Good morning, and thank you for holding. Welcome to the Aon plc third quarter 2022 conference call. At this time, all parties will be in a listen-only mode until the question and answer portion of today's call. I would also like to remind all parties that this call is being recorded. If anyone has an objection, you may disconnect your line at this time.
It is important to note that some of the comments in today's call may constitute certain statements that are forward-looking in nature as defined by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from historical results or those anticipated.
Information concerning risk factors that could cause such differences are described in the press release covering our third quarter 2022 results, as well as having been posted on our website. Now it is my pleasure to turn the call over to Greg Case, CEO of Aon plc.
Good morning, everyone. Welcome to our third quarter conference call. I'm joined by Christa Davies, our CFO, and Eric Andersen, our President. As in previous quarters, we posted a detailed financial presentation on our website. We begin by thanking our Aon colleagues for delivering another strong quarter of top and bottom-line growth.
Our recently concluded all-colleague engagement survey reinforces the resilience and commitment of our team as we continue to receive and benefit from exceptional colleague feedback with overall engagement, ways of working, and brand strength all at 80% or greater.
More than ever, colleagues understand the power of our Aon United strategy and have embraced the Smart Working approach we developed to preserve flexibility in how and where we work while enabling them to be better connected and more capable of helping clients make better decisions to support their businesses.
The importance of this support and the exceptional nature of our response is illustrated by our recently released executive risk survey and the tremendous leadership of our team on Hurricane Ian. Taken together, these two data points reinforce the relevance and return on our Aon United strategy. First, our 2022 executive risk survey, which surveyed 800 C-suite executives from global companies, underscores the volatility facing leading organizations and offers a window into their mindset and needs.
A majority surveyed, 79%, see increased volatility on the horizon, but only a third, just 35%, feel fully prepared to manage the impact of that volatility. Most important, those that feel very prepared share three fundamental leadership attributes that reinforce the relevance of our capabilities. First, they see embracing risk as a source of potential competitive advantage.
62% of very prepared leaders agree that their company's appetite for risk has increased in response to the current economic conditions. Second, they're willing to invest in new approaches to address emerging risks. These leaders focus on long-tail risks and call out concerns around disruptive categories like cyber and supply chain. Third, they value expert insight and are looking for partners to help them make better business decisions.
Prepared leaders are nearly twice as likely to look to counsel from an external advisor that can provide a more holistic enterprise perspective on decisions to protect and grow their businesses. While these survey findings reinforce the relevance of our strategy, Hurricane Ian highlights an excellent example of that value in action. To begin, we want to extend our deepest sympathies to those impacted by this event.
In these times of challenge, as communities endure the tragic loss of life and tremendous damage, we believe that our actions as a firm can help businesses and communities respond and recover. As always, our team took a holistic Aon United view towards serving our clients before, during, and after the event. Pre-event, we used our resource development models to ensure that our 1,800 Commercial Risk claims colleagues around the world were prepared to respond to a surge in client need.
This was a collaborative global effort, possible only because of our mindset and single P&L approach. In addition, we were able to use Impact Forecasting models from our insurance team to game out potential hurricane paths and share those insights with our Commercial Risk colleagues so they could alert clients to potential exposures, allowing for early activation of business continuity plans.
During the event, we provided real-time insight on actual harm by leveraging satellite and drone imagery provided through technology partnerships enabled by our Aon Business Services team. This is another example of how our emphasis on technology-driven innovation is reshaping client service at scale.
Post-event, we obviously focused on accelerating claims resolution, but we're also stepping back with clients and taking an enterprise view of what the hurricane means for their benefit plans, leveraging our Health Solutions team and beginning new conversations around how they think about return to work, exploring how our Human Capital Solutions colleagues can apply learnings from our own Smart Working strategy to their workforce management.
This is Aon United in action and only possible because of the decade-plus investment we've made to break down barriers across our business and build Aon Business Services into an engine that provides us the insight and scale necessary to meet client needs.
Turning to performance. In the third quarter, our colleagues delivered excellent results demonstrating continued momentum and year-to-date progress against our key financial metrics. For Q3, organic revenue growth was 5% on top of 12% in the prior year quarter.
Adjusted operating margin was up 100 basis points, and adjusted EPS was up 16%. These results are consistent with our full-year ongoing financial guidance, and we would note that Q3 is our seasonally smallest quarter for revenue.
Year to date, we delivered 7% organic revenue growth, adjusted operating margin expansion of 80 basis points, adjusted EPS growth of 14%, and generated over $2 billion in free cash flow. Turning to solution lines. Commercial Risk delivered 5% organic revenue growth this quarter on top of 13% in the prior year quarter, contributed 7% organic revenue growth year- to- date.
Driven by ongoing strong retention, new business generation, and renewal, highlighting the resilience of our core business as we continue to help clients protect and grow their businesses. As we've previously mentioned, the significant decrease in M&A volume impacted our Transaction Solutions business, especially compared to last year's result, which was particularly strong in Q3 and Q4.
Reinsurance delivered 7% organic revenue growth in the quarter, with 7% year-to-date as our team continues to help clients in the current market while bringing new solutions and capabilities. For instance, our newly established Strategy and Technology Group provides our clients with strategic advice, data-driven consulting, analytics and modeling tools, and is further strengthened by the capability we've gained through our acquisition of Tyche.
This is all at a time when driving growth, efficiency, and resilience have never been more important. Health Solutions delivered 5% organic revenue growth in Q3 on top of 16% in the prior year quarter, contributing to 8% year-to-date growth, with particularly strong growth in Human Capital Solutions. Across health, we see clients assessing their people strategies to optimize for workforce skill and organizational structure while making sure those employees feel valued and engaged.
Finally, Wealth Solutions delivered 2% organic growth on top of 4% in Q3 last year and 2% year-to-date as our team continues to help clients address market volatility, tackle regulatory challenges, and execute ongoing pension risk transfers. In two exciting milestones, our team has advised over $200 billion of pension risk transfer transactions in the U.S. and U.K. as pension plans continue to de-risk and take advantage of market conditions.
We reached the $1 billion mark in client assets and commitments for our pooled employer plan, which helps cover and helps lower costs and enhance retirement security for employees at smaller organizations. Overall, our strong performance in Q3 and year-to-date reflects the strength of our Aon United strategy and Aon Business Services platform delivered for clients across regions and solution lines.
For the full year, we remain confident in our commitment to mid-single digit or greater organic revenue growth, margin improvement, and double-digit free cash flow growth. As our clients assess the impact of increased economic volatility on their businesses, many are looking to improve their own working capital and liquidity, often by accessing new sources of capital. In one recent example, an Aon United example, our client based in Asia was awarded a multi-billion dollar construction contract in Latin America for a manufacturing facility that incorporates innovative carbon reduction technologies.
The client had a regulatory and contractual requirement that they provide a financial performance guarantee, essentially drawing on their own credit facility. To address, our local Commercial Risk team, who has deep understanding of our client's strategy and financial position, collaborated closely with our local credit experts in LatAm to design a bespoke surety bond solution for our client.
Rather than using a bank guarantee facility, our client was able to access capital at a lower cost and more attractive terms while maintaining their own balance sheet strength and flexibility. Just as we've done with intellectual property lending and pension risk transfer solutions, this is another example of how we help clients access new capital to reduce risk and drive their own growth agendas.
In summary, we delivered a strong quarter of top and bottom line results, contributing to our year-to-date progress against key metrics. We continue to be strongly positioned to deliver on our full year financial commitments of mid-single digit or greater organic revenue growth, margin expansion, and double-digit free cash flow growth.
We see increasing opportunity to help our clients and the steps we've taken to operationalize Aon United and our Aon Business Services platform gives us confidence in our ability to address our clients' existing and emerging needs as they continue to protect and grow their businesses. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Christa for her thoughts on our performance in the quarter and year-to-date, as well as our long-term outlook for continued shareholder value creation. Christa?
Thanks so much, Greg, and good morning, everyone. As Greg highlighted, we delivered continued progress on our key financial metrics for both the quarter and year-to-date. Through the first nine months of the year, we translated 7% organic revenue growth into 80 basis points of adjusted margin expansion and 14% growth in adjusted earnings per share and generated over $2 billion in free cash flow.
We look forward to building on this momentum as we head into the last quarter of 2022. As I reflect on our performance year-to-date, as Greg noted, organic revenue growth was 5% in the third quarter and 7% year-to-date. We continue to expect mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth for the full year 2022 and over the long term.
I would also note that flat reported revenue growth in Q3 and 3% year-to-date includes an unfavorable impact from changes in FX of 5% for Q3 and 4% year-to-date, primarily driven by a stronger US dollar versus most currencies. I'd highlight fiduciary investment income, which is not included in our organic revenue growth calculation, was $26 million in Q3 and $35 million year-to-date. Moving to operating performance.
We delivered strong operational improvement through the first nine months of the year with adjusted operating margins of 30%, an increase of 80 basis points driven by organic revenue growth and efficiencies from Aon Business Services, overcoming expense growth, including investment in colleagues and technology to drive long-term growth and some ongoing resumption of T&E.
Looking forward, we expect to deliver margin expansion in 2022 and over the long term as we continue our track record of cost discipline and managing investments in long-term growth on an ROIC basis. As we've previously communicated, we think about margins over the course of a full year. We expect continued investment in colleagues and ongoing resumption of T&E as well as ongoing investments in long-term growth like technology throughout the year.
Aon Business Services is a key contributor to margin expansion and represents a competitive advantage, especially in a highly inflationary market. Our Aon Business Services platform continues to drive efficiency gains, improved quality and service, and increased innovation at scale. Let me share one fantastic example of how Aon Business Services platform supports ongoing improvement as we automate day-to-day processes around the firm.
Reinsurance has operated on a single global broking platform and client service model since 2017. Over the past five years, the team has digitized processes, automated workflows and moved work to low cost locations. 64% of transactions are now processed digitally, increasing speed and accuracy, which has helped reduce the average number of days it takes to get claims from carriers paid to our clients by 22% from 38 to 30 days.
Increase in capacity enabled 27% more throughput while costs are up just 9% over five years. A particularly impressive outcome when considering recent cost and wage inflation trends. The platform enables the team to provide enhanced services while dealing with more complex transactions. An Aon United outcome that allows our colleagues to better support each other and our clients.
We continue to find and capture efficiency opportunities like this around the firm and expect Aon Business Services will continue to be a driver of ongoing efficiency improvements, quality and service improvements and increased innovation for clients. We translated strong operating income growth into double-digit adjusted EPS growth of 16% in Q3 and 14% year to date.
As noted in our earnings materials, FX translation was an unfavorable impact of approximately $0.05 per share in Q3 and $0.34 per share year to date. If currency remains stable at today's rates, we would expect an unfavorable impact of approximately $0.11 per share or approximately $33 million decrease in operating income in the fourth quarter of 2022. Turning to free cash flow and capital allocation.
Free cash flow increased 79% year to date to $2.051 billion, reflecting an increase in cash flow from operations due primarily to the $1 billion termination fee payment in the prior year period. As we've communicated before, free cash flow can be lumpy quarter to quarter. I'd note Q4 is our seasonally strongest for free cash flow generation.
We continue to expect to deliver double-digit free cash flow growth for the full year and over the long term driven by operating income growth and working capital improvements. Given our strong outlook for free cash flow growth in 2022 and beyond, we expect share purchases to continue to remain our highest return on capital opportunity for capital allocation.
We believe we are significantly undervalued in the market today, highlighted by the approximately $1.2 billion of share repurchase in the quarter and $2.5 billion year to date. We also expect to continue to invest organically and inorganically in content and capabilities to address unmet client needs. We've invested in expertise and content in our retirement business, where we're helping clients navigate regulatory changes such as GMP in the U.K. and utilizing higher interest rates to drive record levels of pension risk transfers.
Our M&A pipeline continues to be focused on our priority areas that will bring scalable solutions to our clients growing and evolving challenges. We'll continue to actively manage the portfolio and assess all capital allocation decisions on a return on capital balance basis. Now turning to our balance sheet and debt capacity.
We remain confident in the strength of our balance sheet and manage liquidity risk through a well-laddered debt maturity profile. We issued $500 million of 10-year senior notes in Q3 and as we've said before, we'll continue to add debt as EBITDA grows while maintaining our current investment-grade credit ratings.
With respect to interest rates, I'd note that our term debt is all fixed rate with a weighted average interest rate of approximately 3.8% and a weighted average maturity of approximately 12 years. I'd also note that our pension liability improves as interest rates increase and historically we've taken steps to de-risk this liability and reduce volatility. In summary, our strong financial results in the quarter and year-to-date demonstrate continued momentum and progress against our key financial metrics.
While we're seeing signs of economic uncertainty, we remain confident in the strength of our firm and our financial guidance for 2022. Overall, our business is resilient and our Aon United strategy gives us confidence in our ability to deliver results in any economic scenario. With that, I'll turn the call back over to the operator and we'd be delighted to take your questions.
Thank you. At this time, we'll be conducting a question and answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you'd like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Our first question comes from the line of Jimmy Bhullar with JPMorgan. Please proceed with your question.
Hi. Good morning. First I just had a question on the Commercial Risk business. Your organic growth slowed sequentially. Obviously comps were
More difficult as well. You mentioned that Asia, Latin America, and U.K. grew at a pretty strong pace, and there was a slowdown in U.S. retail business because of lower transaction volumes. Can you sort of elaborate on that and what you're seeing in the U.S. business?
Yeah, Jimmy, thanks for the question. Listen, as we've highlighted again, on commercial specifically, but it really plays out for the firm overall, 7% organic year to date, 11% year to date last year, and then 13% in the quarter as you highlight, and really just strong across the board, across all geographies and real strength in core P&C and affinity. We really would highlight that.
The only thing we highlighted that was a little different was obviously the M&A transaction levels last year were extraordinary, and our capability there is just exceptional. Eric, maybe you can talk a little bit about that. That's really what, you know, we're not gonna repeat this year, but overall, very, very strong momentum, as we finish the year this year and move into next year.
Eric, any thoughts on that?
Sure, Greg, a great question. I would say, you know, from an overall perspective, Commercial Risk had very solid new business numbers, very solid retention and rollover numbers, Greg, as you mentioned in your prepared remarks. I would just say, look, on Transaction Solutions, you know, we are serving the private equity industry and the corporate industry as they make acquisitions and divestitures.
We, you know, during a period like this where it's a little bit slower, are spending time with the markets, with the Reinsurance markets, with the clients, building out our strategy for when it, you know, ultimately comes back. Feel like the team that we have today is, you know, fantastic.
They're also working very hard with their clients, making sure we've got the next generation of product ready, when the economic environment changes.
Okay. I think you mentioned modestly positive benefit from pricing the last few quarters and this quarter as well. If we think about the reinsurance business, there's obviously a lot of dislocation there. Can you talk about how you expect that to affect your results? Should there be a greater tailwind from pricing, at least on the reinsurance side?
Maybe I'll start with the overall, Jimmy, and then Eric just pick up on the reinsurance front in particular. Overall, Jimmy, as you highlighted, we look at market impact. That's how we think about it. Obviously, it includes insured values and price. We'd highlight modest impact sort of in the quarter and expect for the year. Over time, you can expect insured values will begin to creep up.
That will actually have a you know a sustained lasting impact over time. You know, we'll see how the pricing piece changes out, but overall market impact kind of you know modest as we think about the impact here. The reinsurance dynamic's important and is evolving. Eric, you wanna pick up on that?
Sure, Greg. Maybe just one comment on just the general pricing environment on the primary side. You know, I think you laid it out right. Also, I think we've talked about this before. We spend a lot of time with our clients using data and analytics to kind of understand the choices they need to make. While inflation and while pricing may be moving against them from this perspective, you know, they don't sit still.
They're looking at whether it's captive utilization, whether it's retentions, deductibles, limits, all those tools, and we try and help them think through what's best for them as they're navigating the sort of economic changes that they're facing in their business.
While the market is, as you said, Greg, there is effect of inflation and pricing, we're certainly, you know, working with them as they, as clients, as they make those decisions. Certainly on the reinsurance, I think it's worth just stepping back.
There is a lot going on right now on the reinsurance side. Our primary mission continues to be to help our insurance company clients match risk with capital, right? Remember, this is a global business like few in terms of where the capital is sourced from and how it's deployed, and it shows up very differently in different parts of the world. I think as we move away from Hurricane Ian, we start to get a little more clarity around what the ultimate losses look like and who's holding those losses.
If you step back and think about it geographically, you know, the European clients, I think, are expecting to have the supply of property cat that they need, albeit with a pricing and structure negotiation that takes into account the effects of inflation that's happening in Europe, but also the losses that have happened in that region over the last three years, whether it's German floods, French hail, et cetera.
They've got, you know, certain dynamics that have affected the European marketplace. I think for North America, the property cat market's gonna be more challenging. You know, managing the effects of inflation, the supply challenges, some remaining uncertainty around Ian, you know, will create difficulties, but ultimately, we're focused on creating capital for them, capital options, so they can get the protection that they need going forward.
I would also say it also has an effect on facultative reinsurance and other tools that we have because as those insurers are forced to take higher retentions, they certainly are gonna continue to look to de-risk. They just do it with different tools, right? They actually then will look at specific clients that they've got on their primary portfolio that they want help on. They'll use facultative instead of treaty. While the market does shift, there are levers out there that we bring to bear for our clients that can actually, you know, help them de-risk and get the protection that they need.
Last thing I just wanna highlight on this, Jimmy, before we leave this point. This is a tremendous for us. I mean, this is where we live. There is more activity going on with a set of capabilities that are unique in the world today. What our colleagues have built on the reinsurance side is extraordinary, and we've just added to it with data and analytics and all that we've done with our strategy and technology effort now added with Tyche that I mentioned before.
Eric described the market perfectly, but boy, this is our wheelhouse. We love it. It creates tremendous opportunity to support clients, and we're bringing all the solutions to bear and, you know, in many respects, helping our clients manage challenging times.
For us, it's a great opportunity for the next 12-24 months.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Elyse Greenspan with Wells Fargo. Please proceed with your question.
Hi. Thanks. Good morning. My first question is on the margin side. In the quarter, you guys saw 100 basis points of margin improvement. If I assume that all the fiduciary investment income fell to the bottom line, that could give you a tailwind of 90 basis points. I'm just trying to get a sense of that 100. Can you give us a sense of the split between how much in the margin improvement came from the pickup in fiduciary investment income versus core margin improvement and operating leverage?
Sure. Thanks for the question, Elyse. Look, what we would say is we think about this in terms of year to date. Year to date, we had a $35 million benefit from investment income. So it's about a 20 basis point impact on full year margins. It's not nearly as big as the numbers you highlighted, Elyse. For us, as we think about growing margin expansion for the full year, which we are completely committed to doing, it's really about continuous drive organic revenue growth, the portfolio mix in higher revenue growth, higher margin areas, and the productivity benefits we're getting from our own business services. We're fully on track to deliver full year margin expansion.
As we think about rates continuing to rise, right, so that fiduciary investment income should go higher from here. When we're not just thinking Q4, but 2023 as well, do you guys think most of the benefit will fall to the bottom line, or how do you balance letting it fall versus looking to, you know, take some extra dollars to invest internally?
First of all, Elyse, what I would say is we manage $6 billion of fiduciary investment income, and every 100 basis points of increase is $60 million top line and bottom line. Elyse, we're doing a lot of work for clients to actually manage that. We're actually doing all the insurance accounting and transaction processing in the middle on paying premiums on the way in and then paying claims on the way out. Just one correction, Elyse, the impact of fiduciary investment income in the quarter is 70 basis points, not 90.
Okay, thanks. My last question was going back just to the comments on transactions within Commercial Risk. I know you guys highlighted lower transaction volume. Was the third quarter of last year heavier for that business, or will we also potentially see that impact the growth there in the fourth quarter as well?
Yeah. Elyse, if we take a step back, again, I just emphasize literally look at the quarter overall for us and sort of year to date. Team's just done a tremendous job year to date, 7% overall, 9% over 9% last year, real strength across the board. The M&A activity that we described and talked about was really Q3 and Q4, both levels of activity exceptionally strong.
But hasn't changed in any way, shape, or form, as Christa described exactly where we are now as we think about mid-single digit or greater for the year, margin expansion and double-digit free cash flow growth. I just, you know, would highlight Eric's points around the strength of our team. It's really extraordinary, and what they've been able to do and how that's evolved over time.
They're exceptionally well-positioned as the market comes back.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Michael Zaremski with BMO Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.
Hey, good morning. Happy Friday. Maybe thinking about free cash flow. You know, last year, as you guys helped us out with, you know, there's clearly a good amount of noise this year. Are there any items that you feel you wanna call out? Maybe on the working capital improvement side, you know, you mentioned, Christa, the Q4 is usually a pretty strong quarter. I'm looking at free cash flow this year as a percentage of revenues, for example. It's a very healthy level. I just wanna make sure I'm not missing something.
Mike, I don't think you're missing anything. You know, free cash flow, $2.051 billion year to date, up 79%. Nothing particularly unusual. We did mention in Q1 and Q2 that we had a lower levels of free cash flow because of higher incentive comp based on extraordinary performance in 2021. That's the only thing I would note.
Then I would say in general, we're gonna continue to drive free cash flow growth double digits, based on continued acceleration in revenue growth, margin expansion, and then working capital improvements. You did see, if you look at the external receivables divided by revenue, on the balance sheet, that DSO improved by 2 days from Q3 2021 to Q3 2022. It went from 91 days down to 89 days.
We're very pleased with our continued progress in working capital.
Have you stated as the goal to get down well below 89 over time, or is that the main lever for working capital over the next few years?
What we have said, Mike, is that we have essentially $500 million of excess receivables sitting on our balance sheet, and that over time, we will continue to improve DSO to get that $500 million to zero. That is a big upside in free cash flow growth over the coming years.
Okay, great. That's helpful. Maybe switching gears, curious if, you know, cyber insurance, you guys are one of the leaders in the marketplace. It's, you know, clearly, rates are up a lot, but clients are still, we're seeing still buying just as much or more. Maybe you can comment on the cyber market, but I'd also be curious to hear about whether the intellectual property market, which I think you guys are one of the pioneers of, is gaining any traction. Thank you.
Sure. This is Eric, and maybe I'll take a shot at it. On the cyber market, we continue to see great growth in the business. I would say what has changed, if anything, over the last several months is really the renewed focus on quality underwriting. If you remember at the very beginning of that product, it was all about risk management, risk identification, risk management, and then risk transfer.
I think what happened to the market is they went immediately to risk transfer without enough focus on the quality of the risk mitigation and the risk management. As the market has reacted, you know, due to losses, they essentially went back to basics. I think ultimately the market will be healthier for it. We continue to see great growth.
We invest, you know, globally in our capability there and really like our position and the work that we're doing for clients. I would say on intellectual property, very similar. Couldn't be more excited about where we are with that. Continue to see great deal flow, getting markets to join the product. We actually did our first IP reinsurance treaty this quarter. Certainly not big dollars, but a real symbol on how we're bringing a broader market to bear on supporting that product as it develops. Really excited about both of them and think, you know, we've got a great lead in the market with our capability, and we're gonna continue to invest and push to develop those markets in a broader way.
Mike, I can help with it. I do have to call out the IP progression has been, as Eric said, extraordinary. If you go back four years ago, you know, we bring in 25, 30 colleagues in to sort of think about this. We're 200 strong now in this category. No one had ever actually valued an IP stack as such that our patent stack could actually be insured against, let alone borrow against. Now we've done, you know, 15+ deals. I think we talked about last quarter, we crossed $1 billion in lending on this front. As Eric said, now we have multiple markets involved and even reinsurance involved. This is a progression.
It's still very, very early days, but man, the team's done a tremendous job sort of building out this opportunity.
Thank you. Best of luck.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of David Motemaden with Evercore ISI. Please proceed with your question.
Hi. Thanks. Good morning. I just had a question on the wealth business, just on the AUM, the AUM base delegated investment management that was cited as a headwind. Could you give us an idea how much the AUM base was down and how we should think about that going forward as markets remain under pressure?
It was down, David. We didn't give the impact of it, but you're absolutely right. The way in which we earn fees in that delegated business is percentage on AUM. It really depends on how the markets go as to how we see that progressing going forward. I would say offsetting that, you know, decline on the investment management side was fantastic growth on the retirement side, as Greg and I talked about on our prepared remarks. We've got enormous growth dealing with regulatory change, particularly GMP in the U.K. Fantastic work going on there by the team.
As global interest rates rise, it's one of the best environments to do pension risk transfers that have happened in the last 15 years, and we are the global leader at this. We're very, very excited about our position in that space. As we mentioned on the call, our PEP product in the U.S. is doing exceptionally well. Where there are so many areas on the retirement side where we have great opportunities for growth. Eric, I mean, what else would you add here?
No, because I think you covered all of it. We're just really excited about watching the retirement business in particular really add great value to our clients. You know, the U.K., certainly some great activity going on there, and the U.S. as well. That PEP product, which is the Pooled Employer Plan, really is a great, you know, expense solution for our smaller clients as they look to manage the retirement asset. You covered it well and really a solid quarter for them.
Got it. That's helpful. Maybe just going back to Commercial Risk, I guess I was just wondering if you could talk about, I guess maybe just say what the growth was if we were to just exclude that U.S. retail, that retail's comp that was a bit tougher, and how that compared versus last quarter. Did we see any slowdown there sequentially, or was it really just all driven by the U.S. retail's tougher comp?
Yeah, David, as we described, listen, we would step back really tremendous progress across the board as you think about sort of what's happening on the Commercial Risk front. We highlighted what really is an is an opportunity which we see over time that's gonna be tremendous on the Transaction Solutions side, but overall, really strong across the board and just continues to build momentum as we described before.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Meyer Shields with KBW. Please proceed with your question.
Thanks. Two quick questions if I can. First, Eric, I was hoping you could talk a little bit more about capacity shortfalls in the U.S., in the context of the impact of rising interest rates on capital, and how much more work does that actually entail for, the Reinsurance unit?
If you think about, I'm assuming you're talking about property cat at this point.
Yes.
The casualty basis on the reinsurance, which people don't tend to talk about, but is a substantial part of the industry. You know, they're continuing to battle their own inflation understanding as they price long tail products. I do think that market is, while it's challenged, it is more around price and structure, not about supply.
Listen, I think as property cat in the U.S. continues to be challenged for a couple of reasons. One, you've got significant losses, both on the traditional things like hurricane, but also as you think about wildfire, storms, the secondary perils have been a substantial hit to reinsurers over the last five years. There is certainly a crisis of confidence in underwriting and how they deploy their capital for our clients. Models have to be better.
We really have to focus hard on making sure risk identification, they understand exactly what they're offering and what the sort of return scenarios are for them over time. The effects of interest rates really affect the ILS market, which has two, I would say two headwinds right now. One is there's some trapped capital with Hurricane Ian, as people are trying to figure out exactly what the losses are, what the damage is.
And there's also the relative investment question of as interest rates go up, their ability to find other assets that don't risk their capital is something that essentially just creates a repricing, I think of the ILS market, which is happening. For us, I think it doesn't necessarily create work, it creates understanding of the market dynamics and the returns.
We're in the middle of that right now as we lead up to the big 1-1 renewal season, and then again in April and July.
Meyer, I know we've got another question, and I'll come to that, but this really does, as Eric described, reinforces the opportunity. When you can take apart the market the way Eric just described and have the analytics to really do something about it, drive solutions on behalf of clients, this is what puts us in such a unique position, against the rest of the world on this topic. Again, a lot going on out there, and we love it every day because it puts us in a very, very unique position.
No, that's very helpful. I understand that. Thanks. I guess a question for Christa, maybe. You talked about how there's more pension risk transfer going on, and you also mentioned how higher interest rates benefit Aon's pension funding. I'm wondering, I understand that there's more willingness to take pension liabilities from people in a higher interest rate environment, but wouldn't there be less demand for transfer if interest rates are higher?
There's always been capacity. The real challenge, Meyer, is the economics haven't made it make sense to actually be able to buy out because you haven't been able to execute the transfers without being able to add the cash given to get to fully funded. The increase in interest rates is getting plans to fully funded, which means that they can actually do this transfer. The capacity's always been there. It's more that the pension plans haven't been funded enough to be able to make this work. I would say we're seeing more demand from this for buy-ins and buyouts from clients than we have in the last 10+ years. We have done substantial numbers of pension risk transfers in the U.S. and the U.K. and are very, very well positioned to do this.
It's a very exciting growth area for us.
Okay. Phenomenal. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, our final question this morning comes from the line of Joshua Shanker with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.
Yeah, thank you for getting me at the end here. You spoke on the prepared remarks about higher expenses from T&E resumption. Both as a consultant and a protector of the risk of your clients as well as internally, can you talk about the shape that's happening, where we are relative to where we were 2.5 years ago, and if we go into recession, whether we're topping out here on T&E and whatnot?
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Josh Shanker. I would say, T&E is obviously up from, you know, 2020 and 2021 levels. It's not back to 2019 levels, really because we're actually very thoughtful about how we do the work. You know, we've implemented Smart Working, which I know Greg Case talked about in relation to our engagement survey. It's one of the things that's driving employee engagement to the highest levels in our history. Because we're very thoughtful about, you know, where is the best place. There are a number of areas, and Eric Andersen, you might want to talk about them, where we're doing work in different ways, and it has a higher impact on clients. Eric Andersen?
Yeah, Christa, I think that's great. I think it drives productivity of our colleagues. It drives engagement, as you said, really being able to use the technology that we've been investing in through our Aon Business Services model over a number of years. Just there's something that happened a week or two ago that just came to mind as you were talking, Christa.
We do these insight series across the world with our clients. Normally, historically, we'd have flown everybody in from around the world, and this one happened to be in Australia, so it would have been a week of time for the team off the grid as they went to present, you know, an hour slot for, you know, whatever topic they were asking for.
On this one in particular, we had our climate team, which is based in London, that's been working on building the climate strategy for us, essentially Webex into the insight series meeting, did the question and answer, actually gave a great presentation, and then when they were finished, they were home and they were back on to the next topic and continuing to work.
We were able to bring that capability without the big expense of travel and entertainment. We were able to deliver the capability, and we gained the hours that we would have lost to the flights and the jet lag and everything else that we all know about in a way that drives more productivity. That's just one example. There's many of them that follow the similar path.
We just did a big renewal meeting, for example, for a big U.S. client where we used the immersion room in our New York office and brought in the European insurers and reinsurers and the London European insurers and reinsurers, and essentially did what would have been a three-week trip, turned it into a five-hour session in one location.
Again, saves time, saves money. More importantly, the clients are finding value in it. They actually feel like they're getting that connection with the markets that they want. Our colleagues, it absolutely allows us to show off our global colleagues in a way that you don't really get to do when you're traveling place to place and so focused on schedule.
We're really excited about it, and Christa said it's driving engagement, and more importantly, productivity, and I think the clients are really enjoying the time they get back as well.
Just can you add and this is obviously been Aon's experience, is this similar to what your understanding is going on with your clients, or is your clients' cost rising faster than your crack team of, I guess, spend managers can manage for the company itself?
I would say, you know, our Human Capital business spends a lot of time working with our clients on how to do Smart Working. I think as we come you know, the pandemic is further and further in the rearview mirror, people are finding their new normal, and our teams are doing, I think, a great job helping them structure and engage with our clients in a way that they're able to do the same thing because our clients are also looking to get productivity, they're also looking to manage T&E, and they wanna leverage the technology that we all used so much during the pandemic in ways that actually create the outcomes that they're looking for.
Really, Josh, as you think about it, the whole phenomena you're highlighting, it really ends up being incredibly substantial and significant for us, but even, you know, more so for our clients. It, Eric described it well, but just combine the whole wellness issues and challenges, it really connects with our health business now in ways that it hasn't before.
It's a very integrated response, cutting across multiple solution lines. It's the best example, you know, another example of Aon United in action as we help clients try to understand how they can really address the work environment, Smart Working, as we describe it, but even more broadly, how it impacts their own engagement and how they drive, you know, talent acquisition, talent retention, talent enrichment. It's a real opportunity for us, and it really.
The beauty of it is it connects across multiple solution lines, which is perfect Aon United from our standpoint.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our question and answer session. I'll turn the floor back to Mr. Case for any final comments.
Just wanna say thanks to everybody for joining us. We appreciate it, and look forward to talking next quarter. Thanks very much.
Thank you. This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time.