Stifel Financial Corp. (SF) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, and welcome to the Annual Meeting of Shareholders of Stifel Financial Corp. Please note that today's meeting is being recorded. During the meeting, we'll have a question-and-answer session. You can submit questions or comments at any time by clicking on the message icon. It is now my pleasure to turn today's meeting over to Ron Kruszewski, Chairman and CEO of Stifel. Mr. Kruszewski, the floor is yours.

Thank you, operator. I now ask our Corporate Secretary, Mark Fisher, to provide an introduction to the technical details and rules of conduct for today's virtual only meeting and to provide a quorum report.

Thank you, Ron. Today's virtual only meeting is a live audio webcast. We have chosen this format because the current public health and travel situation makes it difficult for many of our shareholders to attend an in-person meeting. Shareholders who have already voted and do not want to change their votes do not need to take any further action. If you have not voted or wish to change your vote, you may do so at any time prior to 10:00 a.m. Central Time, by clicking on the link provided online or by visiting www.investorvote.com/sf. If you need a copy of the annual report or the proxy statement, links are provided online and on the Investor Relations page at stifel.com. If you have logged in using a control number, you may submit questions online by clicking the dialogue icon on the meeting center on your screen. The question submission function is not available if you logged in as a guest. Consistent with our bylaws, we have established rules of conduct for this meeting in the interest of a fair and orderly meeting. These rules are available in the file section of the meeting center. Mr. Chairman, as to quorum, the tellers have submitted a certificate showing that at least 65,756,546 shares or 95.8% of total outstanding shares of common stock of Stifel are represented at this meeting. A quorum is present.

Thank you, Mark. I call the meeting to order and welcome our shareholders to this virtual only annual meeting. Thank you for joining us today. The officers and directors view you as partners and we value your input. The directors and officers of our company, in addition to myself, participating in today's meeting are, Kathleen Brown; Michael Brown; John Dubinsky; Robert Grady; Maura Markus; James Oates; David Peacock; and Michael Zimmerman. And in addition, Jim Zemlyak, Co-President; Victor Nesi, Co-President; Mark Fisher, General Counsel and Secretary; Jim Marischen, Chief Financial Officer; and David Sliney, Chief Operating Officer and Senior Vice President. I would now like to introduce Dan Seneski, Chris Moran, Andrew [indiscernible] of Ernst & Young. Ernst & Young is being recommended to you as our independent auditing firm for the year ending December 31, 2020. We will now begin the formal business of the meeting. In accordance with the bylaws of the company, I'm acting as Chairman of the meeting, and Mark Fisher is acting as secretary. I now appoint Jim Laschober and Michael Buckley as tellers to tabulate the votes at this meeting. An affidavit of the meeting of the notice of this meeting to all shareholders of record on March 18, 2020, will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. The previous annual meeting of shareholders was held 5th of June, 2019. The minutes of that meeting have been made available to you in the file section of the meeting center on your screen. I will deem these minutes accepted without objection, unless a shareholder or proxy objects by e-mail to [email protected] on or before May 20, 2020. This e-mail address has been provided to you in a box at the top of the minutes. We will now proceed to the proposal of directors for election. Our company's Board of Directors has proposed to the company's shareholders that the following individuals be elected at this annual meeting as directors, each to serve as a Director of the company for a one year term or until a successor has been duly elected and qualified. Mr. Adam Berlew, Ms. Kathleen Brown; Mr. Michael Brown; Mr. Robert Grady; Mr. Ronald Kruszewski; Mr. Daniel Luedeman Ms. Maura Markus; Mr. James Oates; Mr. David Peacock, Mr. Thomas Weisel; and Mr. Michael Zimmerman. This proposal Item 1 has been duly submitted to the shareholders for a vote. As reflected in the notice of this meeting of shareholders, we have 3 additional proposals before our shareholders. Item 2 is approval of an advisory resolution on executive compensation, sometimes referred to as say on pay. The Board of Directors has recommended that shareholders approve this Item 2. Item 3 is approval of an amendment of the 2001 Incentive Stock Plan, which was restated in 2018, and this amendment is to increase capacity by 4 million shares, including 25,000 shares to be reserved for nonemployee directors. The Board of Directors has recommended that shareholders approve this Item 3. The last the proposal properly before this meeting is Item 4 by which the Board of Directors proposes that shareholders ratify its selection of Ernst & Young as independent auditors for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2020. Items 2, 3 and 4 have each been duly submitted to our shareholders for a vote. I now recognize the representative of Ernst & Young and invite them to address this meeting. Is there any statements that you wish to make at this time?

Not at this time.

Later in the meeting, I will recognize anyone wishing to ask questions of the representatives of Ernst & Young. As already stated, shareholders who have already voted and do not want to change their vote do not need to take any further action. If you have not voted or wish to change your vote, you may do so at any time prior to 10:00 a.m. Central Time by clicking on the link provided online or by visiting www.investorvote.com/sf. Before hearing the results of the balloting, I would like to deliver remarks on the company as is our tradition. As we tabulate our shareholder votes, allow me to talk a little bit about Stifel, including a review of 2019 from a financial perspective. In doing so, I will refer to and often quote my annual shareholder letter. So look again at the cover of Stifel's annual report because it expresses an ideal that we should strive for. There should be nothing about anyone's birth or personal background that limits their ability to contribute and compete at our firm. The benefits of moving towards this ideal will be unquantifiable in the best sense of the word. So I cannot stress enough that diversity doesn't need to earn its place in our ranks at Stifel. We need to work and keep working to earn its benefits. Furthermore, I believe that Stifel's enduring success is rooted in our culture. Our strategic vision would be nothing without the individual contributions and commitment of our associates. Stifel is an entrepreneurial firm at heart, and we move forward when people at all levels are empowered to find new and creative ways to succeed. This culture is one of our greatest assets because advisers join the firm, knowing that they can use Stifel's resources to serve their clients in their own innovative ways. The lodestar in our culture has always been the golden rule. In practice, the golden rule asks us to go beyond our own experiences and pay special attention to the way others want to be treated because we cannot assume that our preferences are all the same. Understanding the golden rule in this way demands that we actively listen to and learn from others. And it means our culture must always be a work in progress. We can do much better with regard to diversity among our associates, in particular. The business case for this effort is simple as greater diversity in all its forms provides more opportunities to grow, while reducing the risks of blinkered, narrow-minded thinking. This applies to greater diversity in our community, just as in our revenue sources, business model and geographic location. More importantly though, this is the only fair and just path forward. Sometimes our shareholders ask me why we maintain the names of companies we acquire. I must say, unique at least in financial services is our preference for preserving and enhancing the independent excellence of the firms that join us. We want our brands to uphold the reputation they have dedicated themselves to cultivating. While we maximize operational efficiency by integrating risk, settlement and administrative services, our primary goal is always to better serve our clients, not simply add ornaments to the Stifel emblem. This next slide outlines some of the actions we've taken regarding COVID-19. First of all, I would like to express gratitude to health care workers and extend best wishes to everyone. All of us at Stifel hope you and your loved ones are safe and healthy. Responding to this health crisis, Stifel is committed to supporting and protecting our associates, serving our clients and communities as well as small businesses, commercial and institutional clients. I'm very proud of my Stifel partners and associates who have shown us all creativity and teamwork to achieve the dual objectives of promoting the safety of our people, while delivering essential and exceptional service to our clients. I would like to highlight Stifel's infrastructure and response management as well. As our shareholders know, Stifel has been acquisitive. I'm often asked if we have fully integrated our infrastructure to our numerous acquisitions. I believe the past month underscores the fact while that Stifel has multiple client-facing brands, KBW, Miller Buckfire, Eaton to name just a few, we are fully integrated in our support functions, including risk, trading, technology, clearing and settlement. A couple of points. Over the last month, more than 90% of Stifel associates have worked remotely. Speaking to our infrastructure, I can think of no better example than the fact that precrisis, Stifel globally maintained 8 primary trading floors which because of social distancing and the need to operate remotely will redeploy to 183 separate trading locations. This was achieved without interruption and during a time of elevated trading volumes and volatility. Finally, I believe that the fiscal policies, primarily the CARES Act and the actions taken by the Federal Reserve to address the financial uncertainty have been needed and effective. Stifel's Board of Directors in collaboration with the executive management team evaluates our strategy and corresponding priorities. Our Board understands that our businesses is in a constant state of change and therefore, recognizes the need to be agile and flexible as markets evolve. This slide is truly Stifel's overriding philosophy regarding our strategic plan, unchanged since 1997. First, be in a position to take advantage of opportunity, and second, quality over quantity in all that we do. By adhering to these basic principles in a little over 2 decades, we have built Stifel through organic growth and strategic acquisitions from 733 associates to over 8,000 and from $110 million of revenue to over $3.3 billion. Simply, we endeavor to be a premier wealth management, institutional services and investment banking firm. The intersection of advice and technology continues to be a primary strategic focus for our company. One requiring careful coordination of investments and infrastructure, including the cloud, along with training and recruiting. The result is a much more scalable and flexible way to deliver services to clients. Using new technologies, clients will be able to access banking and wealth management features from a unified user experience. They will also be able to aggregate and analyze their portfolios, monitor their personal balance sheets, read custom news feeds, access our research and much more. At the same time, we are improving our supporting and nonclient-facing services as key business areas across the firm are now integrating big data and data analytics into their advice model. We have also invested in a differentiated trade execution facility that can bridge human and machine interaction. Finally, a new enterprise CRM helps keep our institutional businesses connected across the globe. Our clients and professionals will be uniquely connected to each other and to Stifel, making the firm's excellent and differentiating service available in more ways than ever. We're also focused on providing our clients access to private companies. As market structure has changed, many growth companies are staying private longer, making it difficult for the average investor to participate in their growth. Stifel aims to democratize private company investing through our strategic alliance with OurCrowd, a global leader in cloud funding for start-up growth companies. We have not lost sight of the fact that 2020 is a presidential election year in the United States. The domestic political stakes are high as they relate to both the White House and Congress. It has been some time since this country has entered an election season in a national crisis with our political parties at literally 2 ends of the ideological spectrum. As a regulated business, Stifel will be greatly impacted by what happens this November. Suffice it to say, we will be ready to respond to the opportunities or challenges presented by a post-election Washington. We continuously strive to improve client service and invest in our future, and we are also focused on improving our operational efficiency. 3 years ago, we articulated a strategy to identify costs, savings and efficiencies and to further integrate our various businesses. These steps have resulted in a meaningful improvement in our non-GAAP performance metrics as compared to 2016 as our: first, compensation ratio improved to 58% from 63%; Noncompensation expenses, the ratio improved to 22% versus 24%; pretax margin improved to 20% versus 13%; and return on tangible common equity improved to 25% versus 15%. A clear benefit of our improved financial metrics is a generation of significant cash flow. We remain focused on maximizing risk-adjusted returns when deploying our capital. As a growth company, we believe that investing in our business to enhance our relevance to our clients is essential. In 2019, these investments included 6 acquisitions and significant hiring of talented people to further expand our revenue base. Speaking of acquisitions, Stifel has executed a strategy that has served the company well over the last 15 years. These acquisitions have made Stifel more relevant to our clients and expanded our foundation for growth, while increasing shareholder value. In 2019, we saw the opportunity to expand on this strategy with the acquisitions of First Empire Holding Corp., Mooreland Partners, B&F Capital Markets, Inc. and MainFirst Bank AG as well as the businesses of George K. Baum & Company and GMP Capital. In addition to focusing on acquisitions, strategic hiring and investments in technology, we utilized the strength of our balance sheet to return approximately $300 million to shareholders through dividends, net settlement of restricted stock units and share repurchases. Today, there exists a significant debate, primarily political in nature, about the appropriateness of share repurchases. We as Stifel view share repurchases as an important capital tool, yet understand the importance of buying back stock at a reasonable price. Said another way, share repurchases should add value to remaining shareholders. Of course, we understand the policy discussion restricting share repurchases if a company needs government assistance. Now let's turn to Stifel's 2019 financial performance. Starting with the market environment. The 2019 business environment, which I must say, feels like a light year removed, nevertheless provided a strong foundation for our company's record year. Inflation remained muted, unemployment fell to historic lows and growth was generally consistent across our economies. The S&P 500 gained 29%, while interest rates remained low. In 2019, our business and financial results were the best in our illustrious 129-year history. Over the last several years, our diversity of business has generated not only earnings growth but also earnings stability. This stability is underscored by the fact that fee-based and net interest revenue has grown as a percentage of overall revenue from 21% in 2012 to 42% in 2019. With regard to our 2019 financial results, Stifel reported record revenue, net income and earnings per share. Net revenue, which has increased for the last 24 consecutive years totaled slightly more than $3.3 billion, up 10%. We continue to execute on our long-term strategy of combining organic growth with accretive acquisitions. As evidenced by our record non-GAAP earnings per share of $6.10 and non-GAAP return on tangible equity of nearly 25% and the return of more than $300 million to common shareholders through repurchases and dividends, we have been able to grow our business and enhance shareholder value. In addition, in January of 2020, we announced a 13% increase to our dividend on common shares, our third consecutive annual increase. In addition, both of our operating segments performed very well. Global Wealth Management, which represents approximately 2/3 of our overall revenue, achieved record revenue of $2.1 billion, an increase of 7% over 2018 and achieved record profitability. Our Institutional business also achieved record revenue of $1.2 billion. Looking at Global Wealth Management, our private client group now consists of more than 2,200 financial advisers who serve clients from 382 offices across the country. We had a strong year for financial adviser recruiting, opening 18 new Private Client Group offices and adding 150 financial advisers from a variety of firms. Our wealth management business continues to benefit from growth and stability of revenues. As of the end of 2019, we managed approximately $330 billion in our clients' assets. The success of this group emanates from the entrepreneurial character of each of our financial advisers. As always, our goal is to support them with the tools and resources they need to what they do best, which is, build strong relationships with clients to better define and meet their financial goals. As it relates to client communication and marketing, we continue to grow our technology and digital offerings to create a more efficient and personalized experience for clients and advisers. We ramped up efforts to provide our financial advisers with the most cutting-edge digital marketing capabilities in the marketplace. We now have a suite of offerings that enable our advisers to better communicate with their clients on social media platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn as well as online with customized adviser website. Stifel Bancorp ended the year with $16.9 billion in assets while maintaining a conservative risk profile. Stifel Bancorp's credit metrics remain solid with nonperforming asset ratio of 0.09%, an improvement of 5 basis points from 2018. Our asset quality metrics compare very favorably to the overall market and reflect our conservative approach. Firm-wide assets totaled $24.6 billion, and we ended the year with a Tier 1 leverage ratio of 10% and a risk-based capital ratio of 17.6%. Our Institutional business achieved record revenue of over $1.2 billion in 2019, up 15%. I would note, the balance of the Institutional business -- the balance of revenue of our Institutional business with advisory revenue of $448 million, trading revenue of $423 million and capital raising revenue of $332 million. We usually look at our Institutional business by examining our advisory revenues, along with our equity and debt businesses, in this case, combining brokerage and capital raising. So looking at our equity and fixed income business, I would note, again, the balance of revenue as equities totaled $371 million of revenue and fixed income totaled $383 million. Looking at our trading businesses. Fixed income was up 38%, buoyed by strategic positioning and our acquisition of First Empire. Equity trading was down 10%, largely due to the implementation of the most significant regulatory change in the brokerage business in decades, which was MiFID II. I would note that both equity and fixed income trading achieved record quarterly revenue during the first quarter of 2020. In terms of our investment banking business, let me start off my comments by congratulating my colleague of being named Middle Market Investment Bank of the Year by Mergers & Acquisitions magazine. This award helps validate the effort that's gone into building our investment banking franchise. Investment banking revenues totaled a record $817 million in 2019. Capital raising revenue totaled $369 million, while advisory revenue was $448 million, up 21%. On the advisory front, we completed over 130 strategic advisory assignments. This number includes 18 transactions from our new colleagues from Mooreland Partners, who joined the firm this year and solidified our foothold in European and technology advisory. Equity capital raising revenue of $231 million declined modestly from 2018 levels. Despite the slight decline, I'm pleased with these results as the number of equity offerings industry-wide declined 8% in 2019 as the market was negatively impacted by the government shutdown, which as we all remember, occurred in first quarter of 2019. Also, I would be remiss if I didn't mention our success in London as Stifel ranked #2 in the number in terms of investment banks by volume of U.K. deals accomplished in 2019. Debt underwriting revenues of $138 million increased 37% in 2019. As this business is primarily public finance, we benefited from the improvement in municipal issuance files during the year. Looking a little bit deeper, Stifel's debt capital raising is anchored by our public finance business, which is driven by both geographic and sector diversification. For the 6th consecutive year, Stifel led the nation in the number of municipal negotiated issues, serving as sole or senior manager for 803 transactions with total par value of approximately $16 billion. In addition, the acquisition of the business of George K. Baum expanded Stifel's reach in both -- both in terms of geographic coverage and growing specialty practices. The strength of Stifel's combined integrated platform has also been demonstrated by extremely strong secondary market activity during the recent municipal bond market dislocation in which our municipal desks have cleared significant volume of trades with entities that do not conventionally participate in the market. I would be remiss if I also did not highlight KBW, which posted another exceptional year. In 2019, KBW advised on 10 of the top 15 bank mergers and was the #1 bank IPO lead bookrunner and advised on the largest mutual to mutual insurance company merger in the past decade. KBW's specialized focused on the financial sector and long-standing client relationships help fuel the best year for M&A advisory in its illustrious history. The closing of the acquisitions of MainFirst in Europe and GMP in Canada in the fourth quarter of 2019 significantly bolstered our equity research capabilities. Globally, Stifel covers approximately 2,100 stocks with 159 analysts across 15 business sectors. Stifel is the largest global provider of small-cap and mid-cap company research and also the largest provider of coverage in financials, industrials and energy information technology. Before I look forward to 2020, I want to take the opportunity to thank John Dubinsky, who will retire from our Board of Directors as of today after having served since 2003. We will not be losing John's wisdom and experience, however, as he will continue as Chairman of Stifel Bank & Trust, which has prospered under his leadership. Also, I am pleased to announce that Kathleen Brown has been appointed lead independent Director of the Stifel Board. Since joining the Board in 2016, Kathleen has been an invaluable asset to Stifel. Her background in the financial services industry and experience in public service gives her a unique perspective within our organization and makes her an ideal choice as our new Lead Independent Director. I would also like to thank Bob Grady for his significant contributions during his time as Lead Director, and I look forward to his continued service and leadership as a Board member in the years to come. So looking forward, the economy has been through many crises during my nearly 4 decades in this business. The lesson that I've learned is that risk is omnipresent. I often say that I'm most anxious when things appear relatively calm, and it's hard to predict the next crisis, such as my anxiety in late 2019, all seeing as of 2020 would be another record year. How quickly things change. While we can learn from past crises and explain them all in retrospect, they will never feel normal, especially when they divert careers to lay life choices or upend lives altogether. We do not yet know what the bounds of this pandemic will be. So looking forward over the next few decades, it's hardly prophetic to predict there will be more disruptions to come. The world is not getting any simpler. In our business, we must be fundamentally prepared for the unknown, and it is our job to help others do the same. During my tenure at Stifel, continuing the 129-year traditions of the firm, we have developed a judgment to manage in uncertainty rather than trying to manage uncertainties itself. Our strategic vision has always centered on unexpected opportunity, which requires us to be poised to act rationally and decisively and to do so when things seem least clear, which is where opportunity most frequently appears. We guide our clients in the same way. As managers and advisers, we aim to make things more certain and predictable and to quantify risk and reward. Yet, we must also steel ourselves and our clients for true uncertainty because that is where real risk and real opportunity always lie. It is where downturns and crises are nurtured, but also where entrepreneurship reigns. There will be a time when this pandemic is behind us, and markets will rebound as people take back to the skies and streets, to dine, travel and shop. Until then, we will use our strength to contribute to a better outcome for those more directly affected. As individuals and businesses, nationally and locally, I am confident that the American people will get through this crisis. Looking forward, 2020 obviously will be a year of uncertainty and increased volatility. The social and economic impact of COVID-19 is yet to be determined, and we have a national election in November of this year. Yet, despite the uncertainty, we are confident in Stifel's ability to navigate this environment. I would also note that in 2020, Stifel is performing well even in a remote environment. Our first quarter was our second best in our history. Also to bolster our financial position, just this week, we raised $625 million via preferred stock and 10-year bond offering. So as always, we sincerely thank our shareholders and clients for their support as well as our more than 8,000 associates for their commitment to excellence. I now ask the secretary to read any questions that have been asked of me or representatives of Ernst & Young.

Mr. Chairman, there were no questions.

Thank you. I now ask the secretary to report on the balloting.

Mr. Chairman, each of the following has received the majority of votes cast to serve as a Director of the company for a 1-year term or until a successor has been duly elected and qualified: Mr. Adam Berlew; Ms. Kathleen Brown; Mr. Michael Brown; Mr. Robert Grady; Mr. Ronald Kruszewski; Mr. Daniel Luedeman, Ms. Maura Markus; Mr. James Oates; Mr. David Peacock; Mr. Thomas Weisel; and Mr. Michael Zimmerman. The proposal contained in Item 2, which approves the advisory resolutions on executive compensation, sometimes referred to as say on pay, has received the majority of votes cast and has been approved. The proposal contained in Item 3, approval of amendment of the 2001 Incentive Stock Plan 2018 restatement to increase capacity by 4 million shares, including 25,000 shares to be reserved for nonemployee directors has received the majority of votes cast and has been approved. The proposal contained in Item 4, the resolution ratifying the appointment of Ernst & Young as our independent registered public accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2020, has received the majority of votes cast and has been approved.

Thank you. I will now ask the secretary to state whether any other business is properly before this meeting.

Mr. Chairman, I'm aware of no other business properly before this meeting nor any reason why this meeting may not now be duly adjourned.

Mr. Fisher. Thank you. That being so, I declare the meeting adjourned. Thank you.

This concludes the meeting. You may now disconnect.