Welcome, and thank you all for standing by for the Fiserv Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode until the question and answer session begins. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. At this time, I will turn the call over to Julie Chariell, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Fiserv.
Good morning, and thank you, Ivy, and thank you all for joining us today on short notice. I'm here with Frank Bisignano, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Fiserv, and Bob Hau, Chief Financial Officer. We just issued a press release confirming that Frank was nominated by President-elect Donald J. Trump as the Commissioner of the Social Security Administration. His appointment is subject to confirmation by the U.S. Senate, and Frank will continue in his current positions with the company until confirmation occurs. The Fiserv Board of Directors has an established long-term succession plan, which it will follow to select a successor. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Frank for his remarks, and then we'll open it up to a few questions. Frank?
Hey, thanks, guys, for being here. Thanks for the short notice, and sorry for, you know, if you're not completely caught up. So I thought I'd take a few minutes and talk through this a little bit with y'all, and maybe I need to start with a whole bunch of things that you don't know about me. I'm a son of an orphan, wore a government uniform, retired from Treasury in 45 years, had one of the most coveted awards, the Albert Gallatin Award. But he wasn't a Treasury Department employee, as you would have thought of. It was back in the day when DEA and Customs was in Treasury.
That dad, who was an orphan, you know, was one of 15, and I had a lot of holidays in the basement of that house in Brooklyn when there were a whole bunch of uncles arguing about one item, what was the best branch of the service? And so, you know, I grew up and always knew that I was from a very patriotic household. My grandfather, who lived with us and, you know, came from Italy, left his family behind, and that's why I say I grew up in a multi-generational immigrant household, came to America and joined the Army to fight in World War I to become a citizen and then go back and get his family and bring them here.
I've done a lot with the military, and every time I've had the opportunity with a general, and they thank me for what I do, whether it's military employment or the veterans from Military Institute. I said, I have one regret. I haven't served this country. And they would say to me, no, you are, you are. But of course, I knew they were being kind. I've never had an aspiration to be in government. I wasn't really looking to be in government. People talk to me about things all the time, and I wouldn't really ever think about it. I love my job. I love the company. I love what we're doing here, and I'll talk to you about some of that. I had a planned trip to Brazil that I'm just coming off and got home yesterday. We launched Clover in Brazil.
We saw President Lula. We saw every big bank. Everybody loves Clover. We had an unbelievable time. And, you know, I was faced with, did I want to run an independent agency to go solve what is a bipartisan American problem, Social Security? And my wife and I talked about it, and I think it's much like 9/11. If you ever go back and really, and then you have no reason to want to do this, study me. You'll read in Jamie Dimon's book that he tried to hire me to go to Bank One, and then Sandy Weill decided that he didn't want me to leave, and he kind of made it impossible in a very kind, loving way. And that was before 9/11.
And then when I was on the streets in New York on 9/11, I felt like, gosh, I would feel horrible if I was in Chicago right now. You know, the Social Security Administration Commissioner is not really a glamour job. It's not a job that you could probably ever name one of those commissioners. You know, what was said to me is, you know, I've talked to a lot of very, very, very senior people who've watched me in my career, so you could guess who they are. They said, "If somebody could fix Social Security, this guy could do it." So I feel like I'm doing what's right for the country. I'm not going anywhere. A lot of highway between here and the confirmation. We have a succession plan. We have lots of thoughts around it. We've always had it.
I've worked on it from my first day. I thought it was one of my most important chores, and we have lots of options of how to do it. That's not for this conversation. What's for this conversation is I've talked to every one of you about the construction of this company. It's an unparalleled asset, and that is what the strength of the growth has been and will be. I'll be around here. You know, who knows what happens on a journey, but we're behaving inside the company as I hope you want us to. I'm the Chairman and CEO. I'm running it. I'll be working over the holidays. I was here on Black Friday. I was in Brazil. I have nothing to do in the Social Security revamp till I'm confirmed, and that's going to be months from now, not weeks from now.
So I think it's important you know that. You know, I'm excited for the future here. I feel great about what we've done, but the strength of it and our talent is deep and long, you know, and that's two and three levels deep in my direct report. So I just put it out there that, you know, it's even going on this call, all these things are somewhat emotional for me because I love this company. I love what I do. I think I do it okay. I hope you feel I do it okay. But I will make sure that the place works better when I'm gone. And it's the construction of the company, not, it's a whole team. We met this morning. We're all in. And I think, you know, we'll just continue to get great results for you.
I'm, you know, going to go work for each and every one of you, you know, and, you know, Social Security has 68 million Americans. Doesn't matter who they are. It doesn't matter what party they are. It doesn't matter what, you know, color, creed. You know, it was formed in 1935, and it was broken out in 1994 as an independent agency. It's never had an operator in charge, and I think it's okay to call myself an operator. And it's forecasted to, you know, not be able to do what it does by between 2033 and 2035. And I hope you guys root for me to do that in a way that, you know, I did in other turnarounds.
Pays out a trillion and change, and people think, you know, well, you used to move the money, and you know how to eliminate fraud, and you know how to make things better. So, you know, I'll take my skill and apply it to the American people. And I like the idea that it's an independent agency. The job is not in Washington, D.C. I'm happy, you know, to see any of you for lunch. If I get to that job, we got to see if I can get to that job. And if I don't, I'm happy doing this job. And that's why I'm going to work my ass off the whole way through.
And so otherwise, you know, we'll go have a sandwich when I'm in that job, and you guys could give me advice on what being, you know, and I'll tell you what being a civil servant's like. I don't know if I covered everything I was supposed to. I'm talking from the heart, but, you know, we got a great company. The construction of the company is the key. Nobody has Clover. Nobody's out there in Brazil. I mean, what we did, I mean, like, President Lula was like over the top on it, you know? And we had all our business, small businesses who actually are ours running Clover there in a beautiful session. We have a great construction to this company, and I want you to, I've said that always. Every meeting I say it to you. Also, I'm saying it in this meeting too.
That's the secret sauce to this company, unparalleled asset. Happy to open up for questions or comments, you know, or recommendations on, you know, by the way, you'll be the first public forum to hear this. I have no objective to cut the benefit of any American. We're going to fix it by doing other things.
Thanks, Frank. We would now like to open the lines for questions. For anyone that does have a question, please unmute your phone, hit star one, and record your name when prompted. Again, that's star one to ask a question and star two to withdraw your question. Our first question will come from Darrin Peller from Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.
Frank, first of all, congrats. I can't imagine anyone being in a role to do this better than you, so congrats on it. I guess maybe just start off a couple of quick questions. Number one is, if you could just give us a sense of what the actual actions and moving parts are in terms of the way the company will handle progression and in terms of leadership now, just what's the thought process around it? When should we hear more color on that? And then I guess the second piece, you know, a couple of others would just be whether or not your positions have to be divested. I don't know if you can comment on that or not, but from a stock standpoint, I know there's obviously some tax-free opportunities for anyone that moves to government.
So what are the thought processes around whether you want to have to? And then lastly, just in terms of the position that you can put at the company and to make sure, just give us a couple of steps you'll take to ensure that, you know, everything is running as smoothly as possible over the next couple of years.
Yeah.
Thanks again.
No, look, if you look at every year, I brought in new talent at the senior level while developing fabulous talent at the next level. I mean, we have these co-heads of SMB that I think are future people to run the company after the next person. I want to remind you, I just want to come back to this issue. You know, I mean, I'm going to behave like I'm doing this job till I'm not. I suppose, you know, I don't think we're going to announce a successor unless I'm, you know, confirmed by the Senate. I just want you to know that, you know, because I want to run the company. The board wants me to run the company, and I hope you want me to run the company. And if the day I'm going to Senate, we'll probably be prepared to talk about what we're doing.
But that's not for lack of knowing what we're going to do, if you understand me. I don't think we should be, you know, working on that in the public arena here. But, you know, the board and I always had a plan, a strong plan if I got hit by a car tomorrow. Not an emergency plan, but a strong plan. And then secondarily, you know, we're going to spend some time refreshing thoughts on all the talent. And without this, I'm always have two and three moves deep on my playbook to be prepared for anything. And you watch the slot people in and out, and you watch how business continue to move. So I think you should really expect that of us.
And one of the reasons I wanted to have the call, because I really wanted to have this call, you know. I know that, you know, this could be risk in having this call, but I don't really think so. I wanted to have the call so you could hear my voice. You know, I haven't worked on, I own the stock. I'm owning the stock. I'm not thinking of divesting the stock. I mean, it's too early to even think about that. I'm thinking about driving shareholder value. You know, you see how much stock I've sold over 13, 11 years. You know, I had 4% sold one time over 11 years. So I'm not thinking about that. And I've never heard. I love getting paid in stock. I love this company. And, you know, we're deep. I mean, you know, me and the board spent time this morning.
I wanted you guys to hear me. I wasn't planning on giving you, you know, a succession plan. But you should know, you know, we have one about I got hit by a car, and that's saying it was going to be the one if I'm not hit by a car. And I think that's the best type of succession plan to have, to be honest with you.
Thanks, Frank.
Thank you.
Next, we'll go to the line of Jason Kupferberg from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Frank. I'll add my congratulations as well. Pretty exciting. I know you mentioned you weren't necessarily looking to join government. Can you just talk a little bit more about how the opportunity came about and how those conversations proceeded? And then maybe just one for Bob, I'll ask upfront. I know you were speaking publicly yesterday at a conference. Sounded like you were pretty upbeat about the business, but just wanted to confirm you remain comfortable with your guidance for this quarter as well as the medium-term outlook. Thanks, guys.
Yeah. I mean, like, I think people actually know what I do and who I am, right? So it's not kind of hard to find me. You know, lots of people named that, you know, know me a long time. So my phone, you know, I mean, it's not hard for people to want me to go do things for them. Generally, what they think their big problem is. I really like the opportunity for the country because it is an independent agency, you know, and, you know, it serves the American public, you know? So my clients are your families. So, you know, I wasn't, you know, I had a great freaking gig here, man. I got a great board. I got a great management team. I have fabulous clients. I got one client at nine. I got a client at 10 and one at 12. Three CEOs.
You know, I'm going to be growing revenue the rest of the day. I don't know, you know, if you check my bio, I probably didn't come out from under a rock for somebody to find me to do this job. And when you think about it, it pays out $1.3-$1.5 trillion. And one of the main mandates is, you know, to figure out how to balance it. People go, you know, First Data wasn't supposed to end up what it did. You know, we got a Social Security. I'm probably not gonna, if you want somebody to fix that, I probably guess it'll list pretty fast. And if you call around to the establishment, you know, people who know me, they'll probably say best guy for the job. I mean, that's like, I've had seven fellas and nods like that.
I mean, people think congratulations. I said this to my wife this morning. I said like, I'm sure everybody said, I never said a congratulatory note to somebody who said, you're the best guy for the job. And like, the job needs to be done. Like, it's not glamorous. And maybe that's why I want it, you know? Fixing the mortgage business during the crisis, settling $25 billion with the government and mortgage settlement wasn't sexy. Taking First Data, even, you know, the corner office diagonal from Jamie wasn't sexy. All these other jobs are sexy. I want to do something that you guys will love. So, you know, I mean, it wasn't a long process at all. You know, it was a process that me and my wife had to digest. And I think the fact it's not in Washington.
I think the fact it's, you know, not down the hall. The fact I think it's not a political job. I think it's a job serving everybody in America. So that's, I mean, I hope you can respect that.
For sure. Yeah. And Jason, to your other question, absolutely. As you pointed out, I was at a conference yesterday. We talked about October, November activity with the company. We're in very good shape and expect to deliver on our 2024 commitments as well as our medium-term commitments we laid out in our November 2023 investor day.
Terrific. Thanks, guys.
Yeah, and I'm excited. I'm excited to, you know, do the next earnings call, so you know, I hate talking about that because, you know, I don't know if that'll be my last earnings call, but you know, I'll be glad to hang out with you guys then.
Look forward to it. Thanks, Frank.
Next, we'll go to line of Ramsey El-Assal from Barclays. Please go ahead.
Hi, Frank and Bob. And Frank, a bittersweet congratulations from me as well.
Me too. Me too. Believe me.
Do you have any further thoughts on timing? Is this the type of thing where it just kicks to Congress and who knows how long it is? Or is there any timeline or plans that you can kind of point to in terms of when that might kind of come up? And I guess just secondarily, I'll just ask them both at once here. You kind of mentioned a strong succession plan. That sounds to me like an internal candidate is the most likely, you know, successor. There's not an opportunity here to open it up to an external search. I'm just wondering if that's?
I tell you what. I tell you what. You know, I mean, the amount of people asking me if I want them to do this job is like an unbelievable item. So it's definitely something we have to pay attention to. I mean, my very, very, very, very highly quality. I mean, I mean, sometimes I think you guys forget that, like, you know, I know I run Fiserv, you know, but like, I've been around a really long time and a lot of people know me. And a lot of people love this company we built. So like, we have a very strong succession plan, but that doesn't mean we're going to have blinders on either. And, you know, I mean, I was a little stunned at the notes I got this morning.
You know, Bob has been like stunned now for like nine hours or 13 hours or 18 hours. I don't have to know. You know what I mean?
I do.
And then any thoughts on timing too, Frank?
Timing. Let's put timing in months. You know what I mean? You know, you know, I mean, I keep saying I'm going to be on the earnings call, right? You know, you know, that's February. You know, I mean, this probably isn't the first job that gets the confirmation process. You know what I mean? So most people aren't thinking about this job. I'm sure you were never thinking about this job. I can tell you another guy who was never thinking about this job, me. So I'm going to be here for a while and my staff is happy about that. I'm happy about it. We're going to work together. You know, but, you know, it won't be years, you know, or maybe, you know, like, I'm going to say this, Bob's going to kill me.
Why I'm so guarded is, you know, things happen in the world all the time. I'm maniacally focused on running this joint and being ready if I'm going to go do that job because the country wants me to. But things change too. So we can't, like, we got to behave like we're in the here and now. But it's months, not weeks. How's that? You know, if the inauguration's on the 20th, then, you know, it's not going to be on the 21st.
That's right.
Or probably the 15th of the next month even, you know, or maybe into the next month or sometime, you know, and that's why I'm staying focused on, you know, like, I'm telling clients, you know. First we got a great team. These clients I'm talking to today were on my calendar. They're going to want to know what it means, and I'm going to tell them like you, you know. I'm here to serve them and until I'm not, and of course, we got a great team that serves them that they're familiar with. Sorry for not having the answer. I don't have a date, but it's not, by the way, you know, I'm working on Black Friday. I was in Brazil and I'm going to be working over the holidays, you know. It's our busy time of the year, holiday spending. We love holiday spending.
All right. Thanks, Frank. Appreciate that.
You're welcome.
Thank you. And our final question comes from Dave Koning from Baird. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hey, guys. Congrats, Frank. I feel a lot better about my kids getting their Social Security someday. So thank you for this.
I do too. I do too. I came to work for you always.
Thank you. Thank you for that. And I guess just, yeah, a couple of numbers questions. Just to follow up from Jason's question. So you feel good about medium-term guidance, the $11.60 number for 2026. Is that still the target? And then secondly, is there any government work that could be at risk, I guess, either of going away or maybe on a positive side with you being in government? Does anything change, some of your government education type business or anything like that?
I think this is so, you know, the government's a really big joint. You know, they're down to their last, I don't know, 2.3 billion employees. You know, so I'm glad I'm only working on a small little portion of fixing it. I don't think there's, I mean, you know, we're going to make sure that there's no conflicts and if there's opportunity, you know, I mean, I don't, you know, the conflict would be if we, you know, we're doing something for Social Security, but remember it's an independent agency, and we don't really do anything from, you know.
Yeah. In the $11.60 EPS number.
I mean, in the real world, if this all happened, Fiserv would have a pretty good friend to help them. You know what I mean? All the right way, but you know, the government's a tricky place and you got a lot of hurdles and I think it's. I played as. I hadn't thought about this in this way. It's net positive. You know, it's net positive.
Yeah.
Don't, you know, now you're rooting for me to go.
And Dave, to your second question, yeah, Frank talked about the construct of the company. We laid out, we think, a pretty clear path towards achieving our 2024, 2025, and 2026 objectives and some financial commitments. And our current outlook remains expecting to deliver on those financials that we laid out back in November of 2023.
Yeah. Sounds great. Thanks, guys.
Thank you, Dave.
Okay. Thanks, everyone, for your time. We appreciate the questions and I will be available along with the rest of the team today for any follow-ups. Thanks and have a great day.
Thanks, everyone.
Yeah. Thank you.
Thank you all for participating in today's conference. You may disconnect your line and enjoy the rest of your day.