Virtu Financial Inc (VIRT) 2024 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Virtu Financial 2024 fourth quarter results conference call. (Operator Instructions) Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded.

您好，感謝您的支持。歡迎參加 Virtu Financial 2024 年第四季業績電話會議。（操作員指示）請注意，今天的會議正在錄音。

I would now like to hand the call over to Andrew. Please go ahead. (technical difficulty) Please stand by your conference will resume momentarily. (technical difficulty) You may begin.

現在我想把電話交給安德魯。請繼續。（技術困難）請稍候，您的會議將立即恢復。（技術難題）您可以開始了。

Thank you. Our fourth quarter results were released this morning and are available on our website. With us today on this morning's call, we have Mr. Douglas Cifu, our Chief Executive Officer; Ms. Cindy Lee, our Chief Financial Officer; and Mr. Joseph Molluso, our Co-President and Co-Chief Operating Officer.

謝謝。我們的第四季業績已於今天上午公佈，並可在我們的網站上查閱。今天早上參加電話會議的有我們的執行長道格拉斯·西福先生；我們的財務長 Cindy Lee 女士；以及我們的聯合總裁兼聯合營運長 Joseph Molluso 先生。

We'll begin with prepared remarks and then take your questions. First, a few reminders. Today's call may include forward-looking statements, which represent Virtu's current belief regarding future events and are, therefore, subject to risks, assumptions and uncertainties, which may be outside the company's control.

我們將首先發表準備好的發言，然後回答您的問題。首先，幾點提醒。今天的電話會議可能包含前瞻性陳述，這些陳述代表了 Virtu 目前對未來事件的看法，因此會受到公司無法控制的風險、假設和不確定性的影響。

Please note that our actual results and financial conditions may differ materially from what is indicated in these forward-looking statements. It is important to note that any forward-looking statements made on this call are based on information presently available to the company, and we do not undertake to update or revise any forward-looking statements as new information becomes available.

請注意，我們的實際結果和財務狀況可能與這些前瞻性聲明所示的存在重大差異。值得注意的是，本次電話會議上所做的任何前瞻性陳述均基於本公司目前掌握的信息，我們不承諾在新資訊出現時更新或修改任何前瞻性陳述。

We refer you to disclaimers in our press release and encourage you to review the description of risk factors contained in our annual report on Form 10-K and other public filings. During today's call, in addition to GAAP measures, we may refer to certain non-GAAP measures, including adjusted net trading income, adjusted net income, adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin. These non-GAAP measures should be considered as supplemental to and not as superior to financial measures as reported in accordance with GAAP.

我們請您參閱新聞稿中的免責聲明，並鼓勵您查看我們的 10-K 表年度報告和其他公開文件中包含的風險因素描述。在今天的電話會議中，除了 GAAP 指標外，我們還可能參考某些非 GAAP 指標，包括調整後的淨交易收入、調整後的淨收入、調整後的 EBITDA 和調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率。這些非 GAAP 指標應被視為根據 GAAP 報告的財務指標的補充，而不是優於這些指標。

We direct listeners to consult the Investor portion of our website, where you'll find additional supplemental information referred to on this call as well as a reconciliation of non-GAAP measures to the equivalent terms in the earnings material with an explanation of why we deem this information to be meaningful, as well as how management uses these measures.

我們指導聽眾查閱我們網站的「投資者」部分，您可以在其中找到本次電話會議中提到的其他補充資訊以及非公認會計準則指標與收益材料中等效條款的對賬，並解釋我們為何認為這些資訊有意義，以及管理層如何使用這些指標。

And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Doug.

說完這些，我想把電話轉給 Doug。

Thank you, Andrew. Good morning, everyone. Apologies for the delay. We will check in with the service, but not sure what happened. Thank you for joining us this morning. In my remarks today, we'll focus on Virtu's fourth quarter 2024 financial and business performance and strategic initiatives. Following my remarks, Cindy and Joe will provide additional details on our results.

謝謝你，安德魯。大家早安。抱歉耽誤了。我們將與服務部門聯繫，但不確定發生了什麼。感謝您今天上午加入我們。在今天的演講中，我們將重點關注 Virtu 2024 年第四季的財務和業務業績以及策略舉措。在我發言之後，Cindy 和 Joe 將提供有關我們結果的更多詳細資訊。

Looking at our full year and fourth quarter 2024 results, which are summarized on slide 2 of the supplemental material, we generated $6.8 million and $7.27 million of adjusted net trading income per day for the full year 2024 and the fourth quarter, respectively. We reported normalized adjusted EPS of $1.14 and for the fourth quarter and $3.55 for the full year 2024.

查看我們的 2024 年全年和第四季度業績（補充資料第 2 頁進行了總結），我們在 2024 年全年和第四季度分別產生了 680 萬美元和 727 萬美元的調整後淨交易收入。我們報告稱，第四季度的標準化調整後每股收益為 1.14 美元，2024 年全年的標準化調整後每股收益為 3.55 美元。

In the fourth quarter, we delivered another strong performance in both our customer and noncustomer market making businesses and our Virtu Execution Service business against the mixed opportunity in the quarter. We remain committed to making further technology enhancements and investments in our capabilities to improve our performance in every environment, and there are still significant improvements to make, and we'll touch on these further in a moment.

第四季度，儘管市場機會好壞參半，但我們的客戶和非客戶做市業務以及 Virtu 執行服務業務仍表現強勁。我們將繼續致力於進一步改進技術並投資於我們的能力，以提高我們在各種環境中的表現，並且仍有重大改進空間，稍後我們將進一步討論這些改進。

Slide 3 highlights that our Market Making segment earned an average of $5.5 million per day of adjusted net trading income in the quarter while Execution Services delivered $1.7 million per day, increases of 23% and 12% per day, respectively, over the quarter.

投影片 3 重點介紹了我們的做市部門本季平均每天的調整後淨交易收入 550 萬美元，而執行服務部門每天的調整後淨交易收入 170 萬美元，分別比本季度增長 23% 和 12%。

In 2024, we saw firsthand the unique benefits of our scaled operations that allow us to continually invest in our global multi-asset platform to further increase our operating leverage and meet clients' needs with new and innovative offerings.

2024 年，我們親眼目睹了規模化營運的獨特優勢，這使我們能夠持續投資於我們的全球多資產平台，以進一步提高我們的營運槓桿，並透過新的創新產品滿足客戶的需求。

On the Execution Services side, this past quarter's $1.7 million of NT per day represents VES best quarter since the first quarter of '22 and with our algo product achieving increased revenue for the fifth consecutive quarter. This was VES' best quarter since the first quarter of 2022. We continue to see institutions adopt VES's broad product set, leading to deep integration with our clients' trading workflows. This has resulted in the improved consistency of results you've seen despite a very competitive market segment.

在執行服務方面，上個季度每天 170 萬美元的新台幣，是 VES 自 22 年第一季以來表現最好的一個季度，我們的演算法產品連續第五個季度實現了收入成長。這是 VES 自 2022 年第一季以來表現最好的一個季度。我們不斷看到機構採用 VES 的廣泛產品組合，從而與我們客戶的交易工作流程進行深度整合。儘管市場競爭非常激烈，但我們所看到的結果的一致性仍然提高了。

We have incremental growth plans for VES and Virtu technology solutions both within and outside the United States, which we discussed at length on our last earnings call. These efforts are beginning to materialize as our team expands our footprint with existing clients and generate new long-term business from new clients.

我們針對美國境內和境外的 VES 和 Virtu 技術解決方案製定了增量增長計劃，我們在上次財報電話會議上對此進行了詳細討論。隨著我們的團隊擴大現有客戶的業務範圍並從新客戶那裡獲得新的長期業務，這些努力開始實現。

To this end, in 2024, VES leveraged our investments and enhancements to accomplish key growth milestones winning remits include adoption of our Triton Valor execution management system for fixed income by a world-class asset manager in Europe successfully deployed our Triton Valor EMS, trading analytics, POSIT Alert and global equity execution algos for one of the largest asset managers in Asia.

為此，2024 年，VES 利用我們的投資和增強功能實現了關鍵的成長里程碑，贏得的成果包括：歐洲一家世界級資產管理公司採用我們的 Triton Valor 固定收益執行管理系統，成功為亞洲最大的資產管理公司之一部署了我們的 Triton Valor EMS、交易分析、POSIT Alert 和全球股票執行演算法。

Most importantly, overall productivity and profitability within our VES business segment has grown significantly since we began the technology rebuild and modernization and streamlining of that business. Needless to say, we remain very excited about the growth opportunities, increasing operating leverage and compounding benefits of our VES expansion in 2025.

最重要的是，自從我們開始對該業務進行技術重建、現代化和精簡以來，我們的 VES 業務部門的整體生產力和盈利能力得到了顯著增長。毋庸置疑，我們對於 2025 年 VES 擴張帶來的成長機會、提高營運槓桿和複合效益仍然感到非常興奮。

Now on to Market Making, both our customer and noncustomer Market Making businesses performed well in the quarter relative to the opportunity set. But even in a strong quarter like this, we know that there's room to improve. Our Market Making results were up almost 23% in the fourth quarter, an impressive result considering realized volatility was down across the board. The opportunity was markedly lower in October, but conditions improved in November and the opportunity so far has been the same or better every month since.

現在談談做市，我們的客戶和非客戶做市業務相對於機會集而言在本季度均表現良好。但即使在像這樣強勁的季度，我們也知道還有改進的空間。我們的做市業績在第四季度增長了近 23%，考慮到實際波動性全盤下降，這是一個令人印象深刻的結果。十月份的機會明顯較少，但十一月的情況有所改善，而且自那以後，每個月的機會到目前為止都相同或更好。

Further, quoted spread and executed shares per our 605 reports for the fourth quarter show an increase of 12% and 11%, respectively, versus the third quarter. Our ability to outperform market metrics is a function of many factors, including the success and development of our growth initiatives as well as internalization enhancements and continuous strategy iteration.

此外，根據我們的 605 份報告，第四季度的報價價差和執行股票分別較第三季增加了 12% 和 11%。我們超越市場指標的能力取決於多種因素，包括我們的成長計畫的成功和發展、內部化的增強和持續的策略迭代。

For example, in 2024, we saw meaningful contributions to our results from new and redesigned Market Making models that did not exist in 2023. We are confident that our growth initiatives, combined with our efforts to enhance spread capture rates through smarter internalization will yield increased benefits in any environment.

例如，在 2024 年，我們看到了新的和重新設計的做市模型對我們的表現做出的有意義的貢獻，而這些模型在 2023 年並不存在。我們相信，我們的成長計劃，加上我們透過更聰明的內部化來提高利差捕獲率的努力，將在任何環境下產生更大的效益。

Touching on our organic growth initiatives, including our expansion into crypto, ETF block options and fixed income Market Making continue to expand and perform well and have made meaningful progress throughout the year.

談到我們的有機成長計劃，包括我們在加密貨幣領域的擴張，ETF 區塊選擇權和固定收益做市業務繼續擴大並表現良好，並在全年取得了有意義的進展。

We generated $787,000 per day from organic growth in 2024, the highest NT per day for any year since we began reporting this four to five years ago. In the fourth quarter and for the full year 2024, NT from organic growth initiatives represented 12% or firm-wide NT. Our crypto growth initiatives performed very well in the fourth quarter, delivering strong results despite market volumes in spot crypto ETFs being down almost 20% compared to the first quarter of when they were first launched.

2024 年，我們每天從有機成長中創造 787,000 美元的收入，這是我們四到五年前開始報告這一數字以來任何一年的最高每日新台幣收入。在第四季和 2024 年全年，來自有機成長計畫的 NT 佔全公司 NT 的 12%。我們的加密貨幣成長計畫在第四季度表現非常出色，儘管現貨加密貨幣 ETF 的市場交易量與首次推出的第一季相比下降了近 20%，但仍取得了強勁的業績。

Our strong results were driven by investments we made in the second and third quarters this year. After the excitement around crypto ETFs tapered off and the market became more efficient, we enhanced our crypto capabilities by expanding our market access and liquidity distribution and improving our operational efficiency.

我們的強勁業績得益於今年第二季和第三季的投資。在加密貨幣 ETF 的熱度逐漸消退、市場變得更有效率之後，我們透過擴大市場准入和流動性分配以及​​提高營運效率來增強我們的加密貨幣能力。

Our decision to invest in building our scaled crypto capabilities, pay dividends by enabling us to generate sizable returns in the relatively muted second and third quarters and really set us up to capture a significant opportunity that was presented in the fourth quarter. We aren't done expanding our global crypto footprint to meet growing institutional demand. We are in the early days of building our 24/7 crypto-native offering and continue to build out our connectivity to reputable markets and capital-efficient framework to enhance our market making and risk management capabilities.

我們決定投資建立我們的規模化加密能力，這使我們能夠在相對低迷的第二和第三季度獲得可觀的回報，並真正為我們抓住第四季度出現的重大機會奠定了基礎。我們尚未擴大我們的全球加密貨幣足跡以滿足日益增長的機構需求。我們正處於建立 24/7 加密原生產品的早期階段，並將繼續建立與知名市場和資本高效框架的連接，以增強我們的做市和風險管理能力。

Importantly, despite growing our crypto footprint, we remain committed to risk management and capital efficiency. We are excited for the growing opportunity in crypto and digital assets more broadly. We believe that the new regulatory tailwinds will kick off a wave of new products in 2025 and which will further expand the addressable market of our market making and execution services, which plays to our core strengths.

重要的是，儘管我們的加密足跡不斷擴大，但我們仍然致力於風險管理和資本效率。我們對加密和數位資產更廣泛的成長機會感到興奮。我們相信，新的監管順風將在 2025 年掀起一波新產品的浪潮，這將進一步擴大我們的做市和執行服務的潛在市場，從而發揮我們的核心優勢。

In addition, we continue to grow our ETF block offering by onboarding more clients and broadening our liquidity distribution. This disciplined work delivered sizable results in the fourth quarter as we saw greater client activity across both new and existing clients. Taking a step back, I look at our full year 2024 results, and despite the recent strong performance, I believe there is so much more to come.

此外，我們透過吸收更多客戶和擴大流動性分配來繼續增加我們的 ETF 區塊發行。這項嚴謹的工作在第四季取得了可觀的成果，因為我們看到新舊客戶的客戶活動都有所增加。回顧過去，我回顧了我們 2024 年全年的業績，儘管最近表現強勁，但我相信未來還會有更多表現。

Our strategic focus and areas of growth align us for even greater long-term success as we expand our addressable market by adding more asset classes and offerings to our suite of market-making capabilities and execution service solutions.

我們的策略重點和成長領域使我們在透過在我們的做市能力和執行服務解決方案套件中添加更多資產類別和產品來擴大我們的潛在市場的過程中，獲得了更大的長期成功。

Our focus on enhancing our core businesses and the continued success of our growth initiatives positions us well for any macro environment, whether it be reduced volatility or significant spikes in volatility in volumes that typically accompany increasing global tensions and the economic uncertainty, changes in monetary policy or elections. We continue to hire and make investments in our business. For example, it is worth noting that of our current employees, only 34% of them were at Virtu prior to 2019. This means that we continue to make significant multiyear investments in new traders, developers, quants and other great employees.

我們專注於加強我們的核心業務以及我們成長計畫的持續成功，這使我們能夠應對任何宏觀環境，無論是波動性降低，還是通常伴隨全球緊張局勢加劇和經濟不確定性、貨幣政策變化或選舉而出現的交易量波動性大幅上升。我們將繼續招募人才並對我們的業務進行投資。例如，值得注意的是，在我們目前的員工中，只有 34% 在 2019 年之前在 Virtu 工作。這意味著我們將繼續對新的交易員、開發人員、量化分析師和其他優秀員工進行大量的多年投資。

Notably, about 20% of our new hires since 2023 were to support our organic growth initiatives. And as you've come to expect from Virtu, we remain disciplined as ever around costs throughout the year, which enabled us to realize a 58% adjusted EBITDA margin in 2024.

值得注意的是，自 2023 年以來，我們約有 20% 的新員工是為了支持我們的有機成長計畫。正如您對 Virtu 的期望一樣，我們全年對成本一如既往地嚴加控制，這使我們能夠在 2024 年實現 58% 的調整後 EBITDA 利潤率。

Now I will turn the call over to Ms. Cindy Lee, our CFO. Cindy?

現在我將電話轉給我們的財務長 Cindy Lee 女士。辛蒂？

Thank you, Doug. Good morning, everyone. On slide 3 of our supplemental materials, we provided a summary of our quarterly performance. For the fourth quarter of 2024, our adjusted net trading income or NT, which represents our trading gains net of direct trading expenses, totaled $458 million or $7.3 million per day. Market Making adjusted net trading income was $348 million or $5.5 million per day.

謝謝你，道格。大家早安。在補充資料的第 3 張投影片中，我們提供了季度業績的摘要。2024 年第四季度，我們的調整後淨交易收入或 NT（代表我們的交易收益減去直接交易費用）總計 4.58 億美元或每天 730 萬美元。做市調整後的淨交易收入為 3.48 億美元，即每天 550 萬美元。

Execution Services adjusted net trading income was $110 million or $1.7 million per day. Our fourth quarter 2024 normalized adjusted EPS was $1.14. Adjusted EBITDA was $284 million for the fourth quarter 2024, and our adjusted EBITDA margin was 61.9%.

執行服務調整後的淨交易收入為 1.1 億美元，即每天 170 萬美元。我們 2024 年第四季的標準化調整後每股收益為 1.14 美元。 2024 年第四季的調整後 EBITDA 為 2.84 億美元，我們的調整後 EBITDA 利潤率為 61.9%。

On slide 9, we provided a summary of our operating expense results. For the fourth quarter 2024, we recorded $191 million of adjusted operating expenses. We continue to maintain an efficient cost structure and disciplined expense management which has helped us to control our operating expenses during the inflationary environment.

在第 9 頁上，我們提供了營運費用結果的摘要。2024 年第四季度，我們記錄的調整後營運費用為 1.91 億美元。我們繼續保持高效的成本結構和嚴格的費用管理，這有助於我們在通膨環境下控制營運費用。

Financing interest expense was $27 million for the fourth quarter of 2024. With the benefit of our recent refinance and interest rate swap contracts that we entered in the prior years, our blended interest rate was approximately 7.2% for our long-term debt in aggregate.

2024 年第四季的融資利息支出為 2,700 萬美元。由於我們前幾年簽訂的再融資和利率互換合同，我們的長期債務綜合利率約為 7.2%。

In Q4, we used a portion of our free cash flow to repurchase 1.7 million shares at an average price of $34.18 per share for a total of $57.1 million. To date, we have repurchased almost 51 million shares at an average price of $25.56 per share for a total of $1.3 billion.

第四季度，我們使用部分自由現金流以平均每股 34.18 美元的價格回購了 170 萬股，總計 5,710 萬美元。迄今為止，我們已以平均每股 25.56 美元的價格回購了近 5,100 萬股，總額達 13 億美元。

Quarter-end share count was 159.2 million shares outstanding, bringing our buybacks on target to fit within the ranges we have set forth publicly. Since we initiated our share repurchase program, we have repurchased over 19.4% of the fully diluted shares of Virtu net after new issuance. Our share repurchase program year-to-date is within the guidelines we have published. We remain committed to our $0.24 per quarter dividend and combined with our share repurchase program demonstrates our continued commitment to return capital to our shareholders.

季度末流通股總數為 1.592 億股，使我們的回購量達到了我們公開設定的目標範圍。自從我們啟動股票回購計畫以來，我們已回購了 Virtu net 新發行後超過 19.4% 的完全稀釋股份。我們今年迄今的股票回購計畫符合我們發布的指導方針。我們仍然致力於每季派發 0.24 美元的股息，並結合我們的股票回購計劃，表明我們持續致力於向股東返還資本。

Now I would like to turn the call over to the operator for the Q&A.

現在我想將電話轉給接線員進行問答。

(Operator Instructions)

（操作員指令）

Patrick Moley, Piper Sandler.

派崔克·莫利，派珀·桑德勒。

Yes, good morning. How you guys doing?

是的，早安。你們好嗎？

Good. How are you?

好的。你好嗎？

Good. So congrats on the quarter. My question is on just the regulatory environment. Obviously, Doug, I don't know if you heard, but we have a new Head of the SEC coming in. So can you just maybe talk about like what that means for your business? And what that means for the areas that you're in, the opportunities that are presented there and then what it could mean for just the overall total addressable market of those opportunities? Thanks.

好的。恭喜本季取得佳績。我的問題僅與監管環境有關。顯然，道格，我不知道你是否聽說了，但我們有一位新的證券交易委員會主席即將上任。那麼您能否談談這對您的業務意味著什麼？這對於您所在的領域、那裡存在的機會意味著什麼？謝謝。

One of my New Year's resolutions was not to mention Gary Gantes name again. So thank you, Patrick, for having me violate that right away. And that may be the last time I will say anything about him. Look, I mean, obviously, we're thrilled with the changing of the guard in Washington. I mean, it really was a -- I'll be polite and say it was a burden that the entire industry had to bear for the last four years, you had a politically motivated share and a head of trading in markets that was effectively a puppet.

我的新年新希望之一就是不再提及 Gary Gante 的名字。所以謝謝你，帕特里克，讓我立即違反了這一點。這也許是我最後一次談論他了。看，我的意思是，顯然，我們對華盛頓的換屆感到興奮。我的意思是，這真的是——我很禮貌地說，這是整個行業在過去四年裡必須承受的負擔，你有一個受政治動機的份額和一個實際上是傀儡的市場交易主管。

And so they were [promulgating] getting proposals that were not intended to make the markets better. And so for better or worse, we took a leading role in beating a lot of that back, I think, very successfully, and I give a lot of credit to a lot of people within the industry that rallied behind this and recognize the harm they were going to do.

因此，他們頒布的提案並非旨在改善市場。因此，無論好壞，我們都在擊退許多此類事件中發揮了主導作用，我認為，我們非常成功地擊退了這些事件，並且我非常感謝業內許多人的支持，他們認識到了他們將要造成的危害。

The good news is that Paul Atkins is an unbelievably experienced, thoughtful person. Obviously, I think he has views that are contrary to Gansler his band of Mary men around market structure and wholesaling and payment for order flow. So all of those items will be off the table. I think the most exciting thing in terms of -- and I mentioned it in the script around tailwinds is what's going to happen on digital assets.

好消息是，保羅·阿特金斯是一位經驗豐富、深思熟慮的人。顯然，我認為他在市場結構、批發和訂單流支付方面的觀點與甘斯勒和他的瑪麗幫的觀點相反。因此所有這些議題都將被擱置。我認為最令人興奮的事情——我在腳本中提到順風方面的事情是數位資產將會發生什麼。

I mean it's difficult to predict exactly where it will come out and whether the CFTC will have more authority than the SEC. But you know that there's going to be a bipartisan solution already the interim chair of the SEC overturned staff accounting bulletin 121, which was the absurdity that Gansler had pushed through around banks custodying digital assets. And Hester Perth has been appointed the head of a crypto subcommittee of the SEC, and she's obviously a very smart person that's very favorable around having sensible regulations rather than regulation by enforcement. So we're very, very excited about that.

我的意思是，很難準確預測它最終會如何發展，以及 CFTC 是否比 SEC 擁有更大的權力。但你知道，兩黨很快就會達成解決方案，美國證券交易委員會的臨時主席推翻了員工會計公告 121，這是甘斯勒在銀行託管數位資產方面所推動的荒謬舉措。赫斯特·珀斯 (Hester Perth) 被任命為美國證券交易委員會加密貨幣小組委員會的負責人，她顯然非常聰明，非常贊成製定合理的監管而不是強制監管。因此我們對此感到非常非常興奮。

And Atkins has a history of wanting to look at Reg NMS, in particular, the water protection rule. So I think there'll be a -- in 2021, he suggested that there'd be like a real comprehensive review of equity market structure. And I think that will be -- that will involve the industry. And obviously, we've made sensible proposals around sub dollar stocks and things like that, we don't think that makes a lot of sense in the marketplace.

阿特金斯一直以來都希望研究《國家海洋管理條例》，特別是水保護規則。因此我認為，2021 年將對股票市場結構進行一次真正的全面審查。我認為這將會涉及整個行業。顯然，我們針對低於美元的股票和類似問題提出了合理的建議，但我們認為這在市場上沒有太大意義。

And so we're just excited that we're going to have folks in Washington that are willing to engage the industry that are sensible and that we'll look at data-driven solutions. That's all we ever asked for. We're data-driven solutions. And when presented with the data of the prior regime, frankly, ignored it because of their political motivations.

因此，我們很高興華盛頓有願意明智地參與該行業的人，並且我們將研究數據驅動的解決方案。這就是我們所要求的一切。我們是數據驅動的解決方案。當他們看到前政權的數據時，坦白說，他們因為政治動機而忽略了它。

So it's a new day in Washington. We're very, very excited about it. I think we'll get clarity -- bipartisan clarity around crypto. I know Congressman French Hill is a proponent of clarity around and he's the new Chair of the House Financial Services Committee. I think Senor Tim Scott as well and [senetor Lumis] are all very excited about a bipartisan solution around digital assets so that the United States can again be the leader of innovation in a very, very important and growing asset class.

這是華盛頓新的一天。我們對此非常非常興奮。我認為我們會得到明確的答案——兩黨對加密技術的明確答案。我知道國會議員弗倫奇·希爾是透明化的倡導者，他是新任眾議院金融服務委員會主席。我認為參議員蒂姆·斯科特和盧米斯都對圍繞數位資產的兩黨解決方案感到非常興奮，這樣美國才能再次成為這個非常非常重要且不斷增長的資產類別的創新領導者。

Great. That's great color. And then just a follow-up. If we look back over the last several years, 2024, your earnings were surprisingly stable. Could you just talk maybe you've addressed this in your comments, we had some overlapping calls. But could you talk about what drove that stability and whether you think you can maintain that level of stability as we head into 2025, understand it a lot of it's going to be driven by volumes and volatility, but what are those things that could maybe help it remain as stable as it's been?

偉大的。顏色真棒。然後只是後續行動。如果我們回顧過去幾年，到 2024 年，您的收入出奇地穩定。你能不能說一下，也許你已經在評論中提到了這一點，我們有一些重疊的通話。但是您能否談談是什麼推動了這種穩定，以及您是否認為在進入 2025 年時能夠保持這種穩定水平，您明白這在很大程度上將受到交易量和波動性的推動，但是哪些因素可能有助於它保持目前的穩定？

Yeah, that's a great question. I think, look, we've prided ourselves in being a very scaled diverse organization. We've made significant investments in people. And I can't say the word internalization enough. I mean we really act as a single cohesive firm, so internalizing both obviously, retail order flow, but also within the firm, our noncustomer market making and customer market making businesses. And indeed, our Execution Services business, that's an added value that we can provide to our clients.

是的，這是一個很好的問題。我想，我們為自己是一家規模龐大、多元化的組織而感到自豪。我們對人才進行了大量投資。我對「內化」這個詞怎麼強調都不為過。我的意思是，我們實際上就像一個具有凝聚力的公司，因此顯然既內部化零售訂單流，又在公司內部實現非客戶做市和客戶做市業務的內部化。事實上，我們的執行服務業務是我們可以為客戶提供的附加價值。

So I think that really helps. We've added, obviously, the growth initiatives have brought more to use your word stability and more consistency around what we're doing. -- and options and ETF block. And as I mentioned, crypto had a really nice fourth quarter.

所以我認為這確實有幫助。顯然，我們補充說，成長舉措為我們所做的事情帶來了更多的穩定性和一致性。 ——以及選擇權和 ETF 區塊。正如我所提到的，加密貨幣的第四季表現非常好。

So again, it's the Virtu value proposition, which was be scale the agnostic to markets, try to be in as many asset classes and geographies as you possibly can, try to be the best bid and the best offer in the market making and on the execution services side, provide really scaled, efficient multi-asset products and multiple products to great clients that understand the value proposition.

再次強調，這是 Virtu 的價值主張，即擴大與市場無關的規模，嘗試涉足盡可能多的資產類別和地區，嘗試在做市和執行服務方面提供最佳買入價和最佳賣出價，為理解價值主張的優秀客戶提供真正規模化、高效的多資產產品和多種產品。

And so we're going to have our ebbs, we're going to have our flows. Hopefully, we have more slowing than ebbing. And obviously, with this change in administration in Washington and regulatory tailwind, we're more confident. And obviously, part of that was this buyback program, which we started four years ago, and we bought back about 19.4% of our company. And obviously, that helps grow EPS. Joe, you want to add something?

所以，我們會有低潮，也會有潮起。但願，放緩的勢頭比減緩的勢頭更大。顯然，隨著華盛頓政府的變動和監管的順風，我們更有信心。顯然，其中一部分原因是我們四年前啟動的回購計劃，我們回購了該公司約 19.4% 的股份。顯然，這有助於提高每股收益。喬，你想補充點什麼嗎？

No, I'm just going to say -- I think you touched on it, but execution services having a consistent year and having an outstanding fourth quarter, I think the bar is -- has been raised there. I hesitate to to say permanently, but I think the original thesis of us getting into execution services was that while volatile, it was going to be slightly less volatile than the Market Making segment. And I think that's -- here we are several years later, I think that's proving to be the case. And hopefully, it will prove to be the case even more going forward.

不，我只是想說 - 我想你已經提到了這一點，但如果執行服務今年表現穩定並且第四季度表現出色，我認為標準已經提高了。我猶豫著是否要永遠這樣說，但我認為我們進入執行服務的最初論點是，雖然波動性很大，但其波動性將略低於做市業務。我認為——幾年後的今天，事實已經證明了這一點。希望未來能夠證明這一點。

Awesome. Thanks, guys.

驚人的。謝謝大家。

Chris Allen, Citi.

花旗銀行的克里斯艾倫 (Chris Allen)。

Good morning, everyone. Very nice quarter. Wanted to just dig in a little bit on the fourth quarter. And maybe if you could help us think about the strong performance in the Market Making segment. What was driven by internalization versus in the environment?

大家早安。非常好的季度。想要對第四季進行一些深入探討。也許您可以幫助我們思考一下做市領域的強勁表現。內化和環境分別是什麼因素在運作？

I think you noted earlier on the call, a mixed opportunity set, but there was an improving environment over the course of the quarter. So trying to delineate between the two and then as we start 2025, all the signals in terms of realized volatility, retail trading activity all seem to be pointing in the kind of positive direction when you would agree with that assessment?

我想您之前在電話會議上就提到過，機會好壞參半，但在本季度，環境正在不斷改善。因此，嘗試區分兩者，然後當我們進入 2025 年時，實際波動率、零售交易活動方面的所有訊號似乎都指向積極的方向，您會同意這種評估嗎？

Yeah, I think -- look, it's a great question. I think when you think of Virtu, we've always said this, like market volumes and then like what's the bid offer spread. Those are always the best measurement of opportunity for the market maker. Some of that you can look in and I mentioned it in the script, Chris, in the 605 reports around quoted spread, and certainly, we've seen a positive trend there.

是的，我認為——看，這是一個很好的問題。我想當您想到 Virtu 時，我們總是會這樣說，例如市場交易量，然後買賣價差是多少。對於做市商來說，這些始終是衡量機會的最佳標準。克里斯，您可以查看其中的一些內容，我在腳本中提到過，在 605 份有關引用傳播的報告中，當然，我們看到了積極的趨勢。

So -- we had a very nice quarter in our retail business. We highlighted crypto, where we had a really just a terrific quarter in crypto, our block ETF business did quite well. And that's an area that really benefits from internalization. Think about your standard desk that's taking down large positions, whether it's through the RFQ regime or it's a transition from a big RIA or pension plan.

所以 - 我們的零售業務本季表現非常好。我們重點介紹了加密貨幣，我們在加密貨幣領域度過了一個非常棒的季度，我們的區塊 ETF 業務表現相當不錯。這是一個真正受益於內部化的領域。想想您的標準交易台正在承擔大量頭寸，無論是透過 RFQ 制度，還是從大型 RIA 或退休金計畫過渡而來。

The ability to provide attractive pricing in a highly competitive marketplace really hinges on being able to hedge your exposure effectively without broadcasting that to the greater world and that's what internalization really is. So I'm very proud of a lot of people around the firm that have worked very, very hard in that area to enable us, frankly, to offer a much better product set and a wider product set, both in the United States and Europe. We're really functionally able to provide liquidity in equities, commodities and now fixed income.

在競爭激烈的市場中提供有吸引力的定價的能力實際上取決於能夠有效地對沖您的風險，而無需向外界廣播，這就是內部化的真正含義。因此，我為公司許多在這方面辛勤工作的人感到非常自豪，坦白說，正是這些努力使我們能夠在美國和歐洲提供更好、更廣泛的產品。我們確實能夠為股票、商品以及現在的固定收益提供流動性。

And then the last thing I'll highlight is, don't sleep on our Execution Services business. Really proud of what Steve Cavoli and the crew have done there. We bought a couple of bucks, let's put it that way, and we change the tires as they were driving down the highway and whatever your car of choice is, BMW, Rolls-Royce or Mercedes we have one of those now. We have got a great scaled global business that's a heck of a lot more efficient. And the proof is in the pudding.

我最後要強調的是，不要忽略我們的執行服務業務。真的為史蒂夫·卡沃利和他的團隊在那裡所做的一切感到自豪。這麼說吧，我們花了幾塊錢，然後在高速公路上行駛時更換輪胎，無論你選擇什麼車，寶馬、勞斯萊斯或奔馳，我們現在都有其中之一。我們的全球業務規模龐大，效率也高很多。事實勝於雄辯。

As I tell people the only competitive advantage we have because we don't have research, we don't have prime. We don't have IPO calendar, it is performance. And it's very clear that our products perform at or better than industry standard. And that's why we've been able to grow market share, particularly in our Algo suite, but also Triton and analytics.

我告訴人們，我們唯一的競爭優勢是因為我們沒有研究，我們沒有優勢。我們沒有 IPO 日曆，而是業績。很明顯，我們的產品性能達到或優於行業標準。這就是我們能夠擴大市場份額的原因，尤其是我們的 Algo 套件，還有 Triton 和分析。

So if you add up all of those things, Chris, and that's kind of been the business plan, it led to a nice quarter in 2024. And I tried very hard not to talk about the current quarter because every time I do it is come back to bite me but it's hard to argue with your thesis, right, that a lot of those trends are continuing in the 15 or so trading days we've seen in 2025.

所以，克里斯，如果你把所有這些因素加起來，這就是商業計劃，它將在 2024 年帶來一個不錯的季度。我盡量不談論當前季度，因為每次談論它，我都會受到打擊，但很難反駁你的論點，對吧，很多趨勢在 2025 年我們所看到的大約 15 個交易日內仍在繼續。

And just a follow-up on crypto. You noted that you've made some investments in the middle of the year '24, but you're still in early days in building out your are 24/7 crypto framework. So maybe if you can give us some color maybe any intent color on the investments you made and what you need to do to kind of build that framework to be fully prepared for what could be a good environment for crypto moving forward?

這只是對加密的後續關注。您提到，您在 24 年中期進行了一些投資，但您仍處於構建 24/7 加密框架的早期階段。所以，您能否為我們介紹一下您進行的投資的意圖，以及您需要做些什麼來建立這個框架，為加密貨幣未來的良好環境做好充分準備？

Yeah. I mean it's a great question. I mean in some ways, it's a traditional Virtu-style business. You've got spot, you got ETF and you got futures, right? And that's kind of right now wheelhouse, think of FX, think of commodities. But in many ways, it's different. You have nontraditional venues. I'll be nice and say that. Some of them are regulatorily questionable. So you got to avoid those.

是的。我認為這是一個很好的問題。我的意思是，從某種方面來說，這是一種傳統的 Virtu 風格的業務。您有現貨，有 ETF，還有期貨，對嗎？這就是目前的駕駛室，想想外匯，想想商品。但在很多方面，它是不同的。您有非傳統的場地。我會很友善地說出這些。其中一些在監管方面存在疑問。所以你必須避免這些。

The capital efficiencies are not there. You don't have centralized clearing. You don't have traditional prime brokerage largely because of reputational issues and Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 didn't help. So -- and then also in the ETF world, Zar Gensler wouldn't allow for in-kind creation redemption, you had to do cash creation redemptions. So that meant that operationally, it was a lot more of a hassle to be an efficient market maker in the cash Bitcoin ETF products.

資本效率不存在。你沒有集中清算。您沒有傳統的頂級經紀業務，主要是因為聲譽問題，而員工會計公告 121 沒有幫助。所以 — — 而且在 ETF 領域，Zar Gensler 不允許實體創建贖回，您必須進行現金創建贖回。因此，從營運角度來看，成為現金比特幣 ETF 產品的有效做市商會更加麻煩。

So we spent a lot of time and a lot of money investing in that. And in addition, for the first time, the marketplace demands 24/7 pricing.So typically, Saturdays and Sundays up to whenever the CME would open at 6:00 PM Eastern our machines and our staff was off, and that's changed. So now we're at 24/7 provider, and that's what the industry demands. Obviously, we're a big market maker on EDX the best solution out there because we own a piece of it. We started with our friends at Citadel and Schwab and Fidelity and Sequoia and Pantera, and it's a great venue for us, but they demand 24/7 execution.

因此我們花費了大量的時間和金錢來投資這一點。此外，市場首次要求全天候定價。所以現在我們提供全天候服務，這正是業界的要求。顯然，我們是 EDX 的大型做市商，擁有最佳解決方案，因為我們擁有其中的一部分。我們和 Citadel、Schwab、Fidelity、Sequoia 和 Pantera 的朋友一起開始，這對我們來說是一個很好的場地，但他們要求全天候執行。

And so to build all that took a lot of time, what do we continue to work on, it's distribution. We firmly believe that these products, they've migrated to the wealth divisions of meaningful institutions, and they're going to continue to go up the latter, if you will, and there'll be institutional adoption on a significant scale of these products, we believe.

所以，建立這一切花費了大量的時間，我們要繼續致力於分發。我們堅信，這些產品已經轉移到有意義的機構的財富部門，而且如果你願意的話，它們還將繼續向後者發展，並且我們相信，這些產品將會被大規模的機構採用。

So like our other distribution capabilities, whether it's block ETF or FX, we need to be able to provide attractive two sided pricing insight in a multitude of coins to institutions. And so you'll see a VF crypto, just like we have VF fixed income, we've got VFX, et cetera. So it will be an institutional offering where we stream prices directly to end users.

因此，就像我們的其他分銷能力一樣，無論是區塊 ETF 還是外匯，我們都需要能夠向機構提供多種貨幣中具有吸引力的雙面定價洞察。因此，你會看到 VF 加密貨幣，就像我們有 VF 固定收益、VFX 等等。因此，這將是一個機構產品，我們將價格直接傳遞給最終用戶。

So again, classic Virtu, but with a lot of operational complexities managed and run by legacy long-term Virtu institutional traders and operations people, but just a lot more complexity and a lot more hassle, frankly, because of some of the regulatory uncertainties.

再次強調，這是經典的 Virtu，但具有許多營運複雜性，由傳統的長期 Virtu 機構交易員和營運人員管理和運行，但坦率地說，由於一些監管的不確定性，複雜性和麻煩要大得多。

Great color. Thanks, guys.

顏色很棒。謝謝大家。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Ken Worthington, JPMorgan.

摩根大通的肯‧沃辛頓。

Hi, good morning. Thanks taking the question. First, one of the takeaways from the election was that betting via listed on contracts -- sorry, is a viable market. And I know bedding is a bit different than the financial markets that Virtu is currently in today. but do you see potential for Virtu to participate in listed betting markets? And how big or established would they need to be for Virtu to really be interested here?

嗨，早安。謝謝您回答這個問題。首先，從選舉中得到的一個啟示是，透過上市合約進行投注——抱歉，是一個可行的市場。我知道床上用品與 Virtu 目前所在的金融市場有些不同。但您是否認為 Virtu 有參與上市博彩市場的潛力？那麼，他們的規模需要多大或多成熟才能引起 Virtu 的真正興趣呢？

Yeah. I have to be a little careful of what I say because of our involvement with the NHL, obviously. But putting the NHL aside, Ken, Look, we look at every opportunity. We know that some of our competitors -- great competitors are already involved in this I think here's what I would say.

是的。顯然，由於我們與 NHL 有關係，所以我必須謹慎行事。但是，肯，把 NHL 放在一邊，看，我們抓住每一個機會。我們知道我們的一些競爭對手——偉大的競爭對手已經參與其中了，我想這就是我要說的。

Obviously, we look for credible venues and to your point, there are. Then we look at like are there index products where there's enough volume that it makes sense -- in terms of our involvement. I mean, it's a little difficult to make a market and whether the ranges are going to win or lose against the Carolina hurricanes. They lost last night, for example. Like that's not something that a market maker get involved in.

顯然，我們尋找可信的場地，正如您所說，確實有可信的場地。然後，我們會查看是否有足夠數量的指數產品，從我們的參與程度來看，這是否合理。我的意思是，做出市場判斷以及判斷球隊在與卡羅萊納颶風的比賽中是勝還是敗有點困難。例如，他們昨晚輸了。就像這不是做市商參與的事情一樣。

If you had broader indices, it definitely is something we would look at. We're always excited about new markets. If you had asked me four years ago about Bitcoin, I wouldn't have noted from a BLT. Like it's just not what we do. I don't know or focus on the underlying products. But if it is a widget that people like to trade in a viable market with significant enough volume where somebody needs two sided pricing, we'll be there. And so we like what people are doing in terms of coming up with like DCMs and having futures products and things like that, that's kind of right in our wheelhouse.

如果有更廣泛的指數，我們肯定會關注它。我們總是對新市場感到興奮。如果四年前你問我關於比特幣的問題，我不會從 BLT 上註意到這一點。就好像這不是我們所做的一樣。我不了解或不關注底層產品。但如果它是人們喜歡在可行的市場中進行交易的小部件，並且交易量足夠大，而有人需要雙邊定價，我們就會參與其中。因此，我們喜歡人們正在做的事情，例如提出 DCM 和期貨產品等，這些都恰好在我們的能力範圍內。

So I think, can the market will evolve in that manner because to your point, it's something that has meaningful retail to put it mildly interest. I like very, very much that these entities. I forgot some of the names. It's like, I didn't even had to pronounce it [Calcin Nadex] and some of these other venues are trying to launch DCM products, and that's certainly something that's attractive to us.

所以我認為，市場能否以這種方式發展，因為就你的觀點而言，這是有意義的零售利益的東西。我非常非常喜歡這些實體。我忘了一些名字。就像，我什至不必發音它 [Calcin Nadex]，其他一些地方正試圖推出 DCM 產品，這對我們而言當然具有吸引力。

Perfect. Thank you. And then clearly, you had a great quarter. Historically, Virtu has generated sort of disproportional opportunity to profit around events. Can you help us gauge the magnitude of the election? And how big the impact the days around the election were on the results you had this quarter?

完美的。謝謝。顯然，您度過了一個非常棒的季度。從歷史上看，Virtu 圍繞事件創造了某種不成比例的獲利機會。您能幫助我們評估這次選舉的重要性嗎？選舉前後的日子對本季的結果有多大影響？

Yea. It's a great question. And I'll answer it this way. I mean, obviously, and I said it in the script, the October quoted spread was meaningfully smaller than quoted spread in the 605 reports in November, and I think December is going to be released or has been released. And so it wasn't like on whatever election day was November, whatever we have this crazy outside, like eight, nine figure day. But it's been a buildup since then. And it hasn't really dissipated.

是的。這是一個很好的問題。我會這樣回答。我的意思是，很明顯，我在腳本中說過，10月份的報價價差明顯小於11月份605份報告中的報價價差，我認為12月份的數據即將公佈或已經公佈。因此，這不像十一月的選舉日，無論外面的情況多麼瘋狂，例如八、九位數的選舉日。但自此以後，這種趨勢開始逐漸增強。而且它還沒有真正消散。

So question is, how sustainable is that? I think it's pretty sustainable. I think there's a keen interest again in market I think -- I'm not going to quote the new putten sites, the golden age of this, that or the other thing. But I do think that there's more exuberance and confidence in the market. I think the -- having the Republicans control both houses of Congress means that maybe things are going to get done. And there's just a growing participation and enthusiasm in markets that we see here in the United States and in Asia, and then frankly, in Europe. I mean, Europe had a couple of $40 billion notional days again, which was something that I we hadn't seen in a while.

所以問題是，這種做法有多可持續？我認為它非常可持續。我認為市場再次出現了濃厚的興趣——我不會引用新的普頓網站、這個、那個或其他東西的黃金時代。但我確實認為市場更加活躍，信心更加充足。我認為共和黨控制國會兩院意味著事情可能會完成。我們看到，美國、亞洲以及歐洲市場的參與和熱情正在不斷提高。我的意思是，歐洲再次出現了幾天 400 億美元的名義貸款額，這是我們很久沒有見過的了。

And I do think that there's going to be more innovation, a lot of new products. You can't swing a dead cat these days without hitting a new crypto product, a new crypto ETF. I frankly lost track of how many issuers are are putting out new products around coins and leverage products and things like that. So all of that, if you -- that cornocopia of interest and new products is just a positive for a market-making firm.

我確實認為將會有更多的創新和大量新產品。如今，如果不推出新的加密產品或新的加密 ETF，你就無法擺脫困境。坦白說，我記不清有多少發行商推出了圍繞硬幣、槓桿產品等的新產品。所以，如果你——大量的興趣和新產品對於做市公司來說都是一件好事。

Thanks for comments.

感謝您的評論。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Alex Blostein, Goldman Sacs.

高盛的亞歷克斯‧布洛斯坦 (Alex Blostein)。

Hey, good morning, everybody. I was hoping to go back to the regulatory discussion for a second. So pretty clear the benefits that your business and many others would see from a different approach and a different framework when it comes to crypto and digital assets. But are there any other aspects of your business that you felt were particularly sort of suppressed by the regulatory regime over the last several years that could also see a bit more of a bounce back aside from crypto?

嘿，大家早安。我希望稍微回顧一下監管討論。因此，當涉及加密和數位資產時，您的企業和許多其他人將從不同的方法和不同的框架中看到的好處非常明顯。但是，除了加密貨幣之外，您是否覺得您業務的其他方面在過去幾年中受到了監管制度的特別壓制，而這些方面是否也可能會有所反彈？

Yeah. It's a great question. I think the new SEC is really good for us in two ways. I think it will it's going to stop new rules that were disrupting competition and harming capital formation. So if you think of initial public offerings in this country, again, I don't have the statistics, but I know folks at all of the big investment banks. And when I talk to Adena and [Lynn] about like listings, they're all excited about companies coming public in 2025, less concern around enhanced disclosures around things like ESG and expenses around that and all that kind of stuff.

是的。這是一個很好的問題。我認為新的 SEC 在兩個方面確實對我們有利。我認為它將阻止那些擾亂競爭和損害資本形成的新規則。所以如果你想想這個國家的首次公開募股，再說一次，我沒有統計數據，但我認識所有大型投資銀行的人。當我與阿德納 (Adena) 和 [Lynn] 談論上市時，他們都對 2025 年上市的公司感到興奮，而不太擔心有關 ESG 等方面的加強披露以及相關費用等所有這類內容。

So I think that clarity actually by not proposing new rules and making it easier to be a public company. will mean that there'll be more listed companies, I hope, in the United States in 2025 and beyond. That's all new product for us and obviously, the bigger, the better and the more the merrier.

因此，我認為，透過不提出新的規則，實際上可以實現明確性，並使公司更容易上市。我希望這意味著 2025 年及以後美國會有更多的上市公司。對我們來說這都是新產品，顯然越大越好、越多越好。

I think secondly, and I said this before, I think really just clarity. I mean what Gensler and his crew did to the crypto industry in the last two or three years, I'm going to say it was just patently on American. It really was. It was disgusting to watch how they were on this Jizad of regulation by enforcement intimidating small companies going after large companies with no basis in factor law. It was really an awful, awful thing to be involved with and to see.

我認為其次，我之前就說過，我認為實際上只是清晰度。我的意思是，Gensler 和他的團隊在過去兩三年對加密貨幣行業所做的一切，我想說這顯然是美國的所作所為。確實如此。看到他們在這項執法監管中毫無法律依據地恐嚇小公司、追究大公司的責任，真是令人厭惡。參與和看到這樣的事情確實是一件非常非常可怕的事情。

So having that clarity, I think, is a good thing. And the last thing I'll say just to s** on the administrative state and yes, I used the word s***, is not having Lena con at the FTC is a godsend. I mean in the realm of horrible administrative officials, she and Gensler tied for the gold metal. So I think there'll be a lot more clarity around M&A and not this -- again, I'll use the word Jizad, I don't use that lightly around competition and and combination and just people being more confident about investing in growth. And that's really what this country needs, not overbearing political enforcement.

因此，我認為，擁有這種清晰度是一件好事。我最後要說的是，對於行政部門來說，是的，我用了「狗屁」這個詞，沒有讓 Lena 成為聯邦貿易委員會的騙子真是天賜之物。我的意思是，在可怕的行政官員領域，她和根斯勒並列第一。因此，我認為在併購方面將會更加清晰，而不是這個——再次重申，我會使用「Jizad」這個詞，我不會輕易地使用它來表示競爭和合併，只是人們對投資成長更有信心。這才是這個國家真正需要的，而不是霸道的政治強制。

Loud and clear. Second question for you guys, just around capital management priorities. If the firm, which what it feels like is setting up to be in a more robust kind of trading backdrop again. I don't want to extrapolate Q4, which obviously was very strong, but it feels like given everything we just talked about, you guys are in a stronger footing from a revenue perspective. You have a framework on kind of how that translates into buybacks. That's pretty straightforward, any room within that to reduce debt as well? Or should we be thinking about the buyback still being the main priority when it comes to capital return?

聲音響亮、清晰。你們的第二個問題是關於資本管理重點。如果該公司看起來正準備再次進入更強勁的交易環境。我不想推斷第四季的表現，這顯然是非常強勁的，但從我們剛才談到的一切來看，從收入角度來看，你們的基礎更加牢固。您有一個關於如何將其轉化為回購的框架。這很簡單，其中還有減少債務的空間嗎？或者我們是否應該考慮將回購仍作為資本回報的首要任務？

Yeah. Alex, it's Joe. I think you should still think about the buybacks as being the main source of capital return. I think our capital structure right now, we took advantage of some opportunities there's always -- it seems like there's always opportunities to get the debt stack cheaper, which we'll continue to do. But I think we're excited about the future, and we're really happy with how the buyback program has worked. It's tailor made for a company like us with -- in terms of the volatility of our earnings and the volatility of our cash flows.

是的。亞歷克斯，我是喬​​。我認為你仍然應該將回購視為資本回報的主要來源。我認為我們目前的資本結構利用了一些機會——似乎總是有機會降低債務成本，我們會繼續這樣做。但我認為我們對未來感到興奮，我們對回購計畫的運作感到非常滿意。它是為我們這樣的公司量身定制的——就我們的收益波動性和現金流波動性而言。

So it's worked out extremely well. We look at it all the time. So we don't just set it and forget it. We look at it on a rolling basis and then we also look at how much capital we need to run the firm and invest in the areas we've been talking about today. And so taking all those things into account, I'd say that the buyback is still the front priority in terms of capital management.

因此，效果非常好。我們一直在看著它。所以我們不會只是設定了它然後就忘了它。我們會以滾動的方式看待這個問題，然後我們也會考慮營運公司和投資我們今天討論的領域需要多少資金。因此，考慮到所有這些因素，我認為回購仍然是資本管理的首要任務。

Great. Thank you, guys.

偉大的。謝謝你們。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Dan Fannon, Jefferies.

丹‧範農 (Dan Fannon)，傑富瑞 (Jefferies)。

Hi, great. Thanks. Good morning. I wanted to follow up on Execution Services. Another good quarter, good year. I guess, and you've talked a bit about this, but is there -- is it just time in terms of -- since the ITG stuff that acquisition integration that this is now gaining momentum? Are there things that you're doing externally sales force investment like kind of more front-footed in terms of of that to think about the prospective kind of continued solid growth in that business.

嗨，太好了。謝謝。早安.我想跟進執行服務。又一個好季度，好一年。我想，您已經談論過這一點，但是，自從 ITG 收購整合以來，是否只是時間問題，現在才開始獲得發展動力？您在外部銷售團隊投資方面是否做了一些更積極的事情，以考慮該業務未來持續穩健的成長。

Yeah. Thank you. It's a great question. I would say a couple of things. One is our mantra from day one of acquiring ITG and then the part of KCG that was Institutional Services was multi-asset. Those firms, particularly ITG talked it, but in reality, they didn't really have the offerings. And so making our Triton EMS product, truly multi-asset, making our analytics offering truly multi-asset, having algos and expertise that is truly multi-asset is a huge advantage because what we are seeing, particularly in the global -- the large global asset managers and pension funds, they want a single holistic multi-asset class solution that works really well.

是的。謝謝。這是一個很好的問題。我想說幾件事。一是我們從收購 ITG 第一天起就秉持的口號，當時 KCG 的機構服務部分是多元資產的。這些公司，尤其是 ITG，雖然口頭上這麼說過，但實際上他們並沒有真正的產品。因此，使我們的 Triton EMS 產品真正實現多資產，使我們的分析產品真正實現多資產，擁有真正多資產的演算法和專業知識，這是一個巨大的優勢，因為我們看到，特別是在全球範圍內——大型全球資產管理公司和退休基金，他們想要一個真正有效的單一整體多資產類別解決方案。

It helps that execution services is tied to a firm that is a multi-asset class market maker so that they know these clients and users know that they're getting the same functionality and understanding of markets that the market maker has.

將執行服務與多資產類別做市商公司掛鉤是有幫助的，這樣他們就知道這些客戶和用戶知道他們獲得了與做市商相同的功能和對市場的理解。

So it's a really attractive scaled offering. That's the first thing I'll say. The second thing is the products -- the equities products we had, our algo products, we made those truly global products for the first time. And if you're if you're running a trading firm and you've got a trading office in Hong Kong, one in London and one in New York, let's say, you know that the algo product you're using, obviously, with regulatory and marketplace differences is essentially the same the same product. So that's very interesting.

所以這是一個非常有吸引力的規模化產品。這是我要說的第一件事。第二件事是產品－我們的股票產品、我們的演算法產品，我們首次製造了真正全球化的產品。如果你經營一家貿易公司，並且在香港、倫敦和紐約各有一個貿易辦事處，那麼你知道你使用的演算法產品，顯然，監管和市場存在差異，但本質上是相同的產品。這非常有趣。

We also, for the first time, integrated all those products together. So analytics, EMS really are truly integrated into a single holistic solution. So the mantra around here has been be multi-asset class, sell clients multiple products, right, because you get a better return, a better yield in both broker neutral and our broker products. And then the last thing, and you nailed it, which is it really was a culture shift, changing the firms that we acquired, particularly ITG from a balkanized regional [me -- Me culture] to a single unitary firm was not the easiest thing to do as we were upgrading the technology.

我們也首次將所有這些產品整合在一起。因此，分析和 EMS 確實整合到了一個整體解決方案中。因此，這裡的口頭禪一直是多資產類別，向客戶銷售多種產品，對，因為您可以獲得更好的回報，無論是經紀人中立還是我們的經紀人產品，您都可以獲得更好的收益。最後一點，你說對了，這確實是一種文化轉變，將我們收購的公司，特別是 ITG 從分裂的區域 [我——我的文化] 轉變為單一的單一公司並不是最容易的事情，因為我們正在升級技術。

So I'd give Steve Cavoli a lot of credit. We've added some very talented senior hires in the last year, year half that have really buttressed the group there. There's a lot of great people that hung in there from TG that, as we say, we're virtualized and really get it. And so I'm really excited about the team that we have. We're going to continue to hire there, more relationship managers, more people that are technologically savvy and can speak to clients about their needs very, very effectively.

因此我對史蒂夫·卡沃利給予高度評價。我們在過去一年和上半年招募了一些非常有才華的高級人才，他們對團隊起到了巨大的支持作用。很多優秀的人才都留在了 TG，正如我們所說，我們已經虛擬化了，並且真正了解這一點。所以我對我們的團隊感到非常興奮。我們將繼續招募更多的客戶關係經理，更多精通技術並能非常有效地與客戶溝通其需求的人才。

So I think it's just all of that, Dan has really led to our ability to generate revenue. The last thing I should say is our Virtu Capital Markets Group, the at-the-money offering folks are a terrific group. They had a really nice quarter and continue to grow. That's like the little engine that could. That's delivers really good outsized results.

所以我認為正是這一切，丹才真正提升了我們的創收能力。我最後要說的是，我們的 Virtu 資本市場集團 (Virtu Capital Markets Group) 的平價發行人員是一個很棒的團隊。他們度過了一個非常好的季度並且繼續成長。這就像一個有動力的小型發動機。這確實能帶來超乎尋常的好結果。

Again, as I said in response to an earlier question, the only competitive advantage we have is execution quality and superior customer service. we don't have like your bank, we don't have prime. We don't have research, great guys like you. We don't have IPO calendar. We don't have any of that. We have a bunch of really talented people, we can offer scale, we can offer efficiency, we can offer demonstrable performance and we can give a very, very intensive customer service, and that's what we're all about.

再次，正如我在回答先前的問題時所說，我們唯一的競爭優勢是執行品質和卓越的客戶服務。我們沒有像你們那樣的銀行，我們沒有優質銀行。我們沒有研究像你這樣的偉人。我們沒有 IPO 日曆。我們什麼都沒有。我們擁有一群真正有才華的人，我們可以提供規模，我們可以提供效率，我們可以提供可證明的性能，我們可以提供非常非常密集的客戶服務，這就是我們的全部。

Great. And just as a follow-up, Joe, just as you look at 2025, 2024, actually was another good year of expenses and margin expansion. As you think about areas of investment and also expense growth, -- is there much difference in terms of the growth rates we've seen historically as we look to '25.

偉大的。作為後續問題，喬，正如你所看到的，2025 年、2024 年實際上是費用和利潤率擴大的另一個好年份。當您考慮投資領域和費用成長時，展望25年，我們歷史上看到的成長率是否有很大差異？

No. I would say the operating expenses, I think we've always guided low single digit -- low to mid-single-digit growth. I think over time, that's proven that out. It's a daily battle. I think in the chart we put in the supplement that looks at different levels of net trading income and different levels of EPS and buyback. I think we've incorporated some slightly higher comp expenses, nothing too dramatic, but just taking into account that we -- that we continue to hire and then we continue to hire very high-quality individuals.

不。我想說的是，對於營運費用，我認為我們一直引導著低個位數——低到中個位數的成長。我認為隨著時間的推移，這一點已經得到證實。這是一場每天的戰鬥。我認為我們在圖表中加入了補充內容，以查看不同水準的淨交易收入和不同水準的每股盈餘和回購。我認為我們已經將一些略高的薪酬費用納入考量，沒有什麼太大的變化，但只是考慮到我們會繼續招聘，並且會繼續招聘高素質的人才。

We modeled in slightly higher interest expense, just given we had some old swaps roll off. But there's continued opportunity to always reprice. So we're being a little conservative there. But no, nothing dramatic. I think on the capital side, as I mentioned, buybacks continue and then the investments required, there will be some incremental capital investments needed in crypto, perhaps in Europe as we build out our European ETF block business. to compete over there. So I think we've got a couple of priorities, but it's all captured in that slide, the guidance.

我們模擬了略高的利息支出，只是考慮到我們有一些舊的掉期交易到期。但重新定價的機會仍然存在。因此我們在這方面有點保守。但事實並非如此，沒有什麼戲劇性的。我認為在資本方面，正如我所提到的，回購將繼續，然後是所需的投資，加密貨幣將需要一些增量資本投資，也許是在歐洲，因為我們正在建立我們的歐洲 ETF 區塊業務。去那邊比賽。所以我認為我們有幾個優先事項，但這些都反映在了那張投影片的指導下。

Got it. Thank you.

知道了。謝謝。

Craig Siegenthaler, Bank of America.

美國銀行的克雷格·西根塔勒（Craig Siegenthaler）。

Good morning, Doug. Hope everyone's doin g well. We wanted to circle back on your market share comments to Chris' earlier question, and we can definitely keep the discussion more long term. But how has market share been trending in cash equities relative to your larger established competitors and also several newer entrants that look to be taking share.

早安，道格。祝大家都一切順利。我們想回到您對克里斯先前提出的市場份額問題的評論，並且我們絕對可以保持更長期的討論。但是，相對於規模較大的老牌競爭對手以及幾家看起來正在搶佔市場份額的新進入者，現金股票的市場份額趨勢如何？

Yeah. Look, it's a great question. These -- obviously, the statistics are public and some lag time. I mean, again, I've said this for the last 10 years since we've been public. We look at market share, but we try to optimize P&L against market share. We very easily could ratchet up a couple of hundred basis points market share, particularly from some of the larger retail participants, but that would cost us money.

是的。瞧，這是一個很好的問題。這些——顯然，統計數據是公開的並且有些滯後。我的意思是，自從我們上市以來，我已經說了十年了。我們關注市場份額，但我們會嘗試根據市場份額來優化損益。我們可以輕鬆地提高幾百個基點的市場份額，特別是從一些較大的零售參與者那裡，但這會花費我們的錢。

And so it doesn't seem to be a great reason to do that. I mean, look, it's no secret that like Jane Street and Hudson River, two fantastic firms, great competitors have joined the fray of wholesaling. I think you'll see from the chart, we've maintained our relative share there - share within the group. And they've taken it from other competitors and citadels given up a little bit.

所以這似乎不是一個這樣做的好理由。我的意思是，你看，像 Jane Street 和 Hudson River 這樣的兩家出色的公司、強大的競爭對手已經加入了批發市場的競爭，這已經不是什麼秘密了。我想您會從圖表中看到，我們保持了我們的相對份額——集團內的份額。他們從其他競爭對手手中奪取了它並放棄了一些堡壘。

So there's going to be ebbs and flows there. again, we had a terrific quarter in retail, so I'm very, very confident with what we're doing. The other thing I'll just note is that the volumes, particularly in the fourth quarter in US equities have been -- I'll use a strong word, a little distorted by some of the gigantic volumes you'll see in low-price names and so the sub-dollar stocks.

因此，那裡會出現潮起潮落。我們再一次在零售業度過了一個非常棒的季度，因此我對我們的表現非常有信心。我要指出的另一件事是，特別是美國股市第四季度的交易量——我用一個強烈的詞來形容，低價股票和低於美元水平的股票的交易量巨大，這在一定程度上扭曲了交易量。

And I'm not suggesting that every company that trades under $1 is a company that shouldn't be a public company. But indeed, many of them are. I mean, there's been some obvious fraud from Chinese companies, companies that do one, two, three, five, seven reverse splits, and we submitted a rule-making request to effectively force New York and Nasdaq to delist a lot of those companies.

我並不是說每家股價低於 1 美元的公司就不該上市。但事實上，很多都是這樣的。我的意思是，中國公司存在一些明顯的欺詐行為，這些公司進行了一、二、三、五、七次反向拆分，我們提交了規則制定請求，有效地迫使紐約和納斯達克將許多這樣的公司摘牌。

In the meantime, and those are pretty unattractive companies for us. Spreads are a lot narrower because they trade sub dollar. It's a huge burden because the volume is significant. We have to take the flow from our clients. And so that will distort market share to some regard. So frankly, if we could just ignore all of that direct and not have to take any of it and just allow it to go to an exchange, we would, but that's not the deal that we have with our retail parties.

同時，這些公司對我們來說相當沒吸引力。由於交易價格低於美元，因此價差要小得多。由於數量龐大，所以這是一個巨大的負擔。我們必須從客戶那裡獲取流量。這會在某種程度上扭曲市場佔有率。所以坦白說，如果我們可以忽略所有這些直接因素，而不必接受其中任何一者，只是允許其進入交易所，我們會這麼做，但這不是我們與零售商達成的協議。

So again, I'm not suggesting the market share is completely unimportant. I recognize that there's competition out there. We continue to do quite well and continue to be the number two provider as we have been since we acquired Knight in marketable orders, which is kind of where we focus our time and energy.

所以，我再說一遍，我並不是說市佔率完全不重要。我認識到那裡存在競爭。自從我們收購 Knight 以來，我們繼續表現良好並繼續成為可銷售訂單的第二大供應商，這也是我們集中時間和精力的領域。

Thanks, Doug. Just for my follow-up, I wanted to get a state of the union on the fixed income ramp. I think it's roughly 12 months now since you broke into MarketAxess as leaderboard for the first time, although you weren't a first mover in this business. So where are you in the build-out and also ability to move up into a larger trades?

謝謝，道格。為了後續行動，我想了解關於固定收益方面的國情。雖然您不是這個行業的先行者，但我想從您第一次進入 MarketAxess 排行榜到現在已經大約 12 個月了。那麼，您在建設中處於什麼位置，又有能力進入更大的交易領域？

Yeah, it's a great question. I'm very happy with the progress we've made, particularly in rates as much credit. I mean rates is an exciting opportunity for us, fewer [CUSIPs] kind of feels more like a legacy Virtu business. A lot of it is electronic -- it continues to be a significant opportunity for us. We're now profitable in both of those businesses after fees and expenses, which is a huge thing. I mean it's not a cheap business to be in. We've ramped up hiring. We've got significant distribution. You do make the right point, though, which is to -- we have an opportunity to kind of move upstream and take more risk and take on bigger positions, which we're doing slowly.

是的，這是一個很好的問題。我對我們所取得的進展感到非常高興，特別是在信貸利率方面。我的意思是，利率對我們來說是一個令人興奮的機會，更少的[CUSIP]更像是傳統的Virtu業務。其中很多都是電子化的——這對我們來說仍然是一個重要的機會。現在，扣除費用和開支後，我們的這兩項業務都實現了盈利，這是一件大事。我的意思是這不是一個便宜的生意。我們已加大招募力道。我們的分銷業務十分廣泛。不過，你的觀點確實正確，那就是——我們有機會向上游發展，承擔更多的風險，佔據更大的地位，我們正在慢慢做到這一點。

I mean we're an aggressive firm, but we're an incrementalizing firm in the same way. It's kind of how we built the firm. So I'm not going to go crazy and ramp up beyond our capabilities. Don't forget also that those businesses tie into our ETF capabilities and leverage ETF capabilities which is significant.

我的意思是，我們是一家積極進取的公司，但同樣，我們也是一家漸進式發展的公司。這就是我們建立公司的方式。所以我不會瘋狂地做超出我們能力的事情。也不要忘記，這些業務與我們的 ETF 能力緊密相關，並且能夠利用 ETF 能力，這是非常重要的。

So I would highlight a lot of the progress that we made in Europe in fixed income. A lot of that is driven by our ETF business over there. But I'm very, very happy with the progress we have made. It's been overshadowed in a very, very great way by crypto and ETF block in terms of our growth initiatives, but I wouldn't sleep on it. It's something that we continue to be excited about, and I see a lot of runway for it.

因此，我想強調一下我們在歐洲固定收益領域的進展。其中很大一部分是由我們在那裡的 ETF 業務推動的。但我對我們所取得的進展感到非常高興。就我們的成長計劃而言，它在很大程度上被加密貨幣和 ETF 區塊所掩蓋，但我不會忽視它。我們對此一直感到興奮，而且我看到它有很大的發展空間。

There's been a lot of interest in private credit and the growth of this and you look at these gigantic asset managers that effectively have turned into global credit houses -- we're excited about partnering with those folks going forward.

人們對私人信貸及其成長非常感興趣，你看這些大型資產管理公司實際上已經變成了全球信貸機構——我們很高興能與這些人在未來合作。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Yeah, thank you.

是的，謝謝。

Michael Cyprys, Morgan Stanley.

摩根士丹利的麥可‧賽普里斯 (Michael Cyprys)。

Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. I just wanted to ask about single-name options. Just hoping you can maybe update us on the build out there. How many symbols you guys are active in making markets today across single names? And how do you think about that expanding as you look out over the next year or two?

嘿，早安。感謝您回答這個問題。我只是想問一下單名選項。只是希望您能向我們更新那裡的建設情況。你們今天在單一名稱上活躍的市場交易中有多少個符號？展望未來一兩年，您認為這領域將如何拓展？

Yeah. It's a great question. I don't know exactly how many names are in. I'm looking at Andrew, I mean, it's in the dozens. And again, some of it's opportunistic like when Navidea is going crazy, obviously, you're going to focus on that. It's a little bit of a challenge. Because every time you add more single names, you need more cores and more gear because there's a lot of throughput and a lot of names.

是的。這是一個很好的問題。我不知道具體有多少個名字。我正在看著安德魯，我的意思是，有幾十個。再說一次，其中一些是機會主義的，例如當 Navidea 瘋狂的時候，顯然，你會關注這一點。這有一定的挑戰性。因為每次添加更多單一名稱時，您都需要更多的核心和更多的設備，因為有大量的吞吐量和大量的名稱。

So we continue to grow that. Again, in the same way I answered the last question that Craig made around credit and rates, which is we're in the business. We've invested. We need to make meaningful additional investments and hires in terms of technology. We're in the process of doing that. We make money from single names. Are we at the end state, not even close.

因此我們會繼續發展。再次，我以同樣的方式回答了克雷格關於信貸和利率的最後一個問題，即我們從事這個行業。我們已經投資了。我們需要在技術方面進行有意義的額外投資和招募。我們目前正在進行這項工作。我們靠單一名字賺錢。我們是否已經到達最終狀態了？

We've made a lot of progress in India this year -- I'm sorry, in 2024, and we'll continue to do that in 2025. I'm happy where we are today. Could we have gone faster and done more? I don't know. We're balancing all these different and juggling all these different priorities we have. So again, we're a little engine that could, and we continue to perform well.

今年——抱歉，是在 2024 年——我們在印度取得了巨大進展，2025 年我們將繼續這樣做。我很高興我們能有今天的成就。我們是否可以進展得更快並做得更多？我不知道。我們正在平衡並處理所有這些不同的優先事項。所以再說一遍，我們是一台有能力的小引擎，而且我們繼續表現得很好。

Great. And then just a follow-up question on private credit. Just curious how you're thinking about the set across potentially Market Making in that asset class over time as the end market continues to grow money managers looking to bring some liquidity into the private market space to help expand and brought in investor access to the asset clouds.

偉大的。然後是關於私人信貸的後續問題。只是好奇您如何看待隨著終端市場繼續增長，該資產類別中潛在的做市情況，資金經理希望為私人市場帶來一些流動性，以幫助擴大規模並讓投資者能夠進入資產雲。

Just curious how you're thinking about that? What steps are you taking? may or may not take? How are you sort of assessing some of the hurdles? How might that be overcome? Just curious your thoughts there.

只是好奇您是怎麼想的？您正在採取什麼措施？可以服用或不可以服用？您如何評估其中的一些障礙？如何克服這問題？只是好奇你的想法。

Yeah. Look, I mean, it's obviously gotten a lot of press and a lot of people are interested, and we're talking with the big issuers in the BlackRocks, the State Street, we'll talk to anybody about it. I mean, look, it's a growing, exciting area where you have nontraditional lenders, the KKRs, the Apollos, the Blackstones, all these firms that have massive private credit businesses, Ares, et cetera, all these firms that we know reasonably well.

是的。你看，我的意思是，它顯然得到了很多媒體的關注，很多人都感興趣，我們正在與貝萊德、道富銀行等大型發行人進行談判，我們會與任何人談論它。我的意思是，你看，這是一個正在成長的、令人興奮的領域，這裡有非傳統的貸款機構，KKR、阿波羅、黑石，所有這些擁有大量私人信貸業務的公司，還有阿瑞斯等等，所有這些公司我們都相當了解。

At some point, that all of those assets need to be velocitized or tradable. I saw that they're going to start getting CUSIPs. Obviously, there's operational issues when you have private credit and how they can be transferred and things like that. So again, you'll probably see more indexing kind of products first as opposed to kind of single names, which, again, is right in our wheelhouse. So I think that probably develops first, no surprise, we're working with the big issuers who are working with the aforementioned large private credit houses.

在某種程度上，所有這些資產都需要加速或可交易。我看到他們將要開始獲得 CUSIP。顯然，當你擁有私人信貸時，會存在一些操作問題以及如何轉移這些信貸等等。因此，您可能會先看到更多索引類型的產品，而不是單一名稱，這也正是我們所能掌控的。因此，我認為這可能是首先發展起來的，毫不奇怪，我們正在與大型發行人合作，這些發行人正在與前面提到的大型私人信貸機構合作。

So is it something that we're going to see in the first, second, third quarter of this year? Probably not, but there's a lot of really smart people that are looking at that asset class. I don't know how many trillions of dollars it is, but I know it's meaningful and they're looking at ways to how can they velocitize that, and we're going to be in that discussion. So again, growth area for us can't put a pin on exactly when that's going to happen.

那麼我們會在今年第一季、第二季、第三季看到這種現象嗎？可能不是，但有很多真正聰明的人正在關注該資產類別。我不知道這筆錢有多少萬億美元，但我知道這很有意義，他們正在尋找方法來加速這一進程，我們將參與討論。因此，我們無法準確預測成長領域何時會發生。

Great. Thank you.

偉大的。謝謝。

Thank you.

謝謝。

And I'm showing no further questions. I would now like to turn the call back to management for closing remarks.

我沒有其他問題。現在，我想請管理階層作最後發言。

Thank you, everybody, for joining today. We apologize for the delayed start, and we look forward to speaking with you in April. Thank you.

感謝大家今天的參加。對於延遲開始我們深表歉意，我們期待著四月份與您交談。謝謝。

And this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連線。