Good morning and welcome to Mandatum's Q3 Audiocast. I am Lotta Borgström from Investor Relations, and it is my pleasure to introduce you to our CEO, Petri Niemisvirta , and our CFO, Matti Ahokas , who will guide you through today's presentation. During this audiocast, we will begin by presenting the highlights and key developments of Mandatum's third quarter of 2025. Following this, we will proceed to the Q&A session, where you will have the opportunity to dial in with any questions you may have. As a new feature, participants can also submit questions through the chat, which we will review after the dial-in Q&A. With these remarks, I will hand over to Petri p lease go ahead.
Thank you, Lotta. Let me give you an overview of Mandatum's third quarter of 2025. In Q3, we saw another period of solid growth, which reflects our strong momentum. Our profit before taxes increased by 23% compared to the same time last year. The good earnings growth was supported by the fee result, which increased by 20% from last year, in line with our guidance. On top of that, our net finance result increased significantly from last year due to the favorable interest rate movements. The capital light result before taxes, including institutional wealth management, corporate, and retail businesses, was roughly at last year's level. However, the comparison period included a profit of EUR 3.3 million related to portfolio transfer to If in 2024. Since becoming a listed company, we have made operational efficiency a top priority.
One clear sign of this is our cost-income ratio, which has improved to 50%, a 13 percentage point improvement from a year ago. This shows that our scalable business model is working. We are able to grow our income without a large increase in costs, which puts us in a good position for continued growth. Our financial strength remains solid. In the third quarter, our solvency stayed at a high level, and we have generated EUR 0.48 per share in organic capital since the start of the year. It's worth noting that this organic capital generation is a more reliable indicator of our ability to pay dividends than just looking at earnings per share. Looking at the client activity, we achieved a net flow of EUR 163 million, which is especially good given the usual slowdown during the summer holidays.
Client assets under management reached a new record of EUR 14.9 billion. This was driven by both strong net inflows and a favorable investment market, where the overall market development was much steadier than earlier in the year. Optimism about earnings growth helped support global stock markets, and the bond market was stable. We also saw good sales activity across all our business areas. Our retail business developed as expected, helped by the successful launch of our partnership with Pohjantähti Insurance Company, selling our personal risk insurances. Loan insurance sales to the Danske Bank channel were active, and the average coverage amount of granted loan insurances continued to increase. Turning to our corporate client business, sales of pension insurance and personal funds remained strong. Even though the Finnish economy has faced challenges, our clients have generally performed well in their businesses.
Net flow from the corporate clients increased significantly year- to- date, the growth coming mainly from personal funds. The strong corporate net flow shows also the diversification of our capital-like business, highlighting the importance of corporate business to our growth story. Net flow from the institutional wealth management business year to date was lower than last year, the growth still being clearly above the historical average of 5% of assets under management. Also, institutional wealth management net flow in the quarter was 51% higher than last year. In our institutional wealth management segment, we focus on growing our international presence and private wealth management in line with our strategy. Our efforts are paying off. Sales in Sweden were particularly strong, supporting international institutional sales, and assets from international clients grew by 45% year- on- year.
We also made progress in Central Europe with our first team members starting the new Luxembourg sales office, bringing us closer to the European customer base. Private wealth management assets increased by 17%, mainly thanks to the clients using full-mandate solutions. The largest increase in assets under management was once again in credit and allocation products. Product development continues to be a cornerstone in our business. In May, we introduced the European High Yield Total Return Fund, which focused on European high-yield bonds and has been well received. It has now already attracted over EUR 100 million in investments. Our Mandatum Managed Futures Fund, which uses systematic investment strategies, also attracted significant new investment this quarter. Operational efficiency continued to improve significantly, with the cost-income ratio dropping by 13 percentage points to 50% over the trailing 12 months.
The improved operational leverage demonstrates that the determined focus on cost efficiency is paying off, supporting sustainable profitability. Having said that, we have not sacrificed our investments to the future. During the quarter, we recruited new salespeople in order to speed up our growth in the institutional and wealth management and corporate segments. While the fee margin decreased slightly to 1.13% due to the growth in lower margin institutional wealth management business, standalone product margins remained stable. Now let's move over to Matti and the figures.
Thank you, Petri. Let's now take a closer look at the third quarter result component. As mentioned, our fee result was up 20% year- on- year, with assets under management up by 12%. If we compare to Q2, our AUM was up by some 3%, or around EUR 500 million- EUR 14.9 billion, just shy of the EUR 15 billion mark. The client fee margins were largely unchanged in the quarter when looking on a 12-month rolling basis. We saw similar trends as before: a gradual mix change from the growing international institutional business and a lower share of alternative assets compared to 2024. As Petri mentioned, the product-specific margins were largely unchanged during the quarter. The cost-income ratio of our client AUM continued to decrease according to plan and was 50%.
The main driver for this was a 4% higher average AUM versus Q2, which supported income and then a smaller impact from seasonally lower costs. Our net finance result came in at EUR 39 million. Financial market returns were pretty close to normal during the quarter. In addition, we had some tailwind from the long IFRS discounting rates during the quarter, and I'll talk a bit more about this later on. Our result related to risk policies in Q3 was down compared to 2024, and you all know that the comparison figure included around EUR 3 million of one-off income from the portfolio transfer to If. Also, the cost CSM release was a bit lower in the quarter due to timing effects, but the new business CSM continued to grow. Capital generation is a key success factor for any financial company, and we still continue to consistently generate capital.
Organic capital generation was EUR 70 million in the third quarter. This translates to EUR 0.14 per share. The main positive driver here was the increase in own funds. One of our financial targets, return on equity, stood at 13.6% in the quarter. One of our financial targets is to grow the capital light profit before taxes by more than 10% annually by 2028 compared to 2024. If we look at the first nine months of 2025, the reported profit before taxes was EUR 65 million, or 3% below the level of 2024. As you remember, in the first six months of the year, the result was impacted by the turbulent financial markets, FX headwinds from the weaker US dollar, and lower sales altogether. It is encouraging to see that Q3 saw a step change in quarterly profitability. All segments increased their profit sequentially.
The quarterly level of EUR 25 million suggests a run rate in line with our financial targets. Also worth noting here again is that the comparison figure in 2024 included an EUR 11 million one-off gain from the portfolio transfer to If. Adjusted for this, the profit before tax growth in capital light was 16% year- on- year. The group net finance result was up to EUR 39 million in Q3. The with-profit investment return in the quarter at 0.9% was below last year and slightly below the expected run rate. Our fixed income portfolio had a negative impact, negative mark-to-market impact from higher rates, but this was also partly offset by positive spread movements in the quarter. The mark-to-market yield was down slightly, ever so slightly, you could say, to 4.2% due to tightening spreads, and we also did some portfolio adjustments here.
It is important to stress that this is still well above the cost of liabilities. Equities contribute positively this quarter, but as you know, our exposure here is very low. The listed equity exposure was unchanged at 4% of total during the quarter. On the alternative side, private credit had a fairly normal quarterly return again, but we had a small negative value change in our own real estate portfolio during the quarter. Private equity returns were positive, but slightly below the normal rate in the quarter. If we then look at the long swap rates, they were up by 5 basis point-10 basis points in the quarter, and the IFRS rates that we use for discounting in the long end of the yield curve increased in the quarter by around 15 basis points, lowering the cost of liabilities by EUR 12 million.
The liquidity premium contributed positively to the IFRS discount rates by around 8 basis points, and as you probably remember, in Q2, the impact was negative in the second quarter. The with profit portfolio interest rate hedging ratio increased further and was unusually high, one could say, at 109 at the end of Q3. This was mainly due to technical factors as the fixed income exposure increased and mainly in the 20+ year bucket. As we show in our presentation, and although the average hedging ratio is high, there are big differences in the different maturities. In the third quarter, the hedging ratio was also impacted by tactical bond investments. Finally, worth noting again that the IFRS discount rate, mark-to-mark changes have no impact on the actual contract cash flows, nor our dividend paying capacity. We continue to consistently generate capital.
Organic capital generation, as Petri mentioned, was EUR 70 million in Q3 and again significantly higher than the reported IFRS result. In the first nine months of 2025, we've generated capital organically by EUR 242 million net of taxes, or EUR 0.48 per share. Looking at 2024, for the first nine months, the figure was EUR 0.34. As pointed out before, we think the OCG is a more relevant measure than the reported IFRS result when assessing our performance and capital generation in particular. Own funds generation increased the solvency margin by 9 percentage points in the quarter. The group solvency margin increased by 4 percentage points in the quarter compared to Q2, but decreased by 16 percentage points to 206% when taking into account the larger dividend deduction compared to last year.
Maybe worth noting still is that the announced sale of the Saxo Bank shares is expected to increase the solvency margin quite significantly, around 35 percentage points once the transaction is finalized. Now back to you, Lotta.
Thank you, Matti. Now let's move on to the Q&A. Please dial in or submit your questions through the chat.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from 358415289122. Please go ahead.
Hi, it's Antti from OP. Two questions from my side. Firstly, regarding risk policies, you have guided us that 10% of CSM is a pretty good estimate for results from risk policies, but now it has been four quarters in a row quite significantly below that level. Should we do any conclusion about this? Do you still believe that you're going to reach the 10% level this year, meaning about EUR 13.5 million?
Yeah, hi Antti, it's Matti here. A valid question, and your observation is exactly correct. The CSM release has been lower than one should expect. However, I think it's very important to note here that we've actually been generating the CSM, so it's not the question that we won't be kind of having the kind of potential release. It just has been slower due to the modeling we use. We are looking into this so that it would not kind of be pushing the CSM too much forward, and it would be a more stable release. You should still expect the EUR 13 million-EUR 14 million as the annual run rate. Of course, in 2025, it's lower, but from the following quarters, I think it should be roughly the same. A valid point, and we're definitely looking into that.
Of course, the main thing is that the CSM is still there. The release has just been slower.
Okay, thanks. Another question regarding your very strong fee result. It's stated in the report that yes, costs are seasonally lower in Q3, but was there anything exceptional, or do you think that the cost base was normal for Q3, so to say?
Yeah, I think the cost base was pretty normal for Q3. The main reason for the improvement in the cost-income ratio now in the third quarter was actually the fact that we've been able to grow our AUM. By AUM, we talk about the average AUM because in the beginning of the year, there was a lot of volatility in the market. Even though the end of period AUM grew, the average AUM growth was significantly lower. I would actually say that the bigger impact in Q3 was growth in the income side. Costs were maybe EUR 1 million lower than normal, so that was probably the impact in the quarter. A combination of both, but definitely more impact from the income side because of higher average AUM.
Okay, thanks. This is all from my side.
The next question comes from Emil Immonen from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Hi Petri and Matti. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe to continue on the cost-income ratio, so if I understood correctly, it's a lot now scale benefits that you're seeing, but has there been any cost cutting that you're doing that also is showing an effect? Because I think the jump Q- on- Q in the cost-income ratio was quite big.
Yeah, hi Emil. As I mentioned previously, in this quarter, the impact from higher income was more significant. As we pointed out several times, operational efficiency is one of our key strategic priorities. This means then obviously that it has had an impact. Now in the third quarter isolated, it was more driven by income, which we are very happy about altogether.
That is good to hear. Maybe then touching on the net flow, I saw it was negative in both corporate and retail. Could you maybe elaborate on how that should be analyzed?
Yes, thank you, Emil. Petri here. Yes, let's say if I first answer to the retail segment, the retail segment has been quite much flat or a little bit negative over the years or a quite long period of time. We have a very old cooperation with Danske Bank and a large portfolio which was mainly sold before 2010 when the Sampo Bank was still part of the Sampo Group. Since then, the sale has been, let's say, more modest, especially the savings side, not especially in the loan insurance side. There is nothing special on that compared to other years before and other quarters. Of course, we try to enhance and put some speed to Danske Bank's sales, but it is quite difficult to really increase a lot that sales on that side. Nothing special on that.
About the corporate side, there were some seasonal withdrawals from personal funds. It varies a little bit from quarter- to- quarter. When the companies are paying their variable compensation payments in spring, we will see a lot of inflow in personal funds, which is the largest part of the inflow nowadays. During the summertime, that is the time when the personal fund numbers are ready, and that is the time when the people have a chance to withdraw their money. Some employees wanted to have their money and use those. That is a little bit seasonal issues. Nothing special now business-wise in business and business-wise.
Okay, that is clear. That's all from me. Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Jaakko Tyrväinen from SEB. Please go ahead.
Good morning and thanks. I mean, my question is regarding the with-profit asset allocation and the continuing de-risking process there. Could you remind us how fast you should be able to rotate the capital from the illiquid asset classes to credit and perhaps listed equities?
Yeah, hi Jaakko. It's a good question. Unfortunately, we don't really have a good answer to that. What we've seen obviously in the market, as you know, private credit has been returning capital quite nicely, so that is functioning normally. The private equity side has been clearly slower. Some signs of positive developments there and also some capital payouts already. Of course, the most important factor is how that side will develop altogether. We still feel comfortable about the guidance that during the strategy period, we will be able to release the capital from those investments and take the de-risking, as we pointed out. Important to note that during Q3, we didn't really have a lot of de-risking going on altogether. This was more of a kind of pause in that direction. The trajectory is quite clear.
We aim to continue there, and we see no real changes to that side. Hopefully, the private equity market recovers faster than expected.
Good, thank you. On the solvency, and without transition rules, it was 191%. When thinking your capital guidance and planning and the capital payouts throughout the strategy period, could you remind us which solvency we should be looking at, with or without the transition rules?
It's the one without transition rules, so the 191. There the target is 160-180. There is a bit of confusion obviously there because we report several solvency margin figures altogether. Remember that the transition rules, they expire in 2031, so that's still quite a long time to go until then. In our strategy, that is the figure you should be looking at.
Excellent, thank you. On the net flows, did you see during the strong Q3, did you see some pent-up demand coming from the perhaps moderate Q2 and looking a bit towards the ongoing quarter? Last year, you had exceptionally or very strong quarter in Q4. Was it very exceptional last year, and how should we think about the net flows towards the year end?
Thank you, Jaakko. It's Petri here. I wouldn't say that there were any pending cases from Q2. It was like Q2 was really difficult because of the, especially April. We all know that it's a very volatile market, especially in April and the beginning of Q2. No pending cases. Let's say it was like there's a few things why in Q3 we managed to increase our net flow compared to other Q3s in previous years. I think the one is in wealth management here in Finland. We were more active. We had full calendars when we came back from the holidays in the beginning of August. Really, really high activity towards customers and a lot of meetings. That's something we can now see in the figures.
I guess when we are growing our business outside of Finland, we have to remember that July is not a holiday season yet in Central Europe, and it looks like it is not that much in Scandinavia than it is in Finland. It also helped us. July was really strong with us. Normally, it has been quite weak. On those times, we had only business in Finland. International business growth is helping us in Q3 especially. Another question, the Q4 last year, yes, you are right. It was especially really, really high level. I cannot comment Q4, which is already going on, but last Q4, we were very, very successful in getting some very large tickets and institutional tickets from Sweden and international side. Let's see.
Okay, thank you very much. That's helpful. Finally, perhaps a few words, if you may, an update on the international expansion. You just launched the new sales office. What are your own expectations when that effort should start to bear some kind of material?
Yeah, of course, we are not very patient people here. Of course, we are waiting every day and week. Things happen and growing. To be, of course, realistic, many times once you have tenders with the large institutions, it takes some time. Of course, we have a very good pipeline already in Central Europe where we have been before establishing the sales office there. This is just like boosting the business, what we have already done there before like 2024 and 2023. I would say to be realistic and a little bit optimistic, I guess we will start to see some improvement and clear change in coming year. We just established that in September. I guess it's a little bit too early to wait big change in our business during this year. Next year is something we hopefully see faster growth in that area.
Understand. Let's hope so. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Kasper Melas from Inderes. Please go ahead.
Hi all. My first question is about your profit distribution outlook. If the sales of Saxo shares would happen in 2026 instead of Q4, would this have any effect on your profit distribution potential or plans for 2025?
Yeah, hi Kasper. As we write in the report that there is a slight chance that the transaction would not be finalized by the end of the year, we still think it's possible, but it's also possible that it might be delayed slightly. There is one regulator still investigating the thing. I think there's a total of 40 different regulatory approvals already achieved. We don't believe this is a big thing altogether. Of course, for us, the main thing is that in May 26, when we have our AGM, then we have to have the money on our bank account. We don't expect that this would have any impact on a potential distribution. That said, obviously, it's all up to the board and then ultimately to the AGM to decide what to do with the money. We don't believe that this delay will be significant.
We just wanted to flag a bit that there is a possibility since we said originally that should happen by the end of the year. It still can happen, but it might be delayed, but not materially.
Okay, just a matter of liquidity.
Yes.
Okay, then last question is a bit more technical related to group costs. Group costs, I calculated these as the difference between other results from items not allocated to the segments and your finance expenses. These, according to my calculations, were higher in Q3 than in Q2. Have you done some cost allocations from unit linked to other results or were there some one-time expenses or what was behind this development since I assume that your finance expenses were quite stable quarter- on- quarter?
Yeah, the finance expenses are pretty stable quarter- on- quarter, but there is, of course, some variation from side to side. We haven't done any major factors. I don't think you can draw that kind of straight conclusion from our cost base by just allocating the finance costs. There was nothing clearly different or funny from that side altogether. Remember that in the with-profit now, of course, we do include the with-profit, the tier two loan interest expenses. We started that in Q2. Now, t hat, of course, has an impact on if we look at the previous quarters. Apart from that, there was nothing out of the ordinary in that item.
Okay. That was it from me. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Michelle Ballatore from KBW. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you for taking my question. My first question is about the capital generation, specifically the own fund generation. Can you help us understand to what extent, let's say, friendly market environment helped that metric in the third quarter?
Yes, it definitely did help.
Okay.
It was, of course, if you look at the generation overall, that's typically the biggest driver apart from obviously the net profit that generated in IFRS results. It did have an impact in the own funds generation.
Do you have a kind of run rate for the own fund generation, like a quarterly run rate, or is there seasonality also there?
No, that of course depends on the market development as well. I do not think you can put that kind of stable run rate for that. I think the one way of looking at it, what is the difference between the reported IFRS profit and then the own funds generation? That would give you some kind of indication where it could be. Of course, if the market situation is favorable, we continue to generate future profits or present value of future profits from higher fund growth than we have in our estimation. That contributes positively to the own funds. It is impossible to give a run rate. I think you should look at the difference in the previous quarter. That gives you some kind of indication.
Yeah, fantastic. Thank you. The second question is about, I mean, of course, growth is driven by the institutional and wealth management kind of segments. My question, I guess, is more related to what kind of retention. I mean, based on the products that they are, the segment, the products sold in this segment, what kind of retention you expect? I mean, are these money that can easily move to other funds? Or can you help us understand what kind of behavior you expect for this kind of specific segment in terms of from the client?
Yes, Petri here. Thank you for your question. Let's say that if I start with our corporate segment, in corporate segment, we currently have assets under management and the product we are selling are more sticky because the nature of the business, like pension business, there is no transfer market in Finland. Of course, the taxation and everything is like that. Corporate segment money is really sticky money and stays longer by nature. When it comes to institutional wealth management segment, it's more or less like any other wealth management and asset management company. Customers can withdraw their money if they are not happy with us and we are not good in investments and so on.
Having said that, especially in our wealth management side where we are selling mainly through capital redemption policies, our services and products, there's one thing which is clearly hindering that is taxation. Because once you have created, for example, a taxable income, capital gain taxable income inside your portfolio, if you withdraw your money, you have to pay taxes. You can't transfer that to someone else without paying taxes. In certain ways, it's a little bit more sticky than just to sell, let's say, direct equities. With the funds, it's the same. Another thing which I would say this is not very coming and going money is also that more or less everything we do in our sales and our distribution is in our own hands. We own the customer relation.
We have a very tight relationship to our customers, no matter are they private individuals, high net worth, ultra high net worth, or institutions. We always try to create deep connection to our customers. Let's say in times that the times are difficult, we do have still relations to our customers. It's not in someone else's hands. That helps us to keep the money, let's say, better than otherwise. Of course, ultimately, it's a question of how much wealth you can generate to your customers, how good your investments, and what is your NBS, which is very high with our customers currently.
When you mentioned the taxes on capital gains, right?
Yeah.
Okay. Because I was also thinking, correct me if I'm wrong, but if the allocation is to, let's say, not plain vanilla products, normal equities or liquid bonds, but it's in, let's say, private credit or, I mean, these kind of funds are probably stickier because there is a longer-term view from the investor in terms of approach, right?
Yeah. Y ou are right. Yes, we have a quite big part of our business is also alternative and commitment-based. Once you have committed to something, to fund, to invest to us, you have to stay with that. No matter what you think afterwards, you have to stick with the commitment. Especially in private equity, private debt, it is a long-tail business. It is more sticky as well.
Thank you very much. Very clear.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Emil Immonen from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Hi, thanks. One more question related to the institutional and wealth management business. I was just wondering, I'm seeing the net flow is pretty good. How is the fee margin developing? Is there any pressure on that, or are you getting good net flow without having to touch fees at all?
Yes, thank you for your question. Yeah, as we have stated, we haven't seen any softening and huge price pressure in standalone products. Why our average fee margin is going just a little bit down is because we are selling more institutional wealth management products and services. As we have said, and we all know that there's a lower fee margin on that segment and has always been. More we grow on that segment, of course, it will come a little bit down, but it's slowly going down. Standalone divisions, customer segments, products, we haven't seen any big margin pressure. We are not sacrificing our profitability and discipline in pricing in order to get growth. This money and net flow and inflow we are getting in is right priced.
Sorry, if I understand correctly. It's pretty much developing exactly as you expected.
Yeah, exactly. No changes in pricing and margins.
Great to hear. Thank you.
There are no more questions at this time. I hand the conference back to the speakers.
Thank you. I take two questions from the chat as well. Could you please elaborate on the lack of AUM growth for Finnish institutions in institutional and wealth management business?
Yes, thank you for the question. I think the Finnish institutions as a subsegment, which is moderate growth and/or flat growth in asset management, there are a few reasons for that. I guess one is the bigger thing. I guess it's some kind of mirror of the Finnish economy. Institutions underneath the assets, they are not getting that much new money, and there are no new institutions established. Many of the tier II, tier III institutions of Finland, they have committed a lot to illiquid assets like private equity and private debt also with us. Also, the real estate market is quite a freeze in Finland. That means that investable assets are not that high at the moment. At the same time, the picture is not that flat.
It looks like for us, we have also a lot of commitment-based sales towards institutions in Finland, which is not shown immediately in assets under management and net flow. It will come once we call and once the funds call those commitments in. The sale has been quite good on that segment, but it's not shown yet in those figures.
Thank you. There was a question regarding the transfer for the internal profit transfer of EUR 1.2 million from institutional wealth management to corporate, and that was of a more technical nature.
That concludes today's audiocast. Please do not hesitate to contact Investor Relations should you have any further questions. Thank you for joining us. Have a good day.