Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the MLP SE conference call regarding the publication of the results for the first quarter 2024. At this time, all participants have been placed on a listen-only mode. The floor will be open for questions following the presentation. Let me now turn the floor over to your host, Pascal Löcher. Thank you very much, and welcome to MLP's conference call to our results for the first quarter of 2024. With me today is our CFO, Reinhard Loose. He will guide you through the presentation, and of course, we are happy to take your questions after the presentation. Please go ahead, Reinhard. Thank you, Pascal, and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. First of all, allow me to present the key facts from the first three months of the financial year 2024. MLP is making good progress, and we have enjoyed a successful start of the year. We increased total revenue of MLP Group to EUR 284 million in the first quarter, which represents a new high. We were particularly successful in the wealth competence field, especially in wealth management and interest rate business. With earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) of EUR 37 million, MLP Group is right on track to meet our annual forecast. We reaffirm our planning to record EBIT of EUR 100 million-EUR 110 million by the end of 2025. In the last few years, we have worked hard to achieve the broad and diversified positioning of our group, which highlights the strategic competitive advantages that we can secure and which is once again paying off. In addition to this, we have a good handle on those factors we can influence ourselves: strategy, costs, and above all, services to our clients. We are successfully addressing the issue in the currently difficult overall economic climate in Germany. This is not only reflected in the excellent stability of the MLP Group but also by the fact that we still have significant growth potential in our business model, in which we support and advise private, institutional, and corporate clients in all financial matters. Our clients and our consultants are increasingly benefiting from our successful digital strategy. We are also increasingly using artificial intelligence in areas where it benefits clients. The strategic success factors, which particularly include our assets under management and non-life insurance portfolio volumes, continue to display positive overall development for the MLP Group. Several important trends will continue to shape our markets and the way in which we work for our clients in the midterm, and they are also providing support on this promising path. Irrespective of the requirements in terms of sustainability, which we are actively addressing as pioneers in the field of client consulting, the ongoing process of digitalization will play a key part. However, we definitely do not consider the use of digital concepts and artificial intelligence as an end in itself or a means solely to increase cost efficiency. Our key premise here is: whatever we do in this field needs to benefit our clients, which is entirely in the interest of our consultants as it leaves them more time to complex financial issues. In this comprehension, we are also working consistently on further developing our internal processes. In other words, we are unlocking significant additional potential in both the short and midterm through responsible integration of robotics and artificial intelligence. As MLP Group, we are also benefiting greatly from other relevant trends in our markets, above all from the fact that wealth in Germany is continuing to grow as well as the requirements resulting from personal asset successions. This increases the demand for highly qualified consulting services in this important and difficult area. In our group, we are perfectly positioned to handle these challenges. The same applies to the consulting fee needs arising from inflation. Last but not least, the demographic development is becoming an increasingly important factor both in the private client area and for companies. You can find an overview of revenue development on slide 5 of the presentation. Total revenue increased by 8% to around EUR 284 million in the first quarter, setting a new record. The MLP Group once again benefited from the stable revenue structure we have developed and established over the last few years. Our total revenue has enjoyed significant growth over the course of the last 20 years. At the same time, we have substantially expanded the proportion of recurring revenue in the last few years, which also makes a valuable contribution to our stability. Broken down by competence fields, MLP achieved particularly strong revenue growth of 27% in the wealth competence field. This was largely driven by the wealth management activities and the interest rate business. We were also able to significantly increase revenue in real estate brokerage, which is also assigned to the wealth competence field, albeit obviously starting from a low comparison due to the last year's downturns on the real estate market. Our group also recorded significant growth of 6% in the property and casualty competence field, which compromised the non-life insurance business with both corporate and private clients. In the life and health competence field, which covers old age provision and health insurance, we recorded stable revenue. As expected, revenue in the others competence field, which includes the real estate development business as well as other commissions and fees, suffered a significant decline. This can be attributed to the known market turbulences in the real estate business and our active reduction of the involving risks. The growing and continuing trust of our clients in our consulting services is also reflected in the key figures. These are extremely important for our future revenue development. It is therefore all the more pleasing that we have been able to raise these key figures to new peaks. The assets under management in the MLP Group were EUR 59.3 billion as of the 31st of March. As such, we have long reached the point where we are on par with renowned private banks in terms of this value. In terms of the managed premium volume in non-life insurance, we've also succeeded in significantly increasing this figure to EUR 719 million in the first three months. This is roughly comparable to a medium-sized non-life insurer in Germany. The consultants in the MLP Group were serving 581,200 family clients as of the 31st of March. The gross number of newly acquired family clients was 4,400. We also supported 27,700 corporate and institutional clients in the MLP Group. The number of consultants in the MLP Group was 2,069. This figure still includes a shifting effect due to the successful introduction of the trainee program in mid-2023, which we used to prepare the participants for their future role as MLP consultants. With this program, we are encouraging young talents to join us and take the opportunity to launch their career with the added security of an employment contract. This allows participants to prepare themselves in a highly targeted way for the subsequent role as consultants, including all the prospects that self-employment offers. A total of 159 trainees had already joined this program by the end of March 2024. The current income statement is presented on page nine. Our group was able to significantly increase EBIT to EUR 37 million in the first three months of 2024. Above all, this can be attributed to the strong revenue development observed in the wealth and property and casualty competence fields. The wealth competence field also benefited from the wealth management performance fees collected at FERI. The seasonally strong business performance in the industrial broker and DOMCURA segments, as well as the client consulting for non-life insurance and MLP, is reflected in the property and casualty competence field. The life and health competence field proved stable in the first quarter of 2024. However, earnings in the first three months were negatively impacted by real estate development, which we recorded in the others competence field. In light of the disruptions in the real estate markets, we have initiated measures very early on here. Our measures will become even more pronounced over the coming quarters. Overall, the first quarter of 2024 once again underlines the excellent earnings stability of the MLP Group while also highlighting comprehensive growth potential. If you now take a brief look at the right-hand section of the slide, you will see key figures that underpin our solid balance sheet. In comparison with the balance sheet date in 2023, shareholders' equity rose from EUR 532 million to EUR 557 million. The regulatory core capital ratio was 20.2% as of the 31st of March. The liquidity coverage ratio, LCR, which serves as a benchmark for the short-term liquidity situation in stress scenarios and as such is an indicator of resilience, is 1,890%. It is therefore well above the ratio of 100% only required by the supervisory authorities. We confirm our EBIT forecast for 2024 and still anticipate recording an EBIT in the range of EUR 75 million-EUR 85 million for the current financial year. We have based this forecast on the assumption of continued growth in the competence fields of wealth and life and health. The plan for the property and casualty competence field is to remain stable year-on-year. Risks continue to exist due to the development of individual markets, above all relating to a significant correction on the capital markets or a slower than anticipated recovery of the real estate markets. The Growth Opportunities Act, das Wachstumschancengesetz, recently passed by the German government, on the other hand, could have more of a supportive effect here. Among other things, the act provides incentivation for those looking to invest in new real estate assets as they now benefit from improved tax offsetting options. Starting from the forecast for 2024, we just confirmed. Please now allow me to move on to our planning that we reaffirmed again. An increase of EBIT to between EUR 100 million and EUR 110 million by the end of 2025. This is primarily based on three central strategic success factors: the further increase in assets under management in the group, the ongoing expansion of the non-life insurance portfolio volume, as well as sustainable growth in all parts of the MLP Group. In particular, we expect the brokerage of old age provision products to make an ever-increasing contribution to our earnings growth. More and more citizens are now realizing the importance of having supplementary old age provision in place. People are also becoming increasingly aware of the pressure on the statutory pension system, not least due to disputes in the coalition government regarding its pension package too. In addition, real estate brokerage remains important for our targeted increase in earnings by the end of 2025. Moreover, we anticipate an upturn of real estate development. In fact, property investment is often a prudent option when seeking to diversify large portfolios, particularly among MLP's high-end clientele. At the same time, the new reality in terms of the interest rate now seems to have been noticed and accepted by consumers. Acquisitions are not yet included in our planning for 2025. However, they remain part of the MLP Group strategy agenda. In addition to this, we are continuing our consistent cost management approach to further support positive EBIT development. Ladies and gentlemen, please now allow me to provide a summary. Firstly, the broad and interlinked positioning of our group gives us a strategic competitive advantage. Our approach of offering a high-quality financial consulting service combined with increasing digital support is really paying off. Secondly, thanks to a good start, we have already moved closer to our targeted figures for the financial year. And thirdly, our focus is on our planning for the end of 2025, which we have once again reaffirmed. Accordingly, our sights are still firmly set on recording EBIT of EUR 100 million-EUR 110 million. Thank you very much for your time and your interest. I'm now happy to take any questions. So ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question now, please press nine followed by the star key on your telephone keypad. If you wish to cancel your question, please press nine followed by the star key again. So please press nine star now to state your question. And we'll start with Henry Wendisch from NuWays. Yes. Hi. Good afternoon, Mr. Loose and Pascal. Thanks for the presentation and for the insights on the results. You might guess I have the same question I always ask at the start. What are the performances that you actually recorded in Q1 and how many capital inflows to the assets under management could you record as well? Then I have some follow-up questions. First one is other operating expenses. It actually was reduced by some 6.5%. Could you please give us some more color why this happened? I saw that last year in Q1, you had the HOPE seminar and a jubilee, which could have been a factor that so the comparable base was a bit higher. But if you have any more color on other operating expenses, why they dropped this year, this would be nice. Then third question on personal costs. The headcount increased by some 6% and also wage inflation by some 5.5% came in Q1. Is this a run rate for the year that you would expect to be fair regarding headcounts, so 6% year on the full year? Also, are there any more wage inflation or wage increases planned for the people employed at the MLP Group? Two more questions. You mentioned that you have 159 trainees at the end of Q1. How many of those do you think will become MLP consultants in the course of this year? Then the last question is the net liquidity figure that you used to publish as well in the presentation, and I couldn't find it now, also not in the report. If you have that number for us, it would be very much appreciated. Thank you very much. Hello, Mr. Wendisch. Thank you for your questions. Some expected, some not so much, but I'll try to answer all of them. And as always, we start with performance fees. We have reported in the first quarter performance fees of EUR 3.8 million. Yeah, this as number one. Then our asset under management development, we had in the first quarter net inflows of EUR 200 million and the positive performance effect of EUR 2.2 billion. Then your next question was concerning other operating expenses. What was the reason for the reduction? And you gave a hint, and I can confirm your hint. The main point I have on my mind at the moment is indeed last year, we had our, let's say, very big so-called HOPE seminar, the assembly of all MLP participants. And this was not affected in this year as long or not in this size, and therefore, we have reduction there in the other expenses. Then your next question was concerning headcount. There, I think two issues are perhaps worthwhile to mention. We see, like many other in the industry, a need for people in the, let's say, our service areas in the wider sense. And we have a quite significant number of vacancies there, and we try to fill these vacancies. And therefore, we could find some people in the beginning of the year. And that was one reason for the headcount increase, the main reason, and also one reason for the overall increase in staff costs. Another outlook, let's say, for the years, yes, we will also increase the wages for our employees during the course of the year. To be quite a little bit more precise, we'll publish this tomorrow. Therefore, allow me not to publish this now, but more or less the numbers for the first quarter, I think we can be forwarded also to the other quarters. One reason also for increase in the staff cost is the next question you asked, sorry, concerning the trainees. In mid-2023, as explained, we changed, and as you know, we changed to a system where we now do not hire our consultants directly as self-employed, but we give them the opportunity to start with a trainee contract, and after then four to six months, they can change to consultants, to self-employed consultants. And these trainees obviously also increase the staff costs in comparison to the first quarter of last year where they were not included. And then there was perhaps a little bit misleading, the number I said. I said up to end of March 2024, we had 159 trainees in our trainee program. That means that the majority of these trainees already have changed to consultants, and we now, at the end of the quarter, have 47 trainees already on board being part of the program. And we expect that, let's say, 85% of these trainees then, at the end of the four-to-six-month period, will change to get to change to the consultant status. And your final question was concerning net liquidity. At the end of the quarter, we have a little bit more than EUR 200 million net liquidity in our books. And I hope we've just answered your question, Mr. Wendisch. Yes. Perfect. Thank you very much, and have a good day. Thank you. You're welcome. So next up is Jochen Schmitt from Metzler. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. I have three questions, please. Firstly, on your revenue outlook for non-life insurance brokerage, why do you expect your revenues to remain only stable in 2024 because in Q1, you reported an increase by 6%? Second question, DOMCURA posted a substantial rise in personal expenses to EUR 7.4 million in Q1, and you mentioned a couple of reasons for that in the quarterly report. My question is, what should we assume for the current quarterly run rate of DOMCURA's staff expenses? And third and last question, do you expect the segmental EBIT of Deutschland.Immobilien to improve in the next quarters? And also in this context, you mentioned further realignment measures of the segment during your presentation, if I understood correctly. Does this mean that we should expect some restructuring cost to be booked in 2024? These are my questions. Thank you. Thank you for the questions, Mr. Schmitt. Good questions, difficult questions. First, a difficult question was concerning the outlook in the non-life segment, which was or is still stable, although we've seen a 6% rise in the first three months. Let's say the stable has some positive and some negative deviation, and I think we are, let's say, on the positive part of the stable sector here. Perhaps allow me to explain why we put non-life insurance revenues as stable for this year because I think this is important. The non-life insurance sector is, for us, one of our growth fields. And now you may ask or perhaps have already asked in the last year, why do we set this as stable for 2024? One reason is that we have, let's say, canceled some contracts which have a revenue impact but no profit impact. And this, let's say, negatively impacts our revenue in 2024. Our goal is now to perhaps increase even more. Part of this effect, we will see in the next, let's say, in the next quarters. Therefore, we are a little bit cautious there. Perhaps this effect could lead or will lead to a not as good result as the first quarter. That was the, let's say, long explanation for the reason why we still have our outlook for non-life insurance unstable. Number two, DOMCURA, and this obviously is an important part in what I just explained in the non-life sector. You found out or you commented that the staff costs were increasing. You will not see the same increase in the next three quarters. We had some, let's say, restructuring sounds a little bit heavy, but we had some, yeah, measures taken there which led to an increase in costs in the first quarter. But it's not planned to continue or to repeat these activities in the next quarters. Therefore, the increase in the whole year will be much lower than in the first three months. Your last question was concerning our segment, Deutschland.Immobilien, which started negatively. Also, just to explain here, we stopped the development of new projects beginning of last year with the crisis in the real estate sector. We plan to continue or to start new projects at the end of or the middle of 2024. Therefore, we expect we are not very let's say, I could imagine that we won't see a positive result in the segment in the whole year. But I also believe that the result of the first quarter, the negative result, will be higher, will be more negative or was more negative than what I expect for the next quarters. And I hope I could answer your questions. Yes. Thank you. Just one question left. So this does probably mean that we should not expect any restructuring cost in the segment, Deutschland.Immobilien, to be booked in the next quarters. Is that right? At the moment, I wouldn't expect restructuring costs. But you heard that also in the text, I explained that obviously, we are still cautious in the segment. There are some positive signs, but there is still a lot of instability in this overall segment. And therefore, we are definitely not as positive in this segment as in all the other segments. But from today's perspective, we won't see restructuring cost. Thank you very much. You're welcome. So next question comes from Philipp Hässler from Pareto Securities. Yes. Thank you. Good afternoon, Philipp Hässler from Pareto. I have three questions. Firstly, on net interest income, i.e., interest revenues, less expenses, were quite good again in Q1, up quarter-on-quarter. Maybe you could give us an outlook for the next quarters. Will you expect net interest income to decline in the next quarters? And maybe you could share your thoughts on what the impact of rate reduction by the ECB will be on your net interest income. Then on Q1 in general or on your guidance, I mean, you had a quite a good start, I would say, with EUR 37 million of EBIT. If I take last year's Q2 until Q4 EBIT, I think you would be already at the EUR 80 million if I adjust for the write-down. So how likely do you see more positive guidance with the publication of H1 results? And then more technical question. Your non-life insurance portfolio volume went up by EUR 32 million quarter-over-quarter. I noticed that always in Q1, at least during the last years, that always increases a little bit more than in the other quarters. So maybe is it just a coincidence, or is there a special reason for this pattern that always in Q1, this non-life insurance portfolio increases a little bit more than in the other quarters? Thank you. Hello, Mr. Hässler. Thank you for the questions. I'll start with the last one because that's the easiest one. There is indeed a seasonal effect in our non-life insurance sector. The majority of the contracts are renewed for the 1st of January. That means if you deal with customers during the course of the year, they might sign a contract in, let's say, August 2023 for starting in January 2024. That is the reason why, first of all, the overall revenue is the highest in the first quarter. And this is also the reason why the jump in our portfolio is the highest in the first quarter. This was question number one. Then we come to the interest, yeah, income and the outlook. We all together or, let's say, the majority expects a rate reduction of the ECB in June. And in our balance sheet at the moment, we definitely benefit from the existing ECB rates with our extremely high liquidity which we have in the ECB where we receive a 4% interest rate, definitely. And we have EUR 1 billion at the moment at the ECB. We will see effect if this rate goes down. For our customers at the moment, we pay for one-year contract which we have with our customers. We pay at the moment 3% for the daily accounts. For Tagesgeld, we pay 1.5%. For the current account, the Girokonten, we do not pay any interest rate. There, you can see that definitely, we are more flexible or, let's say, we are less flexible towards our customer than the ECB will be towards us. Taking this all together, we expect during the year a reduction in our interest rate results. We expect that the first quarter was, concerning interest rate results, the best of the year. This is one reason, not the only one. This is one reason why we do not answer your second question, which was the question why we do not or why we are not a little bit more positive concerning our outlook. We see definitely on the interest rate some question marks which could also reflect and that's not the only reason, but one reason which could also reflect in the capital markets. With our positively high income which results from the asset under management, if we have due to the capital markets, if we might see a reduction there, this could also have a negative impact. Finally, the real estate market, as I also explained to Mr. Schmitt, we see some, let's say, question mark in the real estate market less than one year before, but we still have some question mark. That's the reason why we still are there, let's say, a little cautious perhaps. But we do not change our guidance for 2024 at the moment. But taking this positive again and now forget that the CFO is speaking, but taking it a little bit more positive, definitely, this extremely good start in 2024 helps us to have, let's say, a good position for the next quarters. Okay. Understood. Thank you. You're welcome. So there are no more questions at the moment. If you have any additional questions, please press nine followed by the star key now, and we'll wait a few seconds. Okay. So there are no further questions. I would like to thank you for taking part in our conference call. And of course, you can reach us if any further questions arrive later. Please allow me the following indication. Today, we will also publish the invitation to our annual general meeting. And you can find all the details regarding our AGM on our website later in the afternoon. Having said this, I wish you a good afternoon. Thank you, and goodbye. Thank you, bye.