SS&C Technologies Holdings Inc (SSNC) 2025 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. My name is Colby, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome you to the SS&C Technologies Q4 and full year 2025 earnings. (Operator Instructions)

I'll now turn the call over to Justine Stone, Head of Investor Relations. You may begin.

Hi, everyone. Welcome, and thank you for joining us for our Q4 and full year 2025 earnings call. I'm Justine Stone, Investor Relations for SS&C. With me today is Bill Stone, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Rahul Kanwar, President and Chief Operating Officer; and Brian Schell, our Chief Financial Officer. Before we get started, we need to review the safe harbor statement.

Please note that various remarks we make today about future expectations, plans and prospects, including the financial outlook we provide, constitute forward-looking statements for the purposes of the safe harbor provisions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by these forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including those discussed in the risk factors section of our most recent annual report on Form 10-K, which is on file with the SEC and can be accessed on our website.

These forward-looking statements represent our expectations only as of today, February 5, 2026. While the company may elect to update these forward-looking statements, it specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. During today's call, we'll be referring to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures to comparable GAAP financial measures is included in today's earnings release, which is located in the Investor Relations section of our website at www.ssctech.com.

I will now turn the call over to Bill.

Thanks, Justine, and welcome, everyone. We are all well aware of the sell-off in software company shares following the recent release of AI-driven automation tools across legal, sales and marketing and accounting functions. We take all competitors seriously, but we strongly believe we have a wide and deep moat not easily navigated. For decades, we've built deep expertise across sophisticated assets and strategies, and that capability remains a trademark and a key driver of our long-term success. We are functional experts and our software is mission-critical.

We believe the AI boom will be a tailwind and are deploying rapidly and with conviction. As we accelerate adoption of these solutions, we see a clear advantage. We are uniquely positioned and structurally protected through the ownership of our software and code, enabling us to leverage AI in ways that only we can for our customers. Fourth quarter results demonstrate SS&C's strength with record adjusted revenue of $1.655 billion, up 8% and adjusted diluted earnings per share of $1.69, an 18% increase. We delivered record adjusted consolidated EBITDA of $651 million, up 9% and adjusted consolidated EBITDA margin of 39.3%.

Fourth quarter adjusted organic revenue growth was 5.3%, with performance driven by continued strength in GIDS with 13.2% revenue growth and GlobeOp with 9.6% revenue growth. We continue to focus on international growth opportunities and on execution for our clients. GlobeOp is seeing new opportunities in Australia, leveraging our recent superannuation mandates. Prospects include local Australian firms and global firms. Intralinks display signs of improvement with modest growth in Q4, and we are seeing momentum in 2026.

For the 12 months ended December 31, 2025, cash from operating activities was [$1.745 billion or $1.745 billion], up 26% year over year. On a weighted average diluted per share basis, that was $6.89, up $1.42 from 2024. In Q4, we returned $384 million to shareholders, which included 3.7 million shares repurchased for $319 million at an average price of $85.81 and $66 million in common stock dividends. We allocated over $1 billion in share repurchases in 2025, purchasing 12.3 million shares at an average price of $84.12. Our strong cash flow characteristics allow us to return capital to our shareholders in multiple ways.

At current levels, our conviction around share repurchase has strengthened and we will prioritize -- and we will prioritize repurchases absent high-quality accretive acquisitions. We are pleased with the early progress of the Calastone acquisition. Since closing, we've partnered with key leadership and operational talent and deepened client relationships. We are seeing strong engagement and collaboration opportunities with our clients and are able to go live with projects strategically meaningful to them. We expect momentum to continue as we move through the year.

I'll now turn the call over to Rahul to discuss the quarter in more detail.

Thanks, Bill. We delivered a strong quarter with solid organic growth and continued margin expansion. We are optimistic about the future as we look at the durability of what's driving that growth. Across the business, we're seeing a consistent trend of clients making long-term decisions to outsource, simplify and scale their accounting models on our platform. These are multiyear partnerships that create recurring revenue, expand over time and provide clear visibility into future growth.

Lift-outs are a good example of this dynamic. Mandates such as Insignia and Humana reflect a repeatable process where clients entrust us with complex mission-critical operations at scale. These engagements ramp in a disciplined way and often lead to broader adoption of additional services across our platform. The fact that we continue to see similar opportunities emerge across regions and business lines, whether in GlobeOp, GIDS or health, reinforces our confidence that this is a sustainable growth engine. We see the continued advancement of AI as a positive for our business.

We're well positioned given our large data sets, deep processing technology, long-standing client relationships and our ability to deploy solutions at scale in regulated environments. The work we do is highly expertise-driven, requires a deep understanding of complex instruments, global regulation and how information is used by tax authorities, institutional investors and other sophisticated counterparties. AI working alongside with the teams we've built enhances efficiency, accuracy and scalability over time, strengthening our competitive position and supporting sustainable organic growth.

With that, I'll turn it over to Brian to walk through the financials.

Thanks, Rahul, and good day, everyone. Unless noted otherwise, the quarterly comparisons are Q4 2024. As disclosed in our press release, our Q4 2025 GAAP results reflect revenues of $1.654 billion, net income of $193 million and diluted earnings per share of $0.77. Our adjusted non-GAAP results include revenues of $1.655 billion, an increase of 8% and adjusted diluted EPS of $1.69, an 18% increase. The adjusted revenue increase of $124 million was primarily driven by incremental revenue contributions from GIDS of $49 million, GlobeOp of $40 million and acquisitions of $27 million, offset by a favorable impact from foreign exchange of $16 million.

As a result, adjusted organic revenue growth on a constant currency basis was 5.3% and our core expenses increased 4.6% or $44 million, which also excludes acquisitions and is on a constant currency basis. Adjusted consolidated EBITDA was a record $651 million, reflecting an increase of $52 million or 8.7% and a margin of 39.3%, a 20 basis point expansion. Net interest expense for the fourth quarter of 2025 was $111 million, a decrease of $2 million, primarily reflecting lower short-term rates. Adjusted net income was a record $425 million, up 16.8% and adjusted diluted EPS was $1.69, an increase of 18.2%. Our effective non-GAAP tax rate was 19.2% for the fourth quarter of '25.

Our resulting 2025 full year effective non-GAAP tax rate is 22%. Note for comparison purposes, we have recast the 2024 adjusted net income to reflect the full year effective tax rate of 23.1%. The diluted share count is down to 251.5 million from 254.5 million year over year, primarily as a result of share repurchases. Cash flow from operating activities grew 26%, and our operating cash flow per share was $6.89, driven by growth in earnings, improved working capital utilization and lower cash taxes paid. Our full year cash flow conversion has been above 100% for the past three years.

SS&C ended the fourth quarter with $462 million in cash and cash equivalents and $7.5 billion in gross debt. Our net debt was $7 billion, and our last 12 months consolidated EBITDA was $2.5 billion, resulting net leverage ratio is 2.8 times. As we look forward to the first quarter and full year of 2026 with respect to guidance, we will continue to focus on client service and assume that retention rates will be in the range of our most recent results.

We will continue to manage our business to support our long-term growth and manage our expenses by controlling and aligning variable expenses, increasing productivity and leveraging technology to improve our operating margins and effectively investing in the business through marketing, sales and R&D. Specifically, we have assumed short-term interest rates to remain at current levels, an effective tax rate of approximately 22.5% on an adjusted basis, capital expenditures to be 4.4% to 4.8% of revenues and share buybacks and debt reduction levels remain similar to 2025, but subject to changes based on market conditions, as Bill noted in his earlier comments.

For the first quarter of '26, we expect revenue to be in the range of $1.608 billion to $1.648 billion and 5% organic growth at the midpoint. Adjusted net income in the range of $404 million to $420 million; interest expense, excluding amortization of deferred financing costs and original issue discount in the range of $102 million to $104 million, diluted shares in the range of $249.2 million to $250.2 million and adjusted diluted EPS in the range of $1.62 to $1.68.

For the full year 2026, we expect revenue to be in the range of $6.654 billion to $6.14 billion and 5.1% organic revenue growth at the midpoint. Targeted annual EBITDA expansion of 50 basis points, the goal of a 40% margin in Q4. Adjusted net income in the range of $1.662 billion to $1.762 billion, adjusted diluted EPS in the range of $6.70 to $7.02, reflecting approximately 12% growth at the midpoint and cash from operating activities to be in the range of $1.713 billion to $1.813 billion, again, translating to over 100% cash conversion.

And now back to Bill.

Brian. I'd like to summarize our key takeaways from today's call, record fourth quarter revenues, earnings, cash flows and over $1 billion worth of share repurchases in 2025. We're excited about the early execution with the Calastone acquisition and other lift-out wins and the opportunities they present for growth and geographic expansion. Our investments in artificial intelligence and automation are paying off, and we're confident in our ability to drive margin expansion. As we look to 2026, we believe we are set up for success and will drive long-term growth and profitability for our shareholders.

With that, I would now open it up to questions.

(Operator Instructions)

Jeff Schmitt, William Blair.

Question on the health care business. I mean that had a tough quarter from an organic perspective in what is -- its seasonally strongest quarter. So could you maybe talk about what drove that weakness? And why do you think that business hasn't seen maybe better momentum yet, just given how much effort you've put into it?

I think that health care is a long-term play and trying to go quarter-to-quarter or even a year-to-year is a tough comp. I think last fourth quarter, we had large license sales. We had some large license sales in the fourth quarter of this year, but a notable multimillion dollar license closed in the first 10 days of January of 2026. So it's lumpy, they're highly regulated even when you've been in highly regulated businesses like financial services. And so although there are headwinds in health care, it's still an enormous market.

We have new technology. We're bringing out AMISYS, which has been rewritten to a very large degree, and we're going to have a OneHealth with AMISYS and Domani, and we're excited about offering that for both medical as well as pharmacy. And so we have some optimism. But certainly, we would prefer to have more growth than what we're having, but we're still running at pretty healthy EBITDA margins, and we're managing the business in a way where it's adding to our cash flow. It's not really detracting from our earnings. And obviously, it's not accelerating our growth rate. But at the same time, it's a $260 million, $270 million business, and we like its opportunities for the long haul.

Okay. And then could you provide an update on the Elevance relationship? Where does that stand? Is there still a chance they could onboard some of their business on to DomaniRx?

DomaniRx is certainly ready and waiting. At the same time, Elevance is a very large health care organization and their relationships with other very large health care organizations are long-standing and they're difficult to break. And the original sponsor at Elevance has moved on several years ago. And so often when you lose the sponsor, it's hard to find another one. So it's not unexpected, but we think we have a lot of things that entice Elevance, and they've made a big investment. So we think there's still raise of sunshine at the end of the tunnel.

Peter Heckmann, D.A. Davidson.

Great to see the encouraging 2026 guidance. I wanted to ask a question on -- within alternative fund administration, it looked like the fourth quarter had exceptional growth in assets under administration. Can you talk a little bit about that? And does that maybe indicate that the alternative fund administration business can grow maybe faster in 2026 than it did in 2025?

Peter, there's a couple of things going on there. One, we did have a very good organic growth both quarter and year. And similarly, we've got high expectations for 2026. Included in the fourth quarter change in particular, is our acquisition of Curo Fund Services. So I think the breakdown is about $92 billion of that change is organic and the rest is the acquisition.

Okay. That's helpful. Okay. That makes sense. And then just in terms of the intelligent automation business, which includes the Blue Prism business. Just remind us that business seemed to be struggling a little bit from just delays in decision-making. I guess how are you feeling about that business going into 2026? Do you think that can approximate the overall corporate organic growth rate?

We do. We actually feel really good about that business going into 2026. Similar to kind of the comment we just made about health care, that business, in particular, had a really large license in Q4 the year before. So part of when you kind of look at this quarter over quarter, those are some of the changes that kind of have an impact. But in general, many of our comments around AI are centered at least in part on that business.

So that's where we're doing the bulk of our innovation relating to whether that's AI agents, use of large language models, use of our orchestration platforms, governance around AI, really, a lot of the things that we're rolling out across the business come out of there. We perfect them in different others of our businesses and then sell them out. So we're really pretty optimistic about the growth prospects for that in '26.

Alexei Gogolev, JPMorgan.

Good evening. This is Eleanor Smith on for Alexei. So first, I was hoping to ask about the organic growth guide. Your 1Q and full year '26 guide is basically the same. Do you have anything to call out regarding the cadence of organic growth throughout the rest of the year?

Look, I think what it really reflects is that our business is getting stronger, right? And as our business gets stronger, we have more predictability and the recurring revenue is stronger, right? So we're able to, in effect, forecast and maintain the -- whereas traditionally, you might have some more in the back end of the back half of the year, we're basically all year going to be pretty strong. And hopefully, by the time we get to Q3 and Q4, we've got an opportunity to get even better than this.

Got it. Very clear. And as a follow-up, given the breadth of your business, I'm sure you've seen AI fintechs emerging in the landscape. How are you maintaining your competitive advantage?

Well, I think that we see fintechs, it's not very difficult to start a fintech, right? Have an idea, get a programmer, a little app. Now I'm talking a little AI and you got -- you've got an entree with some spice in it. But to build an organization that has 29,000 people, 23,000 products or 23,000 customers, several hundred products and services, I think it's a little more daunting. And what we see with AI and people sometimes forget that our clients are SEC regulated organizations are CMS regulated organizations.

Large language models sometimes have hallucinations. Those regulators, they don't really quite understand us telling them wow hallucination. It's like a bad dream. We'll get over it. I don't think that flies. So we're very control conscious. Our clients are conservative by nature, right? And they're managing other people's money or the health of other people. So we think that we're positioned and how we conduct ourselves is the right way to do it. And I think that we have the financial wherewithal to invest very, very wisely.

We've spent hundreds of million dollars on our development that we've done, and we're still maintaining in excess of 39% margins. And we think we'll close out 2026 at 40% margin. So we're optimistic, and we think we have good reasons for being.

(Operator Instructions)

Dan Perlin, RBC Capital Markets.

It's Matt Roswell on for Dan. I guess two questions, if I could. Firstly, Wealth and Investment Management, I mean, it seems like organic growth ticked up a little bit this quarter. As we think about kind of that business over the next, say, medium term, where do you think the organic growth could be and should be?

Again, I think we're very optimistic about our wealth management business. Our Black Diamond platform is, we think, the best in the industry. We have other platforms like our trust accounting that we have integrated with Black Diamond. Black Diamond has approaching $3.5 trillion that it's administrating for its various RIAs. I think we have something close to 4,000 RIAs that are using that platform.

We have integrated a bunch of the Morningstar that we had the -- we bought their wealth management platform, and we've already moved over 500, 600 Morningstar clients on to Black Diamond. So we're very optimistic about that business. And I think that we have a lot of expertise and a lot of capability. And I think that that's going to be one of -- is and will continue to be one of our crown jewels.

And can you talk a little bit about the M&A environment? I mean you all have done some smaller pieces this year. I guess what are you seeing out there in terms of asking prices, availability, et cetera?

When you've been doing this for four decades, and they start calling a $1 billion acquisition like Calastone in small pieces, bigger -- we're constantly looking. We would -- we think we have the leverage down to a point where we could do a large acquisition. And if we could find the right one, we would, and we might find some of our competitors under different pressures than we're under. We run our own data centers, right? We have our own private cloud.

We have our clients really secured. Plus we have a large-scale services business that we get to really test out our software before we send it into our client base. So we think that we're well positioned. We think as far as all the fintechs out there that we're very well positioned and that our earnings, our cash flow really give us a lot of flexibility.

Congratulations on the next numbers.

And with no further questions in queue, I'd like to turn the conference back over to Bill for closing remarks.

There's always a lot of things that happen in the market. When I first started in this business, we were selling to broker-dealers. That was in 1986 and early '87. And then October of '87 happened and the market went down 25% in one day, and that was the end of that. So you learn to be a little bit nimble, right? And that's what SS&C has been for 40 years. And I think we have the talent and capability to continue, and that's what we're going to do. So we appreciate you listening in, and we look forward to talking to you next quarter.

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.