Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the HUB24 Limited first half FY 2022 presentation. All participants are in listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the Star key followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Andrew Alcock, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer. Please go ahead.
Good morning, and welcome everyone. It's great to be here, and we're very proud today to deliver, hopefully what you regard as a very good result for HUB24. The first half of FY 2022 has seen us set some records in terms of organic growth, but also success on our acquisition strategy to create strategic opportunities for further growth and expansion for the group. With me today, we have Catriona Shanahan, our Chief Financial Officer. Catriona will give an overview of our financial results later on during the presentation. Of course, we will have some Q&A at the end of the presentation. Just moving on to the strong financial results slide, the first one there in the pack. Great, as I said, to be talking about fantastic organic growth.
We had AUD 6.7 billion of net flows for the first half, bringing our total FUA up to AUD 68.3 billion, AUD 50 billion of that being of custodial FUA and AUD 18.3 billion in the PAS and non-custody space. The AUD 50 billion is our closing number at 31/12. We're pleased to be able to say whilst there's been some market volatility, our flows so far in the second half have offset that. As we stand today or as at Friday, the current custodial FUA was also AUD 60 billion. Those flow amounts have driven great financial results, which have also been supplemented by the full half year of having Xplore and inside the business.
With our group underlying EBITDA up at 80% on PCP, our revenue up 72% and our underlying NPAT up 103% to AUD 14.2 million. With statutory following behind that of course, because there's AUD 8.3 million of transaction implementation cost, statutory NPAT of AUD 8.4 million. But really great to see EPS up 27% at AUD 0.1186 per share. We've been able to increase our dividend up 67% at AUD 0.075 for a half year, fully franked dividend. All in all, fantastic statistics with the numbers in the 70s or 80s in terms of percentage improvements in the underlying financials for the business there.
It's been a great half of proactive discipline management for us to do that, to be able to pivot investment in parts of the business that support ongoing growth. In fact, growth that surpassed expectations where we had to move around to support onboarding of customers and advisors and sales team, to be able to move our expense base around to focus on what we needed to do, so that we could expand margins, manage expenses, but also deliver what we think is amazing growth. In fact, if you look at the statistics in historical terms, in terms of platform growth in this industry, it's been a very long time since platforms, in fact, not at all or only once in the last 15 years, where platforms have achieved growth levels of AUD 12 billion per annum.
You've got two industry peers or competitors achieving that, which is really a record for the industry. We certainly look forward and are aiming to continue to do that moving ahead. Moving to the next slide. If we look at the four-year trend for our financials, you can see that we've consistently delivered record growth in terms of funds under administration, and the record being having had three consecutive quarters of record inflows in what could be, you know, challenged as a very interesting and difficult time economically on a world sense. Our funds under administration, you can see the growth there over four years. It's been reliable and consistent, and certainly the revenue and underlying EBITDA growth stats there for four years as well, also being reliable and consistent.
We certainly hope to deliver that trend more again in the future. Our FUA is up from about AUD 10 billion around about first half FY 2019. In a custodial sense, it's at five times that, being at AUD 50 billion four years later. When you add the non-custody, it's at the higher levels there. The CAGR of revenue and underlying EBITDA being in the 41% for revenue and 63% for underlying EBITDA. Good reliable trends for delivery for HUB24, and as I said, we do aim to continue to do that moving forward. We work very hard to do that for our customers, our staff, and deliver great results for shareholders.
If we move on to the next slide and a quick look at the overview of the group today, which has changed market remarkably, certainly from this month due to the completion of the Class acquisition. On the left-hand side of the slide, our platform business. There you've got our custodial and non-custodial platform business, as I said, with a total of AUD 68.3 billion of FUA. Breaking that down, there's about 3,400 advisors using the platform, and about AUD 22 billion of the AUD 50 billion in FUA is in managed portfolios, which is one of the fastest growing parts of the market, and certainly an area in which we excel and lead the market. We'll talk a little bit about that further on in the pack.
The non-custody piece is there as PARS or Portfolio Administration and Reporting Service that also experiencing some growth through the half, landing at AUD 18.3 billion and over 8,000 accounts. In the middle pillar there's the HUBconnect or the tech solutions business line, which is supporting brokers in the Australian marketplace and licensees. There's 92 clients or institutional financial services clients there, and 96 data integrations. That's important for our ongoing strategy, talking about how many data integrations when we think about the strategy about bringing a whole of wealth view together. That business is growing as well. The Class business on the right-hand side, Class being certainly a market leader, an award-winning business. We completed the acquisition or the implementation, the acquisition probably only four business days ago.
In fact, it's week one this week. Technically, tomorrow's we took over the keys of the business last Wednesday. They are experts in the establishment, management, and administration of wealth vehicles. You can see some of the products there with being Class Super, SMSF administration software or accounting software, Class Trust for trust administration, Class Portfolio, and you can see the commonality between some of the existing HUB strategies for investment reporting and administration for assets with data feeds. Class having 220 feeds of data to support those product ranges. The corporate compliance and documentation business NowInfinity, which Class runs to help establish trusts and wealth vehicles and deal with ASIC and company administration activities there to support accountants and professional advisors.
There are some great complementary opportunities and products and commonalities between client bases and opportunities to grow both businesses together, which we're very much looking forward to. That's an overview of HUB24 today. Great to be able to talk about that and very glad that the Class acquisition's been completed. Moving on to the next slide. Of course, the core value driver for our business is our award-winning HUB24 platform. Once again, pleased to be able to say that we are Australia's fastest growing platform provider. By that I mean in terms of our share of net flows versus our current market share. Not in dollar terms, but in terms of rate of growth or how much we're delivering off our base.
Yes, we've edged out to be number one again, and that will move around, but we're very pleased about that to be the fastest growing provider at a ratio of 10.66, i.e. our share of new business is 10.66 times our current share of overall market. In terms of the metrics on the market share, we've grown from 2.3% of the platform market as at September 2020, and that's the latest data. September 2021 has us growing to 4.6%, so doubling our market share in a twelve-month period. We're the seventh largest platform provider from ninth place in that twelve-month period. We're ranked second for annual net inflows, and our five-year compound annual growth rate of 65% for FUA in the marketplace.
You can see on the left-hand side that ratio of new business to existing share, and on the right-hand side there, just the growth in FUA, and we've added the yellow bars there being the non-custody or PARS FUA. A little bit later, Catrina will cover off some of our financial highlights. Before we do that, I wanna just quickly talk about some highlights for first half of FY 2022 in business sense. That's on the next slide. I'll also talk about our strategic pillars. Moving to the first half 2022 business highlights slide. As I mentioned, we've had three consecutive net flow records for the business, and ending up with AUD 6.7 billion for the first half of FY 2022. A great result, particularly when you look at the history of the industry.
I was looking the other day, even if you go back five or six years, you know, it's hard to find a platform that delivered more than AUD sixbillion or AUD 7 billion a year except for the two main players that are in the market today. We are number two for annual net flows, as I mentioned on the previous slide. On that top row there, we've once again won the Platform Managed Accounts Functionality Award from Investment Trends. The data was out last week. That's the sixth year running for us to win the Managed Accounts Functionality. It's certainly our sweet spot and our clear differentiator. We've also won first prize for overall product offer, which we're very pleased about as well. We've just been edged out again into number two position overall, having edged board last year into number one position.
Both of the peers in that space, ourselves and our competitor, were neck and neck in that regard. Both of us had scores over 90%, which is a new record for the scoring, I think, in recent years for Investment Trends. Having said that, being number two overall, but first for product offer, first for managed portfolios, we're in the top two in five out of six categories. Interestingly, below that, we've won 22 subcategories out of 48, and that's the highest amount of categories won by a platform. Having won 22 out of 48 is the best result of any platform. I'd love to say we're number one, but we are very, very close, and we're constantly delighted to compete with our competitor, trying to edge each other out on that award.
In terms of the platform, 3,400 advisors there. During the half, we've done some ongoing enhancements certainly to support advisors with regulatory matters, with advice fee consent, some of the changes that came out as a result of the Hayne Royal Commission. We're pleased to have delivered what we call bulk ROAs or the ability for an RO being a record of advice, ability for an advisor to trade across their client portfolio and issue an advice document and do that as one step to all the customers affected by that. Really great for efficiency for advisors and really amped up our online account opening to make it easier for advisors and customers to work with us. The Xplore integration is progressing well. The benefit realization is on track.
13% EPS growth for FY 2022 is the plan for that. Lastly, the acquisition of Class was completed during the half. We absolutely aim for that to accelerate our growth strategy, moving ahead. Moving forward, to the next slide.
In terms of our strategic pillars, we quite often talk about this, our purpose or why we exist, is we want to empower better financial futures together for Australian customers, but working together with financial professionals, whether that be financial advisors, accountants, solicitors, tax professionals, working together with investment managers, fund managers, working together with licensees, and certainly working together with customers and other tech providers to build better futures for Australians. Of course, through that, our first pillar is about delivering customer value and growth, and that's about our core platform business, continuing to develop that proposition and lead the marketplace in terms of building a sustainable competitive advantage, lead innovation, and continue to transform the landscape as we've done previously.
We are committed to that, to delighting our customers, and we'll continue to work in that space. In the middle pillar, we talk about continuing to build the platform of the future. For us, that means an integrated experience that supports financial professionals able to implement tax, investment and strategic advice. Breaking that down, it's about providing a single view of wealth, allowing customers to see their entire wealth, with one view, whether that involves data from multiple providers, bringing those pieces together. The integration or the seamless integration of being able to view assets that you might hold in custody on a platform, i.e., our core economic engine, the HUB24 platform, and the Xplore business bringing together or looking at non-custody assets and being able to see those transparently regardless of how they're held in different legal structures.
Being able to get a whole view, but bringing the seamless integration of those together. Obviously looking at product solutions that improve retirement outcomes for all client segments. That includes the segments we've had pre the acquisition of Class, Xplore. Now with Xplore having high net worth and non-custody assets there with the Orbit PAS business as well. Building out the platform of the future that creates advocacy and transformation and support for our future and the future of our customers. The third pillar there about collaborating or once again working together to shape the future of the wealth industry. To play our role to develop this industry, to build advocacy and support for advisors and make sure we've got solutions that deliver on that promise to empower better financial futures together.
I'll talk a bit more about some of the initiatives we've got there. We're very pleased that we actually have those three strategies on which to consolidate and think about our further growth. I'll hand over to Catriona Shanahan, our Chief Financial Officer. Kitrina, for you to give us an overview of our financial results.
Okay, cool. Thank you, Andrew. Moving to slide nine, which is the group financial results. You can see the strong results coming through this half with the group's underlying EBITDA at AUD 29.7 million, which is up 76% when compared to the prior comparative period being December 20, 2020. Underlying NPAT is up at AUD 14.2 million, being up 103% on PCP and stat NPAT up again to AUD 8.4 million, being 38% on PCP. The difference between the underlying NPAT and the stat NPAT is the acquisition amortization and the implementation cost for Xplore and Orbit, post-tax. The combination of those two things is about AUD 5.8 million.
You can see on the right-hand side on the operating revenue, bar chart that we've got, that the platform segment continues to be the driving force of the growth, with the tech solution slightly back on PCP, which is an old infrastructure contract that rolled off this half. The continuing business being the applications business is still performing well. Revenue at a group level is up 72% to AUD 81.6 million, and the operating expenses at a group level are up 70% to AUD 51.9 million. That's giving a positive jaws at a group level and has improved the underlying EBITDA margin by about 1%, which has improved to 36.4% up on 35.5% on December 2020 results. Just moving over to the next page.
Here we have on page ten, we've got the platform segment results. Again here you can see Andrew briefly talked earlier to the growth in the total FUA balances. Total FUA is up 118% to AUD 68.3 billion, with the platform custody FUA being AUD 50 billion and the PAS non-custody FUA being AUD 18.3 billion. You can see both of those platform FUAs up 128% and PAS is up 97%. This half we've got the benefit of the Xplore portfolio being in there with the acquisition completing in March 2021. The Xplore business wasn't in the FUA numbers for first half 2021, but is in the first half 2022. The organic growth has also contributed quite significantly.
On the right-hand side, you can see the FUA walk with AUD 6.7 billion of net flows and AUD 3 billion worth of market movement. Market movements in the first half to December were very strong. January and February has been a bit weaker, which everybody will have seen coming through, but first half was a real benefit. We've got the impact of the last RBA rate cut. We've given this just as an illustration. The positive jaws that we saw at the group level, the revenue for platform is still very strong at a 76% growth rate at AUD 77.3 million.
Just as an illustration, the RBA rate cut, the last one in November 2020 of 15 bps, based on our average FUA balances and our cash as a percentage of FUA, that had a drag on revenue of AUD three million over six months just for that one rate cut. Had it not been for that, you would have seen positive jaws coming through in the platform segment as well. Moving on to slide 11. Continuing the platform results. Here we've included a 5.5-year trend for you for the revenue, expenses and cost to income ratio. You can see here that this half when you compare it to full year 2021, even in the platform segment, the positive jaws is coming through, which is the operating leverage on the platform delivering, and we're expecting that to continue.
We've also got small synergies coming through for the Xplore business with the full run rate for synergies expected to come through by the time we get to the beginning of FY 2024. The platform underlying EBITDA is up at AUD 30 million for the six months. That's a 55% five-year CAGR. You can see that compared to a full year underlying EBITDA number of AUD 37.9 million, AUD 30 million for the six months is a fantastic result for us. Cool. Moving on to slide 12, which is the composition of the platform for us. This you can see in the wheels on the right-hand side. We started including this at year-end, just with the acquisition of Xplore. With the diversified portfolio, we included this just to help break out the retail, institutional and Xplore super admin.
It's based on FY 2021. When you compare 1H 2022, the composition has remained relatively stable, with retail representing 81% of the portfolio, Xplore super admin representing 16%, and institutional being 3%. When you look at the bottom of the page on the right-hand side, the revenue margin this half has actually been very strong. We're very pleased with where the revenue margin has come in. Overall, for the whole of the platform business, platform FUA is coming at 32 basis points, and that's slightly down on the FY 2021, which was a total of 36 basis points. You'll see when we get to the next page, that's the annual run rate impact of the Xplore business, which is a slightly lower margin coming through. When we move to slide 13, this is where we talk about the platform revenue.
You can see here, the growth of 76%, half-on-half. Taking first half 2022 compared to first half 2021, it's grown to AUD 77.3 million. Administration fees have contributed nearly AUD 10 million on the second half last year and about AUD 18 million over the first half 2021. Then cash and trading and some small other revenue streams in there has contributed AUD 10 million in this half and about AUD 16 million over first half 2021. On the bottom right-hand side, you can see the platform revenue margin.
When we did the year-end, we did the walk down from the 44 bps in the first half 2021 down to the 34 bps at 30th of June 2021, and that was to do with the cash cash RBA rate cuts, the trading volumes normalizing to pre-COVID levels. Then this half you can see that the only impact on the margin is really the annualization of the Xplore portfolio coming in. A key bullet point that we've included here for you, as I've mentioned earlier, the strong performance in the group is both the organic growth and the net flows, the AUD 6.7 billion of net flows. Also the Xplore and the Ord Minnett acquisitions have contributed AUD 14 million in the first half 2022. Moving on to slide 14, being the group expenses.
You can see here that the group expenses in total, when you include abnormal items, and acquisition amortization, etc., you've got about AUD 69.6 billion-AUD 70 billion worth of total expenses. Just left of that in the far right graph, you've got AUD 61.3 million, which would be the underlying expenses, which includes AUD 3.5 million for the special rights that were issued back in 2021. Last year we didn't recognize any share-based expenses for that issue because the probability of the vesting was still unknown. Given the strong net flows that we've had in the 18 months since they were issued, we've increased the probability of those vesting and included a AUD 3.5 million share-based expense that we flagged to the market when we did the second quarter market update.
Operations, technology, and sales is the driver, the driving force of the core of the business and the increases with AUD 17 million of that relating to employee expenses being the core driver of the investment for this half. We've got AUD 8.3 million of abnormal items, being AUD 3.2 million before tax for implementation costs, and then the AUD 5.1 million of the depreciation and amortization that was acquired through the Xplore and Ord Minnett acquisition that we did. Just moving on to the last financial slide. We've got the NPAT, and we've got a walk of the underlying EBITDA of AUD 29.7 million to the underlying NPAT of AUD 14.2 million and statutory NPAT of AUD 8.4 million.
You can clearly see here depreciation and amortization from the normal core business is AUD 3.2 million, which is broadly in line with the run rate from last year. We've got the share-based payments up at AUD 6 million, which includes the AUD 3.5 million that I mentioned earlier for the recognition of the special rights that were issued in FY 2021. You've got the implementation costs for Xplore and Orbit of AUD 3.2 million and the acquisition amortization for Xplore and Orbit of AUD 5.1 million. Overall, I would sum it up as a fantastic financial result this half, which we're really very pleased with. Coming back to Andrew.
Thank you, Katrina. It has been a great result and I look forward to doing Q&A with you shortly. I'm just moving on to an update on the Class acquisition. Look, it's great today to be able to talk about Class. It's been a long process having announced September, October last year and getting to where we are and having successfully completed last week. I know everyone is keen to hear about strategies and products and markets and what we're going to be doing. I'm gonna broadly cover our approach, bearing in mind it's been less than a week since we've had the keys to the business and since we've started working more closely with the team.
There's some commercial, strategic and competitive matters that means we'll be very circumspect about what we talk about in the short term about our strategies. That's clearly just to put us in good stead. I understand people wanna know a lot, and there's absolutely down the track, we'll be giving some more detail about the HUB24 Group broader strategy, including Class. We look forward to coming back to analysts in the market with that down the track. Certainly working hard to just ratify some of the plans we've got, which we hope to share subsequently. On the Class acquisition, as I said earlier, Class is an award-winning market leader in the wealth vehicle space.
Look, imagine a world where advisors, whether they be accountants or financial planners or lawyers or groups of advisors looking after a customer, can actually, without friction, create an ecosystem or a world for an investor where they can open a family trust or a self-managed superannuation account. They can open a platform account. They can connect that platform account to other providers and other investment vehicles and also their self-managed super fund. It all happens without friction. It all happens with one process. That's just the sort of world or ecosystem we're aiming towards, at the same time allowing each of our businesses, HUB24 and Class, to operate in its own ecosystem with other industry participants as well. Really an open architecture approach as opposed to just HUB24 and Class together.
Hence our need to and our absolute clear goal to operate Class as a separate business unit because it does look after other customers and institutional relationships that do around the edge or do compete with HUB24 in their own right. Not wanting to disrupt that. Imagine that world where you can make it easier and better, you can empower better financial futures together, working across that ecosystem, and you can make that world a bit more relevant to customers. That's certainly the overall strategy. Right now we're finalizing an execution phase on the left-hand side of the chart. The transaction's been implemented. We've got an interim CEO in there. I mentioned Director being Jason Entwistle, so HUB24's Director of Strategic Development and continuing to play that role working with me and my team.
Jason's in there as interim CEO, and it is interim. We're establishing and making sure we're communicating effectively with customers and the Class team, and really excited about that. We're just putting in place the transitional governance frameworks when we need to in terms of reporting through the group structure. Pretty much done. Moving into a transition phase, which is really where we are now. Class will operate, as I said, as a business unit inside HUB24. There will be some streamlining of corporate functions as it makes sense, e.g. finance and so forth. Right now in that transition phase, while we get to know customers, we're really progressing the development of additional strategies that we can look at to increase growth for both HUB24 and Class.
Working through those with the Class ELT or executive team and back with the HUB24 team as well. Then looking at joint product development opportunities that can move towards that world, I said, where imagine a frictionless ecosystem where it's really possible to set up and manage those vehicles. We're looking at opportunities to create efficiencies for customers and so forth. We will, in that transition phase, look to appoint a permanent CEO and refine the operating model within the HUB24 Group moving forward. Moving into a growth phase where really it is about extending the core SMSF strategy that Class have to benefit the customers of the Class business and the HUB24 business, deliver growth for those business. We're actually aiming to grow the market through innovating together.
How can we actually increase the relevance and grow the market for self-managed super funds and some of the features and services that Class have working together with the HUB platform? Think about a world where millennials enter the superannuation environment differently to how I did. They've got more years where they'll have mandated superannuation. They've certainly got higher targets with 12% from the government's point of view. So they'll have higher investable balances earlier than somebody like I did. And so the relevance of really great solutions and making them frictionless is really important, particularly given the attitude of people today, which is they wanna do it themselves or they wanna actually work with advisors and play an active role in securing their future. That's the backdrop for some of those earlier comments.
We're gonna collaborate on solutions to simplify the implementation of advice, as I said. Interestingly, there's some really neat data capabilities that Class have that accelerate our platform with the future strategy in terms of giving a whole view of wealth. We're gonna co-develop data as a service with Class and Hub, combining the market-leading capabilities of both companies as well and provide that in many different ways to this great industry. Obviously we're targeting or we'd like to say we're targeting acquisition benefits beyond the 8% EPS accretion, which we announced when we published or we announced the original transaction. We always said that's a synergy-based target. Clearly, we're looking for revenue synergies and opportunities.
As I said, we'll share more about that down the track once we've got through our transition phase and formed out a more detailed plan and comfortable to announce to the market what we're doing in terms of competitive matters there as well. If you turn the page to the next one, looking at a combined group snapshot, all we've done is on results as at 31 December and the Class results, which are unaudited at 31 December. Resulting in a pro forma consolidation or combination figure there. You know, the group together would have AUD 112 million of revenue and underlying EBITDA of AUD 40.4 million. Interestingly, the diversification of revenue is really great there, with 23% of the group's revenue being software subscriptions.
Broadening out the distribution footprint and the revenue sources for the group and a greater profitable business moving forward. That's just a combination pro forma, as I said, at 31 December. Moving on to the outlook for HUB24 before we go to Q&A. On the slide we've got there, HUB24 well-positioned to capture market opportunities. That's the slide with the market share donuts. A quick look at that market share. As I said earlier, we have 4.6% of the Australian platform market share. It's a AUD 1 trillion market. We've got 4.6%. We're ranked in, you know, first or second position, depending on how you look at some of the statistics there. We're breaking records in terms of flows.
Some of the traditional incumbent winners in that market share have traditionally had market shares above 20%. A lot of room for Hub to grow if we keep executing well. Great opportunity for us to continue growing our business. In the managed account space we have 19% market share there. That's increasing. The market there is expected to grow. I think over 40% of advisors now wanting to use managed accounts as an investment solution. Well-positioned there and we're the market leader there. In the portfolio admin reporting service market, those stats, we'll update them. We'll do some more research for the full year, but 12% market share there. The SMSF market, Class is at 180,000 Class Super accounts in a market of about just under 600,000 accounts.
As I said, looking to grow that share, grow that business, work together with a sales culture across HUB24 and Class to continue growth for Class already, but also grow the market as well. Moving to the next slide. What are we doing about enhancing our value proposition? Again, positioning this slide against the three pillars or the three strategic pillars that I talked about earlier. The first one being about delivering customer value and growth. We are absolutely focused on this and delivering platform enhancements to support advisors with regulations and efficiency. We certainly know that's what's held us in good stead to get to where we are, and we certainly know we need to continue to do that, and we absolutely are. We're really excited.
That is in beta phase, I think with nine practices already, and we're looking forward to getting feedback from those advisors and launching it to the whole customer base down the track. Of course, we're working on enhancements to our managed portfolio capability. There'll be enhanced trading and customization features for managed portfolios we'll update the market on in the future. We've also got development underway for a market-leading payment capability to create payment flexibility on the platform for customers receiving money into their account and also making payments out of their account. Of course, living within the rules of superannuation versus non-super products. Absolutely looking forward to enhancing that as we move forward as well. Moving to the middle pillar in terms of continuing to build the platform of the future.
We are continuing to deliver on our whole of wealth strategy. We're also progressing additional strategies and product initiatives across HUB24 and Class that will help round out that platform of the future capability. We're gonna develop industry-leading data services, as I mentioned on the previous slide, with new capabilities for HUBconnect. As we complete the Xplore integration, we will leverage product features that Xplore had in their high net worth and private clients businesses across the HUB24 platform. Bit of a snapshot there. That includes unlisted bonds and the ability to trade on the Chi-X as well. Leveraging that out across building the platform of the future. In terms of collaborating with the industry, we are accelerating the development of our HUBconnect offers.
We have a HUBconnect licensee service that we've been developing for some time. We're moving that from what we might call active beta into production for those foundation licensees. We're also working with them on a future roadmap for initiatives. That's licensees paying a subscription service to receive the HUB24 licensee capability offer. That really makes it easier for them to look at their business and support their advisors. It also makes it easier for them to use the HUB24 platform and ecosystem as well. Our innovation lab is continuing to think outside the square. There are new members moving into our licensee think tank and looking at how they leverage some of the data we've got and the investment we've got in machine learning and AI solutions.
For example, I quite often talk about prevention versus detection when you think about advice delivery. We're looking at an advice validator module that allows advisors to validate an advice document according to licensee standards before they send it to customers. That's an exciting innovation we're delivering there as well as part of that ecosystem. It's all about having a finely balanced investment across our three strategic pillars, hopefully to result in a healthier, sustainable, profitable business and grow and enhance our collaborative, I suppose, our collective value proposition with the marketplace. We're very excited about that and continuing to enhance our proposition. We're not sitting still. We're absolutely committed to moving forward ahead.
Finally, on the last slide, as an outlook or a summary for HUB24, I'll go to the right-hand side first. We've absolutely updated our FUA target guidance being our custodial FUA target. We had a range of AUD 63 billion-AUD 70 billion by the end of FY 2023. What we've done is we've updated that guidance. We've added a year to it, so we pushed it out to FY 2024. In effect, we've added AUD 20 billion-AUD 22 billion to that range. A range for FY 2024 of AUD 83 billion-AUD 92 billion for the end of FY 2024 of custodial platform data. Really exciting to be able to do that, given we only made the other statement six months ago. Our growth has surpassed expectations internally.
Of course, we obviously aspire to shoot the lights out with that, but it's great to be able to come back to you and say, "Hey, look, six months ago we made a statement. We're now adding AUD 20 billion to it and pushing out the target by a year." We're really comfortable and pleased to be able to make that statement to you. In terms of an outlook, looking at the chart itself or the slide itself, in terms of positioning for success, we will continue to invest, as I've said. We are gonna mature and scale our private client and non-custody offers. We're gonna continue the integration of our new capabilities, that being Xplore, Orbit, PARS, and also the Class acquisition as well.
Of course, given the growth of the business and the opportunity and the strong runway, we're certainly expanding our executive capability, expecting new growth with the Chief Risk Officer joining us on the twenty-first of March. That's in our ASX release. That's Deborah Latimer, a partner at Deloitte, who's leaving Deloitte and joining HUB24, and working on appointing a Chief Growth Officer, really to lead our distribution and marketing functions and work closely with our operations and product functions to look at targeted strategies to increase growth across all our customer segments, given we've broadened our distribution footprint. That's institutional clients, that's high-net-worth private clients, the normal retail platform segment as well, looking at how we absolutely continue to grow and continue to break records in the industry.
In terms of pursuing growth itself, we obviously gonna leverage our existing relationships and deepen those relationships with financial professionals across Class and HUB24. We're gonna leverage the expanded product capabilities, develop new opportunities, and we'll continue to evaluate other strategic growth options as they make sense, if they help us lead change in the industry. In terms of financial results, continuing strong financial results is our expectation, leveraging the full growth and scalability of the business to deliver even further shareholder value. Increased scale and revenue diversification following the acquisition of Class. Increased profitability and enhanced margins, we also expect to continue to do that, and deliver expected synergy benefits and EPS growth from our acquisitions that we've undertaken. We expect those to flow through over time as well.
All leading to us and our ultimate strategic objective at the bottom of the slide about leading the wealth industry as the best provider of integrated platform, technology, and data solutions. That's the end of us covering the formal presentation. I'm delighted to take some questions. I'll go back to our moderator and open up for questions for Katrina and I.
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 a question. Siraj Ahmed with Citi, please go ahead.
Hi, Andrew. Hi, Kitrina. The first question, just regarding this near term. You've given the full update as of a couple of days ago. Just, it does imply that the flows might have been down year on year. I think last year you had a pretty strong start. It was around AUD 1 billion. Can you just talk to the flows?
Sure.
Yeah.
No probs, Siraj. Certainly you've got a market movement in there, so FU is down because of market movement. Our flows so far to date have offset that market movement largely. Our flows are as we would normally expect. You would normally expect a slight softening of flows in January as people go on holidays and so forth for December. We're very comfortable with the flow patterns, very comfortable with them picking up as we move through February. It's simply a market movement drop. Do you have that number, Katrina, since 1 January in terms of-
On the market movement drop?
Yeah.
Yes, about 1.4.
Yeah. There you go. You could do that analysis by looking at the market. I hope that answers the question.
Sure.
Suraj.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, the flows are actually not too bad. It's AUD 1.4 billion. Second thing you also-
Not too bad, Siraj. The flows are exceptional.
Okay, I should say exceptional. There you go. Just on that, you did mention seasonal patterns. Any reason why we shouldn't expect the June quarter to be the strongest quarter this year?
We have no reason to suggest that. Of course, you know, it comes as it comes. From our perspective, we think we're in uncharted territory with the flow levels that we've got. We don't know what normal is, and hopefully we never find out 'cause we'd like to keep exceeding expectations. We've got no reason to suggest that normal seasonal patterns won't continue. You'll have advisors focused on clients' accounts as they lead up to June, and activity. You'll have people reviewing accounts, and as long as we continue to deliver, I'd expect we'll get transitions onto the platform. You know, I'm hoping to have a bumper fourth quarter.
Great. I'll ask one more, but it's a three-part question. On the FY 2024 full-year target, which is quite solid, can you just break that down between your expectation of flows versus market movement? Also on that, you did mention you expect an acceleration in revenue due to Class. Have you assumed anything in that FY 2024 number? Lastly, on the same thing, your LTI is for greater than AUD 100 billion. What can get you from that 93-92 billion range to AUD 100 billion, I guess?
Yeah, I'll answer most of that. I missed the middle part there, Siraj, so you'll have to just help me. On the, when you get to 83-92? How do you get to 83-92? Look, we've just applied a very standard, you know, 5% market growth year-on-year. Then when you look at the net flows, there's clearly quite a broad range of what might the net flow be each year, and it could be anywhere between AUD 10-AUD 14 billion between, you know, going from here to out to full year 2024. It really just does depend on whether or not the momentum continues and whether or not the market stays level at the 5% or what the market does. We've gone for a broad range. It's 10%.
Like, last time we did the outlook for FY 2023, you know, the range was around 10% off the top end of that range. It's 10% again, on the top end of this range. Just for the uncertainty of where might it land. I think, Siraj, what was the other-
Have we actually put anything in that for Class? No, we haven't. We haven't actually looked at that model and said, "Here's an upside or an increased advocacy for the platform due to Class.
Right.
We haven't factored into that in any large meaningful institutional transfers either. If they do occur, they certainly underpin or underwrite the achievement of the top end of that or overshooting that. In our modeling, it's sensible. We look at different sensitivities. It's largely conservative, but there's a range there. It's simply 'cause we don't wanna be updating you and moving it backwards. We'd rather update it as we have and move it forwards. Those two factors aren't there, Siraj. Any uplift for Class or institutional transitions. Sorry, Kitrina.
And so-
No.
I think the last thing is just how do you get to AUD 100 billion, I guess? I mean, is it just institution transfers or anything else that we should be thinking about?
Well, the 100, when you look at it, includes PARS and non-custody. When we put the last LTI out there, it's a combination of custody and non-custody, and the mix of those two things may well shift.
Got it.
You've already got AUD 18 billion.
Yeah.
Yeah, if you add the AUD 18 billion, that gets you there already.
Correct.
Interestingly, surprisingly, with the strong growth we've had, we didn't expect, you know. Well, obviously, we aim to work as hard as we can, but we didn't expect to get the strong growth in the first half. That's how you get there. It's a combination.
Got it. Super helpful.
I think we're at 100-114 is the range. Is that right? Yeah.
Exactly right.
Yeah. Yeah.
Thank you.
Thanks, Siraj. Good to have you covering us again.
Your next question comes from Scott Murdoch with Morgans. Please go ahead.
Hi, Andrew, Kitrina. Well done on the progress this half. Just a couple of questions if I can. On the cost base, Andrew, I know it's always a bit of a focus, but can you, I guess, give us a few more comments on the breakdown. Apologies if I've missed any comments around headcount, but several parts to that. I mean, just the underlying wage inflation versus sort of headcount growth and scale costs. The ability to leverage that cost base from here in context of your outlook statements around margin improvement. And just the third part to this long question, sorry. The addition of Class just adding that further tech capability and that assuming they've already got does that take any pressure off having to hire in the tech space, which is obviously difficult.
I might touch the strategic part but pass to Katrina for some of the detail there, Scott. Thank you for your question. Look, I do think that the two businesses together create some optionality in terms of technology resources. It is a tight market. We're yet to look at how we can leverage that certainly in more detail as it's only day four. You know, we've both got data strategies. I'm hoping that helps us do that, get there faster or leverage that. Certainly my other comment is obviously we always look to leverage our fixed cost base for growth. The factor I always talk about is how fast are you growing.
Yes, Scott, just to answer your queries on the how many is in there. FTE for 31st of December was 460. That's up from about 380 at the 30th of June. In those six months from 30th of June, we've put on about 80 FTE, which is a 21% increase in the headcount. Class is clearly not in there, and Class will add another, you know, 200+ headcount for when we get to the year end. The bulk of where we added, it's in the operations, tech and sales team. They're moving along with the volumes, but also just from a scalability perspective, just to make sure that we're investing for the future and that we can catch what's coming through.
Like Andrew sort of mentioned, we've got a couple of group executive incremental hires in there as well. The support areas are just growing, not quite as fast as the front office areas, but you know, in line with the growth and size of the company.
In fact, we are leveraging those other functions. It's sales which you have a variable cost towards supporting the market and customers, ops as well as customer service. They go with the organic growth and the tech is about investment.
Okay, thank you. Can I just ask a quick follow-up to that then? Sorry, just I mean, the 80 FTE additions in one half is obviously quite sizable. Just so, what that, I guess, means in terms of what we should expect over the next 6 months or 12 months, what that investment, you know, that you've obviously put in in the next 6 months, you know, can it settle down from here in terms of needing to add people?
We, Andrew and I sort of had a conversation about this as well. We know that there's a challenge in the Australian market with actually being able to recruit. People are calling it the war on talent. For us, with the growth that we've got, we've actually been fortunate that we've brought forward the operations tech and sales hires. When we looked at the budget and what we were gonna put on across the whole of full year 2022, with the record net flows of AUD 6.7 billion and the continued momentum, we were actually able to bring forward some of the hires just because of how it's actually.
It takes a bit longer to hire people and therefore we just said like, "Right, hire people as soon as you can in the door so that we can manage the volumes." When you look forward to what does that mean for the second half, we're absolutely aspiring to continue to grow our margins, but at a minimum, we'd expect to hold them flat.
Okay, thank you. I'll leave that one there. Just interested, just two more questions if I can. On the Class contribution, you've given us an idea of their in the first half. If I go back to August last year, Class detailed their own EBITDA target of AUD 25 million for this year. Is that a target? I know this is a short-term question, but is that a target that you support given your due diligence on the business?
I think, I mean, it's very early days. Like Andrew said, we're only into week one or two. The budget is currently still tracking as Class were expecting. What I would say is that given that we've only just taken the keys, we wanna make sure that that business continues to perform. We will absolutely make sure that we invest in that business, and therefore, it will come in round about there, if not maybe slightly below, but we're not expecting it to come in necessarily over, based on what we've seen so far.
We're not making a formal comment. That was a comment made by their board, but we're absolutely working hard to get the best result.
Okay, thank you. Just one more before I pass.
It's just too early. We need to get in and have a look. You know, you don't get to have a look that far when you're doing a public takeover. We're just trying to be prudent. Yep.
No, no, fair enough. Thank you. Just one last question. Just on the revenue margin there, I think at last result, it was indicated that you were comfortable holding a 30 bps revenue margin in total, obviously coming a bit above that. Page 13 gives us detail there. There is a step-up in the other sort of revenue line. Just wondering if there's a sustainable step up in that other revenue or whether there's some sort of boosted trading revenue and the like, how we think about that revenue margin going forward.
Yes, you're absolutely right about cash and other. The other part of that is trading. We have seen sort of trading in this half quite normal compared to the second half of last year. The first half of last year was where you really saw the elevated levels. There's nothing unusual. There's nothing necessarily one-off or anything like that in that AUD 10.4 million. So, exactly as you said, the margin has held up at 32 basis points. If you did have some admin tiering coming through, that may well drop slightly from there. But at the moment, it's holding up and the mix of the FUA premium we're pretty comfortable with.
I think. Look, if there's more volatility, you'll see more trading revenue, but with what's going on in the world, if you see, you know, market adjustments backwards, that's a headwind. You've got the RBA rate environment that hopefully is creating, you know, it's creating positivity for consumers. There's a whole lot of moving parts in that number.
Okay. Thanks, guys. I'll give someone else a go. Thank you.
Thanks, Scott.
Your next question comes from Brendan Kerr with Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, Kitrina and Andrew. Just to follow up maybe from that last question. Just in terms of the revenue margins then, given that there would've been higher account balances and some tiering impacts in the last half, which was likely a bit of a headwind, what was the offsetting factor there, given that you've only called out Xplore in the revenue margin bridge?
I think what I'd say there, Brendan, is that the tiering in this half, we've actually seen the average account balances sort of quite stable, maybe, slightly up, but quite stable. But there's not necessarily, we just haven't seen the admin tiering coming through. It's not that there's particularly something that's offsetting it.
Okay. Just following up from the trading question. In the analyst pack, there's a comment that says trading activ-
Absolutely on the PCP. When you compare it to the six months to December 2020, trading is absolutely down on that six months.
Percentage or dollar?
Both.
Yeah.
Okay, that's clear. Just another clarification just on the calculation. You mentioned about the AUD 3 million for the impact from the RBA rate cut. Can you just confirm that methodology in arriving at the AUD 3 million? Would that be calculated using 15 basis points, which was the hit from that last cut on the average FUA for this half and the cash percentage you have for this half?
Correct. That's exactly right. However, we won't be giving you the cash percentage or the average FUA, but yes, Brendan.
It's for the whole six-month period over the half, right?
Yes. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yes, that's correct. It's the 15 bps on the average FUA. Yep.
All right.
With the cash flow. It's just us saying, hey, that's the difference, half and half, to explain to you that for that final RBA rate cut, that was the impact, for all the rate cuts. That's a 15 bps impact. Leave it to you to-
Yep.
To look at the forecasters and work out what that means, with different forecasts from different banks.
I'll try and calculate it, but I'll probably be wrong. That's all right. Just one last
I'm sure you'll get close.
One last question. You clarified a little bit around the EBITDA for Class, maybe just talking below EBITDA, it might be a little bit early, but the CapEx and therefore the DNA of the Class business is much higher than what you run at Hub. Is there any initial comment that you can provide as to what the acquired amortization might look like in terms of the add back that you would have to add to adjusted NPAT in your business after you've completed the acquisition accounting?
For that one, Brendan, it's really too early days. We've obviously got 12 months to do the purchase price accounting, and we have to do fair value items for whole balance sheet to determine what's the intangible assets that we bring on and then what's the amortization profile of those. At the moment, it's just too early days to know what that opening balance sheet will look like once we fair value that.
Okay. I'll leave it there and jump back into the queue. Thank you.
Your next question comes from Kieran Chidgey with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Morning, guys. Most of my questions have been answered, but just a couple of quick follow-ups on the revenue margin. When we look at the different segments you call out, obviously there's quite a pickup in the institutional margin. I think you kind of flagged that with a couple of new portfolios coming through this period. At 14 basis points where it is currently, is that sort of the best guide to where that should be going forward? Or do you still see further upside in that institutional margin, you know, particularly as you're getting some growth through some of the relationships like AMP?
Yeah. It's a good question. That is a full six months for the clients that we've got in the institutional sort of category. However, depending on the mix of those flows, that could well, there could be some upside in there, but it really just depends on where that flow comes from.
Secondly, I know sort of you don't wanna talk about sort of the cash mix within the book, but I guess I'd be interested in any thoughts on how you see sort of that spread margin evolving given sort of the renewed contract you've seen from your peer out there when your relationship renews in December this year.
Yeah, there's quite a lot of talk out there at the moment. The RBA rate environment is certainly looking more positive than when we started the discussions with the ADIs. Look, there could be a couple of rate cuts coming through in this calendar year if you look at what the research reports are saying and that.
Increases, you mean?
Yeah, increases. Did I say cuts?
Yeah.
Oh, sorry. I've got it, cuts on the brain.
No, you're right.
There could be some RBA rate increases coming through. Some people are saying that there'll be two in the remainder of this calendar year. We're yet to see or determine, you know, how the industry responds to that and whether it's passed on to customers or retained. Clearly, you know, there's potential there for upside if they come through. The negotiations on our contract with our ADI at the moment, we've clearly indicated to the market that that expires on the first of December 2022. We're still in negotiations with a number of different ADIs, including ANZ, who we're with.
The situation is fluid. It's hard to give you any guidance on that. You know, we'll keep working hard.
Okay.
What's the best thing to say?
I mean, strategically, your approach to sort of allowing that cash margin to re-inflate relative to, I guess, being a bit more competitive if you don't allow that to happen. I mean, do you have a position today or are you just more likely to wait and see what competitors?
Look, I think it's not.
Do on that front.
I don't think it's prudent to signal pricing things in the market or talk about competitive stuff like that. Absolutely, you could see that we'd wanna do the best for our shareholders. We're foregoing some fees. You know, one party has signaled that. We'll wait and see what market behavior is. Absolutely, you know, we believe we deliver a great service and our fees are very reasonable for that. That's the best thing to say. We couldn't give you a position on that and probably imprudent to do that from a competitive positioning point of view.
All right. Thanks for your thoughts.
Your next question comes from Bob Chen with J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Just a couple from me. Can you give me any comments on just the overall competitive outlook here? Just given that, yes, there's some news that some of the incumbents are reinvesting and there's some new models being introduced across the platform space.
Yeah. Look, really interesting time. I think, as I hear that there are people looking at reinvesting and tooling up. I think they've got some catching up to do when you look at the scoring that we've got at over 90% in those recent surveys, yet we're continuing to extend our lead and continuing to invest. Of course, there's execution risk with those large players as well. We've seen that not play out well previously. From my perspective, as I always say when people ask about competitive tension, bring it on. Clearly from a customer service point of view and a functionality point of view, hands down, we are very comfortable the position we're in.
I think it'll take a long time to see results from some of those strategies play out, and as yet they're unproven. Yep, there's stuff happening. We don't seem to be having any trouble establishing new relationships, and we're certainly committed to continuing to do that. Right now we're focused on our strategy and our growth, and extending our functional lead.
Thanks. Just on the Class business, I mean, I know it's early days right now, but it sounds like, you know, there is quite a bit of sort of investment you want to make across the whole business, particularly in Class. Like, have you thought about the quantum of investment required to put into that business?
there's some sort of opportunities to potentially do things jointly that might actually mean, you know, that if you're doing a data strategy and both businesses had one, is it gonna cost you less than doing it separately? I'm not sure that that necessarily plays out that way in terms of additional investment versus do you look at the whole group and what the group needs to achieve. it's too early. we certainly wanna look at. I mean, they clearly had their strategic priorities, as did we. when you look at the both of us together, is there things that are more sensibly doing faster? once we've gone through that strategy review piece, which Jason's leading inside the business, we'll have a clearer picture on that. too early to say that there will be more.
You know, there could be complementary reasons to leave it flatter. I don't know at this stage.
Okay, great.
Certainly, if we're going to invest for new opportunities, it will be driven by growth opportunities.
Okay, perfect. Just finally on the platform business and that sort of cost-to-income ratio, I think it's sort of trended around that sort of low 60% mark for a little while now. I mean, how do you sort of balance the growth that you're seeing or the accelerated growth that you're seeing and how much investment spend you're willing to put into that business to maintain that ratio?
It's a good question. We did see some improvement in that platform cost-to-income ratio. It sort of improved 1.3% on the full year 2021, so we've gone from 62.5% to 61.2%. When we do the budgeting and the forecasting, it's a real balance between the operating leverage that comes through and how much of that you take and then reinvest for the future. It was a very deliberate decision making process this half year on how we've managed it over the whole six months to make sure that we did get that positive operating leverage come through. We'll continue to apply that approach, but we're not necessarily giving any guidance at the moment as to what that investment level will be.
It will absolutely remain where it is. While we continue to focus on making sure that those margins continue to improve.
Yeah. If we think we can get to net flow levels of AUD 14 billion-AUD 15 billion, clearly we'll invest for that. It's a real decision about how fast you move.
Great. Thanks, guys.
Thank you.
Your next question comes from Nicholas McGarrigle with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. Thanks for taking questions. A lot of good ones have been asked, and I might just dive back into that AUD 1.3 billion of flow for the first six or seven weeks. Is it fair to say that historically, January has been the slowest flow month of the year, and that result probably indicates momentum building more into February and further into March in a normal seasonal pattern?
Generally, yes. You'll see a January dip and February starts to rebuild, and I think that's the normal experience. Particularly when you think that people had COVID issues and worked up and, you know, then we had that scenario where we all were sort of, well, locked down, but all around the country we had that burst of COVID. I think you saw a lot of people distracted, a lot of advisors not working, so you generally get that drop in January.
Great. Just to clarify on the revenue margin, you mentioned that trading margins in the first half 2022 are back to a more normal sustainable level. The impact of Xplore annualizing that for a full period wasn't as material as potentially might have first been thought. Are they the main reasons for the better-than-expected revenue margin results in custody?
I think I'd say that the admin tiering has leveled off. We normally see a couple of bps, as the average balances grow, they move into either, you know, the cap of the rate card or into a new rate card. We haven't seen as much of that come through this six months, which just goes to show that the portfolio is maturing and it takes a bit longer for tiering to come through.
Well, as you've moved into a tier, you stay there for a while. You know, statistically you're gonna get a migration and over time it'll get to an equilibrium, and I think that's partly what's starting to happen.
In the parlance of a Netwealth result, your fee earning FUA percentage was at a stable level, whereas over the last few years it's been declining.
Our fee earning FUA is stable, Katrina. I'm aware-
Yes.
of the stat for this, but compared to last time.
Absolutely.
Pretty similar. Yeah.
Yep.
Yes, Nick. Definitely.
Great. I think there was a bit of extra detail provided around Class, but, you know, I guess there's a project team working on potential products to go to market. Is there anything you can elaborate on in terms of now that you've got your hands on the asset and any competitive potential dramas have subsided? Can you give us a bit more about where the potential revenue synergies could come from, how you see that, the market that Class has access to providing complementary, you know, product and new clients?
Look, I'll reiterate what I said, and really, we don't wanna be giving away what we're doing or what we plan to do earlier than being ready to launch a couple of things. That's just, you know, sensible for us from a market perspective. Look, certainly I think that there are opportunities to grow. Ignoring HUB24, there are opportunities to grow Class and to focus on that segment. Certainly, culturally, we'd like to influence a sales culture because I think that segment's growing. At the time Class started looking at, you know, growing their total addressable market and so forth, that was post-Hayne when part of the SMSF market was shrinking. I think it's coming back, and so it's time to dial up sales there.
There's certainly, I believe, a growing SMSF market and an opportunity for Class to grow its share in that market with its current business model. We also, as I said earlier, think that there's opportunities to launch joint products or work together to reduce friction, and potentially grow the market, I believe.
Cool. Just one last one from me, just around the depreciation. I think there was some amortization of software intangibles related to Xplore that was taken below the line, but there seemed to be a tax benefit on that. Is that just effectively the way the acquisition accounting worked on Xplore that you took software as opposed to goodwill or customer contracts as the intangible on that acquisition? Can we expect to see similar things with Class?
Yes.
Great question, Nick. Thanks for asking.
When we completed the fair valuation of the balance sheet and we looked at the software that Xplore had, clearly there's some, particularly when you look at the non-custody piece and the private wealth and high net worth, there's some really strong technology in there. When we did the fair value of what that's worth, that gave us a benefit. Yeah, there was a move between that and the goodwill. Similar with the customer relationship. We'll do exactly the same exercise when we do the review of the balance sheet for Class. I don't have any indication at the moment as to where that will land, but we'll do the process.
Yeah.
We'll see where we get to.
As a result, if you put an asset on the balance sheet and you amortize it, you can, as a consequence, alter the tax position. It's certainly about valuing the balance sheet and the assets, and that's our approach.
Great. Thank you.
Your next question comes from James Cordukes with Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.
Morning, Andrew, Katrina. Look, just a couple of questions.
Good day.
on the revenue margin. Hi, can you hear me?
Yes, go for it.
Yeah, sorry. Just a couple of questions on the revenue margin. Look, on page 15 of the analyst pack, you talk about, you know, shifting more of your business towards institutional, and that could lead to kind of some revenue margin pressure. Can you just talk about, you know, what the opportunity in institutional is? You know, do you expect that to, you know, if the flows mix to be skewed towards insto in the near term, or is that more the upside that you were talking about from your guidance?
I don't see flows being skewed more towards that. I mean, as it's a fairly new segment for us, so as it grows, it will increase in dollar terms. Will it increase in percentage terms? I'm not so sure about that, but I think there's certainly opportunities there. We did in the first half do a very small. When I say small, years ago, we would have said it was large, but it was about AUD 350 million of a transition or an SMA out of a products that was administered by one of our competitors in that into the insto sector for us, and it was a good test case for us to do that. We'd like to work very closely with our institutional clients to see if there's more upside there.
I think there's opportunities. I think being the leading platform and being able to have a track record of that, there's clearly possibilities for that to grow. We've not factored it into the forecast. I don't think it'll mean that we'll shift away from success in retail. We're not relying on insto to keep growing, but it will be supplementary and very welcome.
All right. Thanks very much. Just on the other component of your revenue margin, when I look at your retail revenue margin, it was pretty pleasing to see it expanded half on half, which is not something we've seen for a while in the platform space. Can you just talk about what drove that revenue margin higher in retail?
It's all to do with the portfolio mix. There's nothing, there's not one particular driver of it. I think as we've talked about when we've done the quarterly updates, the question that we keep getting is where are the flows coming from and what's the mix? It's coming from all estates, all advisors, all clients. It's really just the mix of the portfolio at the moment.
Yeah. All right. Thank you. Look, just final question on the revenue margin. You know, appreciate most of the decline was just due to mix of Xplore in the half. But you have seen, you know, decline in cash allocations across the industry. Do you expect lower cash allocations to be a headwind for you into over the next six months?
I would say that it's very likely that the cash balances will remain at the lower end of the spectrum. We're definitely not seeing any trend to say that that's ticking up. That's the whole of the last six months. It's remained at the lower end for us.
It's moved around a little bit, but definitely you get an influx in July, August, because people are moving platform. The more money you move onto the platform, the more growth you get. If it comes in a transitory sense, it ends up in cash first, unless it's been transitioned in. We're not, you know, we haven't seen anything. Yeah, it's been a constant trend. If the rate environment improves, then the need for investors or advisors to look for alternatives is lessened, so to speak. You could see the opposite.
Yeah. All right. Thank you very much.
Thank you. I think we're
Yeah, no, Fredo.
Go for it, Kaylee, sorry.
With that, I'll now hand back to Sal for his closing remarks.
Thank you, everyone. Thank you, Kaylee, for moderating for us. It's always a pleasure to talk about HUB24. It's really great to see the level of interest and some of the really good questions there. In some senses, it'd be great to be able to give you more information, but you know, we look forward to sharing with you as things unfold. We've worked very hard on this result, and we'll continue to work hard moving forward. We think we're really well positioned in terms of flows and sales pipeline, in terms of yielding results from our acquisitions and-
That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.