Earnings Call: H1 2021

Sep 21, 2021

Good morning and welcome to Fintell's 2021 Interim Results Webinar. My name is Hannah and I'm a webcast specialist supporting Fintell today. Please note that this meeting is being recorded so that it can be shared with anyone who is unable to attend. In a moment, you'll hear a short presentation from the team, Matt Timmins, Neil Stevens and David Thompson. At the end of the presentation, they'll be happy to answer any questions you may have. To ask a question, please select the raise hand icon on your Zoom screen, and we'll answer as many of your questions as we can in the next hour. And with that, Matt, over to you. Thank you, Hannah, and a very warm welcome to everyone watching and listening to the Fintell Interim results presentation for the first half of twenty twenty one. I'm Matt Timmins, Joint CEO of the business, and I'm delighted today to be joined by my co CEO of 11 years, Neil Stevens. I'm equally delighted to welcome our new CFO, David Thompson, He will formally introduce himself in a few minutes' time. David is a tremendous addition to the business and brings with him A wealth of CFO and listed company experience. Formerly the CFO of Smart Metering Systems, David adds real strength and experience to the board And senior team at Fintel. In terms of the agenda today, I will cover, first of all, a very brief session, An overview of the business and touch on the key highlights for the first half of twenty twenty one before handing over to David, who will take you through a more in-depth financial review. Neil will then take you through the important strategic progress we've made today, along with bringing you right up to speed on current trading. So first of all, a quick business overview For those of you who may be a little bit more unfamiliar with the business, Fintell is a support services and fintech business sitting right at the heart of the UK Retail Financial Services sector. We provide Fintech and support services to 3 customer groups across Retail Financial Services. We provide support services, product research And financial planning technology to thousands of advisers, including IFAs, mortgage brokers, wealth managers and consolidators. We then provide distribution services, technology and data to hundreds of product manufacturers and asset managers. And finally, we provide product research and product ratings, which are used by millions of consumers. Our purpose, the Fintell purpose, is to help product providers distribute their products to the highly fragmented intermediary market And through the provision of data and insights, help them to build better products. We aim to help intermediaries run a compliant and profitable business through the use of technology, allowing them to operate their business more effectively. And for consumers, our purpose is to help them make better informed Financial decisions. And collectively, this allows us to sit right at the center of the market, creating products and services They have multiple applications and multiple customer sets and are further enhanced the more they are used. In terms of our highlights for the first half of this year, I'm delighted to report real key progress in 3 areas. Firstly, we have delivered a robust set of financial results, robust trading. Our revenue is up 10%, our adjusted EBITDA is up 12%, and our adjusted EBITDA margin It's up by 60 basis points to 26.1%. We have delivered strong cash flows throughout the first half of the year And our strong cash flows and the disposal of 2 assets have helped reduce down the level of debt within the business, giving us real financial flexibility and financial resources to grow. Importantly for us, we have continued on our drive to digitize the business. We have delivered a key, service for product providers in the launch of our new product portal. And this provides access to distribution to data and to insights on thousands of intermediary customers For our product provider partners. Again, importantly for Fintel, we have grown the use in Fintech recommendations. That's advisors logging on to the Defaqto system and giving advice to clients through that system. Recommendations through the system are up 52% to £37,000,000,000 We have also delivered progress in 2 key areas in terms of our strategic delivery. We have created a partnership. We have forged a new partnership with Tappan Asset Management, which also includes the disposal of the verbatim funds. And what this partnership delivers to the business is a Fintech contract, a 5 year Fintech contract, which has the capability to increase our customer base by up to 30%. So it's a fantastic partnership that we've engaged in with Tappan. It's a 5 year fintech contract and increases our potential customer base by up to 30%. On top of that, we have disposed of Zest Technologies, which was a non core asset within the business. We've disposed of that business for an initial consideration of £10,000,000 which represents a 22 times trading EBITDA multiple. Plus there is also an option to receive an extra £1,500,000 depending upon performance of that business. I'll now hand over to David Thompson, who will take you through a more in-depth financial review in the first half of twenty twenty one. Over to you, David. Okay. Thanks, Matt, and hello, everyone. So first of all, I want to say it's a real pleasure to present these H1 21 results with Matt and Neil. And I'm absolutely delighted to have joined a business that's got a real quality hallmarks. And For me, those are it's highly profitable and cash generating. It's proven its business model is highly resilient coming through COVID-nineteen. It's a scalable platform to grow through digitization and it actually demonstrates in complete strategic intent. It's very well positioned, We all funded to grow as seen by the 2 recent Zest and Verbatim transactions. So with that as a context, I want to go through the next few slides to show The profitability and growth of the business translates into cash flow, a very healthy balance sheet and positions the business ready for investing to grow further. So Slide 7 and 8, if we turn to Slide 7 first, the key highlights of financial performance. And as Matt has already said, you can see the progress Fintail has made period on period, The double digit growth throughout the income statement is a great claim to make. So with revenue up 10% and EBITDA and PBT both up 12%. That's a great set of results. Over in slide 8, we can see how that robust trading performance levels of strong cash generation profile. So EPS is fairly consistent with prior periods. Although it should be noted that along with many other businesses, the current period EPS net of a non cash reduction of around 0.8p and that's on account of the future corporation tax rate change announcement from 19% to 25%. But on a constant tax rate basis, we would have also seen that double digit growth flow through to EPS Suck 18% tying into the profitability from SLADE 7. And again looking at cash conversion, we use adjusted EBITDA as our start point because we believe that's the best Strong proxy for operating cash flows. Now for context circa 70% is a longer term run rate of conversion after tax. We converted 81% in the period, largely on account of working capital inflows in the first half of the year. Again, circa 70% we would view as a longer term win rate. And then on to leverage, Fintail is clearly a profitable cash generative business. There are strong cash returns and combined with 2 recently completed strategic transactions that positions us very well because you can see the ability of the business to delever quickly. So net debt EBITDA at the end of last period was 1.5 tons and that reduced through trading to just under 0.9 tons at the half point this year. Although on a pro form a basis, if you included the effect of the sale of Zest and the Patent transaction, it actually is under just under 0.2 tons. That current underlying run rate should see the business become net cash neutral by the end of the current financial year. So over to slide 9. Again, it's important to note we look at the business as 3 main operating segments being intermediary, Distribution in Fintech and Research, but also strategically we describe the business as core and non core. And that's really important because that way we can be transparent on areas of Strategic focus going forward. So here we can see the total revenue split by core and non core. It's important to show both these elements continue to grow And provide clarity in the relative weighting of each. But essentially non core comprise Zest and the property valuations business. So we highlight the separate elements of non core. You can see that following disposal of Zest, there's a greater focus on the core business. Now the key metrics from our Capital Markets Day in December are measured against the core business. So presenting this way helps everyone track progress against them. So over on slide 10. So 10 and 11 bridge the growth in revenue and EBITDA by operating segment. So on 10, you can see the majority of revenue growth came from distribution. That was largely a result of the Boeing housing market. But both intermediate and fintech also grew organically by 0.3000000€4000000 respectively. And over in slide 11, it shows how that growth has Well, through to profitability. So distribution of Fintech increasing its profits and it's important to note that continued reinvestment And the product set and delivery for our intermediaries has held that segment's gross profit similar to the prior period. But again, as a business, we always invest to go Do what's right for the benefit of our members. Our infrastructure and support costs that provide key operational leverage for these divisions were also The period on period of €5,400,000 So over in slide 12, to reflect, we look at the positioning of the business for growth I focus in core, on SaaS and subs revenue and it's important to understand the profitability of each of the segments at a direct level And also the clarity over the infrastructure and support costs that then provide a consistent base and key operational leverage The segments to grow in their own markets and we best do that by reporting segment performance at gross profit level and show these support costs separately. Now, Intermediary Services has grown revenues 3%, although as I said, the direct reinvestment in service delivery sees the segment profit consistent with the prior period at 3,900,000 Distribution channels are turned to 46% margin in the current period. Now this is reduced from 50.8% in the previous period, Although it really should be borne in mind that H1 2020 saw the housing valuations and survey teams significantly curtailed During the initial UK wide total lockdowns under COVID-nineteen. So as that part of the business was relatively speaking a lower margin activity although still a strong business, The ceasing of that simply changes the mix last year to a higher margin. But now that we see the valuations business operating Nearly full capacity again, the current margin is deemed a bit more representative of an H1 run rate in the division. And again, Fintech and Research performed really well. We're pleased with the double digit growth in profitability and a gross margin improvement to nearly 60%. So over in Slide 13, focus on one of our key metrics being EBITDA cash conversion percentage. So again, it's important to note and I stress that we look at conversion here from an adjusted EBITDA starting point as a strong proxy for the cash generated. 81% again highlights a strong cash generating ability of the business model as demonstrated by the results in the context of the ongoing pandemic. Again, a highly cash generative business. And how that manifests over in Slide 14, the leverage profile is perhaps the best demonstration, The effect of the cash generation of the business and the excellent strategic positioning that that provides. So just over 2 years from the acquisition of The fact that in H1 2019 and a short term peak of 2.5 tons of leverage, the business has almost returned to a net cash neutral position Through strong cash conversion from trading and strategic divestment. And that just demonstrates for me an excellent cash return And an efficient use of debt at low rates that's got a quick paid out again return to shareholders. So we've got $45,000,000 involving credit facility in attractive terms of 2 high street banks and with access to the significantly undrawn portion of that and our cash resources, the business is positioned extremely well to fund growth both organically and through acquisition. So I recap on Slide 15. If you work top left The bottom right, those are real coherent demonstrable financial strategy at play. We've got robust financial performance, Growth of longer term, higher quality SaaS and subscription type revenues converting strongly into cash And Tom, that provides significant financial resources, positioning the business very well to fund and achieve its growth and other ambitions. So So with that, somebody, I'll hand over to Neil, who will talk a bit more about the strong progress we're making against our strategic objectives. Over to you, Neil. Thank you, David. Thank you, Matt. And I have my own very warm welcome to everybody joining us this morning. So as you've heard so far, We've talked about the robust trading and the progress we've made in the business. And we have driven the business forward and made very significant progress in delivering our strategy during the first half of this year. We've carried forward the momentum from 2020, a year of big change, massive disruption, But a year in which we began the digital acceleration of our business, and that has paid dividends As that momentum's carried into 2021 and enabled us to make real progress towards our medium term objectives, The objectives we set out at the Capital Markets Day back in December. We're going to give you an update today on How we've fared. The first major area of progress has been with the managed distribution services. Now we've had a strong distribution business for many years. We've worked with over 400 product providers, many of those for well over a decade. And we've been helping them to connect their products and services to the UK market. And it's gone very, very well. But the reality is the markets post challenges and it's changing very quickly. And those product providers need greater efficiency As product margins are a bit keener and the market is very competitive, these financial institutions need to reach the market with their products More efficiently and with a greater focus on suitability and product appropriateness. You've got to get the compliance right as well. And our new service we call managed distribution services will help them to do this. We're moving from an approach of Annual repeating agreements, which we've used for years, and they've been very successful. But that meant that we've had to scope and size The agreements with each product provider every year, and they've been a bit static. So whilst we've had the same customers buying the same sorts of services, Doing it in 6 annual blocks has been burdensome, creates a big overhead to do all the schedules and create the workloads. It's quite static for the product providers. And so by moving to distribution as a service, We can take the fantastic tools we've built and digitized and add to those the new data services We've bought online through 2020 and packaged these together into a multi year subscription That gives our product provider customers much more agility in the market. They can get the data, the insights, And then access the services they need to act on those insights at the time that they need them. As part of the service, we're helping product providers understand the buying preferences in the market. How are people making purchases? What are the key decisions people are making about products? And how are consumer needs changing? And we also help the product providers understand pretty much live information on how well their products Positioned and compete in the market. And these deep trends over time are helping product providers To launch new products with a lot more confidence. So this new managed distribution service is A massive leap forward for our product provider partners in terms of the agility and the feedback they get on market dynamics and the ability to respond to them. And for us, it helps deliver these high quality, multi year subscription agreements where we are able to increase service take up and improve the margin as well. And as part of this new service, we've launched a provider portal, which is the access point that the product providers come to, To get this data and to get access to these services. This is helping us be more connected with product providers on a live basis And to keep a dialogue going with them throughout the whole year, much more agile. Also, having them access this portal It's a fantastic shop window for us to extend the platform in the future. So as Matt said earlier, there's more people engage with our software and access our Where access our research, it creates further enhancements to the data sets we have. And as we bring new data products online, We've got the perfect delivery mechanism in this new product provider portal. We've got a strong sales pipeline working with all these great customers we've had for many, many years to get them to move over. As we've had for many, many years to get them to move over to the new managed distribution service. And that pipeline Has been acted on straight away in 2021. We've been able to convert several absolutely flagship clients And around $1,800,000 of annualized revenue to this new service. And we've high ambitions For continuing that progress in the second half of this year, taking the total percentage of provider revenue to 40% And then 60% as we move into next year. We're doing this at a pace that is right for our partners. As I say, we have a very high Quality business in this area already. But we do expect strong progress because what we've built will deliver to the needs and deliver to the agility that our product providers want. So we're very, very confident that this service is going to be a winner And be one of the big enhancements to the quality of the earnings at Fintell. Next, as you heard from Matt, we've made some excellent progress in realizing value from a non core business. We've previously announced that Zest is non core. Back in December, we talked about the fact that it's high quality business, but The employee benefits market is really unlikely to provide the synergies and the network effects that leverage the rest of our platform. Zest is a high quality software vendor. But as a business, it was subscale for us and not profitable for a long time. And so it consumed a lot of attention, and it consumed considerable development expenditure. And whilst we're doing that, it means we're not Fully focused on our call. So what we've achieved in Zest is a very full valuation for a very high quality business, 22x trailing EBITDA. And that's meant we've been able to enhance shareholder value. And as importantly, I think, free up focus, The focus of the time of the team in putting all of our energy into the core business and crucially, the focus of our development expenditure. We can put all of that into our core platform to accelerate growth. The cash generated has been strong, Helping to build those financial resources that David's talked about. And as Matt has said, there could be up to an additional one point £5,000,000 of consideration subject to the revenue performance assessed over the remainder of 2021. Next, the most recently announced thing that we've done is the strategic partnership forged We have Tatham Asset Management. This deal will, as a start point, Deliver total value up to £13,000,000 And in terms of the disposal of our verbatim funds, that's up to 2% of AUM in pure financial terms. But it is much more than the financial terms That has us excited about this new partnership. £7,000,000 of the deal is a 5 year Fintech Enterprise deal That sees us get minimum SaaS fees over that 5 year period for providing our software platform Up to 2,500 users across Tatin's customer base. So in addition to the financials, This delivers a fantastic leap in our scale on our core platforms and extends our reach up to 40% of the UK market. It's a huge extension onto our Fintech and a huge extension of the audience that use our research platform. Fintech and research growth engine, high margin growth engine for our plans at Fintech and what a massive extension of customer scale. In addition to the FinTech contract, Tatum will join our managed distribution service I spoke about a few minutes ago, Adding another flagship partner onto our scalable platform with a scalable fee structure That's going to really align the joint success of patent and Fintell as we go forward. So in addition to the value of the contract to outset, We're incredibly confident this will provide significant future earnings growth in addition to the minimum fees on our core platforms at high margin with fantastic cash profile. So this deal is a platform for growth and for value creation, Embedding our core technology, increasing the throughput of recommendations, which builds our Fintech research demand And helps us access even more value in the research market. Growing the subscriptions base Further and faster as we develop new software modules. We're going to be rolling those out to a much bigger customer base and able to develop further revenue acceleration at very high margins. And as Matt described earlier, Every new usage of our system creates further data assets that feed the network effect of our insights. And so the scalable platform delivers research, delivers data, feeds insights, and we go around building Further value on the platform itself. We're highly aligned in terms of the value creation with Tatan as I've described. And I think this is going to be a very fruitful partnership and hopefully the first of many Enterprise deals we're able to do in the market as Fintel. Just to talk you very quickly through the key components of the The Tappan deal. So there is a 1,400,000 minimum fee per annum for a SaaS contract. And that lets us deploy our technology to those up to 2,500 of their users. There's the 5 year managed distribution service Covering the data and distribution. And our fee platform scales as we get more and more engagement together on that platform. And there's also a 5 year contract for us to provide our IP and benchmarking. We call that strategic asset allocation, SAA. And that will help Tatin to position their products in the market, and we're going to help them launch some new products in the market as well Using our investment IP and financial planning IP. The consideration was €2,800,000 on completion, Plus, there's up to 3,000,000 based on an AUM retention over years 2, 3, and 4. And again, we're very highly aligned on the key deliverables from this new partnership. We expect revenue growth to accelerate from both our SaaS user base And the increase in the research platform. And the alignment means we're very confident this will deliver on our objectives To increase the revenue quality of the business, building those SaaS and subs, help us step up margin as everything we're onboarding for Tatin is on our Core platform, the platform we have today. And of course, very strong cash generation because of the cash profile of the SAS and subscriptions, Of course, boosted by that consideration as well. Just want to look back to the medium term objectives, the key objectives we are completely focused on. And we announced these and talked through these back in our Capital Markets Day back in December. We're going to grow the core business of Fintel to deliver 5% to 7% revenue growth, 35% to 40% adjusted EBITDA margin and earnings quality underpinned by 70% to 80 Percent of core revenues coming from SaaS subscriptions at very high levels of cash generation. And we're going to do this through continuing that digital acceleration of our business platform. And I believe in the first half of this year, we've made Very significant progress towards these objectives. We've significantly increased our customer scale across our core platforms, Which will contribute to margin. We've marshaled our resources and focused around core by disposing of some non core and building those Financial resources. Those financial resources are going to help us accelerate our progress as we pursue both organic And acquisition growth as part of our agenda moving forward. The retail financial services market is still highly fragmented. And this is particularly true of the software and data vendors that feed into our ecosystem. And we have one of the strongest platforms With massive customer scale. So we're going to be working very hard going forward to find those investments and to find those acquisition opportunities That are going to bring added capability to our platform and make the most of the scale we've got in delivering to that fantastic customer base. So a few words on trading, and it's really pleased to be here reporting robust Trading and the confidence in our outlook to our shareholders at the half year review. We are trading in line with expectations while making very significant progress with our strategy in the first half of the year. We are confident in meeting the full year And we are confident that we're carrying and accelerating momentum forward, accelerating our performance towards those Medium term objectives that we've set out in our Capital Markets Day. Thank you to everyone for For watching, for tuning in. It's been a real pleasure to update you on the first half of the year. As we have The business has had a real solid financial performance, really robust trading. We've accelerated digital delivery, Taking on board some great new enterprise contracts, and, we've had a really positive start to the year, and we look forward with confidence. So thank you, everyone. And we'll see you again in the full results.