flatexDEGIRO SE (FTK) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is Achim Schreck speaking, flatexDEGIRO. Welcome to our analyst call regarding the reapplication of our credit risk mitigation techniques for DEGIRO margin loans. I'm here in the room with our CFO, Benon Janos as well as on the line, we have Frank Niehage, CEO of flatexDEGIRO. We would very much like to give you a brief overview and summary of the news and the impact it has on our business before we will hand over to questions from the analysts. I would like to ask you, please, to all mute your lines during the presentation and then to unmute lines for the questions afterwards. With that, I would now very much like to hand over to Frank for the introductory remarks.

Yes, thank you very much. Good afternoon, everyone. It's a pleasure to host this call today. As you can imagine, it's a very important milestone for our firm. We are all quite happy and positive about the news we were allowed to publish today. And like always, I will start with the presentation and then hand over to the CFO and then do the closing final remarks on the commercial outlook, and then we open up for Q&A as Achim mentioned. Dear ladies and gentlemen, allow me to take you back for a moment to end of last year, where our credit risk mitigation techniques for the DEGIRO margin loan book temporarily were suspended in progress in remedying and especially the lack of automatization. Needless to say, we took that various periods, and we focused immediately to set up a project team and to start with the design phase end of last year and over 100 people were part of that project, and we work very hard to technically automatize and roll out with effect of Q1 this year, the new process. In parallel, in Q2, we started to test everything. And when we felt comfortable end of Q2, we started with an automatized new process. We still had an old manual process in parallel, which we later shut off. And we worked so hard and fast to hand over all relevant documents to the special commissioner of [ Mazza ] who was assigned to overview this exercise. And at that time, we had the arrangement with the regulator that we did not have to wait for an after audit, which normally takes place 24 months or 36 months after such an audit. We had that understanding that if we were fast and if we would fix it, the special commissioner would come in to audit this again and oversee it, and that happened. So we handed over all relevant docs and information so that the special commissioner of [ Mazza ] could start to do his work. And in September, it was then concluded that everything is in order again and the commissioner was very pleased with the work and the report was drafted and handed it over to the regulator no later than, I think, this week. And we are very happy that the regulator reacted fast. And we have to thank the regulator here again and the special commissioner for working so professionally and fast with us together to allow for the good result which we then published today. So all in all, this was a very professional and speedy process, and we're all very happy that it worked out there well. And yes, maybe we move over to the next slide. What was the reason why we worked so well? Obviously, we took it very serious. We put together the best people in the firm. We had a focus on this. We had a very clear view that substance will form in accordance with the agreement of the commissioner was key in this project and is now key for the firm. And we obviously had a Board member, Steffen Jentsch, who I would like to thank again for his great work and the wonderful work with the team to run this process. So clear focus, clear commitment, best people work together. And obviously, due to our strong in-house IT competence and our deep knowledge of our processes end of the banking stuff necessary, we were able to come back with that positive result. And this is the view going forward, how we're going to work and deal with those findings. Obviously, this was the most important one that it costed us regulatory capital. And our goal was to free that regulatory capital up as we did today. So all in all, I like to thank all the colleagues involved again and the parties involved for this exercise. And now I'm pleased to hand over to the CFO, Benon Janos, to give you a rundown what that means for our risk-weighted assets for our capital structure and for our important CET1 ratio. Benon, why don't you take over, please?

Yes. Welcome on this fine Friday afternoon. Thank you all for taking the time to listen to us. I would like to take the opportunity to walk you through some of the numbers that, as a consequence from the decision that we published today evolves. For this exercise, we will use our last reported numbers from June 30, that you can all find in the Pillar 3 report that we published a few weeks ago. Based on those numbers, I will walk you through a hypothetical exercise as to what it would mean if we would use those numbers and apply the credit mitigation techniques that we effectively with today's date can now employ again in order to compute our own funds. When we talk about our own funds on group level, we only have common equity Tier 1 capital. So it's synonym with CET1 effectively the highest form of own funds that we have. So I will simply refer to the CET1 ratio. Prior to today's approval on group level, on June numbers, we had risk-weighted assets of EUR 1,371 million or round it EUR 1.4 billion. After today's decision, we are able to successfully reduce that number by EUR 472 million based on June numbers, leading to a new group risk-weighted asset number of EUR 899 million, so below EUR 1 billion. As a consequence, the common equity Tier 1 ratio, which was around 18%, 1-8 percent at midyear. The number increases by approximately 50% or 9 percentage points to greater 27%. In those numbers, this year's profits, for example, the profit from the first half of the year are not yet included. What is not shown on the chart, but I would like to mention in referencing to our bank's capital ratio, the same principles apply. The risk-weighted assets in the bank equally are being reduced by the same number to now EUR 783 million. In the bank, the common equity Tier 1 ratio increases from 15.3% by around 60% to approximately 24.5%. If we take our own fund our common equity Tier 1 capital from June, which stands at EUR 247 million, and we apply our overall capital requirements ratio of 15.43%, we approximately arrive at a capital -- regulatory capital surplus of EUR 108 million. We are very pleased that this number now gives us the room required in order to continue to develop our company. So what does it mean? Where do we stand today? First and foremost, the resulting CET1 ratio is comfortably above all requirements that we have. That includes, of course, our own commercial requirements, organic growth as well as regulatory requirements. We will now take this decision and conclude our financial planning process going forward. We will in due course, speak with the Supervisory Board and the regulatory bodies, BaFin and Bundesbank and will then come to the final communication to the market with respect to our future capital allocation policy. I would, at this point, also kindly ask you to give us some time to digest the news and prepare properly for the next steps to come. This marks a very important step for flatexDEGIRO as it underscores the work on the regulatory side that we have successfully done in the past. At the same time, it's very clear that this is the first step. While we are very proud to be able to communicate to the market that we have reached this milestone, the ongoing resolution of the regulatory findings continues in the background and we will work closely with the regulator to finish this project over the next quarters. However, it gives us a bit of room to refocus on commercial topics, which will include a few steps. For example, we will now be able to roll out margin loans at the DEGIRO brand to our customers, something that we're ready to roll out last year, but refrain from doing so until we resolved the situation that we communicated today. We are finalizing our exchange-traded product offering in several DEGIRO markets. We are adapting the interest rate levels that our customers are being charged on margin loans to reflect the recent hikes by the European Central Bank and continue to work on several improvements on our product and service offering. Thank you very much from my side.

Thank you, Benon. Thank you, Frank. We would now open the lines for questions from your side. [Operator Instructions]. Thank you very much. We're now taking -- unfortunately we cannot hear any question. If you don't have a question please mute your lines. Then only we can hear clearly the questions.

Can I ask the first question please.

Yes, [ Thanos ] go ahead.

So well done with the progress. I'm just going to ask in one of the slides, you mentioned the regulators in terms of the capital distribution and the options. Have they placed any restrictions that we have to be aware or there is nothing like that in terms of how much capital you can distribute.

We have not discussed this topic with the regulator. On a technical level, we don't think we have any restrictions, no.

Okay. And because in the press release, you said something around corresponding coordination with the regulator, that's why I asked. And the second one is on the market size opportunity for the margin loans from DEGIRO customers. I mean you have some numbers in the past. Is the size of that still applicable? Or do you see more opportunity, for example?

Yes. I mean, maybe I can ask the question.

We have not communicated a formal number for this project, and we believe it will grow the credit book, but we have not precisely put a number on that.

Sure. And then on the adjusting the interest rates, shall we expect more pass-through on the margin loans then?

So maybe let me start with the general answer. The interest rate hike cycle by the European Central Bank has been so fast that in general, you always tend to lag a little bit behind to reach -- to pass through those rates to the customers. We have implemented already hikes at the beginning of the year, and we are in the process of also raising rates for both the flatex and DEGIRO brand over the next weeks and months to come. So the adjustment of interest rates for our clients is not finished yet.

Okay. That's very clear. So is that something that this is already happening or is more of a -- for the next few months, as you said, right?

It happened already and will continue to be increased further over the next month.

Okay. So what's the rate now then? Was it like 5.9% from 4.9%. That's the previous rate hike. Is it now at 5.9% deal or has not changed?

Our current goal is to raise the rate to approximately 7.5%. That's for the flatex. We have -- sorry, not for the flatex brand, but this is also a number that we have in mind for the DEGIRO brand.

Which is 4.5% at the moment, right?

That number has not been finalized, though.

Are there any additional questions?

Ian White from Autonomous. Can I ask a few couple of questions, please.

Yes, sure.

Just first of all, on the numbers themselves. Can you just walk me -- maybe help me with the bridge slightly from where you were at the end of 2022 to the surplus that you're reporting today. So at the end of 2022, that you reported a 19.9% CET1 ratio and a bit more than EUR 1.3 billion of RWA and so that gave you a surplus of about EUR 60 million versus 15.4% CET1 requirement that you're highlighting today. And then if I look at the impact of this RWA reduction should be about sort of a EUR 69 million increase in the surplus. So I'd have been thinking on the back of this update, your surplus would have been at least EUR 130 million. I don't know if you're including interim profits in the EUR 100 million that you've put out today. If we add the EUR 20 million that you made in the first half of the year, there's a reported profit, that gets us towards a number more like EUR 150 million. But you're telling us today that the number is approximately EUR 100 million surplus. So can you help me understand what I'm missing, please? Like what's the bridge? What's gone in the opposite direction? It feels like EUR 50 million or so, but the surplus is kind of not there basically based on the moving parts, at least that I can see. I'm conscious that there wasn't -- I don't think any disclosure around capital with the 1H23 results. It would help me to understand what's going on there, please? That's question one. And just question 2, sorry if I missed this, I did join the call slightly late. But on the BaFin monitor, should we -- is there a time horizon now for when you think the monitors work might actually be done and that they won't be with you anymore. I understood this to be the main issue, certainly, financially and so with this now addressed, should we think that next year, you'll be operating without the special representative from BaFin.

Can you hear me?

Yes, I can hear you.

Yes, maybe I'll answer the second question first and then Benon will do the bridge for you. So the most important finding was this one, which has been resolved successfully. The other findings, we will continue to focus and work hard on it to also resolve them but that's rather a normal course of business and will be done over time. Typically, 12 to 24 months is realistic after an audit like that. The special commissioner is assigned by the end of this week -- end of this year, and we have no other information received about that yet. So nothing new all in good order, I would say Benon, would you like to give the answer for the first question, please?

Sure. You can hear me, right?

I can hear you, yes.

Great, Ian. Thank you. So let me answer your first question. In the slides, we indeed have shown a surplus on regulatory capital of EUR 108 million. You are right. We did not include the profits from the first half of the year into those numbers. So that's certainly something that can be added mentally. However, in order to properly account those profits and add them to our own funds, we would need to submit a request for the regulator to approve it, which we can, but given our current surplus capital structure, there simply is no need to do so. So most likely, our plan will be to wait until this year is over, finish our audit and then as the regulator currently to approve our full year '23 net income and add the corresponding number to the regulatory capital base of our business.

Okay. That's helpful. So the EUR 20.1 million of profits in 1H23 is not in the numbers, but can you help me with the other side because it's still be a gap of about EUR 20 million at least in terms of the surplus versus where it kind of just logically would be based on the numbers you reported at the year-end. The RWAs don't look to have changed aside from its relief. So maybe what was the organic capital generation? So where is the other EUR 20 million gone basically?

I mean, first of all, I don't like precisely know what you mean by the other EUR 20 million, but let me try to give you 2 additional factors that kicked in, in the first 6 months of the year. So first of all, on the actual overall capital requirements, the European Central Bank's international regulators kicked in with their anti-cyclical buffer, which was 0 during corona and post-corona and is now being added to our overall capital requirement. So the threshold simply moved up a little bit for every single bank in the Eurozone to be very specific, our exposure in the Netherlands in at the end of June, had an additional 1% capital charge, whereas our exposure in Germany, 2 of our main core markets had an additional 75 basis points being added to the anti-cyclical buffer. Those numbers are a requirement as of June 30 and were not a requirement or the requirement was 0 at the end of the last fiscal year, December 31, 2022. At the second -- at the same time, our risk-weighted assets did indeed increase a little bit. And the combination effect is basically the one that our hurdle rate is a little bit higher, having a bit less room for the capital surplus calculation.

My math is based on just a flat CET1 requirement of 15.4%, which I think is in line with the statement you made earlier. So that still doesn't square the circle for me. It's still like the surplus at the year-end was EUR 60 million. The stand-alone impact of this looks like it's close to EUR 70 million. So we should be talking about a surplus of EUR 130 million. But perhaps it's best to take it offline. It seems to same time together.

Very happy to do so. I'm very happy to walk you through all the numbers, yes.

Ian, you might have missed at the beginning of the call, Benon also mentioned the Pillar 3 report for the first half year is available on our website. So probably you'll also find some details about the movement in the first half in that report. Are there any further questions?

Sorry, can I follow up with the question, please? this is [ Thanos ]. In the Q1 presentation, you gave us some bridge on the CET1, and you also said that the potential decrease the risk-weighted assets was around, I think, EUR 376 million. Today, the deduction is around EUR 450 million. So maybe can you hear us understand what's the difference there?

During that time, our organic credit book with DEGIRO grew a little bit leading to a today higher number. While we did not focus on expanding it by natural drawdown, the margin loan size increased a little bit.

If there are no further questions, I would very much like to thank you all for your participation today and conclude the call here. If there are any follow-up and further questions, please reach out to Investor Relations any time. Thank you very much for your participation today in today's call.

Yes. Thank you very much, everyone. Have a good weekend. Bye-bye.