Verisk Analytics Inc (VRSK) 2018 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the Verisk Analytics First Quarter 2018 Earnings Results Conference Call. This call is being recorded. At this time, for opening remarks and introductions, I would like to turn the call over to Verisk's Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Lee Shavel. Mr. Shavel, please go ahead.

大家好，歡迎參加 Verisk Analytics 2018 年第一季財報電話會議。本次通話正在錄音。此時此刻，我謹將電話交給 Verisk 的執行副總裁兼財務長 Lee Shavel 先生，由他來致開幕詞和介紹。沙維爾先生，請繼續。

Thank you, Chris, and good day to everyone. We appreciate you joining us today for a discussion of our first quarter 2018 financial results. With me on the call this morning are Scott Stephenson, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Mark Anquillare, Chief Operating Officer. Following comments by Scott, Mark and myself highlighting some key points about our financial performance, we will open the call for your questions.

謝謝你，克里斯，祝大家今天愉快。感謝您今天蒞臨本次會議，與我們共同探討2018年第一季的財務表現。今天早上和我一起參加電話會議的有董事長、總裁兼執行長史考特‧史蒂芬森，以及營運長馬克‧安奎拉雷。在 Scott、Mark 和我分別就我們的財務表現發表了一些關鍵評論之後，我們將開放提問環節。

The earnings release referenced on this call as well as the associated 10-Q can be found in the Investors section of our website, verisk.com. The earnings release has also been attached to an 8-K that we have furnished to the SEC. We also filed an 8-K on April 26, 2018, with a description of our business segment recasting. A replay of this call will be available for 30 days on our website and by dial-in.

本次電話會議中提到的收益報告以及相關的 10-Q 表格可以在我們網站 verisk.com 的投資者關係部分找到。獲利報告也已附在我們提交給美國證券交易委員會的 8-K 表格中。我們也於 2018 年 4 月 26 日提交了一份 8-K 表格，其中描述了我們的業務部門重組情況。本次通話的錄音將在我們的網站上保留 30 天，也可透過電話撥入收聽。

Finally, as set forth in more detail in today's earnings release, I will remind everyone that today's call may include forward-looking statements about Verisk's future performance. Actual performance could differ materially from what is suggested by our comments today. Information about the factors that could affect future performance is contained in our recent SEC filings.

最後，正如今天發布的收益報告中更詳細闡述的那樣，我要提醒大家，今天的電話會議可能包含有關 Verisk 未來業績的前瞻性陳述。實際表現可能與我們今天所作的評論有重大差異。有關可能影響未來業績的因素的資訊已包含在我們最近向美國證券交易委員會提交的文件中。

Now I will turn the call over to Scott Stephenson.

現在我將把電話交給史考特史蒂芬森。

Thanks, Lee. Good morning, everybody. The first quarter was another example of our team achieving a high level of organic revenue growth, which remains the most important measure of our vitality as an organization. This growth was a product of our traditional multilevel growth plan, including: first, the development of new customers for existing solutions, such as was seen in our claims analytics platform; secondly, the cross-selling of our existing solutions to existing customers as seen in our imagery solutions and upstream oil and gas analytics; and thirdly, new products, including insurance data hosting.

謝謝你，李。各位早安。第一季再次證明了我們團隊實現了高水準的有機收入成長，這仍然是衡量我們組織活力的最重要指標。這項成長是我們傳統的多層次成長計畫的產物，包括：首先，為現有解決方案開發新客戶，例如我們的理賠分析平台；其次，向現有客戶交叉銷售我們現有的解決方案，例如我們的影像解決方案和上游油氣分析；第三，新產品，包括保險資料託管。

Over the last 90 days, I was particularly impressed by the quality of our engagement with many large leading customers, resulting in real-time business wins and opportunities into the future. We continue to enjoy visits from the most senior leaders of some of our biggest customers, who are looking to get closer to our pipeline of innovations. We held the largest gathering in our history for customers of our catastrophe analytics solutions and were impressed again with the level of engagement and input from our clients. Our results in the energy vertical in terms of renewals exceeded our expectations.

在過去的90天裡，我尤其對我們與許多大型領先客戶的互動品質印象深刻，這不僅帶來了即時的業務成功，也為未來帶來了機會。我們持續接待來自一些最大客戶的高層領導的來訪，他們希望更深入地了解我們的創新產品線。我們為災難分析解決方案的客戶舉辦了公司歷史上規模最大的聚會，客戶的參與和投入程度再次給我們留下了深刻的印象。我們在能源領域的更新換代業績超出了預期。

I'm pleased to have welcomed Lisa Hannan into leadership of our Verisk Financial Services vertical. Lisa has been making a difference at Argus for over 8 years, having led many of the different departments over time. Her background in the cards industry, having held senior positions at Chase and Citi, gives her deep domain knowledge and high standing among our customers. I'm really excited about teaming with Lisa to take Verisk Financial to new heights.

我很高興歡迎 Lisa Hannan 加入 Verisk 金融服務部門的領導團隊。Lisa 在 Argus 工作超過 8 年，期間領導過許多不同的部門，為公司做出了巨大貢獻。她曾在摩根大通和花旗銀行擔任高階職位，擁有豐富的信用卡產業經驗，這使她具備深厚的專業知識，並在我們的客戶中享有很高的聲譽。我非常興奮能與 Lisa 攜手，將 Verisk Financial 推向新的高度。

The integration of our 2017 acquisitions continues apace. I was with the Sequel team a few weeks ago, including executives from both London headquarters as well as the development team in Málaga, Spain. Sequel is well seeded into Verisk and already demonstrating new software capabilities formed through integration with other parts of Verisk insurance. PowerAdvocate is also well grounded in Verisk, and there is a growing pipeline of cross-sell opportunities being actively pursued with WoodMac. Mark will comment at length about the insurance vertical, so I want to take a moment now on the Energy and Financial Services verticals.

2017 年收購專案的整合工作正快速推進。幾週前，我和 Sequel 團隊在一起，其中包括來自倫敦總部和西班牙馬拉加開發團隊的高階主管。Sequel 已很好地融入 Verisk，並透過與 Verisk 保險的其他部分集成，展現出新的軟體功能。PowerAdvocate 在 Verisk 方面也擁有良好的基礎，並且正在積極尋求與 WoodMac 的交叉銷售機會。Mark 將會詳細評論保險業，所以我現在想花點時間談談能源和金融服務業。

In Energy, a generally positive set of near-term subscription renewals was dragged on by developments at 1 large customer, an investment bank, that has fundamentally rethought their participation in the energy vertical. This development is entirely about their business, not ours. In general, we are in investment modus as seen on the cost line in our reported segment results. The energy space, for all of its scale, has not yet been transformed by the kind of data aggregation and modern analytic methods that characterize the other markets we serve. And the need has mounted since much of the recent news in the space has been around unconventional plays, which have much shorter planning and execution cycles. This is a unique moment in which Verisk is aspiring to an even greater leadership position in the space through our WoodMac 2.0 project, which is about transforming our data assets by more thoroughly integrating our existing data along with access to data sets we don't use today. By the end of 2019, WoodMac will be fundamentally more capable at a dramatically higher level, in part by leveraging methods and resources from Verisk, including our cloud-first tools. This major step forward in our capabilities will strengthen an already improving picture as the end market continues to firm up and large customer relationships are yielding good results on renewal. We continue to expect that the energy vertical will contribute meaningfully to achieving our corporate growth targets.

在能源領域，近期訂閱續約情況總體向好，但一家大型客戶（一家投資銀行）的情況有所變化，該銀行從根本上重新考慮了其在能源領域的參與方式，導致續約進程受阻。這件事完全與他們的業務有關，與我們無關。總體而言，正如我們在已公佈的分部業績中的成本線所示，我們目前處於投資模式。儘管能源領域規模龐大，但尚未像我們所服務的其他市場一樣，透過數據聚合和現代分析方法進行變革。而且，由於該領域最近的新聞大多圍繞著非常規策略展開，而這些策略的規劃和執行週期要短得多，因此這種需求也日益增長。這是一個獨特的時刻，Verisk 正透過我們的 WoodMac 2.0 項目，力求在該領域取得更大的領導地位。該專案旨在透過更徹底地整合我們現有的數據以及存取我們目前未使用的數據集來轉變我們的數據資產。到 2019 年底，WoodMac 的能力將從根本上顯著提升，達到更高的水平，部分原因是利用了 Verisk 的方法和資源，包括我們的雲端優先工具。隨著終端市場持續走強，大型客戶關係在續約方面取得良好成效，我們能力的這一重大提升將進一步鞏固已經不斷改善的局面。我們仍然預期能源垂直領域將為實現公司成長目標做出重大貢獻。

In Financial Services, we continue to view 3 parts of the mix as carrying a lot of our future growth, those being media effectiveness, data hosting and regulatory solutions. There were several positive signs in Q1, first on the list being 14% growth in media effectiveness solutions. This category continues to carry a great deal of promise since there are many ways to repurpose our proprietary consortium data. On the other fronts, in the quarter, there were a few factors that moderated growth, one being the thesis relationship we previously reported. The relationship is good, but the implementation leading to additional new sales will be completed 1 to 2 quarters later in 2018 than originally expected. On the regulatory solutions front, banks are facing increased scrutiny of the models behind their compliance, and so model governance processes have moved to require more productized solutions and we are quickly responding to this trend. In general, Financial Services presents attractive growth opportunities.

在金融服務領域，我們仍然認為媒體效果、資料託管和監管解決方案這三個部分將是我們未來成長的主要動力。第一季出現了一些正面的跡象，首先是媒體效果解決方案成長了 14%。這個類別仍然具有很大的發展前景，因為我們有很多方法可以重新利用我們專有的聯盟數據。在其他方面，本季有一些因素抑制了成長，其中之一是我們之前報導過的論文關係。雖然雙方關係良好，但促成更多新銷售的實施工作將在 2018 年比原計劃晚 1 到 2 個季度完成。在監管解決方案方面，銀行正面臨對其合規模型的日益嚴格的審查，因此模型治理流程已轉向需要更多產品化的解決方案，我們正在迅速應對這一趨勢。整體而言，金融服務業蘊藏著極具吸引力的成長機會。

In addition to always looking for new opportunities to grow revenues and the business, we are also constantly evaluating ways to improve the company. To that end, you will have noticed recently 2 significant changes. First, as investors have seen in our proxy, this past quarter was our first under a new program of compensation for our senior executives. We have tightened the metrics used to set award levels to more directly track our key measures of organic revenue growth and organic EBITDA growth and have tied equity awards more closely to our achievement of shareholder returns over a multiyear period. These modifications are a further expression of our commitment to generating shareholder value. Second, this is our first quarter reporting our results in a fully vertical mode. Our presentation represents the current view of how we think about the business, and I appreciate the work Lee and his team have done to get us to this point. In general, we believe in the long-term potential of all 3 vertical markets to yield growth at or above our corporate target.

除了不斷尋找增加收入和發展業務的新機會外，我們還在不斷評估改善公司的方法。為此，您最近會注意到兩項重大變更。首先，正如投資者在我們的委託書中看到的那樣，上個季度是我們高階主管新薪酬計畫實施後的第一個季度。我們收緊了用於設定獎勵水準的指標，以便更直接地追蹤我們有機收入成長和有機 EBITDA 成長的關鍵指標，並將股權獎勵與我們多年內實現的股東回報更緊密地聯繫起來。這些調整進一步體現了我們致力於為股東創造價值的承諾。其次，這是我們首次以完全垂直模式發​​布季度業績報告。我們的簡報代表了我們目前對業務的看法，我感謝 Lee 和他的團隊為使我們達到這一目標所做的工作。總的來說，我們相信這三個垂直市場都有潛力實現達到或超過我們公司目標的成長。

Over the last 5 years, ending in 2017, Insurance has grown at the corporate target. Financial Services has grown materially above the target, and Energy has been about 150 basis points below the corporate target in light of a historic cyclical downturn combined with the Brexit. Over the same 5 years, our competitive position has strengthened. The essence of what we do every day has helped companies harness data and analytics to improve their operations, decisions and performance. This is one of the major themes of what is going on in the global economy and, in our view, will continue into the foreseeable future. We are swimming with a strong tide. And so as long as we remain close to our customers, add to the talents of our team and keep pushing to bring new value into the world, our business will continue to expand. I saw good evidence on all these fronts in the past quarter.

過去五年（截至 2017 年），保險業實現了企業目標。金融服務業的成長遠超過目標，而能源業由於歷史性的周期性衰退以及英國脫歐的影響，比企業目標低了約 150 個基點。在過去的五年裡，我們的競爭地位得到了加強。我們每天所做的事情的本質是幫助企業利用數據和分析來改善其營運、決策和績效。這是全球經濟正在發生的主要趨勢之一，我們認為，這種趨勢在可預見的未來仍將持續下去。我們正逆流而上。因此，只要我們與客戶保持緊密聯繫，不斷壯大團隊，持續努力為世界創造新的價值，我們的業務就會繼續成長。過去一個季度，我在所有這些方面都看到了確鑿的證據。

I will now hand it over to Mark for a few comments on the Insurance business.

現在我將把發言權交給馬克，請他對保險業發表一些看法。

Thank you, Scott. In our Insurance business, we had another very strong quarter with all insurance-facing businesses, underwriting and rating and claims, contributing to growth. Let me highlight a few areas that drove top line growth and update you on several initiatives that better position us for future growth.

謝謝你，斯科特。在我們的保險業務方面，本季表現依然強勁，所有面向保險的業務，包括承保、評級和理賠，都為成長做出了貢獻。讓我重點介紹幾個推動營收成長的領域，並向您報告幾項能更好地幫助我們實現未來成長的舉措。

Underwriting and rating consists of, one, our ISO business unit, including industry-standard insurance programs, property-specific underwriting and rating information and our personal lines underwriting solutions; two, our extreme event models from AIR; and three, our insurance software solutions from Sequel. During the quarter, underwriting and rating delivered strong organic growth across extreme event modeling, personal lines underwriting and industry-standard insurance programs through a combination of cross-sell of existing solutions to new customers and the sale of new innovative solutions. The insurance industry is driving towards automation, and the key to these efforts is high-quality data and predictive analytics moved forward to the point of sale in the process. We are leading the way in helping insurers achieve this goal of flow business in personal and increasingly commercial lines. This industry change has translated to growth in our personal and commercial underwriting solutions as well as our growing reputation as a thought leader in the industry.

承保和評級包括：一、我們的 ISO 業務部門，包括行業標準保險計劃、特定財產承保和評級資訊以及我們的個人保險承保解決方案；二、我們來自 AIR 的極端事件模型；三、我們來自 Sequel 的保險軟體解決方案。本季度，承保和評級業務透過向新客戶交叉銷售現有解決方案和銷售新的創新解決方案，在極端事件建模、個人保險承保和行業標準保險計劃方面實現了強勁的內生成長。保險業正在朝著自動化方向發展，而這些努力的關鍵在於將高品質的數據和預測分析推進到銷售環節。我們正在引領潮流，幫助保險公司實現個人險種和日益增長的商業險種的業務成長目標。產業變革帶動了我們個人和商業承保解決方案的成長，也提升了我們作為產業思想領袖的聲譽。

Our announcement of SmartSource prefill to streamline property insurance quoting is an example of high-quality data and analytics at the point of sale, leading the industry towards a more automated future. This type of solution improves the initial quote for an agent or a consumer when they solicit an insurance quote online. ISO also announced the addition of Hyundai to the Verisk Data Exchange, our growing data lake of telematics and IoT, or Internet of Things data. The proprietary Telematics database now includes General Motors, Honda and Hyundai, representing 32% of the U.S. auto market. Again, the future of underwriting will be dependent on access to information on driving behavior and detailed rating variables, such as miles driven, that can automate the insurance quote. This Telematics data can also drive automation in the claims adjudication process.

我們推出的 SmartSource 預填功能旨在簡化財產保險報價流程，這是在銷售點應用高品質資料和分析的一個例子，引領業界走向更自動化的未來。這種解決方案可以改善代理人或消費者在線上索取保險報價時的初始報價。ISO 也宣布將現代汽車加入 Verisk 資料交換平台，這是我們不斷成長的遠端資訊處理和物聯網 (IoT) 資料湖。該專有的遠端資訊處理資料庫現在包括通用汽車、本田和現代，占美國汽車市場的 32%。再次強調，保險承保的未來將取決於能否獲取有關駕駛行為和詳細評級變數（例如行駛里程）的信息，這些資訊可以實現保險報價的自動化。這些遠端資訊處理資料還可以推動理賠裁決流程的自動化。

AIR continues to extend its solution set beyond property catastrophe modeling to a broader set of extreme events. During the quarter, AIR announced our collaboration with RenaissanceRe to develop the first probabilistic model for extreme liability risks. In addition, our fund designation solution was selected by Hudson Crop to help manage and optimize the risk in their crop portfolio.

AIR 不斷擴展其解決方案集，從財產災害建模擴展到更廣泛的極端事件。本季度，AIR宣布與RenaissanceRe合作開發首個極端責任風險機率模型。此外，Hudson Crop 選擇我們的基金指定解決方案來幫助管理和優化其作物投資組合的風險。

Finally, the strong collaboration across ISO and AIR continues to expand our cyber solutions to a commercial cyber liability and insurance market that we estimate will exceed $6 billion by 2020. Our cyber extreme event models are gaining traction in the industry, while our industry-standard insurance programs for cyber are now filed and implemented in 42 states. These new solutions allow our customers to grow and underwrite new risk in the fast-growing cyber insurance market.

最後，ISO 和 AIR 之間的緊密合作將繼續擴大我們的網路解決方案，使其進入商業網路責任和保險市場，我們估計到 2020 年，該市場規模將超過 60 億美元。我們的網路極端事件模型正在業界獲得認可，而我們符合業界標準的網路安全保險計畫目前已在 42 個州備案並實施。這些新解決方案使我們的客戶能夠在快速成長的網路保險市場中成長並承保新的風險。

I'm pleased with the synergy opportunities that have been generated from our acquisition of Sequel. At the recent AIR customer conference, we showcased our seamless integration between Touchstone and Sequel, demonstrating the power of combining the solutions to providing interesting cross-sell potential. In addition, Sequel has provided a great asset to illustrate the power of ISO data to the London market syndicates. Impact, Sequel's business intelligence tool, has provided powerful data visualization of the ISO data and analytics for U.K. syndicates who have been plagued with suboptimal information about their portfolio of risks. Our international ambitions will be more easily achieved by the exceptional solutions and London market expertise of Sequel.

我對我們收購 Sequel 所帶來的綜效感到滿意。在最近的 AIR 客戶大會上，我們展示了 Touchstone 和 Sequel 之間的無縫集成，證明了將這兩個解決方案結合起來能夠帶來有趣的交叉銷售潛力。此外，Sequel 為向倫敦市場辛迪加展示 ISO 數據的強大功能提供了極大的幫助。Sequel 的商業智慧工具 Impact 為英國的保險集團提供了強大的 ISO 數據視覺化和分析功能，這些保險集團一直飽受有關其風險組合資訊不足的困擾。Sequel 的卓越解決方案和倫敦市場專業知識將使我們的國際化雄心更容易實現。

Our claims businesses include claims analytics, one, our fraud prevention solutions featuring ClaimSearch; two, Xactware, our suite of solutions focused on loss quantification and repair cost estimating; and three, Geomni, our cutting-edge remote imagery business. Claims experienced an exceptional quarter with organic growth across all business units through a combination of cross-sell and the sale of new solutions. Like underwriting and rating, the insurance industry is focused on automating the claims process to drive towards right-touch claims handling, where less complex and smaller dollar claims are handled with limited manual intervention. Our claims business is on the forefront of this evolution. We have been successfully expanding our insurance fraud prevention business, Claims Analytics, by broadening our use cases and licensing our anti-fraud analytic tools to automate our customers' claims processes. As an example, Nationwide Insurance licensed and implemented, ClaimDirector, our advanced fraud scoring tool that provides fraud indicators at the first notice of loss for each incoming claim and provides subsequent updates as new information is gathered. The tool also features an interactive business intelligence dashboard that provides key claims information to claims adjustors and managers.

我們的理賠業務包括：一、理賠分析；二、詐欺防制解決方案（包括 ClaimSearch）；三、Xactware（專注於損失量化和維修成本估算的解決方案套件）；四、Geomni（我們先進的遠端影像業務）。理賠業務在本季度表現出色，所有業務部門均實現了有機成長，這得益於交叉銷售和新解決方案的銷售。與承保和評級一樣，保險業正致力於理賠流程的自動化，以推動精準理賠處理，即在有限的人工幹預下處理不太複雜、金額較小的理賠。我們的理賠業務正處於這項變革的前沿。我們透過擴大應用場景並授權使用我們的反詐欺分析工具來自動化客戶的理賠流程，成功地擴展了我們的保險詐欺防制業務—理賠分析。例如，Nationwide Insurance 獲得了 ClaimDirector 的許可並實施了我們的先進詐欺評分工具，該工具可在每次收到索賠時首次發出損失通知，並提供詐欺指標，並在收集到新資訊時提供後續更新。該工具還配備了互動式商業智慧儀表板，可向理賠員和經理提供關鍵的理賠資訊。

Xactware, our repair cost estimating solutions, continue to deliver strong organic growth, driven by new sales as well as continuing tailwinds from the extreme weather in 2017. Our repair cost estimating tools have always driven automation in the claims workflow, and our claims experience solution takes automation and digital engagement to the next level. During the quarter, Hanover Insurance adopted ClaimXperience, a suite of online and mobile solutions that helps our insurers' customers interact remotely with their policyholders to more efficiently settle claims.

我們的維修成本估算解決方案 Xactware 持續保持強勁的內生成長，這得益於新銷售的成長以及 2017 年極端天氣帶來的持續利好。我們的維修成本估算工具一直推動著理賠工作流程的自動化，而我們的理賠體驗解決方案則將自動化和數位互動提升到了一個新的水平。本季度，漢諾威保險公司採用了 ClaimXperience，這是一套線上和行動解決方案，可以幫助我們的保險公司客戶與保單持有人進行遠端互動，從而更有效地解決索賠。

During the quarter, Geomni, our business that harnesses remote-sensing and machine-learning technologies to provide information about residential and commercial structures, launched a new mobile app for ground imagery and drone inspections. The new app enabled users to collect ground imagery and other data directly from their mobile devices or to conduct complete inspections.

本季度，我們旗下利用遙感和機器學習技術提供有關住宅和商業建築資訊的業務部門 Geomni 推出了一款新的行動應用程序，用於地面影像和無人機檢查。這款新應用程式使用戶能夠直接從行動裝置收集地面影像和其他數據，或進行完整的檢查。

These images and resulting data packages seamlessly integrate with other Verisk offerings across claims, underwriting and catastrophe modeling. We are winning customers and making strong progress because we deliver unparalleled image quality, improved accuracy and automation in a safer and cost-effective process. The exciting part of this mission is that these advanced analytics are applicable to larger markets beyond insurance. Across the board, both from a market and financial perspective, we're very pleased with the performance of the insurance business.

這些影像和產生的資料包可以與 Verisk 在理賠、承保和災害建模方面的其他產品無縫整合。我們之所以能夠贏得客戶並取得顯著進展，是因為我們在更安全、更具成本效益的流程中提供了無與倫比的影像品質、更高的準確性和自動化。這項任務最令人興奮的地方在於，這些先進的分析方法不僅適用於保險業，也適用於更大的市場。從市場和財務角度來看，我們對保險業務的整體表現非常滿意。

With that, let me turn it over to Lee to cover the financial results.

接下來，我將把發言權交給李，讓他來介紹財務表現。

Thank you, Mark. First, I'd like to bring to everyone's attention that we have introduced a quarterly earnings presentation that is available at our website. The presentation provides some background, data, trends and analysis to support our conversation today, and I will refer to it throughout my comments. Secondly, we announced on April 26 a business segment recasting and provided historical revenue, EBITDA growth and margin information on the new segmentation basis. We have recast our prior 2 business segments of, one, Decision Analytics; and two, Risk Assessment into a more industry vertical-oriented segmentation of, one, Insurance; two, Energy and Specialized Markets; and three, Financial Services. Further, within Insurance, we will provide revenue detail for underwriting and rating and claims. On Page 3 of our business segment recast announcement, you will find a mapping of the primary businesses included in each business segment and the insurance businesses within the underwriting and rating and claims categories, which is also included in our earnings presentation.

謝謝你，馬克。首先，我想提醒大家，我們已推出季度收益報告，可在我們的網站上查看。這份簡報提供了一些背景資訊、數據、趨勢和分析，以支持我們今天的討論，我將在我的演講中多次提及它。其次，我們在 4 月 26 日宣布了業務部門重組，並提供了基於新劃分基礎的歷史收入、EBITDA 成長和利潤率資訊。我們已將先前的兩個業務部門（即決策分析和風險評估）重新劃分為三個更注重行業垂直領域的細分市場（即保險、能源和專業市場以及金融服務）。此外，在保險業務方面，我們將提供承保、評級和理賠的收入明細。在我們的業務部門重組公告第 3 頁，您可以找到每個業務部門中包含的主要業務以及承保和評級和理賠類別中的保險業務的映射圖，該映射圖也包含在我們的收益演示文稿中。

I want to note that we have provided growth and margin information on the reported organic and organic constant-currency basis for the past 8 quarters and prior 3 full years. This provides a substantial historical context for the performance of the segments and goes beyond what is required from an SEC reporting standpoint. Consequently, with ample historical data on a comparable basis, we will not be providing individual segment growth or margin targets but will rely on our previously communicated consolidated long-term financial targets of organic constant-currency growth of 7% on average over time and organic constant-currency EBITDA growth above revenue growth, reflecting EBITDA margin expansion.

我想指出，我們已經提供了過去 8 個季度和前 3 個完整年度的有機增長和按固定匯率計算的有機增長資訊。這為各業務板塊的表現提供了重要的歷史背景，並且超越了美國證券交易委員會報告的要求。因此，鑑於有大量可比較的歷史數據，我們將不提供各個細分市場的成長或利潤率目標，而是依靠我們先前公佈的長期合併財務目標，即隨著時間的推移，平均有機固定匯率增長7%，以及有機固定匯率EBITDA增長高於收入增長，從而反映EBITDA利潤率的擴張。

Moving to the financial results for the quarter and referring to Page 4 of the earnings presentation. On a consolidated and GAAP basis, revenue grew 16% to $581 million. We had adopted the new revenue recognition standard, ASC 606, in first quarter 2018, and the impact was immaterial to our results. Net income increased 22% to $133 million for the quarter, and diluted GAAP EPS was $0.79 for the first quarter 2018, an increase of 23% compared with the same period in 2017.

接下來來看本季的財務業績，請參閱收益報告的第 4 頁。以合併及GAAP準則計算，營收成長16%至5.81億美元。我們在 2018 年第一季採用了新的營收確認準則 ASC 606，這對我們的業績影響不大。本季淨利成長 22% 至 1.33 億美元，2018 年第一季稀釋後 GAAP 每股收益為 0.79 美元，比 2017 年同期成長 23%。

Having presented our summary GAAP results, I will now shift to a focus on our organic constant-currency results for the next few minutes for all year-over-year revenue and EBITDA growth rates consistent with our financial targets and to eliminate the impact of currency fluctuations and recent acquisitions for which we don't have full year-over-year comparisons. Acquired revenue and EBITDA in the quarter from all deals that haven't moved into organic results were $37 million and $2 million, respectively.

在介紹完我們的 GAAP 概要業績後，接下來幾分鐘，我將重點介紹我們的有機固定匯率業績，包括所有與年度收入和 EBITDA 增長率相符的業績，以消除匯率波動和近期收購的影響（由於我們沒有完整的年度比較數據）。本季所有尚未轉化為內生性業績的交易帶來的收購收入和 EBITDA 分別為 3,700 萬美元和 200 萬美元。

As shown on Page 5 of the earnings presentation, Verisk demonstrated very solid growth performance and momentum in the first quarter. Revenue growth of 7% was consistent with our long-term targets and was our third consecutive quarter at 7% or higher. We also continue to remain disciplined in our expenditures as EBITDA expenses grew 6.7% below our revenue growth. Consequently, EBITDA grew 7.4% for the quarter on a year-over-year basis and reflected stable organic EBITDA margin of 49% in the first quarter including continued investment in several internal opportunities, including Geomni, most notably. Excluding just Geomni as one of our significant breakout investment opportunities, EBITDA grew 7.9%, demonstrating the operating leverage at Verisk before the impact of significant internal investments.

如財報第 5 頁所示，Verisk 在第一季展現了非常穩健的成長績效與動能。營收成長7%，符合我們的長期目標，這也是我們連續第三個季度達到7%或更高的成長率。同時，我們持續維持支出方面的嚴格控制，EBITDA 支出成長率比營收成長低 6.7%。因此，本季 EBITDA 年成長 7.4%，並反映了第一季穩定的有機 EBITDA 利潤率為 49%，其中包括對多個內部機會的持續投資，其中最值得注意的是 Geomni。如果將 Geomni 排除在我們重要的突破性投資機會之一之外，EBITDA 成長了 7.9%，這表明在重大內部投資的影響之前，Verisk 的營運槓桿作用。

Let me now turn to our segment results on an organic constant-currency basis, as we've described. As you will see on Page 11 of the earnings presentation, Insurance had a strong quarter with 8.7% revenue growth with underwriting and rating contributing 6.9% growth and claims contributing 12.6% growth. The positive financial impact of severe weather on our business in the fourth quarter spilled over into the first quarter and contributed about $2.1 million in repair cost estimating revenue. EBITDA for Insurance grew 9.7%, reflecting an increased organic EBITDA margin of 56.3%, up from 55.8% in the prior year.

現在，讓我來看看我們之前描述的以有機成長和固定匯率計算的各業務板塊業績。正如您將在收益報告第 11 頁看到的那樣，保險業務本季表現強勁，收入增長了 8.7%，其中承保和評級業務貢獻了 6.9% 的增長，理賠業務貢獻了 12.6% 的增長。第四季惡劣天氣對我們業務的正面財務影響延續到了第一季度，並貢獻了約 210 萬美元的維修成本估算收入。保險業務的 EBITDA 成長了 9.7%，反映出有機 EBITDA 利潤率從上年的 55.8% 提高到 56.3%。

As shown on Page 13 of the earnings presentation, Energy and Specialized Markets produced revenue growth of 3.1% for the quarter as the energy business continues to recover. Revenue growth represented stable research activity, continued strength in consulting, regulatory products at 3E and momentum in our breakout initiatives. EBITDA was down 5.9% due to investments we are making in the WoodMac 2.0 initiative and our chemicals, subsurface, power and renewables and analytics breakout initiative that increased headcounts and associated compensation expense. These areas represent opportunities to leverage Wood Mackenzie's data and industry expertise more broadly and deliver and develop products more swiftly and efficiently.

如收益報告第 13 頁所示，隨著能源業務的持續復甦，能源和專業市場業務本季營收成長了 3.1%。營收成長反映了穩定的研發活動、諮詢業務的持續強勁、3E 的監管產品以及我們突破性計劃的良好勢頭。由於我們對 WoodMac 2.0 計劃以及我們的化學、地下、電力、再生能源和分析業務拓展計劃的投資，導致員工人數增加和相關薪酬支出上升，EBITDA 下降了 5.9%。這些領域代表著更廣泛地利用伍德麥肯茲的數據和行業專業知識，以及更快、更有效率地交付和開發產品的機會。

As I've come up the learning curve on the company and have listened to questions from investors on WoodMac, I've analyzed the current margin of the Energy and Specialized Markets segment of 27%, relative to what I understand from investors was a reported preacquisition margin for WoodMac of approximately 47%. There are several components that drive this current differential that I will identify and try to quantify. Starting with the reported Energy and Specialized Markets of 27% for the first quarter, there was a nonoperational FX impact of approximately 3%, an impact of non-WoodMac businesses of approximately 3% included in that segment and a first quarter timing impact for revenue and expense recognition relative to the full year of 2% that would bring the fully allocated and normalized WoodMac margin to 35%. Eliminating the allocation of Verisk overhead to WoodMac would add another approximately 3% to 38%. At acquisition, the accounting change from IFRS to GAAP added approximately 3% of EBITDA expenses from new treatments of CapEx and contractor expenses, and normalization of compensation and insurance expenses added approximately 2%, bringing us to 43%. Finally, the remaining 4% was primarily due to investments in the breakouts, as we've described in acquisitions, since the acquisition of WoodMac in 2015.

隨著我對公司了解的加深，以及對投資者關於 WoodMac 的提問的深入，我分析了能源和專業市場部門目前的利潤率為 27%，而據我了解，投資者稱 WoodMac 在收購前的利潤率約為 47%。造成目前這種差異的因素有很多，我將逐一找出並嘗試量化。報告顯示，第一季能源和專業市場佔比為 27%，其中非經營性外匯影響約為 3%，非 WoodMac 業務的影響約為 3% 也包含在該部分中，此外，第一季收入和費用確認的時間影響相對於全年為 2%，這將使完全分配和正常化的 WoodMac 利潤率達到 35%。如果取消分配給 WoodMac 的 Verisk 管理費用，成本將再增加約 3% 到 38%。收購時，從 IFRS 到 GAAP 的會計變更導致資本支出和承包商費用的新處理方式增加了約 3% 的 EBITDA 支出，而薪資和保險費用的正常化又增加了約 2%，使 EBITDA 支出達到 43%。最後，剩餘的 4% 主要歸因於自 2015 年收購 WoodMac 以來，我們對突破性專案的投資，正如我們在收購部分所描述的那樣。

In summary, we see nonoperational impacts of 14% that include the FX, the non-WoodMac business components, the Verisk overhead allocation, accounting adjustments and the Q1 timing impact; and 6% operational, which represent the breakouts, acquisitions made as well as the normalization of compensation and insurance expenses. The Energy and Specialized Markets segment continues to enjoy core operating leverage and growth opportunities as demand for data analytics in its constituent markets continues to expand and has been demonstrated in the growth of our breakout revenues and the early new contract wins at PowerAdvocate. In addition, we are also investing in WoodMac's product development and distribution platform to improve its operating leverage through our WoodMac 2.0 initiative and continue its development as a data analytics business.

總而言之，我們看到非營運影響佔 14%，其中包括外匯影響、非 WoodMac 業務組成部分、Verisk 管理費用分配、會計調整和第一季時間影響；營運影響佔 6%，其中包括業務拆分、收購以及薪酬和保險費用的正常化。能源和專業市場部門繼續享有核心營運槓桿和成長機會，因為其組成市場對數據分析的需求持續擴大，這一點已在我們的突破性收入成長和 PowerAdvocate 早期新合約的贏得中得到證明。此外，我們也正在投資 WoodMac 的產品開發和分銷平台，以透過我們的 WoodMac 2.0 計畫提高其營運槓桿，並繼續將其發展成為數據分析企業。

Turning to Page 15 of the earnings presentation. Financial Services contributed revenue growth of 1.5% in the quarter, a slight improvement from essentially unchanged year-over-year revenue in the fourth quarter of 2017, representing continued recovery from the contract transitions in 2017. Revenue results reflected continued strength in media effectiveness, offset by softness in regulatory and fraud products. EBITDA increased by 5.1%, reflecting an improved organic EBITDA margin of 36.1%, up from 35.5% in the prior year. Shifting briefly from organic constant-currency results to reported results, I want to call out a specific nonrecurring expense associated with a final earnout expense for Fintellix of approximately $3.5 million that reduced the reported first quarter EBITDA growth rates and reported EBITDA margin.

翻到收益報告第15頁。金融服務業務在本季度貢獻了 1.5% 的收入成長，較 2017 年第四季基本持平的同比收入略有改善，表明該業務已從 2017 年的合約過渡中持續復甦。營收業績反映了媒體效果業務的持續強勁，但監管和反詐騙產品的疲軟抵消了部分成長。EBITDA 成長 5.1%，反映出有機 EBITDA 利潤率提高至 36.1%，高於上年的 35.5%。暫時從有機固定匯率業績轉向報告業績，我想特別指出與 Fintellix 最終或有收益相關的約 350 萬美元的非經常性支出，這降低了報告的第一季度 EBITDA 增長率和報告的 EBITDA 利潤率。

Now returning to the GAAP numbers below EBITDA. Depreciation and amortization was $74 million in the quarter, up 31.4% from the prior year, reflecting the impact of acquisitions and increased capital expenditures in both periods. Interest expense was $33 million in the quarter, up 15.4% from the prior year quarter due to the funding of acquisitions in 2017. Total debt was $2.8 billion at March 31, down from $3 billion at December 31, and our leverage at the end of the first quarter was 2.47x. Our cash and cash equivalents were about $154 million at the end of the quarter.

現在回到 EBITDA 以下的 GAAP 數據。本季折舊和攤銷額為 7,400 萬美元，比上年同期增長 31.4%，反映了收購和資本支出增加在兩個時期的影響。本季利息支出為 3,300 萬美元，比上年同期增加 15.4%，原因是 2017 年收購款項的支出。截至 3 月 31 日，總負債為 28 億美元，低於 12 月 31 日的 30 億美元；第一季末的槓桿率為 2.47 倍。截至季末，我們的現金及現金等價物約為 1.54 億美元。

Our reported effective tax rate was 18% for the quarter compared to 32% in the prior year quarter, primarily as the result of recent tax reform. Our effective tax rate was lower than our targeted range due to significant exercises of outstanding employee stock options that produced a favorable tax rate impact. As the result of recent and anticipated exercises and the current price of our stock, we are reducing our estimate of our effective tax rate in 2018 to be between 16% and 18%. However, the timing and impact of employee stock option exercises depends, in part, on the Verisk stock price and personal decisions. We expect that this impact will be more pronounced in 2018 and that we will revert to a higher effective tax rate in 2019.

本季度報告的實際稅率為 18%，而去年同期為 32%，這主要是由於最近的稅收改革。由於大量員工行使了未行使的股票選擇權，產生了有利的稅率影響，我們的實際稅率低於目標範圍。由於近期和預期中的活動以及我們股票的當前價格，我們將 2018 年的有效稅率估計值下調至 16% 至 18% 之間。然而，員工股票選擇權行使的時機和影響，部分取決於 Verisk 股票價格和個人決定。我們預計這種影響在 2018 年會更加明顯，並且我們將在 2019 年恢復到更高的實際稅率。

Adjusted net income was $159 million, up 27% from $125 million in the prior year quarter. Diluted adjusted EPS was $0.94 for the first quarter, also up 27% from $0.74 in the prior year quarter. The increase reflects organic growth in the business, contributions from acquisitions, the impact of 2017 tax reform and lower share count. Equalizing the first quarter 2017 effective tax rate to that of the first quarter 2018, both adjusted net income and diluted adjusted EPS were up 6.8%. We repurchased 383,000 shares year-to-date for a total return of capital to shareholders of $40 million at a weighted average price of $104.22. At March 31, we had $326 million remaining under our share repurchase authorization, and the average diluted share count was 169 million shares in the quarter. As of March 31, our diluted share count was also 169 million shares.

經調整後的淨收入為 1.59 億美元，比去年同期的 1.25 億美元成長了 27%。第一季稀釋調整後每股收益為 0.94 美元，比去年同期的 0.74 美元增加了 27%。這一增長反映了業務的自然增長、收購帶來的貢獻、2017 年稅收改革的影響以及流通股數量的減少。將 2017 年第一季的實際稅率與 2018 年第一季的實際稅率相等，調整後的淨收入和稀釋後的調整後每股盈餘均成長了 6.8%。今年迄今為止，我們已回購 383,000 股股票，向股東返還了 4,000 萬美元的資本，加權平均價格為每股 104.22 美元。截至 3 月 31 日，我們的股票回購授權還剩 3.26 億美元，該季平均稀釋後股數為 1.69 億股。截至 3 月 31 日，我們的稀釋後股份數量也為 1.69 億股。

As shown on Page 17 of the earnings presentation, net cash provided by operating activities was $327 million year-to-date, up 2.9% from $318 million in the prior year. Capital expenditures were $43 million year-to-date, up 38.9% from $31 million in the prior year, reflecting primarily increased investment in Geomni and software development for recent acquisitions. Free cash flow was $284 million year-to-date, a slight decrease of 1% from the prior year due to the timing of collections, and our free cash flow as a percentage of EBITDA was 106% for the quarter compared to 117% a year ago. And I would note that the first quarter is typically a seasonally high level for free cash flow as a percentage of EBITDA. We continue to evaluate uses of capital across all internal and external investment opportunities as well as capital return alternatives on the basis of potential returns on capital and value creation.

如收益報告第 17 頁所示，截至目前，經營活動產生的淨現金為 3.27 億美元，比去年同期的 3.18 億美元成長了 2.9%。今年迄今的資本支出為 4,300 萬美元，比上年的 3,100 萬美元增長了 38.9%，主要反映了對 Geomni 的投資增加以及近期收購的軟體開發。今年迄今的自由現金流為 2.84 億美元，由於收款時間的原因，比上年略微下降了 1%；本季自由現金流佔 EBITDA 的百分比為 106%，而去年同期為 117%。我還要指出，第一季通常是自由現金流佔 EBITDA 百分比的季節性高點。我們將繼續評估所有內部和外部投資機會的資本用途以及資本回報方案，評估依據是潛在的資本回報和價值創造。

The first quarter consolidated results represented organic constant-currency revenue and EBITDA growth consistent with our financial targets and stable organic EBITDA margins despite substantial investments in growth initiatives. Insurance performance remains consistently strong in both underwriting and ratings and claims, and our Energy and Financial Services business continue to make progress towards their growth objectives. We are excited about the opportunities to invest in our business and remain focused on long-term profitable growth and solid returns on capital, and we remain confident that we have the financial strength and capital structure to support investment for the long term. We continue to appreciate all the support and interest in Verisk as well as your patience today. We know that we had more to cover than we typically do.

第一季合併業績顯示，以固定匯率計算的有機收入和 EBITDA 成長符合我們的財務目標，儘管在成長計畫方面進行了大量投資，但有機 EBITDA 利潤率仍然保持穩定。保險業務在承保、評級和理賠方面均保持強勁勢頭，我們的能源和金融服務業務也繼續朝著成長目標穩步前進。我們對投資自身業務的機會感到興奮，並將繼續專注於長期獲利成長和穩健的資本回報，我們仍然相信我們擁有足夠的財務實力和資本結構來支持長期投資。我們衷心感謝大家對 Verisk 的支持和關注，也感謝大家今天的耐心等待。我們知道，這次我們需要報導的內容比平常多。

(Operator Instructions) And with that, I'll ask the operator to open the line for questions.

（操作員指示）接下來，我將請操作員開通提問專線。

(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from the line of Andrew Steinerman with JPMorgan.

（操作員說明）您的第一個問題來自摩根大通的 Andrew Steinerman。

This is Andrew. I just wanted to focus in on something Lee said at the beginning of the call that your team continues to target 7% organic revenue growth over time. I thought the target was more officially 7% to 8% as mentioned at Analyst Day in the 5-year -- or the multiyear plan and discussed on the fourth quarter conference call. And so my question is, is the company still talking about 7% to 8% for the medium term? And are you within that range this year?

這是安德魯。我只想重點談談李在電話會議開始時提到的一點，那就是你們團隊將繼續以7%的有機收入成長為目標。我以為更正式的目標是 7% 到 8%，正如分析師日上在 5 年計劃（或多年計劃）中提到的那樣，並在第四季度電話會議上討論過。所以我的問題是，該公司是否仍然認為中期成長率將達到 7% 到 8%？你今年是否在這個範圍內？

Yes. So Andrew, I think it's just -- we're saying over 7%. Obviously, 8% is over 7%. No change in the guidance. I think we just are looking at that 7% threshold. We certainly see the potential to be above that and to be at 8%., so there's no change in that. That is our long-term target. We aren't making -- providing any guidance in terms of 2018. We would ask investors to look at the trends in the business, the momentum that we have in the various segments and come to their own conclusions. But our long-term targets remain consistent with what we've expressed in the past.

是的。所以安德魯，我覺得是——我們說超過 7%。顯然，8%大於7%。指導方針沒有變化。我認為我們現在關注的只是7%這個閾值。我們當然看到了超過這個數值並達到 8% 的潛力，所以這一點沒有改變。這是我們的長期目標。我們不提供任何關於 2018 年的指導意見。我們希望投資人專注於公司的業務趨勢、各個業務板塊的發展勢頭，並得出自己的結論。但我們的長期目標與我們過去所表達的目標保持一致。

Your next question comes from the line of Hamzah Mazari from Macquarie.

你的下一個問題來自麥考瑞大學的 Hamzah Mazari。

The first question is just on the margin gap between overall organic and reported margin. It's clearly gotten -- the gap has gotten a lot larger. I realize there's acquisitions coming in at a lower margin, but there's also potentially investment spend. Could you maybe just break that down for us in terms of is investment -- how much investment spend is diluting the margin versus some of these acquisitions?

第一個問題只是關於整體有機利潤率和報告利潤率之間的利潤率差距。差距顯然已經——差距已經變得非常大了。我知道有些收購的利潤率較低，但也可能帶來投資支出。您能否從投資的角度為我們詳細分析——有多少投資支​​出稀釋了利潤率，以及這些收購又帶來了哪些影響？

Yes. So Hamzah, thanks. So the investments that we are making are included in the organic margins that we've reported. So in terms of thinking about those margins, you should assume that the organic margins reflect all of the investments that we are making, for instance, in Geomni, subsurface, power and renewables, all of those breakouts. And then the difference between that organic margin and the reported margin is the impact of those acquisitions that we have made but for which we don't have a year-over-year comparison, and this has been consistent with how we report the organic revenue growth and the EBITDA growth. Now I'll make one qualification. In this first quarter impact, as you will see, there was a $3.5 million earnout expense associated with our Fintellix acquisition that would have impacted that reported margin, so that contributed to that. In addition, if you will note in my comments, the EBITDA from the reported acquisitions that are excluded from organic also include some nonrecurring deal expenses. And so that is another contributor that would -- I would describe as kind of a nonorganic component of that differential. So hopefully, that gives you some context for the differential between the reported margin and the organic margin. Investments are included in that organic, and then the differential from the reported also includes some onetime deal expenses and earnout payments that take that below what we would expect as kind of the normal operating margins for those businesses.

是的。哈姆扎，謝謝你。因此，我們進行的投資已包含在我們公佈的有機利潤率中。因此，在考慮這些利潤率時，你應該假設有機利潤率反映了我們正在進行的所有投資，例如在Geomni、地下、電力和再生能源等所有這些突破性領域。然後，有機利潤率與報告利潤率之間的差異，就是我們進行的那些收購的影響，但我們沒有同比數據，這與我們報告有機收入增長和 EBITDA 增長的方式是一致的。現在我要補充一點。如您所見，在第一季的影響中，有一筆與收購 Fintellix 相關的 350 萬美元的獲利支付支出，這將影響報告的利潤率，因此造成了這種情況。此外，如果您注意到我的評論，報告的收購產生的 EBITDA（不包括內生成長）也包括一些非經常性交易費用。所以，這是另一個影響因素——我將其描述為這種差異的非有機成分。希望這能幫助你理解報告利潤率和自然利潤率之間的差異。投資包含在內，然後與報告的差異還包括一些一次性交易費用和盈利支付，這使得實際利潤低於我們預期這些企業正常的營業利潤率。

Great, that's very helpful. And just a follow-up question. You've added significant new data sets over time through acquisitions as well as investments. You talked about WoodMac 2.0. Have you given any thought as to how you're thinking about pricing for your subscriptions and new data sets and maybe how much pricing contributes to that 7%-plus organic growth metric target?

太好了，這很有幫助。還有一個後續問題。隨著時間的推移，您透過收購和投資增加了大量新的數據集。你提到了 WoodMac 2.0。您有沒有考慮過如何為訂閱和新資料集定價，以及定價對實現 7% 以上的自然成長指標目標有多大貢獻？

Yes. So we're always thinking about how to present our products to our customers. And in general, you should understand our pricing to be value-based pricing. So we're trying to understand the ROIs that customers generate based on using our solutions and then essentially determine what fraction of that we can sustainably hold on to in terms of how we price into the customers. And so really it's a function of how much value the next data set, the next software solution is generating, and it's on that basis that we put the price out there. There's always a price effect in everything that we do. It's seen across all the verticals. And anything which is a multiyear subscription, it's generally the case that those contracts will have price escalation year-over-year. So pricing is a part of our overall organic rate of revenue growth. It's not the greatest part. It's a contributor, but it's well below 50% of what's going on in terms of our organic revenue growth.

是的。所以我們一直在思考如何向客戶展示我們的產品。總的來說，您應該理解我們的定價是基於價值的定價。因此，我們正在努力了解客戶使用我們的解決方案所產生的投資回報率，然後從根本上確定我們能夠可持續地保留其中多少比例，以及我們如何向客戶定價。因此，價格實際上取決於下一個資料集、下一個軟體解決方案能產生多少價值，而我們也正是基於這個價值來定價的。我們所做的每一件事都會產生價格影響。這種情況在各個垂直領域都存在。任何多年訂閱服務，通常都會出現價格逐年上漲的情況。因此，定價是我們整體自然收入成長率的一部分。這並不是最精彩的部分。雖然它有所貢獻，但遠低於我們有機收入成長的 50%。

Your next question comes from the line of Arash Soleimani from KBW.

你的下一個問題來自 KBW 的 Arash Soleimani 的詩句。

Just wanted to know, to what extent do you find that some of your customers, such as insurance brokers, to what extent are they getting into data analytics themselves where they actually end up having some overlap with you in terms of serving insurance carriers?

我想了解一下，您認為您的客戶（例如保險經紀人）在多大程度上參與了數據分析，從而在服務保險公司方面與您產生了一些重疊之處？

Yes, so -- and Mark, please feel free to jump in if you have any additional thoughts. I'm going to broaden out your question just a little bit. It's true across essentially all of our customers that one of the options that they have, of course, and they usually take advantage of the opportunity to build their own data and analytic teams. And we are not in competition with those teams and we never have been, and so the advent of companies trying to improve what they do with data analytics is constructive for our business overall. And we want to be best friends of the person who's the rocket scientist inside of any of our customer sets. So you were referencing specifically brokers. Brokers are kind of doing the same thing that they've always done. I mean, some of the brokers have had some form of catastrophe models for a very long period of time. They always try to harness some element of the data that they've got, but there's just a fundamental difference between what we do and what the brokers do. The data that we have is so much more comprehensive, and it's so much more granular that we just really don't end up overlapping what brokers do. So I think your question was specifically about the influence of brokers. That's not new business. There is nothing that's really all that different there. The reinsurance broker community has changed demographically somewhat just because of changes in the reinsurance business. But in terms of kind of the value that they add and the value that we add, I don't really see very much change there at all.

是的，所以——馬克，如果你有任何其他想法，請隨時補充。我打算稍微擴充一下你的問題。對於我們幾乎所有客戶而言，這確實是他們擁有的選擇之一，當然，他們通常會利用這個機會來建立自己的數據和分析團隊。我們與這些團隊之間不存在競爭關係，也從來沒有過這種關係。因此，企業嘗試利用數據分析來改善自身業務的出現，對我們整體業務而言是具有建設性的。我們希望與我們客戶團隊中負責火箭技術的專家成為最好的朋友。所以你指的是經紀人。經紀人基本上還是在做他們一直以來都在做的事情。我的意思是，有些經紀商已經建立了一些災難模型很久了。他們總是試圖利用他們所掌握的數據中的某些元素，但我們所做的事情與經紀人所做的事情之間存在著根本性的差異。我們掌握的數據更加全面、更加細緻，因此我們與經紀商的業務幾乎沒有重疊之處。所以我覺得你的問題具體是關於經紀人的影響。那不是什麼新業務。其實沒有太大的不同。由於再保險業的變化，再保險經紀人群體的組成也發生了一些變化。但就他們創造的價值和我們創造的價值而言，我真的看不到什麼改變。

Maybe the only thing I will add, this is Mark, is clearly the brokers, like everybody, is trying to do more data analytics, especially as brokering fees become a little bit squeezed. Their target market continues to be into corporates. We do some but very little with corporates. We work and provide those analytics to insurers and the folks that are more in the insurance side of the transaction.

我唯一要補充的是，我是馬克，很明顯，經紀人和所有人一樣，都在嘗試進行更多的數據分析，尤其是在經紀費用受到一定程度擠壓的情況下。他們的目標市場仍然是企業客戶。我們與企業有一些合作，但很少。我們與保險公司以及交易中保險一方的相關人員合作，並向他們提供這些分析數據。

And I guess my second question is, what would you say is the minimum level of organic growth you need to achieve organic margin expansion?

我的第二個問題是，您認為要實現有機利潤率擴張，所需的最低有機成長水準是多少？

It has to be, I don't know, mid-single-digits probably, 5-ish to 6-ish.

應該是，我不知道，大概個位數中段吧，5到6左右。

Your next question comes from the line of Tim McHugh with William Blair.

你的下一個問題來自提姆·麥克休和威廉·布萊爾的對話。

Just following up on the comment about WoodMac 2.0 project. I guess can you talk to us about a little more on, I guess, the outcome of that? And is it an improved product that you hope drives growth? Or does it have a significantly different cost structure afterwards that impacts the margins as well as where are we in terms of the, if you will, the peak investment necessary to drive that project? I mean, does it go up from here? Or are we already absorbing that cost?

關於 WoodMac 2.0 專案的評論，我補充一下。我想您能再跟我們談談這件事的結果嗎？它是一款改進後的產品，您希望它能推動成長嗎？或者，之後它的成本結構是否會發生顯著變化，從而影響利潤率，以及我們目前在推動該項目所需的最高投資額方面處於什麼位置？我的意思是，它還會繼續上漲嗎？或者我們已經承擔這部分成本了？

Yes. So maybe in reverse order, Tim. We're kind of right in the middle of it right now, so I think we're sort of at the investment level that is required. It has both effects that you were talking about. So first of all, there's a, as you would imagine, a massive amount of data that's a part of what Wood Mackenzie does. But one of the things that a modern data analytic company can do is actually more highly automate data extraction, data cleansing and then data integration so that all of the data sets come together in a way that they're easily presented to the analytic layer, you can build new products. And so there is an efficiency effect there, which we expect to enjoy as we move through this 2.0 migration. But then the other part of it is that, and I'm now alluding back to what I said in my comments, one of the big things that's happened in the energy space is that everything has sped up. If what you're trying to do is to harness competitive intelligence and make your investments and run your operations, everything has just sped up, and that's largely the effect of the United States. Basically, sort of the old form was an offshore big development, which would have hundreds of millions of dollars of investment and 5 to 10-year planning and execution cycles to get into business. Now in the unconventionals in the lower 48, you can basically move a rig and 3 days later have a 1,500-foot well. And so planning cycles in a world like that are measured in weeks. And so one of the things that is necessary in that world, if you're going to stay on top of competitive intelligence and have really fresh and relevant solutions, is you've just got to speed up. And that's one of -- that will be one of the major effects of WoodMac 2.0. The other one is actually interacting even more deeply with customers' own decisioning platforms, more melding of their data with our data with other forms of data that we don't even use today. And so the kind of the overall point, which is to help our customers make better decisions faster, that's always been the point and will continue to be the point. But by degrees, what we put out there will actually look different and be more valuable because of data integration plus the deeper connectivity between our data sets and the customers' data sets.

是的。所以，或許應該反過來，提姆。我們現在正處於這個階段的中間，所以我認為我們已經達到了所需的投資水平。它確實具有你剛才提到的兩種效果。首先，如你所想，伍德麥肯錫公司處理的資料量非常龐大。但現代數據分析公司可以做的一件事，實際上是更高度地自動化數據提取、數據清洗和數據集成，以便將所有數據集以一種易於呈現給分析層的方式結合在一起，從而構建新產品。因此，這裡存在著效率提升效應，我們預期在推進 2.0 版本升級的過程中，我們將享受這種效應。但另一方面，正如我在評論中所說，能源領域發生的一件大事是，一切都加速了。如果你想利用競爭情報進行投資和開展業務，那麼一切都在加速發展，這很大程度上是美國的影響。基本上，舊模式是一種海外大型開發項目，需要數億美元的投資，以及 5 到 10 年的規劃和執行週期才能投入營運。現在，在美國本土48州的非常規油氣領域，基本上你可以移動一個鑽井平台，3天後就能鑽出一口1500英尺深的井。因此，在這樣的世界裡，計劃週期是以週為單位來衡量的。因此，在這個領域，如果你想在競爭情報方面保持領先地位，並擁有真正新鮮且相關的解決方案，那麼你必須加快速度。而這將是 WoodMac 2.0 的主要影響之一。另一種方式實際上是與客戶自己的決策平台進行更深入的互動，將他們的數據與我們的數據以及我們目前甚至還沒有使用的其他形式的數據進行更深入的整合。因此，總而言之，幫助我們的客戶更快做出更好的決策，這始終是我們的目標，並將繼續是我們的目標。但隨著時間的推移，由於資料整合以及我們資料集與客戶資料集之間更深層的連接，我們發布的內容實際上會看起來有所不同，並且更有價值。

Okay, great. And just the follow-up on the insurance vertical, the growth rate, I guess, this quarter, in particular, because the boost from the hurricane activity wasn't really the dominant factor there. Can you -- is something different about the environment in the last couple of quarters? I know you talked broadly about very specific items that impacted the business. But given how much the growth has improved, are we just at a point in time where you've had a lot of new products come to market? Or has the spending environment changed in your view? Can you kind of, at a higher level, talk about how you're viewing the growth there lately?

好的，太好了。至於保險業務的後續進展，我想說的是，特別是本季的成長率，因為颶風活動帶來的成長並不是主要因素。您能說說嗎—最近幾季環境方面有什麼不同嗎？我知道你泛泛地談到了對業務產生影響的非常具體的事項。但鑑於成長動能已經顯著改善，我們是否正處於一個新產品大量湧入市場的時期？或者，您認為消費環境改變了？您能否從更高的層面談談您如何看待近期該領域的成長？

Sure, Tim. So this is Mark. I just want to make sure, we've been kind of reiterating the same that we feel that we're well positioned. We've had a better set of assets and new products than we ever have, and those are coming to fruition. The other thing we've been trying to emphasize over the last several quarters, back probably earlier '17, was there were several industry consolidations both on the reinsurance side and the insurance side. And when that happens, sometimes that puts pressure on us, so there was this underlying headwind that we've been a little bit freed from. So there's a combination of good elements that are contributing, and I think that I would be remiss if I didn't mention we're doing a very good job from a sales perspective of cross-selling. And we're seeing good activity, good integration and good engagement with customers.

當然可以，提姆。這位是馬克。我只是想確認一下，我們一直在重申同樣的觀點，那就是我們認為我們已經做好了充分的準備。我們擁有比以往任何時候都更好的資產和新產品，而這些正在逐步實現。在過去的幾個季度裡，我們一直試圖強調的另一件事，可能早在 2017 年初就開始強調了，那就是再保險和保險業都出現了一些整合。當這種情況發生時，有時會給我們帶來壓力，所以我們一直受到這種潛在的不利因素的影響，而現在我們已經從中稍微解脫出來了。所以，多種有利因素共同作用，我認為如果我不提及我們在交叉銷售方面做得非常出色，那就太失職了。我們看到了良好的市場活動、良好的整合以及與客戶之間的良好互動。

Your next question comes from the line of Toni Kaplan with Morgan Stanley.

你的下一個問題來自摩根士丹利的東尼卡普蘭。

Lee, you mentioned the 7% EBITDA growth target that you had also called out at Investor Day. Should we assume that really any incremental leverage that you get from growth in the business is reinvested over that level? Or could you basically allow that to have margins expand? And this is more of a long-term philosophy question than just a 2018 one.

李，你提到了7%的EBITDA成長目標，你在投資人日也提到這個目標。我們是否應該假設，企業成長帶來的任何增量槓桿都會在該水準上再投資？或者，您能否允許利潤空間擴大一些？這與其說是一個2018年的問題，不如說是一個長期的哲學問題。

Yes. Thank you, Toni. I think -- so first of all, reiterating that our expectation is to grow organic revenue above 7% and that we would expect organic EBITDA margin to grow -- I'm sorry, organic EBITDA to grow at a faster level than that. And so your question goes to, to what degree are we reinvesting that growth in the business. And the way I would approach that is to say we are looking at individual investment opportunities in each of the breakouts on their merits in terms of the growth potential and the return on capital for each of those. And we would expect that each of those individually would demonstrate the operating leverage that we expect for Verisk as a whole and to contribute to that stronger EBITDA growth relative to our revenue growth. And so in terms of the timing impacts of that, it depends upon those opportunities and when we put capital into them. Overall, over that long-term objective, we are going to expect to see operating EBITDA growth in excess implying that margin expansion and that operating leverage. So I think the variances around that will have more to do with the timing of specific projects, and I'll tie that to a specific example. Geomni, for instance, is clearly an opportunity that we have been investing heavily in from a CapEx and from a compensation standpoint. That clearly has an impact, as I indicated today in my remarks, on our EBITDA growth. We are expecting 2018 to be the peak level of investment, as we've said before on that, and so that will moderate over time. And so that should demonstrate more expanded margin as that tails off. Now there may be other investments that we're making beyond that. But overall, we are expecting that margin to express itself, and we will try to provide some context between how the investment levels are impacting that growth. Hopefully, that gives you a little bit of clarity in terms of how we think about it.

是的。謝謝你，托尼。我認為——首先，重申一下，我們預期有機收入成長超過 7%，並且我們預期有機 EBITDA 利潤率的成長速度會更快——抱歉，是有機 EBITDA 的成長速度會更快。所以你的問題變成了，我們在多大程度上將成長的勢頭再投資到業務中。我的做法是，我們會根據每隻股票的成長潛力和資本報酬率，來評估每隻股票的特定投資機會。我們預計，這些業務各自都能展現出我們期望 Verisk 整體實現的營運槓桿效應，並有助於實現相對於營收成長更強勁的 EBITDA 成長。因此，就時機影響而言，這取決於這些機會以及我們何時將資金投入其中。總體而言，就該長期目標而言，我們預計營運 EBITDA 成長將超過預期，這意味著利潤率擴張和營運槓桿效應。所以我認為這方面的差異與具體專案的時間安排有關，我將舉一個具體的例子來說明這一點。例如，Geomni 顯然是一個我們投入大量資金進行資本支出和薪資投資的機會。正如我今天在演講中指出的那樣，這顯然會對我們的 EBITDA 成長產生影響。我們預計 2018 年將是投資的頂峰，正如我們之前所說，之後投資水準會逐漸下降。因此，隨著這一趨勢的減弱，利潤率應該會進一步擴大。除了這些之外，我們可能還會進行其他投資。但總體而言，我們預計這一利潤率將會反映出來，我們將嘗試解釋投資水準如何影響這一成長。希望這能讓您更清楚地了解我們是如何看待這個問題的。

Very helpful. And then my follow-up is on Argus. I'm not sure if Lisa is there or not but just any sort of changes made to how Lisa will run the business versus how Nana was running it, how, basically, the plan to maybe kickstart growth up again. Scott mentioned in the beginning of the call, one -- the isolated example of the TSYS relationship and basically being 1 to 2 quarters later than expected. So should we start to see the growth again maybe in the back half of the year? Because I know you've mentioned that the subscription base was up pretty significantly at the Investor Day. So just wanted to get a sense of how confident we are in Financial Services growth in the next couple of quarters and if there's a change in strategy.

很有幫助。接下來，我的後續工作是關於 Argus 的。我不確定麗莎是否在那裡，但麗莎經營公司的方式與娜娜經營公司的方式相比，可能會發生一些變化，基本上，計劃可能會再次啟動增長。Scott 在電話會議開始時提到，一個特殊的例子是 TSYS 關係，基本上比預期晚了 1 到 2 個季度。那麼我們是否應該在今年下半年再次看到成長呢？因為我知道您在投資者日上提到訂閱用戶數量大幅增長。所以，我只是想了解我們對未來幾季金融服務業成長的信心程度，以及策略是否會改變。

Right. So Lisa is not here, but I feel comfortable answering on her behalf. We, as you would imagine, spend a lot of time together talking about all this. The path to growth is going to be the same as it has been. I called out in my remarks that 3 of the streams -- revenue streams at Argus that will be particularly meaningful are media effectiveness, regulatory solutions and data hosting. And so to really be a function of each of those streams finding their mark, we're -- at this point, 25 of the top 25 credit card issuers in the English-speaking world are in our data consortium and customers for our solutions. And so just the building of the consortium now, it's really down to additional countries, I guess, is the way that I would put it, and we're having some success there. But there have been moments over the course of the last 5 years where a pretty good contributor to growth was more issuers coming into the consortium. At this point, that's a little more established. So that part of the revenue stack can grow, but it won't grow quite as fast. And so it's those other 3 components. And that's not really a change from where we've been. So we're really down to execution, and I referenced a timing effect as it related to the first quarter of 2018. But as I mentioned, the long-term view is that this is a business which, for 5 years through 2017, grew in the low to mid-teens. There's -- the depth and the power of our data asset is greater in 2018 than it was in 2012 at the beginning of that time period. The customer demography has not really changed, so we see a lot of opportunity for this business to grow.

正確的。麗莎不在，但我可以代表她回答這個問題。正如你所想，我們花了很多時間在一起討論這些事情。增長之路將與以往一樣。我在演講中指出，Argus 的 3 個收入來源（其中特別重要的三個是媒體效果、監管解決方案和資料託管）將非常有意義。因此，為了真正讓這些管道各自發揮作用，目前，英語世界排名前 25 名的信用卡發行商中有 25 家都加入了我們的數據聯盟，並且是我們解決方案的客戶。所以現在組成聯盟的關鍵，實際上就在於吸引更多國家加入，我想，我這麼說沒錯，而且我們在這方面取得了一些成功。但在過去 5 年中，也曾出現過這樣的時刻：更多發行人加入聯盟，對成長起到了相當大的推動作用。目前，這一點已經比較確定了。因此，這部分收入可以成長，但成長速度不會那麼快。所以，這就是其他三個組成部分。這其實和我們一直以來的處境並沒有什麼不同。所以現在真的到了執行階段了，我提到了與 2018 年第一季相關的時機效應。但正如我所提到的，從長遠來看，這家企業在截至 2017 年的 5 年裡，成長率一直保持在 10% 到 25% 之間。2018 年，我們的數據資產的深度和實力比 2012 年該時期開始時要大得多。客戶群並沒有發生真正的變化，因此我們看到這項業務有很大的發展機會。

Your next question comes from the line of Manav Patnaik with Barclays.

你的下一個問題來自於馬納夫·帕特奈克與巴克萊銀行的合作。

My first question is around the energy investments and opportunity. I mean, you've called out, I guess, breakout is the word you've used a lot of times for the opportunities and why you're investing there. We appreciate the bridge you had on the margins. But I guess the question is I'm still surprised that you still have another 2 years of investments to go before a lot of this is done. And maybe just a little bit more color on how these breakout opportunities are going to phase in. Like do we have to wait 2 years for these margins to start getting better? I think that's the big question on my mind here.

我的第一個問題是關於能源投資和機會的。我的意思是，你提到過，我想，「突破」這個詞你用了很多次來形容這些機會以及你為什麼在那裡投資。我們很欣賞您在邊緣地帶搭建的橋樑。但我想問的是，我仍然很驚訝，在很多事情完成之前，你還需要再進行兩年的投資。或許還可以更詳細地說明這些突破性機會將如何逐步實現。難道我們要等兩年才能看到利潤率開始改善嗎？我想這就是我目前最關心的問題。

Yes. So you -- there are actually 2 things here, Manav, and you kind of put them together a little bit, so let me pull them apart for you. WoodMac 2.0 and the breakout solutions are not the same thing. Breakout solutions are things that we're presenting to customers that they find valuable, which operate in their environments and help them to run their businesses and make progress. And Lee referenced those at some length. Those are relatively large categories of spending. The good news is that each of those, whether it's subsurface or it's power and renewables, we actually find good growth associated with those. We're very happy. Having sort of launched these things and given where they are in their progress, the margins will improve as they grow. The margins are not as high as the other things that we do today, and so that's -- you have both of those effects at work. WoodMac 2.0 is something different. That's about capabilities. That's about WoodMac being a 21st-century, fully equipped, modern data analytic machine. And the data analytic work that WoodMac has done historically has been very unique and the content has been very unique. But the actual data analytic methods have not really been as strong or as advanced as those in other parts of Verisk. So our thesis, even when we got started and here we are now, is that the rest of Verisk could apply methods and help make progress. It's taking a while, and I referenced that 2019 would be sort of a moment of milestones with regard to all of that, but that will be the ongoing work. You just need to separate those 2 forms of investment.

是的。所以你——這裡實際上有兩件事，Manav，你把它們混為一談了，所以讓我來為你把它們分開來說。WoodMac 2.0 和分線盒解決方案並不是同一回事。突破性解決方案是我們向客戶展示的、他們認為有價值的東西，這些解決方案可以在他們的環境中運行，並幫助他們開展業務並取得進步。李在文中對此進行了較為詳細的提及。這些都是相對較大的支出類別。好消息是，無論是地下資源或電力和再生能源，我們都發現這些領域都蘊藏著良好的成長潛力。我們非常高興。這些項目已經啟動，就目前的進展來看，隨著專案的成長，利潤率將會提高。利潤率不如我們今天做的其他事情那麼高，所以——這兩種效應都在起作用。WoodMac 2.0 則有所不同。那關乎能力。這說明 WoodMac 是一家 21 世紀設備齊全的現代化數據分析公司。WoodMac 歷來所做的資料分析工作非常獨特，其內容也非常獨特。但實際的數據分析方法並沒有像 Verisk 其他部分那樣強大或先進。因此，從我們開始到現在，我們的論點始終是 Verisk 的其他成員可以應用這些方法並幫助取得進展。這需要一段時間，我曾提到 2019 年將是所有相關工作的一個里程碑時刻，但這仍將是一項持續進行的工作。你只需要將這兩種投資形式分開。

And Manav, I would just -- I want to add one thing to Scott's comments just to contextualize this for you. The breakout opportunities in the Energy and Specialized Markets are entities that are EBITDA-positive. They are generating EBITDA. They are generating real revenues and revenue growth. And so it isn't a situation where we're investing and hoping that revenues and the profitability will come. We've already demonstrated product viability, client acceptance, and we're now in the phase of driving to a scale level where we can see that substantial EBITDA growth, given the operating leverage, grow. Now that varies from investment to investment, but I want to give -- your question goes to the level of maturity of these investments and our timing. And I would -- I just want to make the point that these are generating EBITDA profitability, and we are generating attractive revenue growth in the businesses. So they are establishing probably at a more mature level than perhaps kind of your initial impressions were.

還有，Manav，我只想補充一點Scott的評論，以便你更好地理解。能源和專業市場中的突破性機會在於那些 EBITDA 為正的企業。它們正在創造 EBITDA。它們正在創造實際收入並實現收入成長。因此，我們並不是進行投資然後寄望於收入和獲利能力自然而然地到來。我們已經證明了產品的可行性和客戶接受度，現在我們正處於擴大規模的階段，鑑於營運槓桿作用，我們可以看到 EBITDA 的大幅成長。這因投資而異，但我想說的是——你的問題涉及這些投資的成熟度和我們的投資時機。我只想強調一點，這些業務正在產生 EBITDA 獲利能力，並且我們正在這些業務中創造可觀的收入成長。所以，他們現在的發展程度可能比你最初印像中的成熟得多。

Yes. Actually, there's one other point I want to make around profitability levels at WoodMac, and that is you can actually see our philosophy at Verisk at work if you look at WoodMac over the last several years. And what I mean by that is there was a remarkable discontinuity in the end market in the energy space, remarkable. The industry, globally, meaning our customers, shed hundreds -- about 350,000 jobs globally. The choice that we made was that we're in this for the long haul. So we didn't slash headcounts. We didn't penalize our people by saying, "Okay. There was this downturn, but you're just going to get paid a lot less because we're groping for a near-term margin impact." And I think we've been rewarded for that. Our performance relative to referenced competitors in the space with respect to growth has been considerably better. But this is our philosophy at Verisk. As much as our business runs on intellectual capital, and it does, a lot of that is tied to our people and the greatest part of our cost structure is our people. And we're going to manage for the long term, and that is absolutely what we've done as we've moved through with WoodMac. And so you can see that in terms of the choices that we've made in light of a very difficult external environment. We thought long term and we remained investment-minded, and that's what we'll always do at Verisk.

是的。實際上，關於 WoodMac 的獲利水平，我還有一點想說，那就是，如果你看看 WoodMac 過去幾年的發展情況，你會發現 Verisk 的理念是如何發揮作用的。我的意思是，能源領域的終端市場出現了顯著的斷裂，非常顯著。全球範圍內，包括我們的客戶在內，整個產業裁員數百人，全球約有 35 萬個工作流失。我們所做的選擇是，我們要長期堅持下去。所以我們沒有裁員。我們沒有透過說「好的」來懲罰我們的人民。雖然經濟有所下滑，但你的收入會大幅減少，因為我們正在努力應對短期利潤率下降的問題。 「我認為我們因此獲得了回報。與同領域的競爭對手相比，我們在成長方面表現得好得多。但這正是Verisk的理念。雖然我們的業務很大程度上依賴知識資本，而且確實如此，但其中許多知識資本都與我們的員工息息相關，員工也是我們成本結構中佔比最大的部分。我們將著眼於長遠發展，而這正是我們在與 WoodMac 合作的過程中一直秉持的理念。因此，從我們面對非常艱難的外在環境所做的選擇來看，這一點顯而易見。我們著眼長遠，始終保持投資思維，而這正是 Verisk 一直以來秉持的理念。

That's very helpful. Maybe just one -- the follow-up is Just on the -- I think, Lee, you made a comment that you're not giving guidance for '18. But last quarter, I think, Scott, you had said you would do 7% to 8% organic growth in the year. So are you backing away from that because of the slower start to Financial Services and Energy? Or am I just reading that wrong?

那很有幫助。或許只有一個——後續是——我想，李，你曾說過你不會對 2018 年做出指導。但史考特，我記得你上個季度說過，你們今年的有機成長率將達到 7% 到 8%。所以，您是因為金融服務和能源產業起步較慢而放棄投資這些領域嗎？還是我理解錯了？

I think you're just reading that wrong. We just -- at the start of the year, I think we want to give a sense as to what -- where things look contextually. Nothing has, I think, changed in that outlook. We just are not providing a specific estimate for 2018. We are working towards our targets. You can see that we successfully achieved that in the first quarter. We've done that consistently over the past few quarters, and we think that should be the basis for investor and analyst perspective on 2018.

我覺得你理解錯了。在年初，我們想讓大家了解事情的來龍去脈。我認為，這種看法沒有任何改變。我們目前無法提供 2018 年的具體預估數據。我們正在朝著目標努力。你可以看到，我們在第一季成功實現了這個目標。在過去的幾個季度裡，我們一直堅持這樣做，我們認為這應該成為投資者和分析師對 2018 年看法的依據。

Your next question comes from the line of Alex Kramm with UBS.

你的下一個問題來自瑞銀集團的 Alex Kramm。

I wanted to come back to, I think, Mark, you just made a comment a couple questions ago on M&A and how that has weighed on growth in the past. And I think you brought this up proactively on the last call, too. So just looking for a little bit more color. You said you were through that. But at the same time, I think, so far this year, we are on pace for the highest M&A year in the insurance end market. So maybe you can contrast that and how you're thinking about that outlook. And then maybe more specifically, if you could give us a little bit of a history lesson. I think a couple of years ago, when the ACE-Chubb deal was going on, I think some people noted that maybe that cost you a couple of percent of growth. So maybe just be a little bit more specific what you're seeing and how that could impact your outlook there.

我想回到馬克剛才你提到的併購以及併購在過去如何影響成長的問題上。而且我認為你在上次通話中也主動提出了這個問題。只是想增添一些色彩。你說過你已經走出來了。但同時，我認為，今年到目前為止，保險終端市場的併購交易量有望創下歷史新高。所以，或許你可以對比一下你對這種觀點的看法。然後，更具體地說，您能否為我們簡單介紹一下歷史？我認為幾年前，當 ACE-Chubb 交易進行時，有些人注意到，這可能會使你的成長損失幾個百分點。所以，或許你可以更具體地描述你所看到的情況，以及這可能會如何影響你對那裡的看法。

So obviously, some acquisitions and consolidation in the industry could or could not affect us. It really gets to what models, as an example, use AIR. If there's 2 reinsurers that are combining, the acquiring company and what models they use could drive a better or a worse outcome for us. And what happened, as I described, over kind of '16 into early '17 was some of that merger activity worked against us. You referenced ACE-Chubb, those are both large users of [ISS] services. We worked an agreement with them that I think made both customers and Verisk happy. But there, obviously, in those type of things does come some negotiation. So I can't really get all that more specific. All that I can tell you is the headwinds that we experienced are behind us. The 2 calmer things that have been announced or are pending don't seem to have that big of implication on us going forward, so I think we're in a better space -- place we are today than we were a year ago.

所以很明顯，產業內的某些收購和整合可能會也可能不會影響我們。這實際上取決於哪些型號（例如）使用 AIR。如果兩家再保險公司合併，收購方及其採用的模型可能會為我們帶來更好或更差的結果。正如我之前所描述的那樣，在 2016 年到 2017 年初期間，一些併購活動對我們產生了不利影響。您提到了 ACE-Chubb，它們都是 [ISS] 服務的大型用戶。我們與他們達成了一項協議，我認為這對客戶和 Verisk 雙方都很滿意。但很顯然，這類事情確實需要進行一些談判。所以我真的沒辦法提供更具體的資訊了。我只能告訴你們，我們遇到的逆境已經過去了。已經宣布或正在籌備的兩項較為平靜的事項似乎對我們未來的發展不會產生太大影響，所以我認為我們現在的處境比一年前要好得多。

And Mark, maybe just picking up on the point, maybe you and I could dialogue about 2 things real quick. So one is in the ACE-Chubb situation, is it fair to say that actually we're now looking at cross-sell opportunities that could probably actually cause the combined account to be bigger than it was, maybe even materially bigger than it was when -- than before the time when they were separate entities. Is that fair?

馬克，也許我正好抓住了重點，也許你我可以快速地聊聊兩件事。所以，以 ACE-Chubb 的情況為例，可以說我們現在看到的交叉銷售機會可能會使合併後的帳戶比以前更大，甚至比它們還是獨立實體時要大得多，這種說法是否公平？這樣公平嗎？

I think one of the benefits we've had of kind of taking our insurance businesses and being holistic is we've had these more senior-level discussions, as Scott highlighted, and these outcomes are positive in the sense that we think we have bigger growth opportunities to cross-sell products and get Verisk more integrated and more product into these bigger customers. So we'll continue to look forward for the future, but I think there could be a very positive outcome.

我認為，我們對保險業務進行整體性調整的好處之一是，正如 Scott 所強調的那樣，我們進行了更多高層討論，這些討論的結果是積極的，因為我們認為我們有更大的增長機會來交叉銷售產品，並將 Verisk 更深入地整合到這些更大的客戶中，並提供更多產品。所以我們會繼續展望未來，但我認為可能會有非常正面的結果。

And maybe get your view on one other thing, which is the announced AXA, XL Catlin put together. Kind of my view is I think that that's probably actually good news for us because AXA, a more global company, has made relatively less use of what we do to date. XL Catlin has been a very strong, well-established customer. I think there will be flow from -- or there could be flow from XL Catlin into AXA. What do you see?

或許你還可以談談另一件事，那就是 AXA 和 XL Catlin 宣布的合作項目。我的看法是，這或許對我們來說是個好消息，因為安盛（AXA）是一家更全球化的公司，迄今為止對我們所做的工作利用得相對較少。XL Catlin 一直是我們實力雄厚、信譽卓著的客戶。我認為會有資金從 XL Catlin 流入 AXA，或者說資金可能會從 XL Catlin 流入 AXA。你看到了什麼？

That was my specific reference when I said the acquisitions that are pending on the horizon probably are more positive to us, and we don't see any concerns. So yes, agree.

我之前說即將進行的收購可能對我們更有利，我們看不到任何擔憂，我指的就是這件事。是的，我同意。

Your last question comes from the line of Bill Warmington with Wells Fargo.

你的最後一個問題來自富國銀行的比爾沃明頓。

So first question on the telematics data exchange. Scott, in the past, when you've described building these contributory databases as 3 yards and a cloud of dust. So you announced their first contributor, GM, back in September 2015, then there was nothing for a couple of years. And now you've announced Honda in January and Hyundai in April. So are we at an inflection point? And how should we think about the size and the timing of the revenue opportunity for the Verisk Data Exchange?

那麼，第一個問題是關於遠端資訊處理資料交換的。Scott，過去你曾把建構這些貢獻資料庫比喻為 3 碼和一團塵土。所以你們在 2015 年 9 月宣布了他們的第一位貢獻者 GM，然後幾年間就沒有任何消息了。現在你們宣布本田將於1月上市，現代將於4月上市。我們是否正處於轉捩點？那麼，我們該如何看待 Verisk 資料交換的收入機會的規模和時機呢？

Yes. And Mark, let me invite your comments. I think the answer to inflection point is I think more in terms of curves than steps when we -- as we sort of build all of this. So I do think that the data exchange becomes just that much more inevitable as it grows, so you do have that effect. On the other hand, you've got -- sort of every OEM seems to be its own special case and the rate at which they look at these opportunities and what they think they're going to get out of vehicle telemetry just seems to vary from OEM to OEM. So I think it's something short of kind of a -- sort of a herd movement, but I do think that sort of the next contributor is that much closer to hand because of having reached roughly 1/3 of the market, as Mark has described. And the revenue side of it will look like a curve also because, as the data deepens, it'll just be that much more compelling an increasingly larger number of insurers to ones who access the data and build their process around these data. So I would encourage you to think in terms of curves rather than step changes. But it is very encouraging, and I compliment our team for having gotten this far. I mean, we are clearly the leader in this category, hands down. In fact, I don't really actually think anybody else is really in this category. It seems to belong to us.

是的。馬克，請允許我請你發表意見。我認為拐點的答案應該更多地用曲線而不是階梯來表示，因為我們——就像我們建造這一切一樣。所以我認為，隨著資料交換的成長，資料交換變得越來越不可避免，確實會產生這種影響。另一方面，每個 OEM 似乎都是一個特殊案例，他們看待這些機會的速度以及他們認為能從車輛遙測中獲得什麼，似乎因 OEM 而異。所以我認為這有點像羊群效應，但正如馬克所描述的那樣，由於已經佔據了大約三分之一的市場份額，我認為下一個貢獻者離我們更近了一步。而且，收入方面也會呈現曲線狀，因為隨著數據的深入，越來越多的保險公司會更青睞那些能夠獲取數據並圍繞這些數據建立流程的公司。所以我建議你們用曲線而不是階躍變化的方式來思考。但這非常令人鼓舞，我要讚揚我們的團隊能夠走到今天這一步。我的意思是，毫無疑問，我們在這個領域絕對是領導者。事實上，我並不認為其他人真的屬於這一類。它似乎屬於我們。

And then a quick follow-up on the $3.5 million Fintellix earnout. Just wanted to check, why is that running through the income statement and not through the cash flow statement as an earnout? And then just to be clear, the $3.5 million -- is the $3.5 million included in the expenses in reported and then excluded from the expenses in organic EBITDA? I just want to make sure I was clear on that.

然後，我們快速跟進 Fintellix 350 萬美元的獲利分成。我想確認一下，為什麼這筆款項會列入損益表，而不是作為獲利支付列入現金流量表？最後，為了明確起見，這 350 萬美元——這 350 萬美元是包​​含在報告的費用中，然後在有機 EBITDA 中從費用中排除嗎？我只是想確認一下我的意思表達清楚了。

Yes. Thank you, Bill. This is Lee. So the answer is, is that this earnout structure was tied to ongoing employment agreements with the employees and, under the accounting rules, that has to be reflected as an expense when that's paid. So that's the technical answer. And it is included in the reported results, but it is excluded from the organic results for -- that we have reported.

是的。謝謝你，比爾。這是李。所以答案是，這種獲利支付結構與員工的持續僱傭協議有關，根據會計準則，支付時必須反映為一項費用。這就是技術層面的答案。它包含在已公佈的結果中，但不包括在我們已公佈的自然增長結果中。

So operator, I think that concludes our session for today.

操作員，我想我們今天的會議就到此結束了。

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

今天的電話會議到此結束。您現在可以斷開連線了。

Okay. Well, I just wanted to say before we sign off, thank you, everybody, for your interest and for the questions today. I hope and I believe that the expanded presentation that we're providing you is giving you a deeper look into the company. We're very happy for you to have that deeper look because we're actually very confident in where our business sits and where it's going, and so we want everybody to kind of appreciate the dynamics of our business. And so I imagine that our conversations going forward will just be enriched by the greater disclosures. So thanks for your interest, and we'll talk to many of you in the coming days and weeks and look forward to it.

好的。最後，在結束之前，我想說，謝謝大家今天的關注和提問。我希望並相信，我們提供的這份更詳細的介紹能讓您更深入地了解公司。我們非常高興您能更深入地了解我們，因為我們對公司目前的狀況和發展方向非常有信心，所以我們希望每個人都能了解我們業務的動態。因此，我認為隨著資訊揭露的增多，我們未來的對話將會更加豐富。感謝大家的關注，我們將在接下來的幾天和幾週內與大家交流，我們非常期待。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Bye for now.

暫時再見。