Azimut Holding (Milan:AZM) Q1 2026 Earnings Call

0:00 Good afternoon. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the Azimut Holding's First Quarter twenty twenty six Results Conference Call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Georgia Meda, Chief Executive Officer of Azimut Holding. Please go ahead. Thank you. And good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today for Azimut's first quarter twenty twenty six results presentation. As you know, I'm Sergio Mera, CEO of the group, and I'm pleased to be here in Milan with Alessandro Zambotti, our CEO and the group CFO and Alex Sopera, Head of Investor Relations.

0:56 So following a defining a record breaking 2025, I'm quite proud to say that the first three months of 2026 have proven that our growth trajectory is indeed structural and accelerating. We started the year exceptionally well, setting a very powerful pace that underpins another year of expected high quality growth. So let's get it started and move to slide number three, please. Despite adverse and volatile market conditions during the quarter, our teams across the globe have once again demonstrated the true strength, scalability, and resilience of our diversified business model. We closed the first quarter achieving a staggering €4,600,000,000 in net inflows, an absolute record alongside a highly solid net profit of 125,000,000 And finally, I want to highlight that €4,000,000,000 of these inflows were entirely organic, making it our best results on record for organic growth and this translates also in attractive double digit growth in recurring net profit.

2:03 Alongside these strong operating numbers, we are making steady progress on our broader strategic priorities. First of all, in The U. S, we have successfully integrated the NSI, further strengthening our footprint in the world's largest loss market and where we are about to launch a suite of active ETFs bringing our market leading global asset management capabilities value to American investors. Meanwhile, the TMB spin off remains firmly on track. It is a transformational step, I remind you, for the group that will unlock significant value and we are working diligently towards this completion. And Alessandro will discuss it in more detail later in the presentation. And on the back of the strong start of the year and our continued operating momentum, we confidently confirm our full year 2026 guidance of €10,000,000,000 in net inflows and €550,000,000 in net profit.

2:56 And with that, let us please move to Page number four. Here we detail the financial metrics that underscore this robust start to the year. Total assets reached €144,000,000,000 at the end of March, up 32% year on year. And this reflects both strong organic growth and the continued expansion of our global platform. In terms of net inflows, the story here is a sustained commercial momentum of our global platform with half of inflow generated outside of our domestic operations remains strong and continues to be the cornerstone of our success. Importantly, this growth is translated directly into high quality financial growth.

3:41 Looking at the top line, we delivered €271,000,000 of revenues. We have recurring revenues up 14% year on year and this is highlighting the resilience of our business mix. The same momentum is visible in profitability with recurring EBIT increasing by 14% and group net profit reaching €125,000,000 with recurring net profit actually being up 15% year on year. Let me also highlight that global operations have contributed €14,000,000 of net profit representing 12% of the group's total. This contribution is still below its long term potential and was temporarily impacted by transitory items and business growth effects as we scale our platform.

4:28 However, the direction is clear and we expect this contribution to continue growing as our global platform matures. In summary, Q1 twenty twenty six set the pace for another year of robust and sustainable growth. So turning to slide five, we look here at the bridge from our reported net profit of €150,000,000 in the first quarter of twenty twenty five to our current €125,000,000 As the title of this slide suggests, this is a clear story of high quality earnings expansion driving record profitability. So we start from the left and you can see here very clearly a strong 14% uplift in our recurring operating performance after cost.

5:13 If you want to see that differently, we grew by €20,000,000 We also generated €4,000,000 in better performance fees, split equally across both our mutual funds and our insurance products. And let me remind you that this has been done during a quarter where market conditions certainly were not the easiest for everyone. However, it's important to know that the markets around the world and our global operations book performance fees on a semi annual basis. Hence, there will be certainly a better contribution coming at the end of Q2. This strong operating strong quality of operating drivers were only slightly offset by €2,000,000 impact from our strategic affiliates and the GP stake, primarily due to lower dividends from the GP stake in our business and due to an €11,000,000 impact from other items below EBIT and Alexander will detail on those later.

6:16 While this reflects higher gains on our own investments year on year and the continued strong growth on Nova, there were some negative fair value options net of non operating costs, finance expenses and higher minorities. So, yes, the ultimate takeaway from this bridge is that our recurring net profit grew by an impressive 15% year on year reaching €128,000,000 Now turning to Slide six and seven very briefly, we provide here a deeper look under the hood of our reclassified profit and loss payments by business lines and geography. So we start with integrated solutions on Slide six, which is our core business dedicated to retail and affluent customers. Here, our clients, let me remind you, value benefit from our full vertical integration and the direct synergy of our investment professionals and financial advisors.

7:10 As a result of this business command superior margins and as we are seeing robust growth here coupled with disciplined cost control in Italy, we see this vertical expanding across all metrics and ultimately our recurring net profit margin increasing year on year to 71 basis points. In our Global Wealth division, the higher net profit margin year over year reflects the scalability of our proposition across our key international financial hubs and resulting increase in recurring and ancillary revenues. Looking at our institutional and wholesale business, we delivered a strong asset revenue growth driven primarily by Novo and the AZIH. While the bottom line for this specific segment is temporarily impacted as we integrate the latter and the SI into our platform, we remain highly confident that the strategic value and future revenue potential will unfold in short order already during the course of 2026.

8:12 So, finally, looking at our strategic affiliates, we are seeing that strong business growth is progressively and finally translating into improved profitability, yet impacted by financing costs as investments are still in an expansion phase. So moving to Slide seven and zooming in by region, the message is very much the same and consistent across our entire global footprint. In Italy, we continue seeing outstanding resilience and commercial momentum with our net profit reaching €110,000,000 and our recurring net profit margin remaining exceptionally strong at 67 basis points. Globally, top line growth in America is being driven by the premier change. I mean, we said following the consolidation of AZIH. And while the net profit contribution from this global operation is temporarily impacted right now, it's fully expected to unfold progressively as we bring these assets to scale.

9:10 And all of this while maintaining a healthy group recurring profit margin of 41 basis points. Ultimately, the takeaway from both of these slides is clear, continued platform expansion, resilient margins supported by cost discipline are driving our net profit increase across Italy, The Americas, the Asia Pacific region, and Europe and The Middle East areas. So now moving to slide eight, more on the qualitative side of our business performance. We see that our commitment to global excellence, a global local expertise is benefiting not only our clients but also recognized by the industry.

9:57 On this slide, you see a selection of recent awards that we have won around the world. I'm particularly proud to highlight that Azimut was recently named the World's Best Independent Wealth Manager at the Private Banking Awards twenty twenty six by Euromoney in Singapore. This prestigious global recognition highlights the trends and consistency of our independent business model. It acknowledges our commitment to excellence and our ability to combine a solid international presence with a long term strategic vision. And all this in turn allow us to deliver high quality tailored advice services to clients worldwide. Beyond this overarching global award, you will see top recognitions across our entire asset management platform. For example, in Brazil, AZIHFUET was recognized at the Majorito Mercado twenty twenty six awards organized by Xtampi BTG Patrol.

10:52 And furthermore, in The United States, Nosquare Investment was named as a winner of the twenty twenty six Lipper Fund Awards for its preferred income securities fund. From The Americas, our specialized Islamic funds and our Asian wealth management teams, our investment capabilities are being celebrated locally and globally. And this growth success proves that we are delivering superior performance and measurable client value in each market that we operate in. Turning to Slide nine, we zoom here on the performance of our Italian clients and we look at the net weighted average performance that we have delivered since the start of the year, as I mentioned earlier, in adverse and volatile market conditions.

11:37 We had a very solid start and certainly the period was not easy for everyone in the market. But we managed to overcome the sharp turbulence in March triggered by the geopolitical anxieties that led to a sharp and sudden market correction. However, our teams have stayed highly disciplined and maintaining a constant dialogue between our portfolio managers, our financial advisors, and ultimately our clients. And we have successfully navigated this complexity. I'm pleased to report that despite the highly unpredictable market, our net weighted average performance delivered to clients year to date is at 2.1% that is currently beating the industry benchmark by about 50 basis points.

12:32 So, our outlook remains confident with resilient global growth, solid corporate earnings, the potential easing of global trade tensions expected in May, we are perfectly positioned to capture further upside for our clients. At the same time, let me stress that we are driving forward our strategic expansion and continuous product innovation in private markets. And certainly, we are empowered by our global ecosystem. We recently secured exclusive access for our Italian clients to a prominent U. S. Artificial intelligence project, allowing them to converse alongside leading institutional investors. And including this club deal, our private market inflows in recent months have exceeded €950,000,000 projecting us firmly towards our goal to of over €2,000,000,000 of private market funds raising by the end of this year. And with this, I hand over to Alexander to give you more insight into our financials.

13:41 Yes. Thank you, Giorgio, and good afternoon to everyone. So moving to Slide 10 and let us break down the quality of the revenues. Total revenues reached EUR $371,000,000, which represents a solid 50% increase year on year. This was primarily driven by our recurring fees, which grew by nearly EUR 39,000,000 or 14% year on year. If we break this down further, our global business adjusted grew by EUR 28,000,000 and this was significantly boosted by an €80,000,000 perimeter effect from the successful integration of MSI, Kennedy Capital, CyPost and NOx. And furthermore, our existing global business added almost €9,000,000 led by solid organic growth in Brazil, Singapore, 10 digits.

14:35 It's also looking to Italy, we also delivered strong growth across all the business lines, adding over EUR 10,000,000 to our recurrent fees and this was supported by the usage perimeters of the public fund, the private market fund, our advisory service and also our partnership of Nova. And while we achieved impressive double digit growth year on year and let me spend a moment comparing these figures against the fourth quarter, we achieved quarterly growth despite the natural headwind, providing fewer billing days in February. And if we adjust for those missing days, it can account for the adverse March market that Giorgio mentioned before. So our actual growth is actually higher than compared to the quarter. So therefore, we look consistently ahead with increasing of the figures for the remainder of the remaining part of the year.

15:35 Looking at the performance fees, we recorded EUR 2,000,000 increase year on year. This positive result was mainly driven by momentum in Monaco, Singapore, Turkey and Switzerland, which successfully offset a EUR 1,300,000 negative pull through effect in Italy. Furthermore, looking to our executional revenue, we reached €35,500,000 for the quarter. This includes a very solid base of €28,500,000 in highly stable recurring revenues due to the underlying asset growth and a favorable product mix. And also as well, we benefit from €7,000,000 in insurance performance fee, mostly recorded in January and February.

16:26 Finally, our centric commission income and the other revenues also showed a strong positive development, primarily driven by higher centric fees across Dubai, Switzerland, Monaco and Singapore. So overall, are features of highly resilient and high quality of revenue generation that definitely support our growth looking also to the following quarters. So then moving to Slide 11, we analyze the evolution of our operating costs. Total operating costs for the first quarter amount to EUR206 million, which represents a 15% increase year on year. This projection is entirely current with the expansion of our consolidation perimeter and the underlying growth of our business.

17:16 Breaking down the main components, distribution costs increased by €4,000,000 to €116,000,000 and this variation is directly correlated with the growth in our accounting revenues both in Italy and abroad. And within this line item, we observed AZIHF such as security and severance payment for our Italian financial adviser, which were largely mitigated by lower provision for valuable incentive and reduced marketing costs and costs related to events. Looking to the personnel and the SG and A expenses, we have an increase of €20,000,000 year on year to reach €82,000,000 I would point out that €90,000,000 of this increase is entirely linked to our global business. This is primarily reflect the change in perimeter that we just mentioned for the recurring fees and are related to The United States and Brazil for the amount of €40,000,000 On the other way around, in Italy, we have an increase of €1,000,000 confirming our ongoing cost discipline in our domestic operation.

18:31 Finally, depreciation and amortization and provision increased by €2,000,000 This movement remains substantially linear and primarily reflects the perimeter effect that we just mentioned also for the previous line of the P and L. So in summary, our cost dynamics remain firmly under control and are directly aligned with the strategic expansion of our platform. So now moving to Slide 12, We highlighted our operating and net profit figures are fueled by strong organic growth and geographic diversification as our economic EBIT rose to €157,000,000 and this represents a 14% of increase year on year. Below the operating line, finance income amounted to €7,000,000 for the first quarter compared to the €15,000,000 in the same period of last year.

19:29 This €7,000,000 result is primarily driven by a positive €10,000,000 contribution from our assets and portfolio performance. And this positive impact were partially offset by a negative €4,000,000 adjustment related to the fair value option and equity participations alongside a negative €1,000,000 impact from the IFRS 17. And then looking to the tax position, we recorded a rate of 22% in the first quarter, but our guidance for the full year 26% remain at around 25. Finally, looking at the bottom line of our reported net profit was €125,000,000 and our recurring net profit reached €128,000,000 This confirms an ugly robust 15% expansion year on year.

20:20 So let's now turn to Slide 13 and talk about the net financial position. Our balance sheet remains very strong and provide a nice solid foundation of our strategic initiatives. At the end of March twenty six, our total cash and cash equivalents stood at EUR $980,000,000. So on the liability side, you will note our bank loan figures sit at EUR 45,000,000. This financial debt was coming up from the acquisition of AZIH and we are currently actually renegotiating the renegotiation of this debt to secure better financing terms for the group.

21:06 Looking at our cash deployment during the first quarter, we have sold €43,000,000 in M and A and investments to support our expansion in The U. S, Brazil and Italy. We also executed €60,000,000 in share buyback, purchasing approximately 488,000 shares and an average price of €33.4 This outgrowth was partially offset by a positive €24,000,000 including related to the reimbursement of stamp duties and net of taxes that we paid in advance. Importantly, this robust EUR $647,000,000 net cash position doesn't yet include the upcoming cash dividend of €2 per share that will be paid in the May 20.

21:59 So now moving to Slide 14, we outline our capital structure and shareholder remuneration target. I will not go into full detail here again as we presented this plan in March. The key message is that we remain committed to returning approximately 25% of our current market capitalization to shareholders between now and the end of twenty twenty seven. So as part of this commitment, the AGM has recently approved our share buyback program with cancellation of shares. This cover up to 10% of our share capital is equal to about €500,000,000 at current prices. From the execution standpoint, we will conduct the share buyback and various tranches over the next eighteen months and we expect to start the first tranche after the dividend payment in May 26.

22:52 But as we progress to the update the market regarding any buybacks that we will execute. So let's now move to Page 15, where I give you a quick update on the T and B project. The project is firmly on track and also the T and B division is proceeding with the solid growth result. Since our last update, we have completed the remediation activities related to our new capital management, which have now also been reviewed by our internal audit team. The regulator is currently conducting their customary follow-up assessment and our dialogue with them remain constant, transparent and highly constructive.

23:37 This is the prerequisite step to continue and receiving the necessary regulatory approval from the regulators for the overall GMV transaction. Based on the current timeline, we remain confident that the project will be completed before the end of twenty twenty six. So I now let hand over to Giorgio for the conclusion. Thank you, Alessandro. So turning to Slide 16, let me wrap up on this presentation by looking at our guidance for 2026. What is obviously a very clear robust operational performance achieved today makes us very confident on the ability to deliver sustainable growth and we are confirming our targets for the year. So let me remind you that under normal market conditions, we are targeting €10,000,000,000 in total net inflows and a core net profit of €550,000,000 excluding extraordinary items.

24:42 Let me give a bit of a spoiler for April, net new money figures that will be published early next week. And let me anticipate that we have already achieved over €5,000,000,000 in net inflows to date. That means that we're already 50% halfway to our annual target in just for a month. While on the profitability side, with under €25,000,000 we have already secured what is essentially very solid first quarter, but we are absolutely on track to deliver another year of robust and sustainable growth for our shareholders.

25:27 And with that, let me thank all of you for the time today. And we will now open the floor to your questions. Thank you. Thank you, sir. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. The first question comes from Elena Perini of Intesa San Paolo. Yes, yes. Good afternoon and thank you for taking my questions. I've got three easy questions. The first one is on your recurring fees as basically the growth versus last year on a like for like basis was quite limited. And also compared to the fourth quarter, there was some of drop.

26:28 So I would like you to elaborate a bit more on the trend that you are expecting going forward, especially in terms of margins. Then I would like you to ask about your TMB project. So you are saying that you are confident to finalize it by year end. So I know that you are under regulatory review for the remediation plan. Is there any other potential obstacles that you could find in your path?

27:23 Yes. And finally, I was wondering about your JV with UniCredit. UniCredit is looking for an alternative to Amundi for next year. How do you feel about this? And do you feel ready for potential replacement if it would come? Thank you. So, let me take the first two questions.

28:08 So, starting from TMB that I would say is the easiest one in a way that as you know, there is no additional point to add compared on what I already mentioned. So there are two stream of work nowadays. There are one that is built by the fund or by FSI to, let's say, present and define and fix everything that's required to get the license. And the other way around that is also important because it's part of the condition to get there is the stream that we are dealing with the Bank of Italy in terms of obtain the okay to proceed with the extraordinary transaction.

28:57 So in order to where we are, as I said, we finalized the remediation plan. We completed also the internal audit review. We present and provide everything to Bank of Italy and now Bank of Italy is dealing to review and to get all the confidence to give us the okay to proceed. So, at the moment, there are no elements to be negative. On the other way around, we continue to manage the situation with them with our constant dialogue. So, therefore, we just try to work in the correct way to get the results within the end of the year. Referring to the recurring revenues, so first of all, taking into consideration the same parameters for taking out the effect of the global business evolution, So, without having the contribution of the $19,000,000 coming from the new acquisition, the like for like comparison has to consider from the global business, 9,000,000 of growth and from the Italian business, 10,000,000 of growth. So, all in all, the current business compared to last year is producing €19,000,000

30:27 more compared to last year. That means the 10% growth. Obviously, as I also said during the presentation, we have seen an evolution compared to the last quarter that is seems to be not it's in line with the expectation, but the key element that we have to consider is the part of February. So the quarter in general, if we compare the number of days that is based on cancellation of the let's say, recurring fees generated by our fund or portfolio discretionary portfolio, etcetera, as to be compared with two and let's say, two days more of the full quarter Q4.

31:20 That means that we are missing in the revenues around €2,000,000 €3,000,000 of growth, so positive contribution obviously. And also, we are considering we are impacted by March that was a month very complicated from the situation outside the market that impacted the AUM. And also one point more, when you look to the growth of the group in terms of AUM, you have to, let's say, maybe as a side to allocate also the growth in terms of AUM or net new money that are coming from the strategic affiliates.

32:07 So, a few elements and as you know, sorry, the strategic affiliates are not consolidated line by line. Therefore, all in all as well, there are three elements I would say to put on the table to make the right comparison of with the last quarter of the year. And therefore, from our let's say, in terms of size of the numbers that we are managing, also the other way around, we have to be we are seeing a positive growth on the evolution of our recurring revenues. I'll let Ben Giorgio for the last quarter. Yes. And let me tell you that we love all our clients, all our partners. Certainly, we can say nothing less when it comes to unit credit. We see this relationship working great.

32:56 I think what is very important for us is that we are delivering to unit credit clients top performance. I guess that strengthen our relationship for the future. And we stand ready should UniCredit need any help on their strategic focus on asset management. This is what I can say, but certainly, we read the press as you do and nothing has changed since we have seen the news regarding relationships that UniCredit has with other players in the market. Okay. Thank you very much. If I may, I would have a follow-up. It is a question about your private credit and the private market exposure, just an update if you are seeing any tensions in your exposure or everything is like you said in March?

34:06 Thank you. Yes. On this one, Elena, I think we have elaborated during our last earnings call on the fact that our private credit funds have very little to do with the areas of the buckets of the market that have created some troubles elsewhere, particularly in The U. S. One aspect that is certainly very important to highlight here is that, you know, our private credit strategies are essentially focusing on asset based finance. So we talk about private credit with the strength of very strong collateral. And second of all, most of the travels were related to the so called evergreen fund structures, I mean funds that promise or commit to provide liquidity to investors should investors redeem part of the investments in the funds and probably a bit of mismatch between the portfolio composition and these liquidity needs have created the issues that we have seen in the market. But none of our funds here in Italy are evergreen, in particular when it comes to private credit. We only have one evergreen portfolio in the private credit credit to institutional clients.

35:31 But, you know, I can say that we always manage it with the liquidity buffer in line with, the potential liquidity that we need to provide. So, all in all, we see no issues. We have no impact on our performance. And this is related to the fact that what we do here is very different from what others do, right or wrong, something that anyway doesn't really create any issues for us or our clients. Thank you very much. Alain, this is Alex. Just for your question also before with regards to recurring fees and how to model them out, actually, if you want to do it on a like for like basis, it's best that you would now take the Q1 numbers and what you probably factor in is about a 1% quarter on quarter growth for the remainder of the year.

36:26 And this we basically already are baking in that benign market, what we assume so far. And then of course the fundraising targets which we have given out and then may potentially update in the course of the year. Okay. Thank you very much. The next question is from Hubert Lam of Bank of America. Hi, good afternoon. I've got three questions. Firstly, this is a follow-up on the Evergreen question that was just asked. I think Giorgio you mentioned that you don't have any Evergreen's in Italy. But just wondering about any evergreen funds you have in The U. S. Through your various stakes and entities, any impacts on them so far? That's the first question. Second question is on the regulatory review from the Bank of Italy, just wondering when we should expect them to respond to you, what's the expected timing on that?

37:20 And last question, a question around the NSI and how can you talk about integration so far and how that's coming along? And you also mentioned about launching some active ETF funds through AZIH. I'm just wondering in your view how much you expect to raise through these new funds? Thank you. Okay. I shall resort to the first question. So when it comes to our GP states in The U. S, we do not have any manager in the market with the evergreen fund structure. So what I said for Ida is actually true also for The U. S. Hence, we see a very little risk of contagion as opposed to what is troubling others.

38:06 When it comes to NSI, yes, we said very, very successful integration of NSI into our platform. Let me tell you, mean, we don't provide many money figures by single business. So we actually consolidate everything into a geographic sort of aggregate. But, AZIH today is contributing approximately $200,000,000 to $300,000,000 of net new money. This is actually something even better than we expected considering our initial projections. Certainly, every month is different from the other, but things are going great. We had a bit of integration costs at the beginning, hence a bit of impact on the profitability.

38:58 The launch of this active ETF on July 1 certainly will mark an important meaningful development even for Azimut as we have never been really active in this space. It's a great way for Azimut to enter The U. S. Markets with our global investment management capabilities. We already registered with our sales force strong market interest. ETFs will be available will be made available, sorry, to a very large audience of RIAs, private banks, commercial banks, broker dealers, have about more than 6,000 distributors and wholesalers. We tend to be always very, very conservative when it comes to these things. So we are projecting by the end of the year net new money into the EPS into the range of between $200,000,000 to $300,000,000 But certainly, we are undershooting here on what is the real potential. And particularly, equity ETFs have become a very hot topic in The U. S.

40:05 In light of, you know, the very appealing tax treatment that, you know, the instrument has vis a vis mutual funds. Last year alone, there have been more than 7,000 active ETFs launched in The U. S. Market against only 50 mutual funds being launched during the same period. And the fact that we are entering the market with this global strategies, what the Americans call international markets focused portfolios, I think right now, looking at what's happening in world, looking at investors' preferences in The U. S, people seeking diversification even when it comes to currency. I think this is great opportunity where we see honestly little competition from the incumbents.

40:53 Certainly stronger, better known for what they can deliver when it comes to The U. S. Markets. But when it comes to global strategies, think we have a bit of potential here accuracy of our agility and always think differently and disruptively as opposed to what the others do. So we are very confident as I said. And as I was a transformational deal for others in The U. S. And we see this as a very meaningful engine of growth for assets and profits for the short, medium and long term. And taking the second question related to Banco Britsley and PMB, I mean, unfortunately, the time is an element that we do not control.

41:44 From a regulatory point of view, there is no, let's say, kind of a number of days within they have to answer. Therefore, what we know that we have no to do, let's say, the wrong way to approach to them to make them pressure. So therefore, we are keeping them, as I mentioned before, so we'll be updated on everything and keeping also the good dialogue that we have built over the last few months. So, we are just waiting I would say. But on the other way around, we are keeping the dialogue open. Great. Thank you. The next question is from Ian White of Autonomous Research.

42:35 Hi there. Thanks for taking my questions. Just a couple from my side, please. I guess just around the sort of delays you've had on T and D. Can I just understand whether that's causing any other sort of frictions or challenging conversations internally? I'm thinking about things like advisers becoming restless, unusual attrition, anything like that, just because I know that your advisers wanting to raise deposits was one of the reasons that you explored this in the first place. That's my main question, please. And just secondly, is there any particular reason that you're stopping short of increasing the net inflow guidance at this stage? Is that just caution? Is there a specific reason that this run rate might not be sustained over the next eight months? Thank you.

43:29 So we'll take both questions. So let me tell you, first of all, on the impact from what's happening in terms of engagement and constructive dialogue with the authorities and regulators vis a vis our entire advisors. I mean, Azimut has been operating as a non banking financial institutions for thirty six years. So it's not a couple of months changing the way advisors are in the markets. And you see the results in terms of net new money. People that are still very effective, very strong. Our business at the end of the day is based on very strong personal and business relationships. Certainly, we would have all loved to have the Gen V transaction being closed by now for a number of reasons that there's no need for me to elaborate on.

44:21 But that is not impacting the determination and the commitment by advisers to keep delivering performance and service to clients. So, we see no impact there. We see no stress, as I said. In a way, the business as usual, we are waiting and working hard to make things happen. And we remain confident that will happen within the time line that we have been extensively commenting on until now. And then when it comes to net new money, so let me take this question with a light answer, but it saves you a lot. We have a tradition of overshooting our net new money targets, and we have always a tradition of upgrading our net new money by H1 results. So let's see whether we can keep the tradition of changing our forecast in July when we report on our H1 results.

45:23 What we see right now is absolutely giving us all the confidence that we can keep delivering. But we won't sort of do anything different that will sort of make us look, you know, to I mean, rushing in changing things, you know. As I said, let's be a bit more patient for another couple of months. But, you know, as far as we can see, this might be another year where we will deliver better than we expected at the beginning of the year. Very good and clear. Thank you. The next question is from Alberto Villa of Intermonte Sim. Good afternoon, Georgio and Alessandro. Thanks for taking my questions.

46:13 I have a couple. One, maybe I missed it, but it's a busy day. Did you give any anticipation about the April net inflows trends? That would be helpful. And the second is on Slide 14. I see that on top of the committed equity at the end of twenty twenty five, you also had another €300,000,000 in the coming eighteen months and a fair portion of it would be potentially dedicated to M and A. So I was wondering if you can give us a sense of what might be of interest for Azimut in the M and A space, it's a fair significant amount of money that could be invested.

47:04 It would be interesting to get your view on that. And on the first tranche of the buyback, can you quantify what would be the amount that we would start after the payment of the dividend? Thank you. Okay, Alberto. You must have been very, very busy because we made a very clear comment on new money at the end of the presentation. So, we will update obviously with the official, you know, figures early next week. But we can say right now that, you know, things are pretty strong and that would make us certainly, close the first four months with cumulative net new money above €5,000,000,000 So let me tell you that that was the result of strong commercial performance both in Italy and across our global operations.

48:02 When it comes to committed equity and how much of that is earmarked for M and A, look, I think here what we want to convey on to you is an approach when it comes to balance sheet and, let's say, financial management. Historically, we have been sort of favoring M and A as opposed to the remuneration when it was coming to making that decision of managing capital. What we have been saying now loud and clear over the last year is that we're going to approach this topic with a balanced approach. Both growth and shareholder remuneration are equally important. Azimut is a growth company.

48:57 We will never retreat from a mission of growing the business, even if that is nonorganic, yes, we want to have a balance sheet run efficiently. And, you know, our capital management strategy that we announced now a few months back, I think, is a testament to this commitment to manage return capital to shareholders in multiple ways. Should there be any major M and A, I think we will keep the same balanced approach and we will make recourse to third party financing, I mean, the form of debt And that we certainly proved an approach remaining consistent and certainly aiming at what is a disciplined management of our balance sheet where discipline means also taking care of the efficiency. So an optimal leverage structure that allows everyone, but shareholders in particular to enjoy both earnings growth and capital return.

50:05 When it comes to the share buyback and how we will be in the market following the dividend, I'll let Alessandro to comment on that. Well, we are obviously looking to define a partner to proceed with this process. It's going to probably split it into tranche. The two means between six and nine months of the for the single tranche, so two fifty and two fifty. Actually, this is something, you know, very linear in terms of approach. Okay, thank you. Gentlemen, there are no more questions registered. I'd like to hand it back to you for any closing remarks.

51:04 Excellent. So we thank everyone for attending this call and look forward to seeing you all soon. Thank you. The conference is now over and you may disconnect your telephones.