Everyone, my name is Latif, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Sun Life Financial Q1 2022 financial results conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. The host of this call is Yaniv Bitton, Vice President, Head of Investor Relations and Capital Markets. Please go ahead, Mr. Bitton.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Sun Life's earnings call for the first quarter of 2022. Our earnings release and the slides for today's call are available on the investor relations section of our website at sunlife.com. We will begin today's call with an overview of our first quarter strategic highlights from Kevin Strain, President and Chief Executive Officer. Following Kevin's remarks, Manjit Singh, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer will present the financial results for the quarter. After the prepared remarks, we will move to the question-and-answer portion of the call. Other members of management will also be available to answer your questions this morning. Turning to slide 2, I draw your attention to the cautionary language regarding the use of forward-looking statements and non-IFRS financial measures, which form part of today's remarks.
As noted in the slides, forward-looking statements may be rendered inaccurate by subsequent events. With that, I'll now turn things over to Kevin.
Thanks, Yaniv, and good morning to everybody on the call today. Turning to slide 4, Sun Life delivered a solid start to 2022, driven by our diversified business model, prudent risk management practices, and strong capital position. Reported net income of CAD 858 million was down 8% from prior year, and underlying net income of CAD 843 million was broadly in line with last year. COVID-19 continued to impact our businesses, and while headwinds from COVID remain, as of March, we started to see an improvement in U.S. COVID-related deaths, which should drive more favorable mortality experience in the second quarter. We continue to watch the trends closely, and in most of our markets, we are seeing a transition as COVID becomes less of an impact and populations have increased immunity.
This doesn't mean COVID is over, but it does suggest smaller impacts in terms of claims and business interruption going forward. We are also pleased that in most of our markets, our offices are now open, and we have people working flexibly, both in the office and virtually as their day allows. With the war in Ukraine impacting economic conditions, supply chains, and energy costs, the world is now facing new challenges with heightened geopolitical pressures and central banks raising rates to curb higher than expected inflation. These challenges create uncertainty, but our diversified business mix and strong risk management will enable us to manage through these headwinds. We're expecting pressure on equity markets, credit, and expenses due to inflation, but higher interest rates, particularly at the long end of the curve, should help drive profitability. The ongoing growth in our businesses also supports our medium-term objectives.
Our capital position remains strong with a LICAT ratio of 143% at SLF. We are also pleased to announce a 4.5% increase to our common share dividend, demonstrating our commitment to deliver value for our shareholders. Turning to slide five, we continue to deliver on our purpose and our ambition in the quarter as we saw continued progress in delivering on our client impact strategy. Sustainability is a key component of our strategy, and in March, we released our annual sustainability report, which outlines the areas where Sun Life can have the greatest impact, including increasing financial security, fostering healthier lives, and advancing sustainable investing. The report outlines how being sustainability-driven is core to Sun Life's strategy and how we're making an impact on sustainability for our clients, our employees and advisors, our communities, and future generations.
In Hong Kong, we announced Stellar, the first ESG savings plan in the market that actively integrates ESG concepts into its investment strategies. This enables clients to build their wealth in a way that has a positive impact while also ensuring a legacy for future generations. Stellar allocates funds to sustainable investments such as renewable energy, sustainable buildings, energy transition, and water and waste management, with a particular focus on assets with relatively low carbon intensity. This is a great example of bringing a sustainable solution to market by leveraging the strength of SLC Management and our affiliate companies, InfraRed Capital Partners and BentallGreenOak, as well as our local investments team in Hong Kong. Moving to distribution excellence, last month, we announced the expansion of our partnership with CIMB Niaga in Indonesia. CIMB is an important regional partner for us in Asia.
In fact, CIMB Niaga was one of our first-ever bank insurance partners. Under the new agreement, Sun Life will be the provider of insurance solutions to CIMB Niaga customers through all channels starting in 2025. We're excited about expanding our relationship with CIMB in Indonesia. Indonesia is the largest economy in Southeast Asia with a young emerging middle class, one of the world's largest working age populations, and low insurance penetration. Turning to asset management, we continue to see strong momentum at SLC Management, where in the first quarter, we raised CAD 5.7 billion of capital, reflecting the strength and diversification of our alternative investment capabilities. Sun Life was also recognized for its inclusive culture last month when it was named one of the 2022 best workplaces in Canada by Great Place to Work.
I'm proud of this achievement, and I want to thank our employees for making this possible. We're also excited that starting next season, Sun Life will be the official health and wellness partner of the Toronto Raptors basketball team. As part of this expanded partnership, our goal together is to find new opportunities to help Canadians live healthier lives. Slide five and six also provide updates on how we continue to drive digital leadership across the organization. In Canada, we launched Prosper by Sun Life, delivering a simple and intuitive client experience. Prosper by Sun Life is a first of its kind hybrid device solution that provides all Canadians a digital tool to identify, track, and reach their protection, wealth, and health goals all in one place.
Prosper is linked to a team of salary advisors who can provide recommendations and product solutions to our clients at moments that matter. In the U.S., we introduced Benefits Explorer. We know benefit selection can be stressful and confusing for some members, so this tool helps educate and prepare employees for benefits enrollment. The tool provides access to live benefits counselors and direct links to their employer's online enrollment and offers employees a guided path to learn about their benefits through the year, so they can choose the right benefits package for their needs. In Asia, our predictive modeling tool, Next Best Offer, helps our advisors recommend the right products at the right moments to our clients. We've seen terrific results with over 70% product take-up from the clients we were able to engage with through this tool.
These are just a few examples of how Sun Life's digital leadership is delivered on our client impact strategy while also generating business growth. I also want to provide a quick update on our agreement to acquire DentaQuest. We've made good progress obtaining necessary approvals and remain on track for a close in the first half of the year. We're looking forward to DentaQuest becoming part of the Sun Life family and welcoming their employees and 33 million members to Sun Life. Before I hand the call over to Manjit, I want to say our hearts and thoughts remain with the people of Ukraine and everyone affected by this senseless invasion and war. Together with the global community, we're concerned about the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the country and surrounding regions, and the threats to global peace and security.
Sun Life, its companies and affiliates, including DentaQuest, BentallGreenOak, and InfraRed Capital Partners, along with our employees, have donated more than CAD 1.1 million to various charities that are providing direct humanitarian support in Ukraine. We also know that people are struggling with mental health concerns, which have been exacerbated by both the ongoing pandemic as well as concerns related to world security and peace. As a result, in partnership with Dialogue, we are currently providing free access to self-guided online therapy to anyone in Canada struggling with mental health issues. All of this continues to drive home how important our purpose is, and I can't remember a time when helping people achieve lifetime financial security and live healthier lives has been more important. Our mix of asset management and insurance businesses are well-positioned to deliver on this purpose, but also to manage through these economic headwinds.
With that, Manjit will now take us through the financial results for the first quarter.
Thank you, Kevin, and good morning, everyone. Slide eight provides an overview of our first quarter results. Sun Life delivered solid results amidst a challenging operating environment with good momentum across all of our business groups. Reported net income in the quarter was CAD 858 million, down 8%, reflecting less favorable market-related impacts. Underlying net income of CAD 843 million and underlying earnings per share of CAD 1.44 were down modestly from the prior year. Earnings for the quarter were supported by strong fundamental business activity, partially offset by COVID-related impacts in the U.S. and Asia. Earnings and surplus of CAD 65 million was lower this quarter, primarily driven by higher external debt costs and lower AFS gains. With rising rates and wider spreads, contribution from AFS gains are expected to moderate.
At the same time, these factors can also provide trading opportunities, which can generate investment related gains. Underlying return on equity was 14% in the quarter. Assets under management were CAD 1.35 trillion at the end of Q1. This was down from the end of last quarter, reflecting declines in equity markets and rising interest rates. Book value per share was up 7% over the prior year, excluding impacts in other comprehensive income, which includes foreign currency translation and changes in available for sale. Book value per share was up 11%. Our capital position remains strong, with LICAT ratios of 143% at SLF and 123% at SLA, and a financial leverage ratio of 25.9%. Let's turn to our business group performance, starting on slide ten with MFS.
MFS reported net income of $228 million, which is up 23% from the prior year, reflecting lower fair value changes on share-based payment awards. Underlying net income was up 4%, driven by higher average net assets, and MFS generated a solid pre-tax net operating margin of 39%. Compared to the fourth quarter of 2021, the operating margin declined by four percentage points due to lower average net assets and seasonally higher compensation expense. AUM declined 8% during the quarter to $637 billion, largely reflecting the decline in equity markets and $5.4 billion of fund outflows. MFS continues to deliver strong long-term fund performance for our clients.
In the annual Barron's rankings released in February, MFS ranked in the top 10 for the 5- and 10-year periods across its US funds lineup. Turning to slide 11, SLC Management delivered another strong quarter with a reported net income of CAD 19 million and underlying net income of CAD 34 million. We have provided some additional financial metrics to SLC Management that align with alternative asset management peers. One of the key metrics is fee-related earnings, which represents the profitability from managing the assets before items such as realized performance fees. Fee-related earnings were up 38% year-over-year, reflecting strong capital raising activity and deployment into fee-earning AUM over the past 12 months. The fee-related earnings margin of 23% was down modestly due to higher marketing costs for capital raising activities.
Operating margin of 24% was up slightly and is on track to meet our target of 30%-35% by 2025. Strong capital raising of CAD 5.7 billion in the quarter reflects the strength and diversification of our investments platform. We are currently holding CAD 18 billion of AUM, not yet earning fees. Once invested, these assets can generate annualized fee revenue of more than CAD 150 million. On slide 12, Canada's reported net income of CAD 263 million was down 35% year-over-year, mainly due to market-related impacts. Underlying net income of CAD 298 million was up 5% from the prior year, underpinned by broad-based business growth and higher investment gains. Momentum in the Canadian business is strong. Expected profit growth was 7%. Total wealth sales were solid, reflecting higher defined contribution sales.
Insurance sales were strong, driven by new group benefits mandates and higher non-par life sales. We are also continuing to invest in capabilities that make it easier for clients to do business with us. One example is our investment in predictive analytics in our underwriting process. This has allowed us to process over 60% of life policies without lab testing, further improving our overall client experience. Turning to slide 13, U.S. reported net income of $133 million was down 20% from the prior year, reflecting a decline in the underlying net income. Underlying net income for the first quarter of $93 million includes $30 million of COVID-related impacts, mostly driven by elevated group mortality.
Compared to the prior quarter, earnings were up CAD 37 million, driven by favorable stop loss morbidity and a 17% decline in working age population deaths, partially offset by higher long-term disability claims. Looking forward, we expect pandemic-related mortality headwinds to moderate as U.S. deaths have continued to decline since early March. Similarly, we expect there will be some normalization of favorable stop loss morbidity experience as healthcare utilization starts to increase. More importantly, the core fundamentals of our U.S. business remain strong as we continue to generate high persistency, good premium growth, and achieve solid pricing margins, all while making investments in our product and digital capabilities. Slide 14 outlines Asia's results for the quarter. Reported net income was CAD 161 million, down 16% from the prior year in constant currency, reflecting market-related impacts.
Underlying net income of CAD 152 million was down 1% on a constant currency basis. The first quarter results included lower sales in Hong Kong, driven by heightened COVID-related lockdown measures. Mortality experience was elevated in international, driven by a small number of larger claims. These factors were partially offset by higher investment activity gains and disciplined expense management. Excluding Hong Kong, insurance sales were relatively consistent with prior year, which highlights the benefits of our diversified markets and products across Asia. Wealth net flows of nearly CAD 300 million reflect the strength in the Hong Kong MPF market, where we continue to rank second overall for net flows. Looking forward, as COVID restrictions are slowly lifted in our Asian markets, we are optimistic that sales activity will pick up. Altogether, our businesses delivered solid financial results against a challenging macroeconomic backdrop.
Although we expect headwinds to continue over the near term, we believe our diversified business model, along with our strong capital position, provide a resilient foundation to manage through the current environment. We will also maintain our focus on executing on key strategic priorities, and we will continue to invest in our businesses for future growth. Before I close off, I want to remind everyone about our IFRS 17 education session on May thirty-first. Overall, Sun Life is well prepared for the transition to IFRS 17, and we look forward to sharing more information with you at the end of the month. With that, I'll turn the call back to Yaniv for Q&A.
Thank you, Manjit. To help ensure that all of our participants have an opportunity to ask questions this morning, I would ask you to limit yourselves to one or two questions and then re-queue with any additional questions. I will now ask our operator to poll the participants.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one on your telephone. To withdraw your question, press the pound key. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from Meny Grauman of Scotiabank. Your line is open.
Hi again. Just wanted a little bit more detail on your outlook for mortality in the U.S. It was noted that it's improving. When do you expect it to actually normalize? If we look at the stop loss business as well, when do you expect COVID-related impacts to fully normalize there as well?
Good morning, Meny. It's Dan Fishbein. Thanks for the questions. In terms of mortality, you know, we're certainly seeing significant improvement. As you saw, the first quarter was better sequentially than the fourth quarter. Most of that improvement occurred in the month of March. So break it down by the months, we're starting to see steady improvement month-over-month. I can share that April improved from there, and so far in May, we see further improvement. If you look at external estimates, there were about 160,000 total deaths in the U.S. in the first quarter, and the external estimates are predicting an average of about 30,000 total population deaths in the second quarter. That's a reduction of about 80%.
You should expect to see significant improvement in our mortality, certainly reflecting that. As for your question as to when will it completely, you know, return to normal, unfortunately, we don't think that COVID is going away completely, and we do think there will be elevated mortality for, you know, a significant period of time. We are building that into our pricing, as we've mentioned before. It does take a full three years to cycle through the entire book of business. We started increasing our pricing at the end of last year, but certainly we have a ways to go until that pricing, you know, catches up. That's probably about a mid-single digit impact.
Our hope, of course, is that deaths will remain at the current relatively low level, but we're likely to see some peaks and valleys in that, going forward. We are at 325 deaths a day at the moment on a seven-day average in the U.S., and that compares with numbers in the first quarter that reached as high as 2,700 a day. Clearly, mortality is at a lower level now. On stop loss, as you noted, we had quite favorable experience in the first quarter. About half of that was due to tailwinds related to COVID delays in care, but about half of that was related to underlying favorable underwriting results. We do think over the next few quarters that utilization in hospitals will return close to normal levels, but that will take a few quarters.
Our own underlying good results, though, should persist.
Thanks for that. Just maybe to follow up on the pricing, I know we talked about it last quarter, but just from a competitive point of view, what are you seeing out there in the market? Are most of your competitors viewing it the same way as you in terms of the necessity to raise pricing, COVID's not going away, or is there? Basically, what's going on in the market now relative to the pricing that you're pushing through?
Yeah, generally our sense is that that mid-single digits range is what the industry is doing. You know, there's always exceptions. It remains a highly competitive market, and so on a case-by-case basis, we still see pretty intense competition, but we believe that our level of increase is consistent with the market.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from David Motemaden of Evercore ISI. Your line is open.
Thanks. Good morning. Just had a question for MFS. Kevin, could you just talk about the margin outlook there, and how you think you can manage through the market volatility given some of the inflationary comments you made in your prepared remarks that may make it more difficult to manage the expense base than in the past?
Well, thanks, David. I'm gonna let Mike answer the question on that.
Yeah, good morning, David. I mean, clearly as we made our way through Q1 year-over-year, you know, results were up, pre-tax was up over last year. As ANA has continued to come down in the second quarter relative to last year, that's gonna obviously have an impact on, you know, the profitability and the margin. You know, the guidance we provide over time is in a normal environment. We think, you know, a net margin in the 35-40 range. We were at the higher end of that, and well over that at late last year, given the market at all-time highs. What you'll see on the expense side, what naturally comes down is those things that are tied to profitability like compensation, asset-based fees that we pay distributors.
We're still comfortable with that range, but you should expect that if the market stays where it is for the year, obviously the margin's gonna be pressured relative to last year.
Yep, got it. That makes sense. Maybe just another question just for Dan. Just in terms of, you know, the non-COVID long-term disability experience, could you just talk about what you're seeing, what you saw in the quarter, your expectations, and if you're repricing the business, or how you're repricing the business in response to that?
Yeah, we definitely are seeing some elevated morbidity in long-term disability. Now, a significant amount of that is COVID-related. We do have some long COVID cases. The good news is, although this is a little more anecdotal, we are seeing recoveries in long COVID, so those disabilities don't seem to be, you know, long-term persistent. But there is some overall elevation in LTD experience that's non-COVID related as well. It's modest, but it's real. We think that's related to some of the second order effects of the pandemic, including the recent moves by some employers to require employees to return to the office. We think, you know, some of that will persist, but maybe not long term.
That may be a few quarters kind of impact as the labor market and employers find their equilibrium of how they wanna work in the future. However, like in our group life business, we are raising prices in our disability business as well to reflect these impacts. Coincidentally, it's the same, you know, mid-single digits kind of range, and we're generally seeing that in the marketplace as well. Same effect though, you see case by case intense competition, but we do believe competitors are raising rates by a similar amount.
Got it. Thanks for that color.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Gabriel Dechaine of National Bank, Your line is open.
Good morning. Just yield enhancement gains. Big uptick this quarter from what we'd seen in the prior few quarters. Over CAD 100 million. Can you tell me what that number would look like under IFRS 17?
Gabriel, it's Manjit. Good morning. As you know, the overall investment activity gains are largely driven by a couple of things, the overall market conditions and, you know, our available funds that we have to put into the market to invest. Obviously, we had some pretty good conditions in the quarter, and our investment teams took advantage of that to invest in good quality, higher yielding assets, and that's what drove the gain in the quarter. On the IFRS 17 question, you know, we'll handle that on our May 31st session that we have upcoming. We'll give you more details then.
Would it be materially lower?
I guess, Gabriel, we'll give you more details on May 31st.
I guess this quarter, I mean, on the current accounting this quarter, you're probably seeing similar spread pickup opportunities, right?
Yeah. Like I said, you know, it'll depend on sort of the market availability as well as the funds that we're putting into the market. So far the market is continuing to provide some opportunities.
Okay, thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Scott Chan of Canaccord. Your line is open.
Good morning. Maybe for Manjit or Steve on SLC. Really appreciate the increase in the updated disclosure on that segment. Specifically on FRE versus kind of the net income target that you updated last quarter, and maybe going down to the margin because I don't think you're prepared to do an FRE target. Margins were in the low 20s% for FRE, and you talked about a 30-35% operating target by 2025. Would it be safe to assume that FRE margin would be aligned with that operating target, or would there be nuances up or down?
Thanks, Scott. This is Steve. I can answer that. I think over time you're gonna see. You know, the main difference between FRE, fee related earnings and operating income is gonna be that between those two, you're gonna have performance fees and, income from seed investments. That would be the difference between operating income and FRE margin. I think that those over time you're gonna see more performance fees, as the business grows. I think you're gonna see more seed capital investments, so you'll see more, seed related income. You know, I think with our margin for the quarter, you know, we're on track, we think, for the margin targets, that we set out for 2025.
Some of the fluctuation you'll see in margin quarter-over-quarter or even year-over-year can relate to things like catch-up fees, which can impact the margin or marketing costs, where we have a big fundraising and you expense marketing costs in a given quarter, but you haven't earned the revenue yet because that will play out over time as the money's invested. You are gonna see a bit of fluctuation in that, but we do think we're on track for our targets.
Great. While I have you, Steve, we're all seeing what's happened in the public markets, but the private markets are your all platform. Can you maybe describe any market headwinds that you're seeing or perhaps tailwinds in the current environment?
You know, I think it's a bit too early to see what the long term impact is on either the underlying portfolios in our different asset classes or on the fundraising. I would say, you know, the first quarter fundraising we feel really good about. We haven't really seen, you know, examples of investors pulling back from these asset classes yet. You know, if market volatility picks up, you could see that. We haven't seen it yet. I think the market environment actually can cut both ways. You know, I mean, with rates going up and spreads going up, that could have an impact on asset classes like real estate. Though I would say our real estate portfolios were up strongly during the first quarter.
On the flip side, with rising rates, we've actually seen money coming back into our fixed income portfolios as pension funds. This actually helps the funding ratio for pension funds, and in some cases, they're more willing to now put more money back into fixed income at higher yields. A little too early to see what the longer term impacts are, but I think it cuts a couple different ways.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Paul Holden of CIBC. Your question, please.
Thank you. Good morning. Going back to the U.S. group and the conversation around the normalization of experience and perhaps mortality staying higher for longer, is there anything in your mind that's changed your profit margin expectation excluding the DentaQuest acquisition?
Good morning, Paul. It's Dan Fishbein again. There really isn't. Now, obviously, you know, the fact that we may see somewhat elevated mortality, although certainly nowhere near what we've been, you know, seeing in over the past couple of years, in the short term could affect margins. But as we reprice for that, and we should be able to reprice for that would put us back at the same margins. You know, as I mentioned in the last call, overall, our group benefits business is in the best condition that it's ever been. Sales are strong. Persistency has improved. We're getting the pricing that we ask for, that we need. We've had significant gains in expense efficiencies, introduced new products, capabilities and digital programs into the marketplace.
All of those things position us very well. The previous margin guidance that we've given, of 7% or greater is, you know, still our, very much our expectation, absent COVID effects. The fundamentals of the business remain strong and remain as they were.
Great. Thank you. A capital allocation question for Kevin. You noted the capital strength of the business, which is obvious. We're seeing valuations drop. Is this leading to increased potential capital deployment options, and would you be willing to be opportunistic in this type of environment with capital deployment?
Well, thanks, Paul. As you know, and we've talked about in other quarters, our priorities for capital deployment remain largely the same, right? We're focused on supporting our organic growth. You know, our organic growth target for EPS is 8%-10%. Continuing on that, we're committed to supporting our dividend and the dividend growth. We've outlined 40%-50% of underlying earnings, and you saw the 4.5% increase in our dividend this quarter. Of course, we've been able to deploy into M&A that improves either scale or adding new capabilities, like the DentaQuest that's gonna be closing soon, and that's gonna use a big chunk of capital. But we're always looking sort of forward at what the opportunities are across the three of those.
We always keep buybacks as an alternative. If we see that the level of capital is more than what we need, we give it back to shareholders. At this point in time, you know, it's a combination of economic conditions, uses we have for capital, and we continue to look at all of the uses.
Okay. That's great. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Doug Young of Desjardins Capital Markets. Your line is open.
Hi. Good morning. I guess this question is for Jacques. I think group morbidity experience in Canada was adverse once again. I think that's been a recurring theme for a while here. Just, I know that you're taking actions, putting through price increases. Just wanted to get a better sense of what you're seeing on the ground and what level of price increases are flowing through and when we might see that turn.
Yeah. Doug, thank you for the question. This is Jacques. You're right on the morbidity experience is unfavorable in the quarter, and it has to do with GB disability, as you say. I might just remind you that we've got two things we're looking at. One is the volume of cases, which we call the incidence, and then how long or the duration of cases before people get back to work. In May 2019, we decided to increase our pricing quite materially, and that was to do with the fact that when it comes to incidence, our view and our models were suggesting that the trend up was a what I would call durable trend. Today, I can tell you, Doug, that the incidence is in line with our pricing and our expectations.
The issue is indeed, as you point out, on the duration. Now, unlike incidence, on duration, we don't see this for now as a durable trend. Part of this is COVID. You know, access to care has been an issue, people getting surgeries and so on. Our view remains that this is temporary. Of course, if signals were to change and suggest that has a more durable pattern to it, we would take action. But at this stage, you know, we think that's not the case.
Okay. Just a question on the Asia business. You know, there's a large Indian state-run insurance company in India going public and which is interesting and topical. I'm just curious what, if any, this has impact-wise on your viewpoint in India or your India life insurance business.
Yeah, I can start, and then Ingrid's also on the call, so I can let her add some color. Yeah, the LIC we're well aware of is going public. You know, the LIC is the largest provider of insurance in the country. It's an amalgamation in 1956 or 1957 of all the insurance companies. You know, I think being a public company provides a level of discipline and transparency, which is probably long-term good for the industry. We really like our partnership with the Aditya Birla Group.
We have a strong position in both the insurance company and the asset management company. You know, I think that doesn't change from the LIC going public at all. They were already a big competitor. You know, we're still optimistic about India, and we think there's great potential there. I don't know if Ingrid, if you wanted to add anything.
No, but other than that, you would have seen, we still had a relatively strong sales in the quarter, and we're excited about the business and also the digitalization that's taking place. We are well positioned both in life and asset management.
That's it for me. Thank you.
You would see that the valuations in India are quite high. You would note that, you know, the PE multiples are high. That shows you, I think, the long-term value creation opportunity in India.
Yeah. Agree. Thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Mario Mendonca of TD Securities. Your line is open.
Good morning. If we can go back to policyholder expenses or policyholder experience. I noticed that expense experience was positive this quarter. I kind of look back at the model to see when the last time that was true, and I think I have to go back to Q3 2019. Can you talk a little bit about why it would have flipped signs this quarter? On a related note, the other expense or the other experience was rather negative. I'm referring to the -CAD 41 million. Is that expense? I mean, should we be looking at those two together, is what I'm getting at.
Good morning, Mario. It's Manjit. On the first item, the sort of credit that you see in expenses this quarter is largely due to some compensation adjustments that happened as part of the year-end process. That's what. There was a true up for that. That was a recovery in the quarter. That's what you saw. On the other expenses that you mentioned, you know, we do have some investments that we make in businesses over time that are reflected in that line, and one of those investments obviously that's happening right now is IFRS 17. Along with some smaller investments we're making in the BGO group. That's what's in that line.
Now, Manjit, I appreciate that you're doing your IFRS update later on this month. You know, given the market's interest in this, is there anything you can offer in terms of what the transition could mean to the company's book value today?
Again, I think, you know, Mario, that, you know, it's. As you sort of say, there's a different component to that. So I don't think it would really be helpful to give you a short answer to that. I think we wanna take the time to walk you through the various elements of that and how they come together on May 31st.
All right. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Tom MacKinnon of BMO Capital. Your line is open.
Yeah. Good morning. Thanks for taking the question. Just with respect to, you know, an unexpected dividend increase, it kind of just shows there's some reasonably good capital generation here. I don't think we've heard anything about, you know, kind of excess capital generation since you gave us CAD 800 million annual figure several years ago. Is there anything you can share with us with respect to excess capital generation at Sun Life? And then I have a follow-up.
Sure. Good morning, Tom. It's Manjit. I'll take that. As you know, we've maintained a strong capital position for many years and that's really underpinned by our disciplined approach to capital management. As you say, an important component of that disciplined approach is generating strong capital from our diversified portfolio of businesses. As Kevin outlined, we do have a very clear and consistent approach to how we manage our capital. We first invest in organic growth of our businesses, and that consumes about 25%-35% of our overall capital generated from underlying net income. Next, we focus on growing our dividend, and as we talked about, our payout range is 40%-50% of underlying income.
That leaves about 25%-35% of underlying net income for excess capital generation to deploy before the impacts of market related items. If you were to take a look at that for the past year, that would have been about CAD 1 billion before those market related items. A bit higher than the CAD 800 million we saw earlier.
Okay, that's great. Just with respect to some of the discussions on group morbidity, is the thing that we should be looking at here more just confirming that it might be more short-term related and more COVID related. Should the focus be more on unemployment? You know, there is sometimes anti-selection in group morbidity. So, as long as we stay with relatively good employment levels, would you expect a group morbidity, just the modest uptick that we saw in the quarter to, you know, come back in as a result of, you know, unemployment being fairly muted here?
Tom, I think we can let Dan answer that first for the U.S. and Jacques answer second for Canada.
Okay.
Sure. In the U.S., as you noted, you know, unemployment is almost at a historically low level. In fact, there's 11.5 million open jobs in the U.S. Right now. We don't think unemployment is really a factor here. We think there are other second order effects.
As I mentioned, including employers requiring people to come back into the office who might not be fully comfortable doing that's likely a transient effect. The marketplace will find its equilibrium as labor and employers decide how they wanna work together in the future. We don't see that as necessarily a persistent impact.
Tom, this is Jacques. Similar to Dan, I would say we don't see employment levels as being a material issue at the moment to what we're seeing. It's really about duration, as I said earlier. Yeah, I didn't mention it earlier, but mental health cases tend to be a bit longer than our other cases. With the access to care, it's really an issue of how quickly we can get people back to work. At the moment, I would say we don't expect that to be a durable trend, but we're obviously watching it very closely, Tom, since it has obviously an impact on our results.
Okay. If I could just squeeze one more. There's an impairment in the quarter, if there's any kind of color you can shed with respect to that and how we should be thinking about credit going forward.
Tom, this is Randy Brown. I'll take that. Yeah, the impairments were on a couple of credits within our private fixed income portfolio. They were entirely idiosyncratic in nature, and so not indicative of any trends either within PFI specifically or in the overall portfolio. I think overall you'll see another positive credit release this quarter, albeit down from prior quarters. I'm very comfortable with the composition of the portfolio, so we have to see how markets play out as we look forward.
Okay, thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Lemar Persaud of Cormark. Your line is open.
Thanks. My question is probably most suited for Manjit, and it's around the, I guess, the outlook for earnings and surplus, and that's kind of rough CAD 100 million range. I understand it's a rough target and may bounce around from quarter to quarter, but just looking at that target in the context of what we've seen over the past two quarters, some of the challenges associated with generating AFS gains and seed investment gains and, you know, what's playing out in the markets and rate environment. Does it feel like that CAD 100 million target is achievable in this market backdrop? I guess the reason why I'm asking is that you have to really go back, like, over a decade to find a two-quarter string of earnings on surplus this weak. Any comments would be helpful.
Sure. Good morning, Lemar, it's Manjit. As you mentioned, you know, our earnings and surplus has kind of been in the CAD 100 million range. This quarter we saw CAD 65 million. There were a couple of items that led to that lower result. As you know, we had lower mark-to-market seed investment losses. And that really reflects the wider credit spreads you're seeing. There were some timing items in our investment income. We also had some higher debt costs reflecting the higher floating rates on floating rate debt, as well as the debt that we issued to fund DentaQuest, and as you mentioned, a lower AFS gain. Altogether, that's what drove that number.
Given the current environment that we're in, and as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, you'd expect the AFS gains to be more muted, which would result in a surplus number below the CAD 100 million range that we've been seeing, you know, previously. The other thing that I mentioned obviously is also there's other components that also have differing impacts from those market-related items. We talked about it earlier in this call that, you know, that could also provide some opportunities on the investment activity gain side.
Okay, thanks. If I could squeeze another one in, maybe just circling back to an earlier question around capital allocation for Kevin. Does management have the capacity to integrate DentaQuest while still digesting another acquisition, or would M&A kind of be off the table for a period of time?
It's a great question. Thanks. You know, if we look at DentaQuest, it is the second largest acquisition we've ever made. But it's got a great management team. Dan and his team have executed on a large acquisition. If you remember, it's really bringing a larger dental business into a smaller dental business alongside of ours. We're pretty confident that integration is gonna go well. Manjit actually mentioned we've got the debt cost running through our earnings right now, but we don't have the benefit of the earnings coming through. That's one thing that we're looking forward to. From the overall capital position, it's obviously gonna use a big chunk of the CAD 4.7 billion we have at the holdco.
We obviously see that we're in stressed times right now, and if you look at the economic conditions. We do have a solid capital position, and we continue to assess what the opportunities are. You know, it is a use of the majority of the capital of the holdco when the deal closes. We know we continue to have an eye on things that will improve the business. You know, we have that financial discipline will not change, and I think part of the financial discipline is looking at the economic conditions and what you're purchasing.
Great. Thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Nigel D'Souza of Veritas Investment Research. Your question, please.
Thank you. Good morning. I had a follow-up for you first on SLC. I believe you mentioned the CAD 150 million annualized fee revenue that could be generated from AUM not yet invested. I was wondering if you had a period over which you expect to realize that, and what margin do you expect to earn on that revenue?
Hi, Nigel. Thanks for the question. You know, when we raise money across our platform, the expected investment periods can vary, but I would say we'd expect to get that money invested over 12-24 months generally. You know, in some funds, the investment period can be three years, so you know, that can be the case. I would say if it goes into the third year in a given fund, you know, you've invested most of the assets by that time. You know, the type of funds that lead to these non-fee-earning assets are generally higher fee asset classes.
It's real estate, it's alternative credit, it's infrastructure, where you raise money in a fund and then you draw it down, and as you draw it down and invest the money, you start earning the fees. As I said, those are higher fee assets. I'm not sure I'd be prepared to give out a specific margin on that. I would say that, you know, across our platform, those would be the higher fee assets that we manage. Therefore, you know, there are some additional costs to go with those assets, but those would generally be our higher margin assets as well.
Okay. I think it's fair to assume it's probably above 20%, based on what you disclosed on your fee-related earnings margin. The next question that I had was on your impact from investment activity, it's favorable experience this quarter. I was wondering if you could provide some color. Is that mainly yield enhancement? How sustainable do you think this quarter's run rate is given the yield environment that we're seeing today?
Hi, Nigel. It's Randy Brown. I'll take that. Some of what you heard in prior quarters is that we had built some dry powder coming into this period with the expectation or the observation that credit spreads were near all-time adjusted lows. Real rates were at all-time lows. Equities were at all-time highs. We took some risk off the table and built dry powder. Some of that dry powder was deployed this past quarter. Some of that dry powder will be deployed as we see opportunities in Q2 and forward. We are seeing opportunities with the dislocations in the market. That was a nice piece. Another piece, as mentioned, was the strong PFI originations and spreads.
We are seeing that continue in Q2. It's a matter of deployment on the balance sheet in terms of how they flow, but we are seeing strong achieving strong spreads there as well.
That's helpful. The last question I had for you, and apologies if you already answered it. On the IFRS 17 update later this month, did you mention that you'd be providing an update on the expected impact on underlying earnings, or is that still further out?
Yeah. I think we're gonna cover a range of topics, including our outlook for our medium-term objectives.
Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Thank you. We have no further questions at this time. We're turning things over to Mr. Bitton for closing remarks.
I would like to thank all of our participants today. Should you wish to listen to the rebroadcast, it will be available on our website later this afternoon. Thank you, and have a good day.
This concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.