Mandatum Oyj (MANTA) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to Mandatum's Q3 audio cast. My name is Lotta Borgström. I am Head of Investor Relations here at Mandatum and I am pleased to be joined today by our CEO, Petri Niemisvirta; and our CFO, Matti Ahokas. During this audiocast, Petri Niemisvirta and Matti Ahokas will initially walk you through the highlights and key developments of today's report, after which we'll take the Q&A where you have the possibility to dial in for any questions. Also, please do not hesitate to contact us at Investor Relations, should you have any further questions. With these remarks, I will hand over to Petri. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Lotta. Now let's move over to our third quarter figures. Mandatum's business continued to grow in several areas during the third quarter. The fee result increased by up to 42% from the previous year to EUR 18 million. This was a great achievement considering that the [ spearhead ] of our strategy is to grow in the capital-light business, which we did during the third quarter. The main reasons for the positive development were growth in client assets under management and improved cost efficiency, which I am really happy about. Our client assets under management grew by 18% from the previous year to EUR 13.3 billion, driven by net flow and positive market development. All client segments contributed to the growth. Allocation and fixed income products were once again the main source of inflow. The quarterly profit before taxes decreased to EUR 45 million. The return on our investment was at a good level at 2.4%, but the net finance result was negatively impacted by the finance expense of with-profit insurance contract liabilities that increased due to the decreasing interest rates. However, it is worth highlighting that the active investing and hedging of our own balance sheet have decreased earnings volatility, thus making Mandatum as more resilient company in different market environments. Mandatum is well positioned to pay out substantial dividends as we continue to steadily generate capital in the third quarter. The organic capital generation ended up to EUR 0.11 per share as clearly exceeding the earnings per share at EUR 0.07. Mandatum's solvency position continued to be strong. The solvency ratio was 224% One of our most important financial targets is the annual net flow. Mandatum aims for an annual net flow of 5% of the client asset under management. The net flow from the beginning of the year increased by 9% and was EUR 592 million, which, with the fourth quarter yet to come, is already very close to our target of 5%. Furthermore, the annualized net flow year-to-date was 7% of asset under management, which is well above the target. Excellent sales activity contributed to the inflow and the client outflow remained low, partly due to a consistently high level of customer satisfaction. The positive market movements contribution to the increase in client assets under management was EUR 203 million in the quarter. All in all, we haven't seen any softening in the market and our product range continues to work well. The growth engine of our strategy is the institutional and wealth management business. the highest growth in assets under management as well as in the net flow came once again from the institutional and wealth management business. Within Wealth Management, all client segments grew rather evenly, the largest growth in asset under management came from the subsegment ultra-high-net-worth clients, followed closely by private wealth management and our international institutional clients. Then over to different product areas. Mandatum's core competence is within credit products where the growth was strongest, 41% year-to-year. The mark-to-market yields in our credit and fixed income products are still at the high level and a good performance gave additional support to our sales. I'm also happy that the positive trend within our allocation products continue with strong growth numbers also during the third quarter. Furthermore, Mandatum's Growth Equity II private equity fund raised EUR 140 million this autumn and became Finland's largest equity growth fund. I'm very pleased with the performance at our wealth and asset management, and these examples illustrate the outcomes of the determined and consistent efforts made daily by our team of more than 180 people in the Mandatum's asset management organization. The fee income was up 13%, supported by increase in asset under management and stable fee margin levels. Despite the fact that most of our sales was related to credit and fixed income type of products, our fee income margin remain at the same level, meaning that we have had a good discipline in our pricing, which is also one of our financial targets. Also, I'm very pleased with the improving cost efficiency trend that we have seen during the whole year. As we have stated before, our platform is scalable, and we can now clearly see that in the quarter-on-quarter development. As in the previous year, the group's net flow in the third quarter was lower than in the first 2 quarters of the year because of the summer season, but it increased from the previous year by 19% to EUR 140 million. I'm very happy with our net flow development. We have beaten most of our competitors in that field during the third quarter as well as during the whole year. The net flow has now been positive for over 3 years in a row, even if the market conditions have varied during that time. No matter if one looks at the absolute numbers or relative success compared to our peers, we have had a stellar performance in net flow during the year. The reason behind this is obvious and simple; very high customer satisfaction, active sales and market product mix with good performance are the reasons behind the success. All this together, with positive market movements, have led to steadily increasing client asset under management, now reaching a new all-time high of EUR 13.3 billion. And now over to you, Matti.

Thank you, Petri. And then if we look at our financial performance in the third quarter. Well, firstly, our profit before tax was EUR 45 million. This was down 46% compared to the third quarter of '23 but our capital-light business continued its strong performance with good volume growth and stable fee margins. And as Petri mentioned, our assets under management grew up by 18% year-on-year to EUR 13.3 billion. The cost/income ratio of our client AUM continues to improve to 63%, and our organic capital generation was EUR 0.11 for the quarter and EUR 0.34 year-to-date. And as you all know, this is the key parameter to look at when assessing our dividend generation during the year. Return on equity in the third quarter was 9.4%. And if we then look at closer at the different result components. As Petri mentioned, our fee result was up 42% year-on-year with AUM up 18%. And if we adjust for some EUR 2 million of holding company costs, that now are reported under other, which were previously included in the fee result, the underlying growth is -- was around 25%. We've clearly paid focus on the expense side, which also contributed positively to the fee result in the third quarter. Within the fee result, the fees from investment and asset management services were up around 60%. At the same time, the other part of the fee result or the insurance service result from the CSM release was largely unchanged like in previous quarters. Our net finance result came in at EUR 27 million, which is below the historical average, as you can see. As you all know, the market interest rates fell significantly during the quarter and this overall had a EUR 81 million accounting headwind in Q3. However, we were able to generate good investment return, and this more than offset the negative discounting and unwinding impact. On the positive side, we had a EUR 9 million positive impact from holding in Enento this quarter. Our result related to risk policies, which is also an important part of our capital-light offering continued to develop positively. Volumes continue to increase, and we continue to have a positive expense in claims variance. In addition, the result included a EUR 3 million one-off CSM release related to the portfolio transferred to If. The group net finance result decreased to EUR 27 million. And in the with-profit segment, it was down to EUR 18 million. With-profit investment return in the quarter was 2.4% or 9.6% annualized and it was clearly higher than last year. Our with-profit fixed income assets continue to generate good returns with a mark-to-market yield of 4.8% when adjusting for the increase in cash from our September EUR 300 million Tier 2 issue. Note that our old EUR 250 million bond was repaid only in the beginning of October. However, the higher share of lower return money market instruments had an impact on the total yield during the quarter as we typically have a higher cash weight to prepare to upstream internal dividends to the holding company towards the end of the year. Equities contributed positively this quarter, but it's good to remember that our own equity portfolio is not an index portfolio, so the return was below international benchmarks. In the third quarter, we also decreased our equity weight further. And as you all know, this is in line with our long-term allocation strategy. Private equity had a bit of a slower quarter, but private debt was at a more normal quarter with a 2.6% investment return. The lower discount rate had a EUR 62 million negative P&L impact as market interest rates, well, fell by 50 to 80 basis points in the quarter. The unwinding cost remained stable throughout the year. I think it's important also to remember that although declining market interest rates, especially in the long end of the yield curve have a negative impact on the P&L of the quarter, Q3 shows that our hedging strategies worked well even in a quarter when rates fell dramatically. And even more importantly, it's worth to remember that our future profit generation is a function of the investment return we can achieve above the discount rate, not the actual level of interest rates. And this spread has remained largely unchanged. Our Organic Capital Generation or OCG was EUR 54 million in Q3 and this translates to EUR 0.34 per share during the first 9 months of the year. In addition to reported profits, this measure takes into account also, for example, the own funds generation from the income booked in the CSM as well as potential capital release from the SCR. As we have said before, we think OCG is a more relevant measure than the reported IFRS result when assessing our financial performance and dividend generation in particular. And in a normal quarter, you should still continue to expect that the OCG is higher than the reported P&L results. Our dividend adjusted solvency margin was unchanged quarter-on-quarter, 224%. Own funds increased, but the SCR also increased during the quarter mainly due to lower owned yields. And as you can see, our solvency margin is robust in different stress scenarios as well. And now I'll leave it over to Petri for some concluding remarks.

Thank you, Matti. So to conclude, I'm pleased with our Q3 results. The good momentum we have had has continued all year. At the time when the company was listed, I said that our goals are to maintain a stable balance sheet and solvency position while aiming to pay out attractive dividends and achieve profitable growth. During our first year as a public company, we have obtained these goals. Now let's move on to questions and answers.

Thank you, Petri. And yes. Now let's move on to the Q&A. Please dial in for any questions.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Jan Erik Gjerland from ABG.

This is Jan Erik Gjerland from ABG. I have 3 questions. The first 2 is about the portfolio and the growth in asset under management, the margin you have. Is it so that the fixed income or credit margins are a little bit less than the active equity margins as well as the private equity fund you sort of raised this quarter during this year. Could you shed some more light into how the margin are on those type of products. Finally, the EUR 0.34, you have an organic capital generation versus the EUR 500 million dividend you said you would wanted to do on the inception of your company. How should we read this, the EUR 0.34 versus the EUR 500 million you already have on the books versus a potential increase in the dividend at year-end?

So thank you for the question. Petri Niemisvirta here. So about the question related to our products and margins. Yes, I guess the credit product, we are selling quite a lot in Finland and outside of Finland to institutional investors. So of course, it's normal those yields compared to, let's say, high net worth or even in retail segment. Equity markets are lower but we are -- our product range is -- when we are in credit and high-yield side, we are, let's say, active fixed income range of products. So the margins are higher than traditional in just a plain vanilla fixed income product. So -- and we haven't seen any change in the margins and pricing in that area. And when it comes to this private equity, we raised EUR 140 million. It was mainly sold here in Finland to different segments and asset customer segments and fee levels are, how would I say, just normal and quite good. So nothing special on that. And all that explains that we have now seen a year almost exactly the same margin level of 1.2% even though we have sold quite a lot during this time. So we haven't seen any, let's say, dramatic change in pricing in those product areas, we are currently selling to our customers.

Can I just have a follow-up on the PE portfolio. Is it so that you book a fee when you got a commitment? Or is it so that you charge the fees when the money is paid in or is it more traditional PE style income generation for that type of fund?

Yes, we have both, but let's say, the traditional and direct private equity is traditional way we -- customers pay for commitments.

Erik, it's Matti here. And regarding your question on the dividend, you're absolutely correct that we're generating capital probably faster than expected. And obviously, also when during the IPO, we mentioned that the EUR 500 million cumulative ordinary dividend was a conservative estimate and looking at our figures and our capital generation, I think it's fair to say that it's even more conservative assessment at the moment. So I think that's something you should keep in mind. The Board, of course, ultimately decides on the dividend. But we are generating good capital. We have a very strong capital position, we also have a good liquidity position. But at the end of the day, the Board will decide on the dividend for this year. But as said, it's the -- EUR 500 million was already a year ago a conservative estimate.

The next question comes from Ulrik Zürcher from Nordea.

I have two -- a bit technical one, I guess. I was just wondering if you would consider part of the fee result this quarter as, I guess, somewhat of a one-off because if I go on Slide 13, the fee income and client AUM cost, you report, year-to-date like this quarter that would net to EUR 15.1 million but you report EUR 18.1 million? So that was my first question. And then second one, I was just wondering if you could shed some light on what is sort of the run rate result, we should expect on the line, you call other results. I guess especially what is the now the expenses of Mandatum Holding, the debt cost and potential other recurring revenue that we should add there?

it's Matti here. Yes, good questions. And I think 2 things to keep in mind. Firstly, of course, there is some seasonality in terms of costs, but I don't think it's significant in that respect. So if we look at the fee income up 13%, this is related to the client AUM. It's also including a lot of sales commissions, which are for our retail segment. So that is actually a bit understating the actual development altogether. But an important part is, like Petri mentioned as well, that a lot of our IT investments we've made throughout the year, especially fairly big ones are now kind of starting to bear fruit and the big investments have been made. So the kind of underlying level is lower. So to answer your question, I don't think there was any clear one-offs, maybe a bit lower seasonal cost due to the holiday season, but that's about it. And I think we're seeing good development on the fee result, not 42% growth, underlying growth probably in the magnitude of 25% but nothing to kind of single out in terms of the Q3 fee result that would make a big difference.

The other one -- Sorry, Matti, if I could just follow up because I guess still that like what we should expect going forward, at least in the short term, is that we should look at your fee income margin that's 1.2% and then look -- make some adjustment on the cost-to-income ratio that's been falling, right? Like that's...

That's correct. But as you said, like EUR 15 million is the net fee income and then the net fee result is EUR 18 million. So there is also the component on the CSM release, and that also plays a part -- role here and all the allocated costs related to the rest of the business. So still repeating that I don't think there was anything funny in terms of except slightly lower seasonal costs. As about the other, of course, now we had in the third quarter, we had 1 month, we were paying double interest for our old EUR 250 million Tier 2 bond as well as the new EUR 300 million bond. So there was a seasonal or an uptick on the cost side related to that as well as obviously, we had some other kind of cost of, let's say, one-off nature. Overall, I think you should expect that the financing costs roughly are around EUR 5 million per quarter or roughly EUR 20 million per year. Then of course, you will have the occasional income and costs on that line as well. But the underlying level is not EUR 9 million per quarter. It's probably closer to EUR 5 million.

So the Mandatum Holding expenses aren't -- and other revenue there is not so important?

No. It's -- we also have some income offsetting that.

The next question comes from Antti Saari from OP Markets.

Many of them have already been asked, but I would continue about the dividend outlook. So the capital generation is very strong and the EUR 500 million is indeed conservative, as mentioned. But during the listing, you also stated that going forward, you're looking to increase dividend stably over the years. So in this sense, is it fair to assume that if you happen to generate a very high amount of capital this year, you won't pay that all out as a dividend so that you have room to raise the dividend next year? So in that sense, should we look more for buybacks along with more conservative dividend hike? Or how should we read this statement?

Antti, Petri here. Maybe I answer to that because I was on -- during the listing time, I was here and Lotta and Matti joined later. So yes, maybe it's like you said, over the years, the question, of course, what it over the years means. I refer to Matti's answer that as we started our journey in Helsinki Stock Exchange, we say that because as a new company, and a lot of things going on, we will be a little bit more conservative in our dividend policy even though the EUR 500 million is a big amount, we stated that, that is like conservative amount still. And when we look at how the year -- last 12 months has went, so like Matti said, it looks even more conservative. So ultimately, of course, this is how conservative we will be in the future will be raised, of course, inside of the company as well, not only in your tables. So but it's -- ultimately, it's Board's decision to make the proposal to AGM and so on, but it's -- I think this is a little like a positive issue. So a good thing is that we are generating a lot of dividend capacity. And as we have also said that we have all kind of tools in our toolbox, so if it's good for the company and the value, so it's not such a dividend. We have right also to buy our own shares and so on. So this is kind of answer to you. Hopefully, it gives at least some kind of answer.

Yes. But I would still like to put it another way around. When you consider dividend from this year, do you want to play it safe that you're able to increase next year?

We don't want to guide that or comment that. So it's a Board's decision to make a proposal then. And we are soon there. It's already November.

The next question comes from Kasper Mellas from Inderes.

This is Kasper from Inderes First of all, could you remind me what kind of currency risk do you have in your with-profit investment portfolio?

Kasper, it's Matti here. It is -- we hedge our currency risk extremely high, so to say. So I wouldn't say it's 100%, but we have a very conservative hedging policy when it comes to currency risk in our own portfolio.

Then some 4 key persons in asset management left Mandatum after the quarter. Do you expect any notable effects from this?

So first of all, Mandatum is a quite big company. We currently have like more -- close to 200 people, 180 people working in wealth management and asset management area. So 4 people, it's not that much compared to size of the whole operation. And there's no people leaving from our factory, should I say. So portfolio management, all the portfolio managers are there. So business goes as it has done previously, so no big changes. And of course, we are already started to make the new recruiters to this place. And so we have a very big operation, so no really big changes and effects to our business.

Okay. Have you been witnessing any turnover in the investment teams?

No, nothing.

The next question comes from Jaakko Tyrvainen from SEB.

It's Jaakko from SEB. A couple of questions still from my side. And starting with the kind of normalizing rate curve. Are you planning to increase the duration in the with-profit fixed income portfolio? And is there any material moves that you can make in order to kind of boost the fixed income yield even further from current levels? And for example, what is the cost of hedging the long end currently versus previously?

Jaakko, it's Matti here. No, we don't really have any plans on that side. If you look at the kind of market, obviously, the most liquid part of the market is between lower than 5 years, and there's not that many instruments, especially taking into account that our portfolio is focused on credit, we don't really have any government bonds or covered bonds in our portfolio. So that is the kind of key thing there. And I think as you've seen from our sensitivity, but -- sensitivity slide in our investor presentation deck, I think that also went quite well in line with the current rate movements. And you can see the net impact altogether. There are some variations that doesn't take into account the credit spreads and a couple of other technical factors like this aggregated portfolio. But no kind of big plans, and as said, the most important thing for the future profitability is the spread between the investment return and the discount rate and if we kind of adjust for the extra cash that we've had, there hasn't been any big changes to that. So there's not really a big need. So even though rates would go down, we also have the unwinding cost coming down if rates stay at current levels for this year. So I think overall, the big driver for the profitability of the with-profit portfolio is actually the volumes and not the rates. And I think we're quite happy with our hedging strategy for the time being. But of course, we look at different alternatives, but for the time being, I think it's more on the discussion to decrease the kind of long-term weight of alternative and equity investments, and that's a gradual process. And like we've discussed that is the more kind of -- more of the long-term allocation strategy plan in that portfolio, given that the with-profit liabilities continue to kind of decrease every year.

Okay. Good. Thank you for that one. Then on the net flows, which were kind of seasonally down in Q3, could you shed any light on the current trading and Q4 net flows? Can we expect normal type of seasonality to be seen in the quarter? And how have the recent market moves kind of played for your sales and product offering?

We can't guide out Q4, but it's -- let's say that if you look at the Q3, it's really nothing special on that. It was lower than Q2 or Q1 traditionally so that it's -- in July, it's nothing really happening in Scandinavia. It's a holiday season. And if it's -- it turns to be good weather like it was now in August, it's a little bit bothering our businesses as well. So -- and I'm still happy that we managed to increase 19%, our net flowing in Q3. So I just refer to my statement that we haven't seen any softening in the market and our product range is working really well.

Very well. And then finally, perhaps looking a bit towards 25% and the cost level in the fee business, what kind of inflation you are budgeting? Or are we seeing similar level rising cost in '25 that we are seeing now in '24? Any comment on that one.

I think you should, Jaakko, focus on the net -- or the fee result in the P&L instead of the fee income. It's more of a kind of factor that is influenced by many things. And like Petri said, actually, one of the big drivers has been sales commissions, which, of course, is a positive thing because that also increases the income. So in that respect, I think it's important to keep in mind that -- look at both the income and the cost and the cost income ratio is the main driver. So typically, variable costs are related to higher income as well, and that's what we plan to do also going forward.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Hans Rettedal Christiansen from Danske Markets.

I have 2, I think. So the first question is, if you could just provide a bit of extra color on the net flow development this quarter, specifically around the comments that you had on the mix. So you said that the majority of it is coming from the ultra-high-net-worth segment. And I'm just trying to kind of see that in relation to the comments that you had in Q2 on the International segment. So maybe how the international expansion is going according to your own expectations here during Q3 and maybe what we should expect there going forward as well?

Yes. Petri here, I will take this one. So thank you for the question. Net flow Q3, I would say that it was led by ultra-high-net-worth area. And what typically are the customer base is family offices and very wealthy individuals. But at the same time, I would -- I should say that it's all our subsegment, the really good sales and net flow in all areas. So it was quite evenly between the subsegments. And when the question is to our international institutional business, it's grown 20% during the quarter. So I am really pleased with that, and we have seen good process on -- especially in Sweden lately. There we are selling high yield and credit products to professional investors. And we have -- [indiscernible] a new person to Swedish sales as well. So we are putting more resources to our Swedish operation in order to speed up our growth there.

Got it. And then my second question, I guess, is a little bit more technical. But just on the new kind of reporting measure that you're coming out with this quarter on the organic capital generation per share. You don't have the kind of year-over-year comparison or the quarter, but how should we think about how kind of that number is developing according to how you're expecting it to develop? I mean if I look at the quarter, EUR 0.11 versus the sort of year-to-date number, it looks remarkably flat quarter-over-quarter. So should we just, in many ways, annualize the quarterly result on OCG to get the annual? Or is there any sort of -- perhaps not one-offs, but anything special happening this quarter where the numbers may be higher or lower than we should be expecting going forward?

Yes. Hans, it's Matti here. No, absolutely correct. We haven't provided the comparison figure for the quarter, but for the full year, it was EUR 0.52 altogether. And as going to annualizing the figure, I think you would end up pretty closely to the kind of similar kind of figures that we discussed here. So we've given you the components and of course, the result is one thing. But then as I said, we do have a number of products which are based on the IFRS 17 accounting, which means that the income generated there goes partly to the CSM and not in the P&L. So that takes into account the kind of real, in our opinion, development of our business, plus, of course, then the capital release from the reduction in the SCR, which gives us more flexibility to kind of pay dividends. So annualizing the figure probably would not get you too far away from the kind of reality. As said, typically, the OCG is higher than the reported results because of the CSM and this SCR release. So if it was 11%, annualizing that probably is a fair assessment in the -- of the development of the quarter.

And then my final question, I guess, is just on the CSM, which continues to grow a little bit here in the quarter, whereas, I guess, my expectation has always been that it's going to come down at some point. Could you just speak a little bit around why it is? I'm guessing it's due to the AUM but at which point should we expect it to start coming down?

Sorry, Hans, what was the line you mentioned or the item you mentioned?

The CSM. So it's at EUR 473 this quarter. At which point we should expect it to sort of start coming down because it keeps growing.

It keeps growing, and you're absolutely correct that actually the new business CSM is totally related to the risk policies, which is a smaller item. And the release is related to the fee result altogether. But I think the main point here, if you compare here, quarter-on-quarter that the experience variance was positive here again in the third quarter. So we've had kind of conservative assumptions regarding both the kind of cost, but also the unit-linked AUM development, so that has contributed positively. So yes, it should gradually start to come down, but we're very happy that it shows that our assumptions regarding the development have been a bit conservative. So there's been positive variance there.

The next question comes from Jan Erik Gjerland from ABG.

My follow-up. Regarding the organic capital generation, which you talked about, Matti, the EUR 0.54 for the full year, how should we think about your dividend policy? Should it more be linked to this number versus the EUR 0.32 of earnings per share? When it comes to the payout ratio, you probably will refer to, after a while. Is it this number which we definitely should look at, and this is what you could also be paying out regarding the FSA proposal or any restrictions you may have on payment of dividends in the future. Is it this number we should then look at rather than the IFRS 17 EPS?

Yes, exactly. So that is the whole point that this includes the kind of the underlying development of the year. The EUR 0.52 [indiscernible] was for last year. But of course, for this year, the figure is higher. And there is no kind of restrictions when it comes to our plc dividend capacity. It's up to the Board to decide. And regarding any future changes in the dividend policy, the Board will probably consider those in due course, if needed. But this is the figure how much net of taxes we could actually pay out from the earnings of the calendar year. And of course, on top of that, we have a fairly high solvency altogether and also kind of liquidity. So there are no kind of restrictions. It's more of a question of what is the kind of level desired. And in that respect, the annual dividend generation is very closely linked to the OCG, not the earnings per share.

There are no more questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers.

So that was all for today. Thank you for joining us this Tuesday morning. Goodbye.