Good morning, and welcome to ASX's results briefing for the financial year ending 30th of June, 2024. Thank you for taking part in this virtual presentation. I hope you're well wherever you're joining us. My name is Helen Lofthouse, and I'm the Managing Director and CEO of ASX. I'm pleased to be presenting these results today, along with ASX's Chief Financial Officer, Andrew Tobin. I'd like to acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, who are the traditional custodians of the country where I'm speaking today, and we recognize their continuing connection to the land and waters, and pay our respects to elders, past and present, and we extend that respect to any First Nations people joining us today. I'd like to begin today by addressing Wednesday's announcement regarding the civil proceedings filed by ASIC against ASX Limited.
This is in relation to certain statements made by ASX in February 2022 regarding the previous CHESS replacement project. As I said on Wednesday, we recognize the significance and the serious nature of these proceedings and are now carefully reviewing and considering the allegations. I appreciate that you may have more questions about this situation, but as this is an ongoing legal matter, I am limited in any further comments I can make at this time. We play a critical role in the Australian financial system and are committed to delivering for our customers and shareholders. And despite this setback, I'm proud of the strong progress that we're making as an organization, as we work towards our five-year strategy and delivering our vision of a new era ASX. So now let's turn to our FY 2024 results.
Today's presentation will cover three areas, and then Andrew and I will take your questions. I'll begin with highlights from the FY 2024 results, then Andrew will provide a more detailed view of our financial performance, including each line of business, and I'll then update you on our strategic priorities for the period ahead and provide some observations on the market outlook and its implications for ASX, and we'll finish with Q&A. Let's begin with the FY 2024 highlights. At our investor forum in June, I gave you an update on our progress as we move into the second year of our five-year strategy. We understand that delivery is a key focus for our shareholders, and in FY 2024, we have delivered in many areas.
We delivered record operating revenue in FY 2024, demonstrating the quality of ASX's businesses and the value that they create for the markets in which we operate. This was offset by an increase in operating expenses as we continued to invest in activities to meet our regulatory commitments and our technology modernization program, which are the focus areas for Horizon One of our strategy. I've been pleased with what these investments have delivered in FY 2024, which further enable us to be dynamic and respond to the needs of our stakeholders. We play a key role in promoting financial system stability through the licenses that we hold, as well as the markets and clearing and settlement facilities that we operate. This is a privilege and foundational to ASX and to shareholder value. We've made good progress in delivering on our regulatory commitments in FY 2024.
Our regulatory deliverables have included a series of special reports and significant uplifts in our stakeholder and regulatory engagement in the past year. ASX is underpinned by technology, and we're continuing to build sustainable, secure, and resilient technology. This requires investment also in our capability to deliver key projects, and we made good progress in FY 2024. I'll go into some of the specific achievements in the year and what we intend to deliver in FY 2025 later in the presentation. Finally, we delivered a series of expense management initiatives in FY 2024 as part of the ongoing cost-conscious approach to the way we run our business. This included a targeted restructure, which helped to ensure that we're carefully prioritizing the most strategic and efficient outcomes for ASX.
We've also generated a further annualized saving of approximately AUD 5 million through reducing our use of consultants and process improvements, which Andrew will talk about in more detail shortly. Turning now to our financial highlights, we delivered AUD 1.03 billion of revenue in FY 2024, which is a record for ASX and achieved in a challenging year for equity markets. Our diversified business model supported the revenue performance, where the decline in listings and securities and payments was offset by growth in our markets and technology and data businesses. Total expenses were up by 14.7% compared to FY 2023, which is within our guidance range, and this expense growth was primarily driven by investment in our focus areas of regulatory commitments and technology modernization, as well as some one-off costs in the period.
We expect a growth rate of between 6% and 9% in FY 2025 as a result of the business efficiency actions that we're taking. An underlying net profit after tax, or NPAT, decreased by 3.4% to AUD 474.2 million, while statutory NPAT increased substantially, given that the prior corresponding period included the loss from the derecognition of the previous CHESS replacement project. ASX's dividend payout ratio of 85% of underlying NPAT is in the middle of our range, with the board determining a fully franked final dividend of AUD 1.068 per share, bringing the FY 2024 total dividend to AUD 2.08 per share. We reported underlying ROE of 13% for the year, which is within our medium-term target range.
So let's move now to some specific delivery highlights for FY 2024. At the Investor Forum in June, we provided our indicative technology roadmap, setting out the delivery sequencing for our major projects, and we've been delivering against this roadmap in FY 2024. So let's begin with our trading project. For cash market trading, we rolled out an update of ASX Trade in March, which provided technology upgrades and new services focused on increasing resiliency for the market. And for trading networks, we replaced the infrastructure in our data center, which delivered a series of upgrades for data services critical to our customers. Work continues on the CHESS Replacement project, and in FY 2024, we appointed TCS as our product partner and Accenture as our delivery partner. This project has a unique set of challenges, including its importance to a large and diverse group of stakeholders.
We want to work closely with market participants, and we have a significant consultation process in place to facilitate this. This includes a highly engaged CHESS Replacement Technical Committee and Business Committee, as well as the advisory group for cash equities, clearing, and settlement. All of these forums help to ensure effective engagement with the market. We completed consultation on release one of CHESS Replacement, and have received feedback that the industry is broadly supportive of a phased implementation of the project on the basis that this approach will allow participants to see some of the benefits of this project earlier, while managing delivery risk. Earlier this year, we also published an industry-wide paper seeking input on a potential move to a T plus one settlement cycle.
This month, we released a public consultation paper on release 2 of CHESS Replacement, as well as a summary of feedback received on the T+1 white paper. We're also delivering for our customers by launching new products in response to market demand. As an exchange, we have an important role to play in supporting the economy's transition to net zero, and this is one of the structural tailwinds driving the long-term growth of ASX. We're uniquely positioned to offer the products, connectivity, and price transparency to operate fair and transparent derivatives markets to support our customers as they look to hedge transitional price risk. As foreshadowed at our investor forum in June, our markets team have added environmental futures to our product ecosystem alongside electricity derivatives.
We're also intending to launch Wallumbilla Gas Futures on Monday, the 19th of August, and this product has been developed with a working group of over 25 organizations, reflecting strong demand from our customers. In technology and data, we continue to develop new ways to support our customers as the way that they consume data continues to evolve. In FY 2024, we saw increasing demand from our customers to integrate ASX content into emerging analytical applications and machine-based consumption models. We also added new market participants to our technical services ecosystem, centered on the Australian Liquidity Centre. As you can see, FY 2024 was a busy year for us, and we remain focused on delivery going into FY 2025. I'll now hand over to Andrew to talk through the detailed financials for our full year results.
Thanks very much, Helen, and good morning, everyone. As Helen has already mentioned, our FY 2024 financial results demonstrate the resilience of ASX's diversified business model. The underlying and statutory profit for FY 2024 was AUD 474.2 million, with the underlying profit after tax down 3.4% compared to FY 2023. However, ASX's statutory profit after tax was significantly higher, given the comparative period included the derecognition charge of the capitalized costs associated with the CHESS Replacement project. Statutory profit increased from AUD 317.3 million in FY 2023 to AUD 474.2 million in FY 2024.
Operating revenue for FY 2024 was AUD 1.03 billion, which was an increase of 2.4% compared to the prior corresponding period and was a record for ASX for a financial year. Total expenses for the period were AUD 429.5 million, up 14.7% on PCP and within our guidance range. Net interest income was up by 8.3% to AUD 76.7 million, supported by higher net interest received from ASX's cash balance, offset by lower collateral interest due to the decrease in average participant collateral balances. The increase in expenses relative to the revenue outcome resulted in our EBIT margin falling from 62.9% in FY 2023 to 58.5% this period.
The 3.5% decline in earnings per share to AUD 2.448 is consistent with the trend in underlying net profit after tax. Underlying return on equity generated in the year was 13%, compared to 13.4% in the PCP, reflecting the decline in underlying NPAT. Now turning to the business unit revenue outcomes. The total listings revenue was 4.8% lower than PCP at AUD 208.2 million. Annual listing fees make up over half of total revenue for listings and are driven by market capitalization, which is set at on 31 May each year. Lower market capitalization in May 2023 impacted FY 2024 revenue, resulting in a decline of 1% to AUD 107.2 million.
As you may be aware, we recognize the revenue derived from initial and secondary listings over five years and three years, respectively, and so the revenue outcomes reported mainly reflect prior period activity. This is shown in the bar charts on the slide. The uncertain macro environment has contributed to lower initial and secondary capital raising activity. Initial listing revenue recognized in FY 2024 was AUD 20 million, down 13% from FY 2023, and secondary revenue was AUD 72.8 million, down 7%. Total net new capital quoted for the year was AUD 27.8 billion, up 94.8% from FY 2023, and was primarily driven by dual listings on our market. Moving now to the markets business. This business generated revenue of AUD 315.4 million, up 7.9% compared to FY 2023.
Futures and OTC revenue of AUD 237.9 million was up 12.3% on FY 2023, supported by a 14.9% increase in total futures volumes, driven by global interest rate volatility in the period. Strong revenue growth, strong growth, I'm sorry, was observed across all major products, including 90-day bank bill futures and 3- and 10-year treasury bond futures, which, with traded volumes up 23%, 15%, and 16% respectively. Commodities revenue also increased, primarily driven by higher trading activity in electricity derivatives as a result of volatile electricity prices. Cash market trading revenue was AUD 60.3 million, down 4.7% on PCP, impacted by a 6% reduction in the average daily on-market value traded.
This was partially offset by auctions traded value, which was up by 5.7% and derives higher fees. ASX's share of on-market cash market trading averaged 88% for the year, which is marginally down from 88.8% in FY 2023. Equity options revenue was AUD 17.2 million, down 0.6%, reflecting lower trading activity. Index options volumes, which attract higher fees, were down 5.3% on PCP, and this was partly offset by higher single stock option volumes, up 5.6%. Now, looking at the technology and data business. This business had another strong period with revenue of AUD 255.1 million, increasing by 5.9% compared to FY 2023.
Information services generated revenue of AUD 156.3 million, up 7.9%, supported by strong growth in demand for equities and futures data in the year. Technical services was also up, with revenue coming in at AUD 98.8 million, 2.9% more than FY 2023. Growth in customer infrastructure and connections at ASX's data center drove this revenue increase, with the number of customer cabinets growing slightly to 391. The number of service connections between data center customers increased by 3.9% to 1,399 connections by the end of the financial year. And finally, moving on to our fourth business segment, securities and payments. This business generated revenue of AUD 255.6 million, down 1.1% compared to FY 2023.
Issuer services revenue was AUD 58.1 million, down 4.9%, impacted by a decline in the average number of unique security holdings, resulting in lower subscription fee revenue. Subdued levels of trading activity and a reduced number of new IPOs also adversely impacted revenue in the period. Equity post-trade services revenue declined by 4% to AUD 129.4 million compared to FY 2023. The total on-market value cleared for the year was AUD 1.4 trillion, compared to AUD 1.5 trillion in FY 2023, and dominant settlement messages volumes fell by 1.5% in the period, primarily due to lower levels of equity market activity. Austraclear generated revenue of AUD 68.1 million, up 9% compared to last year.
It saw a 1.3% growth in holding balances to just over AUD 3.1 billion at 30 June, and a 5.7% increase in transaction volumes. The ASX Clear revenue also includes the net operating contribution from Sympli, ASX's property settlement joint venture. Simpli reduced its cost base in the year due to the uncertainty around the pathway to interoperability. While New South Wales and Queensland have expressed interest in proceeding with interoperability, Sympli awaits further information from governments and regulators before a potential forward, forward, pathway forward and timeline becomes clear. ASX's share of Sympli 's operating loss was AUD 10.8 million, compared to a loss of AUD 14.9 million in FY 2023, representing a 27.5% reduction. Turning now to expenses.
Total expenses for the year were AUD 429.5 million, up 14.7% on PCP and within our guidance range. Total expenses were 5.4% lower in the second half of FY 2024 compared to the first half, as we started to see the benefits of our expense management initiatives and a reduction in one-off regulatory expenses. The FY 2024 figure reflects the growth in expenditure required to meet the group's regulatory commitments and technology modernization roadmap during the year. In addition, we observed inflationary pressures impacting our expense line, particularly around technology license fees. We also saw a significant increase in administration expenses and the ASIC Supervisory Levy.
The largest growth in expenses was in relation to employees, where expenses were up by 21.1%, with permanent and contractor headcount increasing from 1,050 in FY 2023 to 1,193 at the end of FY 2024. As you can see from the chart at the bottom of the slide, there was a reduction in the number of employees related to operational activities going into FY 2025, which demonstrates our focus on workforce optimization. The growth in project-related headcount primarily relates to our technology modernization program. We reiterate our total expense growth guidance provided at our investor forum in June. We expect FY 2025 total expense growth to be between 6% and 9% compared to FY 2024. This growth is primarily driven by ongoing technology-related costs related to Horizon One of our five-year strategy, including software licensing and equipment.
Going into FY 2025, we have achieved annualized savings of approximately AUD 5 million by reducing the usage of consultants and process improvements around employee recruitment. This is in addition to the approximately AUD 11 million of annualized savings in FY 2025 from our targeted restructure announced earlier this year. We expect a steady step-up in depreciation and amortization in the years ahead, as prior period CapEx spend starts to amortize and various technology systems transition into production. Excluding D&A, we expect operating expense growth of between 4% and 7% for FY 2025, significantly lower than the FY 2024 growth rate, as we see further benefits from our expense management program. We are continuing our cost-conscious approach in FY 2025 and expect to make further progress on workforce optimization, primarily through reducing use of consultants and other process and procurement opportunities.
Net interest income consists of net interest earned on ASX's cash balances and net interest earned from the collateral balances lodged by participants. Total net interest income for the year was AUD 76.7 million, representing an increase of 8.3% compared to the PCP. Group interest income of AUD 41.7 million was up 39% and was driven by higher investment returns due to the higher average cash rate, increasing short-term interest rates during the period. Financing costs include interest payable on our AUD 275 million bond and costs related to our short-term bank facilities. In FY 2024, these costs were AUD 10.6 million. Net interest earned on the collateral balances was AUD 35 million, down 14.2% compared to FY 2023.
This reflects a reduction in the average collateral balance from $11.9 billion in FY 2023 to $10.7 billion this year. These balances declined early in FY 2024, following a significant adjustment to margin requirements for interest rate derivative products. Balances steadily grew during the year as activity in these products increased, and the net investment spread on these balances remained consistent at 10 basis points due to the significant levels of excess capital in the financial system. The average participant balances subject to risk management haircuts declined from $8.1 billion in FY 2023 to $6.8 billion for the year, with lower collateral balances being the main driver of this fall.
The excess cash in the financial system is expected to persist, but we are seeing early signs of improvement in the market following the unwind of the term funding facility. As at 31 July 2024, participant balances of AUD 13.1 billion and balances subject to risk management haircuts of AUD 9.1 billion were significantly higher than the FY 2024 average, and this has created a positive start to FY 2025 for net interest on collateral balances. ASX's balance sheet continues to be strong and positioned conservatively with an S&P long-term rating of AA-, and as I mentioned earlier, we raised a AUD 275 million corporate bond in February this year to provide flexibility to our balance sheet.
From a shareholder return perspective, underlying ROE for the year was 13%, down 40 basis points compared to FY 2023, reflecting the lower reported underlying profit in the year. Underlying ROE was 13.3% in the second half of FY 2024, up from 12.6% in the first half, as the organization benefited from expense management initiatives and a reduction in one-off costs in that period. The board has determined a final fully franked dividend of AUD 1.068 per share, or 85% of underlying earnings per share, reflecting the midpoint of the dividend policy to pay out 80%-90% of underlying NPAT. This takes the total dividend to AUD 2.08 per share, fully franked.
Our CapEx for FY 2024 was AUD 136.3 million, compared to AUD 98.7 million in FY 2023, reflecting the increased investment in the major projects on our technology roadmap. We reiterate the guidance provided at our investor forum of CapEx spend of between AUD 160 million and AUD 180 million a year from FY 2025 to FY 2027 before starting to reduce. We expect an average depreciation and amortization schedule of 7-10 years for these major projects once they go live. So in summary, the record operating revenue we reported in FY 2024 reflects the strength of ASX's diversified businesses. We will continue our cost-conscious approach to expenses as we balance the investment requirements of our Horizon One focus areas with Horizon Two growth opportunities.
We are focused on returns for our shareholders, as illustrated by our medium-term ROE target range of 13%-14.5%. With that, I will now hand back to Helen. Thank you.
Thanks, Andrew. I'll now provide an update on our strategic priorities for FY 2025 before finishing with our outlook and guidance. As I mentioned earlier, we're still in Horizon 1 of our 5-year strategy. We have more to do to ensure that we're protecting long-term shareholder value and positioning ourselves to capture future growth opportunities. This means that we're deliberately prioritizing the majority of our investment and effort into our great fundamental strategic pillar, and particularly our key focus areas of regulatory commitments and technology modernization. In FY 2025, we'll continue to embed uplifts identified in the special reports that we published last year, as well as any findings from our annual financial stability standards assessment, that we understand the RBA will publish in the next few months. Doing this helps to build a better ASX as we continually strengthen our frameworks and capability.
A few weeks ago, ASIC published a consultation paper on proposed rules to facilitate outcomes that are consistent with a competitive environment in cash equities, clearing, and settlement. These rules are provided for under the competition in clearing and settlement legislation that I spoke about at our investor forum. This legislation provides powers to ASIC to make rules in relation to clearing and settlement services and gives the ACCC the power to resolve disputes regarding access to these services. In the coming months, we'll also be releasing a consultation paper to receive stakeholder feedback on certain aspects of our cash equities, clearing, and settlement pricing policy. More broadly, we support competition in clearing and settlement, as we believe that we provide a compelling offering. In terms of technology modernization, we'll continue to deliver against our roadmap, which I'll recap in more detail shortly.
Importantly, we're also investing in our platforms and capability to support this delivery. For example, we're exploring the use of cloud services to support the scale and resilience of our applications, and improving the accessibility of our data platform to leverage our rich data sets and create new products for our customers. In terms of business efficiency, Andrew's already talked about our expense management initiatives for the year ahead. We'll continue to invest in our people, bring in new talent, and deepen our expertise. We're investing in process simplification and automation to reduce operational costs and allow our people to focus on activities that add value to our markets and customers. In terms of customer-driven activities, our suite of carbon futures went live in late July, and we'll shortly be adding gas futures to our environmental product ecosystem.
These products are designed to support our customers in the net zero transition, as I mentioned earlier. And although it's early days and new futures products can take time to build momentum, we're particularly excited about these products, which have been launched in response to strong market demand. We see a great opportunity to serve debt market participants with data services, in addition to our existing services in the equities and derivatives markets. Austraclear is the registry and settlement system for the vast majority of Australian dollar-denominated fixed income instruments, and as such, it's a primary repository of local fixed income market data and insights. We see significant potential for growth here, having launched our first debt market reference data services in FY 2023, and we'll be following this up with debt market activity services in the first half of FY 2025.
These new product launches are part of the broader growth strategy that we outlined at the investor forum. We see good opportunities to support the net zero transition by seeking to further expand our environmental futures product offering, and by working with a clean energy regulator to explore the concept of running a carbon exchange. As a data-rich environment, we see significant opportunities to broaden and upgrade the data and access options that we make available across ASX's activities to support our customers. All of these opportunities are supported by the ongoing growth of the Australian capital base as it drives activity across our markets. Turning to our One ASX strategic pillar, our people and culture remain an important focus for me.
We have highly specialized people at ASX, with deep expertise in what we do, and we want to continue to nurture the best of what ASX has, while also developing our people as we execute on our strategy. The new era ASX is about having a vibrant and inclusive culture that inspires growth with empowered and engaged teams. We know that our people are proud of what we do at ASX, and the important role we play in the Australian economy. Our recent employee engagement survey showed that 90% of our people understand how their role contributes to the ASX vision and strategy. We're aiming for an outcomes-focused culture that is centered on customers and supported by our performance management framework and refreshed organizational values.
During FY 2025, we'll be investing in our people leaders to ensure that they're enabled to both lead and deliver on our strategy. We're also taking steps to improve our overall employee experience in terms of how our people do their work, including investing in the processes and tools that they use. We presented this indicative technology delivery roadmap at our investor forum in June, and this roadmap sets out logical windows to implement key stages of each major project. It's subject to regular review as part of our iterative planning process to manage interdependencies and stakeholder input. As I mentioned earlier, we've made good progress in FY 2024, and in FY 2025, our focus will be progressing the major projects shaded in blue on this chart. Let's start with the trading project.
Service Release 15 for cash market trading will deliver a number of important benefits, including the removal of what's referred to as the opening auction stagger, and will seek to better align ASX with other major global exchanges. It will introduce a new post-close trading session to provide the market with additional execution opportunities. For ASX 24, our derivatives trading platform, Service Release 4 will deliver changes to help support liquidity during the bond roll period and to improve technical resilience ahead of the move to a new platform. We intend to upgrade our networks, including the customer endpoints, to simplify the solution for our customers and provide significantly increased resiliency. We're planning to implement these changes in alignment with the trading platform upgrades that I've just mentioned, which will be more efficient for our customers.
Finally, for CHESS replacement, we'll continue to progress work on Release 1. As I mentioned earlier, for Release 2, we've published an industry consultation paper seeking market feedback, and this will assist in finalizing the scope and approach of the releases and will also assist in developing the industry work plan. We expect to determine and communicate the indicative plan and estimated cost for Release 2 in the December quarter of 2024, following this industry consultation. We are delivering, but also appreciate that there's still plenty of work for us to do in modernizing our technology. We're progressing this program, which prioritizes safe implementation and operation. This roadmap has been staged to allow us to build capability and delivery confidence along the way and manage the impact of the changes for ASX and industry participants. Turning to outlook.
We're starting to see signs of a return of IPO activity, with the listing of Guzman y Gomez being a recent high-profile example. We continue to see increasing levels of interest and activity from companies considering a listing. We expect that the more stable macroeconomic conditions may be supportive of an increase in listings activity, although ongoing geopolitical instability may impact sentiment. July cash market trading activity was in line with the same period in FY 2024, for what's typically a quiet month due to the holiday period. Total net new capital quoted was down in July, following several large delistings due to the conclusion of long-running M&A activity, including Boral and CSR. Notwithstanding these recent de-listings, net new capital quoted on ASX increased by approximately AUD 15 billion in the 12 months ending July 2024.
The changing interest rate environment is driving growth in our interest rate futures activity, which we expect to continue, and we're also seeing activity move further across the curve as the market takes a view on longer-term interest rates. As I've discussed today, we continue to see an increase in demand for our data and connectivity services, and we're working with our customers to meet emerging areas of demand, with a focus on making our services easier to license and consume. We're also finalizing the development of new data products to add to our growing information services proposition. Moving now to guidance. We reiterate the guidance provided at our investor forum in June. We expect FY 2025 total expense growth of 6%-9%, with operating expense growth guidance of 4%-7%, reflecting the expense management actions we're taking.
FY 2025 capital expenditure will be between AUD 160 million and AUD 180 million and is expected to remain at this level until FY 2027, primarily to support our technology modernization program, before starting to reduce. We have the capital management flexibility in place to support this CapEx profile, and this includes a dividend payout ratio range of 80%-90% of underlying NPAT and a AUD 275 million corporate bond raised earlier this year... Finally, we're focused on the underlying ROE as the key performance metric driving the organization. We delivered a result at the lower end of our target range this year, and we'll continue to focus on total expenses and revenue opportunities. In conclusion, FY 2024 was a busy year for us, and I'm proud of what we've delivered.
FY 2025 is about continuing to listen to our customers and delivering our five-year strategy. Thank you, and I'll now invite questions.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you're on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Julian Braganza with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. Thank you so much for taking our questions. Maybe just the first one on pricing. Can you maybe just talk to some of the material pricing changes that you've implemented and just sort of the benefits that will come through the FY 2025 numbers, maybe just on listings and information services? And I know you, you're sort of planning to release a pricing policy on settlement and clearing, so maybe if you can provide any color on that, that would be great, but maybe just the other businesses. Thanks.
Thanks for the question, Julian. Yeah, so look, on pricing, we regularly review pricing for most of our services. So, you know, typically we will review, and if appropriate, implement changes, for example, to listings pricings. That's typically from the beginning of July. And the cycle for technology and data pricing review is typically from the first of January. So, we're in the process of reviewing that piece at the moment.
So I don't have any specific numbers for you on that at this point, but I guess it continues to be an area of review, and obviously, we take into account, you know, a number of factors when we consider what's appropriate pricing, international benchmarks, the value that we're continuing to add as we invest in resilience and new services, and, you know, CPI and various other factors as we do that.
Okay, great. Thanks. And then maybe just on cost. Can I just clarify, the AUD 5 million savings that you've identified there, is that incremental or just your previous guidance? And if so, just wanted to understand, if there's anything offsetting that into 2025, given you've retained your expense guidance. And then secondly, just clarifying that just in light of the ASIC action, just any implications of a cost as well on the regulatory cost side into 2025, if there's any risks there.
Yeah, thanks, Julian. I might grab that question. So firstly, the five million dollars that we referred to today is another illustration of our focus on cost management across the organization. We called out specifically around, you know, reduction in consultant spend and some procurement opportunities that we've sort of seen benefits come through this period. Both of those things, so the AUD 11 million in terms of annualized savings and the AUD 5 million, are included in the sort of the expense guidance that we've reconfirmed today, the 6%-9%. Your question in relation to regulatory costs, it's too early to speculate on the ASIC case at this point in time, so we've restated guidance today. We're comfortable with that guidance.
Okay, great. Thank you so much for that.
Thanks, Julian.
Your next question comes from Andrei Stadnik with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Can I ask my first question just around the pricing for futures and option contracts? So I think, I think you showed one of the later slides that it moved from AUD 149 last year to AUD 145 in FY 2024. Can you talk a little bit about the drivers behind that?
Yeah. Look, I don't have all of the detail in front of me, but generally, I'd say that would be driven by, like, as we've seen, increased volumes in the interest rate futures, particularly, what you'll start to see is that some customers will also then be hitting some of the volume rebates so that, with the additional volume, you'll start to get a slightly lower average fee per trade coming in.
Great. Thank you. Can I ask my second question just around some of the RBA consultation around central clearing, Australian bond and repo markets as a bit, you know, something to consider, in the near to medium-term future. Like, what's your view on this? And, you know, how should we think about, you know, size and the, you know, potential revenue opportunity here for the ASX?
Thanks, Andrei. Yeah, so the central clearing of bonds and repos is certainly something that we've been discussing with a number of our customers for a, for a little bit of time, actually. So it, you know, it is something that we're actively looking at and evaluating. I think it's too early to be able to quantify that in terms of overall revenue opportunity at this point, though, I'm afraid.
Thank you. Can I ask a final third question? Look, slightly different, right, but what are your thoughts on zero data expiry options, and introducing them to Australia? Like, they've seen very strong uptake in some parts of the U.S. What's your view on, you know, how, you know, they could be introduced to Australia?
Yeah, thanks, Andrei. I have to say, I don't have a particular view right now, but I'll definitely be passing your question through to the derivatives team and have them check in whether they're having a mull over that. I'm sure they will be contemplating that. So, maybe there's more to come there.
... Thank you.
The next question comes from Ed Henning with CLSA . Please go ahead.
Hi, thanks for taking my questions. A couple from me. Just firstly, on your, excuse me, your cost guidance, and obviously you've got increased CapEx coming through as well. Can you just talk about the increasing DNA beyond 25, obviously, as your CapEx continues to increase and the roll-on and roll-off of projects, how we should think about that? Should it be similar levels that you're seeing in 25, kinda go through 26, 27, or does it step up materially? How should we think about that growth in DNA? For the first question.
Thanks very much, Ed. I'll grab that one. We talked about this at the investor forum as well. So, we've today sort of highlighted our or reconfirmed our guidance of 6%-9%, and excluding depreciation, 4%-7%, for the year ahead. We haven't provided any further formal guidance beyond FY 2025, but we've also talked about sort of the depreciation profile of those major projects, those technology projects. We've called out 7-10 years as sort of the average depreciation period, and they won't start to amortize until those actually, you know, those new platforms or projects become live. And so you can get an idea from our technology roadmap as to when we're delivering those projects and when the start of that depreciation will begin, I suppose.
Then there's a bit of an elongated sort of depreciation profile attached to those. I suppose, what I can say is it will be a sort of a gradual step up in that depreciation profile over the coming years.
Okay. And with the projects you've got on at the moment, when do you see peak DNA or a DNA charge?
Yeah. Ed, we haven't provided any further guidance around that. Hopefully, we've given you enough sort of indicators-
Yeah.
around that sort of 7-10 years amortization period and the technology roadmap.
Yep. Okay. Thank you. Secondly, you just talked about competition consultation paper and, you know, cash equity, settlement clearing. Can you just touch a little bit more on, on that? And basically, because you haven't launched or CHESS hasn't come through, you know, how can someone come and compete in settlements and clearing when CHESS, the new CHESS hasn't been delivered yet, and why would you do it?
Well, I think bear in mind, Ed, with the approach from regulators, it's both about enabling the conditions for competition, should competition emerge, but also trying to make sure that the service that's being provided for customers is provided on a basis that's as if there were competition in place. So, you know, bear in mind, ASX is not a legislated monopoly in this area and never has been. But you're right, there isn't currently competition in place.
But the focus of some of the proposed rules that you can see is really making sure that we are, you know, still listening to stakeholders very carefully, making sure that pricing is, is transparent, and provided on a, a fair and, and reasonable, and non-discriminatory basis and, and things like that, to try and make sure that, you know, even in the absence of competition, that the services are provided, in an appropriate way.
Okay. And just one last one, just on Simply. Can you just run through your criteria to continue to fund losses or more so invest more money in that, in that business? And you know, how long are you willing to, I guess, wait potentially before pulling the pin if it, the can continues to get kicked down the road on interoperability or potentially not even happening?
Yeah, look, thanks for the question, Ed. Look, I think it's a little bit early on that question. What I would say is that we continue to see e-conveyancing as a really attractive market opportunity. It's a significant market, and it's one where we think that there absolutely still is a strong case for a very customer-focused competitor in that market, which we, you know, are confident that Simply can provide. You know, there obviously has been some uncertainty from ARNECC about the interoperability timings. It's good to see that both New South Wales and Queensland governments have expressed a desire to still pursue that. And so, you know, the Sympli team continue to work with them to try and firm up the interoperability approach and timings.
But I would also note that the, you know, obviously, in light of the extended period and the uncertainty, the Sympli cost base did get reduced significantly last year to reflect that timeline.
Do you have any indicative anticipation of when New South Wales and Queensland might come up with some sort of resolution, or is there a paper due, or is there something due, or is ... And are they waiting for the federal government, or is it them just doing it themselves?
I don't have any more detail for you at this point, but the Sympli team are certainly working with both the New South Wales and the Queensland government to figure that out.
Okay. Thank you.
The next question comes from Simon Fitzgerald with Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Hi there. Helen, just on the technology roadmap, and the sort of four key platforms that are either looking for upgrades or to be replaced. The technology roadmap gives us a good sort of timeline in terms of FY 2025 and FY 2026, in terms of the various releases. Could you give us a comment of whether any of those projects at this point in time might be running behind schedule?
... Look, it's an indicative plan, and what it tries to show you is what we think are the logical windows for implementation for those various releases, and at this stage, we're working towards that plan and comfortable with it.
Okay. And at the Investor Day, you talked about the OTC clearing upgrade, that that was planned for implementation for FY 2025. Is that still the case, I imagine?
Yeah, we're still working towards that plan.
Excellent. Excellent. And then just on the futures clearing platform, I was just hoping to get a bit of an update in terms of the design and implementation process, when you think you'll get to the end of that to be able to, you know, make some sort of announcement about how you're gonna go with the replacement side of that.
Yeah, thank you. Look, it's a little bit early on that one right now, so the team are sort of working through a lot of that detail at the moment, but there will be further updates at the right time to give the market more transparency on those questions.
Excellent. And then with the potential move to T+1, I know we talked a little bit about this in the Investor Day. It was brought up as well. Is there any sort of business impacts that you can think about if we did move to a T+1? I'm just trying to think about whether participants could actually run down margins with the clearing house at a lower level because there's essentially a day less in terms of that, settlement profile.
Yeah, look, it's an interesting question, Simon, 'cause T+1's quite complex and has a range of different-
Mm.
impacts, you know, some positive, some negative. We've modeled up the margin impact, and it's actually overall a bit less than you might imagine, because, of course, you know, at the moment, the margining looks at the worst of the one-day or two-day moves. And there's been some pretty significant one-day moves. So actually, it's not that big a saving for Australia, but there are other benefits. But of course, there are other challenges and potential costs for the market as well, including a question mark about, you know, securities lending processes, you know, upgrades needed to systems to have pre-matching processes in place, that kind of thing.
I would encourage you to take a look at the T+1 white paper and then the response that we published to that.
Okay.
'cause that actually goes into quite a lot of the detail on all of those questions. And then we published a summary to sort of give an idea of sort of what all of the feedback on that was.
Okay, I will have a look at that white paper. Thank you for taking my questions.
Thanks, Simon.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. The next question comes from Siddharth Parameswaran with J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Helen and Andrew. Just a couple of questions, if I can. Firstly, just following up on the question earlier around margins on the derivatives segment. Helen, I think you're flagging that you expect the strength to continue on fixed income futures into next year. If that does come through, if we see further growth, would that mean further pressure on the margins? Would that mean more rebates, or would that... I just can't remember exactly how it works. Is it the change from one year to the next, so, you know, the extra rebate won't—the level of rebates won't be higher or...
Yeah, I mean, if you could just help us understand what's likely to happen to the margins if there continues to be growth.
Yeah. So maybe, just for anyone else who's listening, I'll just distinguish between sort of margins that we take as kind of initial margin for the risk exposures. Those are very separate. I think you're really pointing towards what the fees are and what the average fee-
Yeah
Per trade is. Which, and as one of our previous callers mentioned, the average fee has gone down very slightly. And that can be because you've got more customers getting volume discounts. So we do have a scale of volume discounts that are available as people trade, you know, larger and larger quantities. It can also be, I should add, it can be because of the product mix as well, because the fees are different for different types of futures products. Some of our lowest fees are on the interest rate derivatives. So as you see the interest rate derivatives grow, you know, that just can, you know, it's obviously incremental revenue, but it can have an impact on that overall, the overall fees.
So, I'd say, Sid, then to your question, at the margin, you know, as you see, growth in the interest products, you know, at the margin, you might have a few more clients, switching into, you know, a few more getting slightly higher volume rebates. So your sort of marginal revenue might be slightly smaller, but it is still incremental.
Okay, so not a major change from this year. Okay, that's clear. Thank you. If I could just ask about some of these new IT programs that are about to be implemented over the next couple of years. Are there any revenue implications? I mean, I think you talk about, you know, removing the open option stagger, and I think some changes on the derivative side as well to support liquidity. If you could just comment on if there are any revenue implications from some of these IT rollouts and which way they might work.
... We certainly do see areas where these technology changes will support growth. And, you know, your examples that you called out, they're great examples where, you know, we think that supporting the effective functioning of the market is helpful, and makes the market easier to use and more attractive for a wider range of participants. And yes, potentially we might see some additional volume from, for example, the post-close trading opportunity.
I'd say we've nothing specific to call out in terms of sort of material numbers to really highlight, but of course, you know, as well as focusing on resilience and making sure we've got a secure and sustainable long-term technology platform, we're also very focused on trying to make sure that we can be more responsive to our customers and that we can really have the flexibility to drive some growth opportunities there. So that's certainly a goal and a conscious thought process as we work on our technology modernization.
Okay. Just my final question, Helen. I asked six months ago just, what the plan was to get back to your target ROE range, and, you know, it seems like you, you won't be there next year. You said the main focus was cost, but, you know, there seems to be reasonable cost growth, and obviously, DNA will still tick up again quite materially for a while. I'm just wondering, you know, what, what is the... How, how do you get back to that ROE target range?
Well, you'll see that we have got back to our ROE target range, actually, with the full year FY 2024 result, which we're very pleased about. And certainly, the second half ROE was slightly above the bottom end of that range as well. So you know, really, you know, ROE is a function of revenue and costs, as you know, and we'll continue to have a strong focus on both of those, you know, both in terms of responding to our customers and driving growth opportunities, as well as continuing a very cost-conscious approach and making sure that we are thinking about efficiency in our business.
The comment, sorry, the question was about 25.
Ah, so-
25 and onwards. Yeah.
Yeah. Really, the answer is the same, right?
Mm.
It's a continuing focus on both revenue and being very cost conscious in our approach to running our business.
Okay. Yeah. Thank you.
The next question comes from Nigel Pittaway of the Citi. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Helen and Andrew. Thanks for taking my questions. Just first of all, on sort of revenue, I mean, I was just wondering whether you expect any of the new product initiatives, so, you know, carbon futures, gas futures, debt market data, et cetera, to contribute to materially to revenue in the near to medium term, and which of those initiatives does have the greatest potential to be a material contributor?
Look, at this stage, Nigel, you know, we obviously, you know, we are, you know, we've made our estimates about what we think the opportunities are there and that to make sure that we think there's a good business case there. We will, you know, at this stage, we don't really have any additional detail to disclose on those, but to the extent that any of them do become material, we would be disclosing that. Andrew, anything you'd want to add?
I think, I think that's right. It's a combination across our various products, Nigel. We've talked in the past, that you know, tech and data, particularly, there's a significant opportunity there as a thematic, and we're continuing to pursue that thematic.
Okay, so nothing particularly tangible at this stage. Okay. Secondly, just on the IPO pipeline, I mean, obviously, you've expressed some optimism about that, and, you know, the macroeconomic stability is something that you've mentioned. I mean, is there anything in particular you think companies are waiting for before they decide to list? And if we do get that trigger, are you expecting it sort of to be a sort of gradual build, or do you think there'll be, you know, some kind of rush at a certain time? How are you thinking about that moving forward?
Well, I guess I'd have a couple of comments about that, Nigel. I mean, recognizing that I certainly don't have a perfect crystal ball, so I'll more sort of observe what we, you know, what we see. Firstly, you know, globally, we've observed a cyclical low for IPO activity over the last couple of years. That's not particularly unusual. IPOs do tend to go through a cycle, and in what, in certainly in FY 2023, was a rapid rate of interest rate increases. It's really not unusual for that to create some of those cyclical challenges in IPOs. But we're certainly very conscious that IPO is a question of confidence as well, right?
So, you know, for a business owner, the decision to go to IPO is one of the biggest decisions they'll make for their business, and choosing the right time is something that's really important to them. I think we can see that, you know, the macroeconomic environment in Australia is much more stable now, and we think that that is conducive. We've obviously seen some good, successful IPOs recently, which I think are encouraging.
We see a good level of inquiry and activity from companies at the moment, and we hear the same from the various advisors in the market who would be talking to IPOs as well, that they're also getting a much higher level of inquiry and interest at this stage than they have done for some time. So I think, you know, add all of those things together, and you know, those are the things that are making me feel positive about the opportunity ahead of us. Predicting the exact timing is much more difficult.
... Great. That's helpful. Thank you very much. And then maybe just a couple of very quick questions. I think probably more Andrew questions, but just in terms of the what you were saying about the excess cash in the system, I mean, do we take it from those comments that you're not really seeing any change to that 10 basis point spread anytime soon, firstly? And then just secondly, there weren't any one-offs this time, which I presume reflects the fact you've made no compensation payments. Just on the expected timing of those and whether you'll still be treating those as one-offs when they do occur.
Sure, Nigel. So firstly, on the interest rates, so 10 basis points is what we've seen over the last couple of years, and we've started to see some early signs of change there. But I would note there's still AUD 207 billion in the system, if you like, in the ESA accounts. The peak was AUD 450 billion. The term funding facility has rolled off, but there's still AUD 207 billion sitting there at the end of July. So a little way to go, but we are seeing some early signs. But we're not expecting sort of a dramatic change probably over the next 6 to 12 months.
In relation to the one-off items, you're referring to the significant items there. And I think you're calling out the CHESS Partnership Program. And just to sort of recharacterize your positioning of that, that's not a compensation payment. It's a forward-looking payment around the partnership program on the new CHESS project. We haven't recognized any expenses in this current period, but the balance of the incentive pool, there's about AUD 37 million still to be expensed in the future. That will pretty much be tagged to release 2 of CHESS. And so we'll sort of come out with some more indicative timing around that as that CHESS 2 release comes out in that December quarter. So future periods to come.
Okay, thank you.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand it back to Helen Lofthouse for closing remarks.
Thank you. That concludes today's presentation of ASX's FY 2024 results. Thank you very much for joining us today.
Thank you.