IVTJY - Investec Group (IVTJF) Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

2024-05-25 06:19:03 ET

Investec Group (IVTJF)

Q4 2024 Earnings Conference Call

May 23, 2024, 04:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Fani Titi - Group CEO

Nishlan Samujh - Group Finance Director, CFO

Ruth Leas - CEO and Executive Director, Investec Bank plc

Cumesh Moodliar - new CEO, South African business

Conference Call Participants

Alex Bowers - Berenberg

Presentation

Fani Titi

Okay. Good morning. We have a pretty exciting presentation today. So I propose that we start. I'd like first to welcome our colleagues in London.

Today, the A team will present from London. I have in London, joining the presentation later today, Nishlan Samujh, our Group Finance Director. He will go through a bit of detail of the Group performance, and then we will have Ruth Leas give us a bit more of color on our U.K. business. As you can see in this result, we've seen significant growth in profits and really impressive performance from our U.K. business and Ruth will be followed by Cumesh Moodliar, our new Chief Executive of our South African business. Again, that business has performed pretty impressively in a very difficult market. So excited to be joined by this A team coming in from London.

So I'll go straight into the presentation. As you all know, this year marks 50 years of our existence as a business. In 1974 in one small office here in Johannesburg, 18 people gated and decided to start what would become the Investec of today. 50 years later, we are in 11 countries. In fact, we were in more five, six years ago, and we have 7,500 colleagues around the world. And, in fact, as we report today, you will see that we will be reporting revenues of over £2 billion. For a little start-up in the southern tip of Africa, that really is an impressive fit to achieve over the time.

In 1986, we listed in -- on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, and in 2002, and I still remember the tears in Stephen's eyes when we got permission to list in London in 2002. And between that time and now, we have spanned very large businesses that are world-class and international in scale.

I'll talk about Ninety One, which we demerged a few years ago. And in doing so, we released significant value to our shareholders, approximately £780 million. Recently, we deconsolidated Burstone, again, a really high-quality international-type business. Very recently, we bolstered our position within the U.K. market with the very strategically exciting combination of Investec Wealth & Investment U.K.

and Rathbones. That transaction brought about the U.K.'s largest DFM with over £108 billion -- around £100 billion of assets under management and administration. And that really strengthens our position going forward within the U.K. market.

Obviously, when you get to a moment like 50 years of existence and you celebrate it, we have to again say how grateful we are to our founders for founding this most incredible business that is Investec. And we also want to appreciate everyone who has been a part of Investec, our colleagues, our clients, so on and so forth.

The magic of Zebra and out of the ordinary would not have been possible, but for the contribution of everyone that has been here at Investec that has made a contribution. In 2018, as you know, we had a fundamental change in the business in that the business transitioned from the founders. I know there were risks at that time about whether we would sustain the business. The transition was smooth. While the founders are gone, our commitment to our clients, our commitment to our entrepreneurial culture, our commitment to playing a positive role in society remains undiminished. And following on the transition in 2019, we looked to review the business as a whole and to chart a path forward that would lead to better sustainability for the business.

And, in fact, that would lead us to achieving the returns on capital that we require. As a consequence of that, we demerged IAM now called Ninety One. In fact, last night, Hendrik sent me a congratulatory message that was really a lovely of him to do around this set of results. And following on that, as you know, we have executed a share buyback that has returned approximately ZAR 7 billion to our shareholders. Later in the presentation, I will touch on some of the achievements we have made against the commitments we made in 2019 in Cape Town....

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