate and express their entrepreneurialism, retain ownership and day-to-day decision-making and control while benefiting from the discipline and the support of a scaled national platform. Partners have access to capital, M&A capability, business integration, technology and a broad suite of services, which enables them to grow more confidently and efficiently than they could on a stand-alone basis. Critically, this model creates long-term alignment between Count and our firms. And that alignment supports scalable growth with lower risk, strong cultural cohesion across the network and a consistent focus on building mutual long-term value. With more foreign capital entering the market, we are seeing the appeal of our 46-year-old Australian-made Australian-owned business strengthen. Australians just don't seem to like seeing local profits set for foreign offshore corporations. Add to that, this year, the Count Foundation created by our founders, Barry and Joy Lambert expects to cross over total donations since inception of $15.2 million, game-changing for our advisers and for the communities in which we all live and work. Before I hand over to Keith, I just wanted to reiterate my deep appreciation to my team, to our partners and advisers and the people across the group for their personal role in delivering an outstanding first half. Keith, over to you.

Thank you, Hugh, and good morning, everyone. Let me start with the headline numbers for the half. On an underlying basis, we delivered EBITA up plus 19% to $16.6 million, underlying NPAT attributable up plus 45% to $7.2 million and underlying NPATA up plus 33% to $9.2 million. On a statutory basis, we delivered EBITA up plus 50% to $18.7 million and statutory NPATA attributable up 133% to $9.2 million and statutory NPATA attributable up plus 91% to $11.2 million. We had a number of one-off adjustments, of which the majority relates to the WSE transaction due to the accounting treatment of the $1.3 million gain on sale of the WSE equity holdings and the recognition of deferred consideration related to a Diverger subsidiary acquisition prior to account's ownership. More importantly, this is the first set of results for a clean comparison on a full 12-month basis for the company post the Diverger acquisition. The uplift in earnings was underpinned by the full period contribution of businesses acquired and integrated over the last 12 to 18 months, combined with solid organic growth across the network. We also saw the flywheel effect strengthening with more firms using Count services, more managed accounts uptake and increasing reoccurring revenue from wealth service lines. To demonstrate the internal cross-sell within our subsidiaries, we eliminated $1.7 million of inter-entity revenues in the first half 2026, of which $1.1 million belonged to the Services segment. Productivity initiatives across the equity partnerships and continued outsourcing demand in services also supported the earnings across the segments. Margins improved as costs continue to grow more slowly than revenue, reflecting the disciplined investment and the increasing operating leverage the business has. Our underlying earnings growth this half was driven by increasing exposure to the wealth segment, which we're benefiting from the industry tailwinds. M&A continues to play a key role as the market continues to consolidate, and our first half reflects the M&A momentum that we have had in the past 18 months with those earnings accretive transactions flowing through into the revenue mix. We delivered a strong half of revenue growth of 15% as the higher quality recurring parts of the business continue to expand, particularly through the greater uptake of our investment solutions, combined with the financial planning organic growth within our Equity Partnerships segment. Importantly, disciplined execution remains a hallmark of the half. Our EBITA margins continues to increase year-on-year with underlying EBITA margins improving to over 20%. Furthermore, our proactive approach to capital management and optimization of our cash continues to deliver benefits to the bottom line, resulting in lower interest costs for the business. On Slide 14, we outline the principal movements that reconcile statutory EBITA to underlying EBITA for the period. The uplift represents a combination of both organic and acquisitive growth. We saw strong organic earnings momentum supported by FUM growth and increased gross business earnings across the network as more advisers and clients adopted our investment solutions. At the same time, we benefited from the full period of contributions of the businesses acquired, in particular, the upgrade from associate to subsidiary of Count Adelaide as well as the various acquisitions we completed in the last financial year. We continue to see operating leverage come through with costs increasing at a slower rate than revenues, which reflects both the scale benefits and the cost discipline we've had. There are 2 areas worth calling out in respect of our operating costs. Firstly, we've been very deliberate around reinvesting in areas where we can see clear long-term returns, particularly in technology, uplifting capability and increasing maturity in our support functions, while still expanding margins overall. Secondly, we remain focused on keeping corporate costs appropriately scaled as the business grows as a percentage of total revenues. We continue to be focused on maintaining our cost discipline, invest where it matters for the long term and ensuring incremental revenues continue to translate into incremental earnings. Earnings growth across the group was mainly driven by strong contributions from Wealth and Equity Partnerships segment. Firstly, the equity partnerships continued to deliver growth with a stronger mix of wealth revenues and an ongoing productivity initiatives across the firms. We're also seeing more firms lean into outsourcing and into Count services to address capacity constraints and increase productivity. And that operational discipline is increasingly showing up in the earnings growth and margins. Within the half, we continue to incur additional transaction costs relative to the prior period, in particular, higher stamp duty costs following 2 acquisitions in Count Gold Coast in Queensland. Secondly, our wealth contributed strongly, supported by FUM growth and higher gross business earnings. And we've really benefited from the full period contributions of the businesses acquired and integrated over the last 12 to 18 months, in particular, the continued adoption of investment solutions across the network. In practical terms, this is a flywheel at work with more of the advisers using the Count investment solutions, resulting in a bigger base of recurring revenues. Lastly, our services delivered a strong and steady performance with outsourcing demand and actual revenues, major contributors to the half year performance, notwithstanding the integration and transaction costs of the McGing acquisition, which will boost our true consulting capability, particularly in meeting our clients' needs in retirement income products and services. Our cash flow remains a strength. Operating cash flow increased materially on the prior corresponding period, and our EBITDA to operating cash conversion was around 90%. That conversion reflects the quality of earnings and our continued focus on operating discipline. We continue to actively manage our interest costs and ongoing liquidity. This strong cash flow generation from a flywheel helped reduce debt over the half and increase our funding headroom, giving us flexibility to pursue targeted M&A opportunities while maintaining a healthy balance sheet. Finally, on dividends, the Board declared an interim dividend of $0.02 per share, fully franked, which is another increase of 14% or $0.0025 per share compared to the last interim dividend. We continue to target a payout policy of 60% to 90% of maintainable NPATA attributable to Count shareholders for the full financial year. Dividends continue to be funded from operating cash flows, and we remain focused on a balanced capital allocation, maintaining a sustainable dividend profile while continuing to deploy capital into earnings accretive opportunities. We have a strong balance sheet with plenty of headroom capacity to continue our M&A strategy, and we remain very disciplined in what we acquire and target earnings accretive transactions that also meet our nonfinancial requirements, particularly around people, capability and culture. I will now hand back to Hugh for an update on outlook and priorities.

Thank you, Keith. Looking ahead, our priorities are consistent and very clear. We're focused on, one, adding employee planners and scaling financial advice revenue; two, executing disciplined mergers and acquisitions; three, accelerating the take-up of our investment solutions; and four, driving deeper uptake of our services across the network. The common thread is very simple: keep building a larger, more productive adviser base and keep increasing the proportion of recurring scalable earnings in the group. Robotics and AI featured throughout our strategic growth plan, and we have numerous live use cases that are improving our productivity and the number of clients that we can serve. It's also proving fruitful in reducing our risk by enhancing our compliance processes. On the balance, we see a number of potential AI threats and disruptions to stay ahead of. We're not complacent. And in particular, we know we need to evolve our specialist tax services and training businesses in the form of KnowledgeShop and Tax Banter. We have some near-term execution priorities. And firstly, as I said, we'll continue scaling wealth and advice, including growing our salaried adviser channel and supporting adviser capacity across the network. We plan to double the throughput of emerging advisers. This is a key part of how we will convert the structural tailwinds in advice demand into sustainable earnings growth and allows us further leverage into funds under management. Secondly, we'll execute disciplined accretive M&A. We're focused on targeted acquisitions that strengthen the flywheel, particularly in financial planning with a clear emphasis on cultural fit, quality and integration readiness. Third, we'll build out our investment solutions with a clear ambition to grow funds under management to $10 billion within 5 years. That growth is supported by continued care education, adoption, adviser productivity benefits and increasing client demand for managed account solutions. And fourth, we will deepen the uptake of Count services across the network, including outsourcing, IT and education because that is a practical lever for improving productivity, addressing capacity constraints and supporting margin resilience for firms. Stepping back, it's clear our flywheel continues to gain momentum. The way our segments intertwine with each other, wealth, equity partnerships and services is increasingly evident in the financial outcomes, particularly that Keith has just highlighted. And with the structural tailwinds in advice demand and wealth transfer, we know that Count is well positioned to keep executing and keep delivering sustainable long-term shareholder value.

Thanks, Hugh and Keith, for your presentation. We will now open the line for questions. [Operator Instructions] Now, Oli, I noticed you had your hand up for a while. So we might unmute you first and let you go ahead with your first question.

Just had a question. You're speaking a lot about transaction expenses go in the underlying numbers. So yes, what is your policy around, I guess, normalizing for transaction expenses? Because it sounds like you kept some transaction expenses within McGing in the Services segment and across the equity partnerships as well.

Thanks, Oli. Thanks for your question, and good to have you on. And Keith, maybe you can just share a little bit more color around the nuances and why we've sort of called those out.

Yes. Look, our typical policy is they're part of the DAU acquisitions when they're in the sort of tuck-in into our existing hubs, so to speak. And typically, they're considered as part of that underlying figure. Only the reason call out is where there has been quite a significant increase, for example, McGing in the services that we haven't done a transaction like that. So -- but not significant enough that it needed to be called out as a significant one-off item because we'll continue to look at these bolt-on acquisitions, particularly into the equity partnerships and services segment.

Yes. Okay. Just on the leverage to the gross business earnings of your licensees in wealth, I was -- kind of assumed that it was relatively low. It sounds like it's actually driven a reasonable outcome in this period. Without going into too much detail, what is the leverage to the gross business kind of earnings of your licensees -- in your licensee segment?

Thanks, Oli. There's 2 elements that I'll talk about in the licensing segment. I'll also touch on obviously, in the equity partnership segment, too, because that client financial advice fee revenue line is important. And it did -- the gross business earnings of our advisers in the licensing business did exceed expectations. Of course, as we've been clear before, that segment is a relatively lower margin part of our business, but a crucial and critical very important part of our entire proposition and business. What we're seeing there is strong demand for advice, increase in fees that the firms are performing well. That translates to slightly higher revenues within the financial advice part of the licensing business and higher revenues within the equity partnerships model through the advice fee revenue. And Keith, did you have any else you want to add to that?

Yes. Look, I think what we're seeing in the licensee business is just increasing benefits from scale. Maybe a few years ago, that was a licensee business, you'd be quite hard-pressed in that kind of single to low mid-teens. So I think we're starting to really get the benefits of scale, and that's really driving a much higher margin business for us. So it is naturally approaching high teens to low 20s kind of EBITA margin. And we're increasingly seeing more quality. So it's not only is it just the number of firms being licensed, it's actually also the structure of the fee structure and the quality of their gross business earnings, which we then capture a percentage share of through the pricing structure of the licensee fees.

Right. Okay. No, that's pretty very positive. And in terms of just -- I mean, spectacular growth in the CARE FUM, almost $500 million with most of that being net flows. How do you feel about the momentum in that business? Because it does seem like it may be accelerating. I think you did something more like $180 million in net flows in the preceding half as in the second half of '25?

Yes. Oli, just sort of step back with the 2 kind of headlines there. So obviously, $5.3 billion in funds under management now, as you rightly point out, Care makes up the lion's share of that. And then, of course, we did as we flagged last year, we brought in-house those CFS account portfolios. which is the other contribution to very strong headline growth in funds under management. From a FUM perspective, within CARE, there's been continued good contributions from existing firms using CARE, from new firms taking up CARE, and Keith, I might get you to talk a little bit about this in a moment. But equally, market movements have probably in the period probably exceeded what we had anticipated when we were forecasting. So there is strong momentum there. At the same time, I'd hesitate to add the penetration of CARE across our network still remains lower than we think would be its potential, much lower than what we think it would be its potential. When we originally onboarded the Diverger transaction going back 2 years ago, I think we talked about that representing about 10% of our funds under advice. Keith, that's probably closer to 12%, 13% of funds under advice now. Under Diverger ownership, that within the GPS group was a much higher proportion, around half and across Diverger Group represented about 20%. So we still see a lot of room to move, a lot of interest from firms, and we have a backlog of discussions with businesses around the right time for them to adopt that integrated solution for them and their clients.

Yes. So Oli, I think what we have provided is the number of firms that have been adopting CARE. I think that's always a good leading indicator for us because the new firms coming on, they're just writing new business for new clients. So what you see is, over time, they start converting their existing clients to that. So you'll see it's sort of like a bathtub in terms of that takeoff in terms of FUM. So for us, it's a good indicator of the proposition. It's a good indicator of future take-up. And increasingly, like as Hugh mentioned, it's only about 13% take-up. And what we've seen historically is it can get as high as 53% under GPS when we first acquired Diverger within that GPS licensee in terms of FUM divided by funds under advice. So there's still plenty of opportunity and plenty of firms to talk to and driving more of that engagement in terms of the client engagement tools that are on offer under the CARE proposition.

Yes. Okay. Maybe just the last one for me. I understand that I think you had the account national [indiscernible] during the first half.

Conference, conference, the professional conference.

Yes, sorry, professional conference, apologies. The earnings impact of that in the half because I understand they are normally kind of loss-making.

Well, I'll just touch on that. So we do an annual education event. It's called Count Ed, Count Education. And that brings together all of our financial planners and accountants are invited along to that and our business -- key business partners as well for 4 or 5 days of learning, networking, business development, et cetera. So I'd say it is a full-on experience. And as you know, particularly in financial planning, the CPD point requirements for a planner are extremely high, about 3, 4x that of a lawyer. So education is a critical component of our value proposition as is the network and having those shared experiences. We had 500 people together last September. It was a highly successful event. What I would say is that, firstly, advisers pay a registration fee to attend that event. They fund their own travel and accommodation. So kind of the short answer to your question, Oli, is that any kind of net costs of running that event are included within the results. But on a net basis, the cost is a lot lower than the gross basis because a lot of those costs are funded by the attendees themselves. And there's some contribution through our educators to the Partners Education program. that helps us to acquire the best talent and speakers and other people at that event.

Yes. I think, Oli, to also add, like we didn't hold our Count National Conference in the last financial year. So -- but going forward, this will be normalized. So we've got another one scheduled in October this year. So that will flow into FY '27. So you can expect those costs to be normalized on an ongoing basis.

Yes. But just to clarify, it did cost you money on a net basis in this first half?

Yes. Yes, it did.

Okay. So we shouldn't see that in the second half?

No, you won't see that in the second half, but it will flow in again into the first half of FY '26.

In the next year. I'll let somebody else ask question.

You still got the floor, Oli, as there's no further questions in the line. Just a reminder to callers, just to raise your hand in Teams if you do have any questions. But failing that, Oli, back to you if you've got any.

Yes. Okay. Well, let me ask just around equity partnerships because I remember in the second half of last year, you had quite an impact at your EBITA from fee revenue kind of not being able to actually be generated in that half, particularly on kind of the fee purchases where you're actually buying a book of business. Did you kind of work your way fully through that in this first half? Or did you still get some inefficiency on that?

Yes. Oli, it's a good point. We did and I sort of made reference to that, that these results for some of our equity partnership firms that have been through both some M&A activity, but also some system upgrades, particularly in the CRM space or from time to time, a firm might migrate from MYOB to Xero or something like that. So there was some disruption in some of the firms in the period. I think pleasingly, that disruption was probably smoother than we thought it might have been, which would indicate we're collectively improving how we undertake sort of big integrations or big technology changes without skipping too much of a beat in terms of business performance. But we do think that will continue to be a bit of a feature of our business because as I said, we are acquisitive, we are doing a number of transactions. And from time to time, there's disruptions associated to that. What we tend to find is with the financial planning tuck-in acquisitions, they're typically a little smoother in terms of the cycle of the advice given to the client. And they don't -- we've talked in the past, one of the big impacts on our accounting firms is that first meeting of the accounting clients, getting to know them and so forth, often is an unpaid engagement to reestablish the connection. which takes time out of the accounts dies, which means it's not billable, et cetera. In the financial planning space, given the way that fees and services are provided, typically, that's not the same impact. So we don't see so much disruption. And as Keith mentioned, we are selective in our acquisitions where we look for businesses that are aligned to our technology stack, our operating processes and so forth. So switchovers from a systems perspective and operating procedures are generally smoother as well.

Okay. But fair to say that you think on a kind of DAU basis, there's probably a little bit more in the tank from a margin perspective.

We think so. And I think also, too, as the business scales, it grows in its size, scale and breadth. If you go back 24 months ago, an integration within one firm might have a headline impact. Now with 19 large-scale business integration in one firm, just have a lesser impact on our overall results.

Yes. Okay. There's nobody else I may ask perennial question about your supportive and major shareholder or largest shareholder. What's the latest on the class action resolution and expected timing around when there might be movement at the station there?

Thanks, Oli, I'm shocked that you'd asked that question. No, not at all. It's a perfectly reasonable question. And as you rightly point out, CBA been a terrific shareholder, still 24 and a bit percent holding in Count as we've talked before, through our M&A activity, particularly Diverger transaction and our dividend reinvestment plan, we have been supporting them to dilute that percentage shareholding. But obviously, it's -- they're still our largest shareholder. As you know, yes, last year, the class action that CBA are running on behalf of Count Financial that is contemplated by the indemnity arrangements with the bank was dismissed with a win for the bank and the group. There was an appeal against that outcome. That appeal is currently laid down to be heard by the 3 judges towards the end of March. That will be a material event, we would assume in terms of any decision for the bank. But as always, as it pertains to their shareholding, as I always say, that's a matter for the bank. We appreciate their ongoing support. We appreciate the fact that they are running the defense of the class action for the group, and they remain very supportive.

Yes. Okay. I appreciate that. I have another question, but just it slipped my mind. I might follow up. I appreciate that. Sorry, just pipeline. Yes, in terms of deal flow, do you expect any slowdown on that front? Or do you think you can kind of keep that cadence of bolt-ons that you've been doing over the last 6 months?

Yes. Thanks, Oli. And again, probably worth just reiterating the 3 types of acquisitions that we tend to make, obviously, the bolt-ons or the tuck-ins with a particular focus on financial planning and we absolutely love those. The second type where we might make a direct investment into a new equity partnership or a new hub for which we see some opportunity to create bolt-ons. And then the third being the strategic and transformational opportunities, our Count Financial and Affinia, Diverger and so forth. We remain really active in all 3 of those segments. I think, Keith, it's fair to say we're probably more active than we've ever been. The market is -- there's plenty of opportunity out there. The pipeline remains strong, in particular, with the size and scale of our financial advice network, the opportunities around financial planning tuck-ins are really on the improve. And those we love, a, because they're very accretive and relatively straightforward to do. But of course, b, we know those businesses really well. We've been on the hook for their risk and compliance and other activities. So we understand their employees, their clients, et cetera. So from a due diligence perspective and a risk perspective, they're very straightforward as well. Keith, did you want to add anything?

Yes. Look, we -- as mentioned, we get a lot of inbound deals. We've got a number of term sheets for nonbinding term sheets already executed. We've got at any stage 7 or 8 term sheets out -- offers out to firms, which we'll be negotiating, obviously, as part of our DAU. So a very healthy pipeline, a lot of market activity. We've got a lot of hubs that we can ingest as well as exploring new hubs to acquire. So I think there's a lot of opportunity in financial planning, in particular, where we're more targeted, but also in accounting as well. So that provides a good intro layer for clients into financial planning. So we've got plenty of opportunities across the board.

And Keith, I think in particular, Oli, an area of strategic interest for us is in our employed financial planners in and around our equity partnership model. So expect to see some activity in that space.

Thanks, Oli for the questions. I'll just do a final call out for any callers on the call if you raise your hand in Teams for any further questions. Okay. Failing that, I'll hand back now to Hugh.

Thanks, Doug. And thank you, Oli, for your questions. I'm sure you were speaking on behalf of many people on the call with those excellent questions you had for us. I appreciate that. As always, it's a very busy time of year. We value the fact that you chose to be with us today, and thanks for your continued support of Count and the group. We were really pleased to deliver another set of very strong results, and we appreciate everyone's engagement today and as I said, the questions that have come through. We're excited about the opportunity set in front of us. We're staying very focused on disciplined execution as we continue to build long-term shareholder value. Thank you again, and this concludes today's investor briefing, and good morning.