Good morning, and welcome to the Aberdeen Q3 trading update. I'll now hand over to Chief Executive Officer, Jason Windsor. Please go ahead. Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thank you very much for joining our Q3 call this morning. I'm actually delighted to speak to you today, as it's my first time as your new CEO. And I'm pleased that I'm joined in the room today by our interim CFO, Ian Jenkins. I'm going to give you a quick walk through of the key points, and then, as usual, we'll open up to Q&A. So let me start with the key highlights. Assets under management and administration is up 2% year-to-date to GBP 507 billion, and this principally reflects positive market movements and net inflows in Interactive Investor. It's worth noting that Interactive Investor continues to deliver strong organic growth, with customer numbers up 6% year-to-date to 430,000. Trends in investments remain similar to the half year, with outflows in equities and insurance, but we did have a strong quarter in real assets. However, in Adviser, we had GBP 1 billion of outflows in the quarter, and we're taking action with urgency to address this. In terms of outlook, today, we are confirming we're making good progress in our transformation program and that we're on track to meet our cost-saving commitment. So putting this all together, there is clearly more work to be done, but with strong foundations to build upon, we can create a lot more value for this company. Now, just let me take each of the businesses in turn, starting with investments. Excluding the sale of the private equity business, AUM is up 2% year-to-date to GBP 368 billion, with positive market movements more than offsetting the net outflows of GBP 4.5 billion. This compares to net outflows of GBP 13.5 billion in the same period last year. And unpicking these results in the quarter, which will be somewhat volatile as institutional businesses are, institutional and retail wealth had net outflows of GBP 2.4 billion, primarily driven by equities, which reflects the continued challenging risk-off sentiment, particularly toward China and emerging markets. And after a strong first half, fixed income had outflows of GBP 0.8 billion in the quarter, largely reflecting a significant redemption from one client. Net inflows in fixed income are still positive year-to-date at GBP 0.4 billion. Given our positioning, strong performance, and the unfunded pipeline, we remain confident in the outlook for our fixed income business. Other areas of inflow included GBP 0.3 billion in liquidity, GBP 0.4 billion in quant, and pleasingly, GBP 1 billion in real assets, where our business remains well-positioned. This included the extension of our real estate capabilities in the Japanese market with a new GBP 0.6 billion mandate. Insurance had net outflows in the quarter of GBP 1.1 billion, with AUM flat since the half year and up 2% year-to-date. Gross inflows in the quarter were GBP 3.3 billion, with outflows primarily reflecting the heritage business in run-off. I'll now turn to Adviser. AUM at the end of September was GBP 75 billion, unchanged since the half year, with positive markets offset by outflows of GBP 1 billion. Simply put, we have work to do. At the half year, I outlined actions that were needed: a strategic reprice, focus on the timely delivery of the in-flight projects, and consistently providing excellent service, which, after all, is our reason to be in this business. So we're redoubling our efforts in this regard with urgency and laser-like focus, adding resource with the aim of delivering a better experience for all of our IFAs and their clients. I also mentioned our plan to strengthen Adviser's leadership team significantly. I can now confirm we've made three senior hires: a new Chief Distribution Officer, a new Chief Technology and Product Officer, and a new CFO. I'm very pleased we've been able to attract top talent to the group. The full benefit of these actions will take some time, but our priority remains to return the Adviser business to net inflows as soon as possible. Finally, back to Interactive Investor. As I mentioned, it's been another strong quarter, with customer numbers now up 6% year-to-date to 430,000. We attracted GBP 1.2 billion of net inflows in the quarter, bringing year-to-date net flows to GBP 4.3 billion. To put this in context, that is 48% higher than the whole twelve months of 2023. SIPP customers, which is a strategic focus area for us, we're now at seventy... just over 76,000, up 5% in the quarter and 22% year-to-date. In addition to net inflows, AUMA in ii also benefited from positive market movements and was up 2% in the quarter to GBP 74.5 billion, which is 13% higher than the end of 2023. Building on this very encouraging performance, we have significant further growth plans for ii in 2025 and beyond. For example, including the launch of ii Community, which went live yesterday. At the group level, we continue to make good progress with our transformation program. As I've said previously, rightsizing our cost base is essential to move the group toward a more acceptable level of profitability. Transformation is about cost savings to improve profitability, but it also allows us to invest more in our people, technology, processes, and controls, all so we can deliver better outcomes for our clients. We're on track to deliver approximately GBP 60 million of cost saves in the 2024 year of account, and at least GBP 150 million of annualized savings by the end of 2025. Given this, we continue to expect group costs for the year to be below GBP 1,075 million. To conclude, our overall performance this quarter is not where it needs to be and underlines the need to move quickly to deliver on the priorities I set out at the half year. While there remains much to do, I'm confident we have great talent and can make further progress toward a profitable and sustainable long-term growth business, benefiting shareholders, clients, and colleagues. With that, Ian and I are happy to take your questions. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star, then one on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star then two. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. The first question comes from the line of Enrico Bolzoni with JPMorgan. Please go ahead. Morning. Thanks for the update. Just two questions from me, please. So one, in Adviser, can you just give us some color in terms of what the feedback from the IFA has been? In other words, what is driving this high level of redemptions? Is it specific feature of the on the platform that are not up to the standard, or is just pricing from competitors? Just looking to have some additional color on how to fix this. And then second question on the interest margin. Can you please give us an update in terms of what we should expect in outer years, so beyond 2024, as rates keep declining? Thank you. Okay. Morning, Enrico. Thank you for that. I think in Adviser, there are multiple things. I would say price, which we announced the reprice, is really about growth in new rather than losing existing. You know, price is important, but it's not the pivotal factor in why people choose platforms. They choose platforms for service and for functionality, and it's on service that we can do better. And it's hard to say it's one specific thing, but what IFAs want is their orders to be processed within a reasonable timeframe. And I think so little things, you know, make a big difference in it. Normally, it's when the order's not quite filled in at every last data field. We need to chase that down faster. We need to get things processed quicker. We need to get the queues knocked over, you know, before people go home in the evening. Not literally, but you get the point. So we've added some extra resource, both to make sure that, you know, when the orders come in, when they're processed, you know, we can execute them faster, and then when we have got the people that are need to help and then support the transfers, which it's generally transfers or money out, that we can do it faster. And that's a work in progress. We've added people, we've added resource, and we are laser-like focused on doing a better job. On margins- No major change. No, no major change. We get this one quite often. I think we've given, you know, guidance in it that predates me of around 2% sort of margin, which is kind of in normalized times, pretty comfortable with that. It will bounce around, obviously, depending on rates. We're above that this year. We'll probably remain above that as we go into next year. You know, but the split between, well, how much we pay to customers is partly driven by, you know, the competitive environment, partly driven by the proposition, and partly driven, you know, by how well we're doing at investing the assets on the other side. Mr. Bolzoni, are you done with your question? I am. Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Hubert Lam with Bank of America. Please go ahead. Hi, guys. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I got three of them. Firstly, in equities, any change in sentiment recently for EM and Asian funds after the market stimulus in China? Just wondering, or is it maybe too early for this? Second question is on fee margin. Given you had still sizable outflows in equities, which are higher margin in the quarter, how should we think about fee margin in the second half? Last question is on investment performance. If you can give us an update in terms of how both equities and fixed income have done so far this year, this quarter on a one to three-year basis, because the half year equities were still pretty much underwater, both one year, three year. Just wondering if there's any improvement in that, and whether or not fixed income has still remained, strong? Thank you. Sure. Let me deal with equities and performance, and then comment on the margin, if I may, so like, no fundamental change to sentiment. Clearly, some of the macro things that are going on in China and elsewhere, you know, do remain important. We're not seeing major change to sentiment towards China and Asia, but what we are seeing is slightly more interest, in fact, considerable more interest in more narrow offers, so I would point to products like GEM ex-China, single country strategies like India, or GEM Income strategies, in fact, which, you know, they're not as big for us. Of course, they're not as the major banner, GEM and Asia- Pac strategies, but they're not insignificant either. You know, we are changing the shop front to be more relevant to what people are buying. That's a work in progress, but there's clearly, we're seeing sales in those areas, but no major change to sentiment elsewhere, just to be clear on that. The investment performance, I think fixed income has got stronger. Actually, the one-year performance is better and sort of consistent. Because the three-year track record is pretty good. It's ticked up slightly. Equities, actually, the one-year performance is better, which I'm looking at primarily. It's up from 23%-30% of funds outperforming. It's still not where we'd hope it can get to, but you know, across the board, actually, fund management, you know, is that sort of level. So the team's got my full support, you know, in what they're doing through Peter and Devan, and, you know, they're making, I think, the right steps. It will take a little bit of time for that to come through, particularly in the three-year number. Because everyone knows, 2022 was a very tough year for us. On fee margins, I mean, our guidance remains the same as it did at the half year. I think for the first half, we had 22 basis points, and on the second half we will be below 22, and that's where we stand at the moment. Okay, thank you. The next question comes from the line of David McCann with Deutsche Numis. Please go ahead. Yeah, morning, everyone. Three questions from me. The first one may have already been partly addressed, but can you just touch on the Adviser platform? Back to the very first question. So are these problems that, I guess, you're having are still fundamentally linked to the replatform thing that you did last year, or is there something else that's emerged since then that led to this? Because obviously, we have seen most of your peers seeing improving flows here. So it does appear to be something internal. So that's the first question. Appreciate you were going to give us an update on the DB pension surplus in February with the results. But maybe you could just remind us, what are the options that are on the table that you're actively considering in terms of that, just so we have a sense of that. And then finally, you know, Jason, now you are a full-time CEO, as you mentioned at the start of the call. You know, when you were asked about this as interim CEO at the results, you did refer to three core businesses at Aberdeen. Is that still your view now you are, yeah, CEO full-time? Thank you. Hi. Morning, David. Thanks for, thanks for that. Absolutely, in terms of, you know, strategy, we're totally committed, you know, to improving the performance of the three businesses. That is, obviously Adviser, Investments and Interactive Investor. They are at very different stages of their development. I'll come on to Adviser again in a moment, but the growth in Interactive Investor, frankly, is for the taking, and we are taking it. The cost efficiency and the transformation going through investments and change of the product mix is there. Plans, you know, are there. There'll be, you know, sharper and better and more plans to continue to do that, and in Adviser, we remain very supportive of it. If I sort of segue from the strategy question into the performance question, I think it's hard to say it's one thing. I think the platform upgrade, you know, which was whatever it was, eighteen months ago or so, clearly did knock us off course. Getting back on course has been harder than we thought. I don't think you can say there is any functionality or any software issues. I mean, there aren't. But to take people's view of, you know, where we are, just takes some time to shift it back, you know, to being that level of service and delivery that we aspire to be, and we've got to get better. In the last two years since we started that project, frankly, the market's moved, the market's got better. Aberdeen needs to get better, and we need to do better. So you know, the plans that Noel and his team have put in place are to achieve, you know, a much better service proposition for our advisors. And I mentioned a few minutes ago, you know, getting better on queues, getting better on orders, getting better on delivery, you know, to IFAs are some of the basics, and in a way that delights them, not just meets an SLA, but actually, they think that was a good experience, is what we're focused on doing. The DB surplus, well, look, nothing's off the table. So we could just leave it, we could look at a run-off, potentially some extraction, or we could look at a buyout. Clearly, we'd partner with the trustees, who are the ultimate decision-makers here, in it to do that. Surplus remains very well funded. The fund remains very well funded with a significant surplus, so I know there is, you know, a block of capital in that could potentially be released, either in the shorter term or over time, and we'll take steps to make sure that, you know, we make the right decision for members and for the PLC. I will try and give you an update. What I was trying to say in the release, just to be clear- Right. No update today. If we can get the work done, and it's out, it's a bit out of my hands 'cause it sits with- Your end. -with authorities that, you know, frankly, don't march to our orders. But we'll try and, you know, give an update as soon as possible. I'd expect that by the year-end results. Great. Thank you very much. The next question comes from the line of Ruth Hamilton with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Hi, morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Just one, on the. I think I heard right, you're saying, you know, costs should be below a GBP 1.75 billion, because it also sounded as though the, you know, the need to reinvest in advisory- Yeah To sort out the problems was probably proving a bit more significant than some of the highest, you know, senior hires, I suspect, would be working the other direction. So just to check on that and so I didn't miss anything. And then secondly, just looking at the business, I mean, what are the synergies you're currently driving from having the three divisions side by side? And what can you do further to improve that? 'Cause it's not entirely obvious from the outside. I can see those three businesses working as silos with their own sort of growth opportunities. But what's the benefit from having the three combined in the group? Thanks. Okay. Well, on the cost point, we're taking out a material amount of cost, GBP 150 million. The sort of numbers we're talking about to get Adviser back up are kind of in the single, small single digits. 80% of those costs are really coming out of the Investments business, not the Adviser or ii. Yeah. So, and we're not flagging any cost issue, just to be clear. We're reallocating some resource to focus on service. We might take away a little bit from change, but service, service, service. You know, that is the clear message on that, but it's, you know, that business will and is very profitable. So it's really about delivery of a better product and a better experience for IFAs. On the group, we're all in the investment business, all three. You know, we share content, we share leadership, we share, you know, a number of systems. We have, you know, one regulator, one capital base. So we do operate as a family of businesses doing similar things. On the revenue side, you know, there are some. I'm not gonna overstate this, to be clear, but there are some benefits, you know, where we have managed products that Interactive Investor sell. For example, the managed ISA product I talked about at the half year, which will be followed by a managed SIPP product, designed by Aberdeen, with some Aberdeen componentry within that. That's a good proof point. On the Adviser side, we again, you know, we do have managed products, you know, that we actually offer to IFAs. Frankly, we're well below where I'd like us to be in there, so there's definite upside potential in the MPS world, through Adviser. There's also some data assets. You know, we do get from Interactive Investor, you know, significant market insight and intelligence as to what customers want, and that allows us to tailor our products. Obviously, in an anonymized basis, but we see huge flows. We were number one, I think we probably still are at Q3, number one in U.K. D2C, and that's a phenomenal position to have, and you get real insight into what's going on in the market, and we can use that. So, that's where we are. You know, they're the businesses that we've got, and the absolute focus is in improving all three of them. Got it. Very helpful. Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Nicholas Herman with Citi. Please go ahead. Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Just two for me, please. Just one follow-up on equities. I heard you say before, you're seeing a slight pickup in performance. So just to circle back on this, I mean, how much of the weak flows in equities in Q2 was just, do you think, due to AM, Asia and EM just not being in favor of the month versus, let's say, the impact of relatively weak performance that we've been talking about for the past couple of years? I'd just be- Yeah ... kind of interested to kind of hear how you disaggregate those two. And then one on real assets. Pleasing to see some good inflows there. I guess, just, are you seeing any change in demand or for real estate or infrastructure at the margin, as we move into this next phase of the cycle? And I guess, as part of that, do you have any other funds beyond the European Concession Infrastructure Fund coming to market? And I think you've mentioned, you think you are well positioned here, generally, in real assets. Where in particular do you see yourself as well positioned, I guess, apart from, let's say, Tritax? Thanks. Yeah. All right. Well, thanks, Nicholas. I think given the performance that we've had, and the clients that we're gonna leave, because of performance, frankly, made that decision some time ago. You know, those that are with us, you know, buy into what we do, our process, our style, our team. So it's largely, you know, allocation issues that are affecting it. You know, clearly, some would like better performance, of course, so would we. As I said, performance, we've seen a slight uptick. I'm not gonna overstate this and, you know, it's hard to sort of talk about a business with, you know, numerous strategies in holistically. So we've had really good performance in certain strategies, and I don't wanna walk past that. Smaller companies, GEM Income, India, just to rattle three off that come immediately to mind. The challenges tend to be in our bigger products, so hence, we've seen that in the numbers. So that is a work in progress. We are on it, and we're focused on that, as you would imagine. Yes, we were pleased with the real estate growth. I think, you know, whilst we've had the... Don't be penciling in that sort of level of growth every quarter. Having said that, you know, it is going well. We do expect, you know, to continue to see that through 2025, as you know, people get used to higher rates and rates have peaked and have probably turned across any number of different markets. I think we've seen, we'll still see some probable outflow from the more developed U.K. real estate world, but offset by interest, you know, across Europe and out of Japan, which has been, you know, particularly interesting. It's quite exciting for us to be able to see that mandate, and I think you could see, further growth, from that. On the infrastructure side, well, frankly, we've had a number of wins. We would like to be bigger. You know, we've got a strong business on the concession side. I think, you know, giving, frankly, more fuel to that business is one of my challenges and one of the opportunities for us, you know, to try and grow that further. So, it's certainly, again, it's a work in progress on the upside there. There's certainly more to do, but clearly a pleasing win and some pleasing progress in Q3. Yes, sir. Thanks very much. The next question comes from the line of Gregory Simpson with BNP Paribas Exane. Please go ahead. Hi. Yeah, good morning. So three questions. First is, can I ask if there is action taken on the pension scheme surplus, what would be the potential intended usage of any capital unlocked? Would you be thinking buybacks, M&A, supporting dividends? Second question is, can you give any color on client trading activity? This quarter in ii, it was strong in H1 with 20,000 trades a day, I think. Has this persisted or has sentiment pulled back with the budget uncertainty, for example? And then thirdly, I think there was an article last month that you were cutting China from your emerging markets fund. Can you just remind us if China is, in general, an overweight or underweight position across your equity investments business? Thank you. Okay. Well, I'll deal with the use of capital question first. So I think. Look, frankly, we don't know yet, so it's a bit hypothetical, you know, as to whether there would be a significant release of capital or not, you know, from the pension scheme. So we could have run-offs, we could have buyouts, we could have any number of things. I think what I said at the full year results was, we would use it to repay debt, and I think we probably still would look at that. I think the debt is slightly. We've got a lot of cash, we've got quite a lot of debt for an asset management business. It's still. We still have legacy debt from an insurance company. I think we've got gross debt of about GBP 800 million. We can't use all of that in our regulatory capital, never mind, you know, make it a sensible balance sheet. I think, you know, don't be penciling in buybacks for sure. And M&A is not high on my list of priorities. You know, we might be doing sort of closed-end fund type activity, a bit like Tekla, but there's no real M&A appetite for us at present. So that would be that. But again, it's all a bit hypothetical across the piece. On the EM, well, I'm not quite sure I know the answer from our weightings of our GEM products. I could find that out and let you know. What we have got is products like GEM ex-China. We've got single strats, you know, across the piece. So there's a shop front change to products that people are trying to sell, you know, in either to Asia directly or from international Asian product outside, which is going much better than the more traditional Asia-Pac type, China-dominated funds. But that's a slightly different point, I think, around, you know, product desire. But the appetite for China, particularly from the U.S., remains low, you know, and that probably won't change, and obviously, the election is, you know, could lead to some change. It could not. So we'll see how that plays out. Ii trading, I haven't got the exact number to give you. It's a bit quieter. Q3, it being July and August, as you would expect, are two quieter months. It does remain at a relatively healthy level. We can follow up with you with a bit more precise figures on it through September. Really helpful. Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Steven Haywood with HSBC. Please go ahead. Good morning. Thank you very much. One question on ii and one on Adviser. On ii, I wonder if you could tell us how many new customers you added in the third quarter. And previously, you have highlighted the number of customers you have in the sort of run-off books that were acquired, and you expect to run off. Would you be able to provide that again as well? And then on Adviser, obviously, you've got some upcoming impacts on your revenues from the fee changes. Could you sort of quantify the impact on your revenues from the fee changes? And I believe you have the SIPP coming from Phoenix as well. And could you quantify this on your expenses as well, going forward? Thank you. Okay, so the fee changes in Adviser, you know, will play through, you know, some of that we're seeing already. The expectation on the impact to margin was two to three basis points, I think, you know, as we earn through all of that. So by the end of 2025, we'd expect to see that played through. So we've repriced new business. The back book implementation will be in Q1, and we haven't quite pinned it, whether it be January or March, but that will be through Q1. It is slightly tiered, so but it's in that range. The SIPP thing from Phoenix is done. I don't think we probably communicated that particularly well, you know, eighteen months ago, before my time. That was just a change to the way things were going. That is in the numbers. That is not a one-off. That is what we expect to see that through 2024. So the second half of 2023 and all of 2024, that is in cost and revenue, and that's not a big change, you know, to what we are seeing there. And then, new customers in the quarter were nine thousand net. But we're not presenting the run-off thing here, and partly because a lot of it's happened, and it's not a significant factor as the past. So we've gone from four to eight. Precisely, I said just over four hundred and thirty thousand, to give you the exact number, four hundred and thirty-seven thousand, up from four to eight. That's 9,000 new customers in the quarter. Okay, thanks very much. The next question comes from the line of Michael Werner with UBS. Please go ahead. Thank you very much. Two questions from me, please. First, as we started to see, rate cuts coming through, some other asset managers are indicating greater interest in the EM space and the Asia space. Is that something you expect to see in the coming months and/or quarters? That's my first question. And then, second, within the Interactive Investor, can you, you know, share whether you've seen any unusual flow trends in the quarter or even into October in anticipation of the October thirtieth budget and the uncertainty that that's creating? Thank you. Okay. So look, I think we're as hopeful that, you know, the stabilized rate environment and political environment will lead to growth in EM. I'm not sort of forecasting that or ready to go on the record as saying that, but, you know, conceptually, why not? It ought to be right, both for debt and for equity, frankly, around some of the credit products. But I'm not giving a forecast on that. The trading flows... Look, some people are preemptive of, you know, budgets, speculation. Not all by a long way, and it's clearly there are no proposals out there, you know. But we have seen a little bit of an uptick in ii. I would say we've seen a little bit of an uptick in Adviser, people taking out tax-free cash, particularly in the last few weeks. Who knows what the rules will be from next month? But that's probably the one thing I would find. It's not huge. I would have mentioned it in the prepared remarks if it was, but it is there, and it is what's going on in some people's minds. Thank you. Again, if you have a question, please press star then one. The next question comes from the line of Charles Bendit with Redburn Atlantic. Please go ahead. Thanks very much. Yeah, just wondering whether ii has evolved its thinking in any way around retained interest since the start of the year? Wondering whether there's been communication from the regulator or whether that's just gone quiet? And perhaps you could just comment in general terms about your approach to deposit repricing as the Bank of England cuts rates this year and next. Thanks. Sure. There's no new news from the regulator, and I'm not sure they're planning any new news, frankly. They've told everybody, you know, the high standards they expect us all to adhere to, and we've, you know, committed to do that. I think we're comfortable with what we do. I've said this a couple of times on ii. You know, if you look holistically at the overall ii value proposition to customers, it's extremely strong. You know, I think, and the business model and then the way that we're set up, you know, is very customer-oriented, both in terms of service pricing across the piece. The retained, there's been no significant change to the way that we deal with retained interest. And when the base rates move, you know, we pass that through pretty much to customers, as it moves. But we have no commitment, you know, to sort of maintain a margin or otherwise. You know, we make a commercial decision, you know, when these things come to pass. Mr. Bendit, are you done with your questions? Thank you. Yes, done. This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Jason for any closing remarks. Great. Well, look, thank you all very much for joining. Any follow-ups, and then please let us know. I'm pleased that we're out here with the Q3 updates. First time that we've done it. We'll continue to produce it and it for you, and we look forward to the continuing dialogue. Thank you all very much.