Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange Q1 2024 Results Conference Call. All participants are at present in listen-only mode. Following management's formal presentation, instructions will be given for the question and answer session. For operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded May 22, 2024. The recording will be publicly available on TASE's website. With us online today are Mr. Ittai Ben-Zeev, CEO, and Mr. Yehuda Ben-Ezra, CFO. Before I turn the call over to Mr. Ittai Ben-Zeev, I would like to remind everyone that this conference is not a substitute for reviewing the company's annual financial statements, quarterly financial statements, and interim report for the first quarter of 2024, in which full and precise information is presented and may contain, inter alia, forward-looking statements in accordance to Section 32A to Securities Law, 1968. In addition to IFRS reporting, we might mention certain financial measures that do not conform to generally accepted accounting principles. Such non-GAAP measures are not intended in any manner to serve as substitute to our financial results. However, we believe that they provide additional insight for better understanding of our business performance. Reconciliations between these non-GAAP measures and the most comparable related GAAP measures are included in tables that can be found in our earnings press release and in the slide presentation accompanying this call. Both can be accessed on the English Maya site and in the investor relations portion of our website at ir.tase.co.il/en. Mr. Ben-Zeev, would you like to begin? Good evening, Israel Time, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I'm happy to host you in our earnings call. Overall, TASE is reporting strong results for Q1 2024, and quarterly revenues hit an all-time high of ILS 108.3 million, up 8% from the same quarter last year. Our Adjusted EBITDA also reached a record of ILS 48.6 million, a 12% increase from the same quarter last year, with EBITDA margin reaching a record 45%. Our quarterly results demonstrate the resilience of our business. Despite the headwinds from the ongoing war, we achieved record quarterly results, driven in part by the continued organic growth of all TASE core operations. Yehuda Ben-Ezra, our CFO, will discuss the financial statements in detail later in this call. Despite the country still being in the midst of the war, the market showed resilience in Q1 2024, and the TA-35 and the TA-90 indices posted a positive return of 8% and 11%, respectively, compared to an increase of 6% and 10% in the Dow Jones and S&P 500 indices in the U.S.. As a result of the rise in the TASE indices, the total equities market cap at the end of the quarter was ILS 1,155 billion, 9% higher than the market cap at the end of 2023. Compared to 2023, Q1 2024 trading volumes in the main trading channels increased significantly. Trading volumes in equities were about 7% higher than the average daily trading volumes for all of 2023, an average ILS 2.1 billion a day, despite the high volatility and high volumes that characterized trading in 2023, stemming from the unprecedented events that took place last year. Heightened activity was recorded in every type of bond traded on the bonds market. The daily trading volume in government bonds averaged ILS 3.4 billion, 18% more than in 2023, with shekel bonds recording the greatest increase. The average daily volume in corporate bonds reached ILS 1.2 billion, a 14% increase compared to 2023. In this context, I would like to mention that at the beginning of January this year, we reduced the minimum order size for CoCo Bonds from ILS 50,000 to ILS 10,000, a move that has increased the average daily trading volumes by 270% to ILS 32 million in Q1 2024, compared to ILS 12 million in Q1 2023. We also saw high trading volumes in Israeli government T-bills that average ILS 1.9 billion a day, which is 38% higher than the average daily trading volume in 2023. In Q1 2024, two new companies completed an IPO on TASE, compared to just one IPO in all of 2023. Equity offering raised ILS 2.5 billion, similar to the amount raised in Q1 2023, but more than twice that raised in Q4 2023. Corporate debt issuance raised ILS 21.8 billion, similar to the amount raised in Q1 2023, but slightly less than the ILS 25.4 billion raised in Q4 2023. In light of the ongoing October 7 war and the increase in the cumulative deficit, the Ministry of Finance continued to raise debt in Q1 2024, and issued bonds totaling ILS 51.9 billion on TASE, compared to ILS 36 billion in Q4 2023. In addition, the Ministry of Finance raised a record ILS 28.7 billion at the beginning of March in an overseas issuance, compared to ILS 23 billion in Q4 2023. It's worth noting that this issuance attracted record demand, the highest in the history of the State of Israel, five times the amount issued, and with the participation of about 400 different investors from 36 countries around the world. The total amount of debt raised by the Ministry of Finance in Israel and abroad in bond offerings totaled ILS 80.6 billion in Q1 2024, compared with ILS 59 billion raised in the previous quarter. The sharp increase in these issuances, mainly on TASE, contributed to the significant growth in trading volumes that I mentioned earlier. We continue to implement our strategic plan of strengthening international participation in our market. I would like to report that about a week ago, we published for the first time, in cooperation with the Israel Securities Authority and the Bank of Israel, a call for public comments in relation to the transition to trading on Fridays, as is customary throughout the world. We believe that aligning our trading days with the rest of the world will help increase accessibility for international investors. We continue working to introduce new traders to the Israeli capital market and to encourage foreign brokers to become members of TASE. In this context, I would like to mention that at the beginning of April, the international trading group, Jump Trading, began operating on TASE. Jump Trading is one of Europe's leading algorithmic trading operators and serves as a market maker and a liquidity provider on the world's largest stock exchanges. We are also seeing an increase in the value of the public holding in foreign funds traded on TASE, which at the end of Q1 2024, stood at ILS 8.8 billion, ILS 2.3 billion higher than the value at the end of 2023. I would like now to bring you up to date with TASE equity movements in Q1 2024. As you recall, following the signing of a deal last December for the sale of the bank's legacy Arrangement Shares, we distributed a special dividend of ILS 231 million. Subsequent to the sale of the shares to local and foreign investors in January, we received ILS 242 million. This sum went straight into TASE equity in January and is earmarked for developing investment in TASE IT infrastructure. Deducting the dividend paid out from the payment we received from the sale of the shares, left us with ILS 11 million, which was added to TASE equity. On top of this, we distributed an additional dividend of ILS 42 million during March, representing 50% of TASE 2023 profits, and we adopted the dividend policy for 2024-2026, which will be to distribute 50% of the annual profit, as declared in the annual report. Finally, I'm pleased to inform you that at the end of March, we signed an agreement with the TASE employee union for the next five years till the end of 2028, which regulates the terms of the employment. It is our belief that the estimated average increase in the overall annual cost of the company's payroll expenses will not have a material impact on TASE results over the course of the agreement's term. In conclusion, the Q1 financial statements show that even during this challenging wartime period in Israel, the stability and resilience of TASE as a critical component in the Israeli economy is clearly evident. We will move forward on the path of further growth for TASE, while achieving the goals we have set for ourselves in accordance with our strategic plan for the coming years. Now, I would like to hand over to Mr. Yehuda Ben-Ezra, who will continue with a more detailed review of the Q1 financial results. Thank you, Ittai. As Ittai mentioned earlier, despite the complex situation in Israel, TASE has again posted strong financial results for Q1 2024. Some of the main financial metrics are shown in slide four. Our revenue for the quarter hit a new record, totaling ILS 108.3 million. Our adjusted EBITDA at ILS 48.6 million, also set a new record, while our adjusted EBITDA margin, reaching a record of 44.8%. I will continue with slide six, which shows some of the key highlights from our results for the first quarter. Our revenues totaled ILS 108.3 million, compared to ILS 100 million in the corresponding quarter last year, an increase of 8.3%, which was evident across all operations. Our revenues from non-transactional services increased to 60% from the total revenue, an increase of 2%. Adjusted expenses totaled ILS 73.2 million, compared to ILS 69.4 million in the corresponding quarter last year, an increase of 6%. The increase in expenses is due mainly to employee benefit expenses, computer and communication expenses, and marketing expenses. Adjusted EBITDA totaled ILS 48.6 million, compared to ILS 43.5 million in the corresponding quarter last year, an increase of 12%. The increase is due to a higher revenues. Financial income in Q1 2024 totaled ILS 1.4 million, compared to financing income of ILS 2.5 million in the corresponding quarter last year. The decrease is due to financing expenses on a loan obtained at the end of 2023. Adjusted net profit amounted to ILS 27.8 million, compared to ILS 26.1 million in the corresponding quarter last year, an increase of 12%. Now, let's go to slide number seven, where we can take a deeper look into the composition of our revenue in Q1 2024. Revenue from trading and clearing commissions increased by 2% compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 43 million. The increase is mainly due to an increase in the volume of mutual fund units and to an increase in the trading volume of T-bills, which were offset by a lower number of trading days in the quarter and a reduction in the effective commission rate. Revenue from listing fees and annual levies increased by 6% compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 21.6 million. 4% of the increase arose from annual levies, while an additional 2% is from higher revenues from listing fees. Revenues from clearing house services increased by 5% compared to the corresponding quarter last year, totaling ILS 20 million. The rise is primarily driven by higher revenue from custodian fees as a result of an increase in the value of assets held in the custodianship. Revenues from data distribution and connectivity services increased by 32% compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 22.6 million. 22% of the increase was due to updating the index usage price list, by a further 7% of the increase resulted from higher revenue from data distribution to business and private customers, and additional 3% of the increase is from higher revenues from connectivity services. I would like now to discuss our Q1 2024 expenses, so please turn to slide nine. Employee benefit expenses increased by 2% compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 39 million. The increase in these expenses resulted mainly from an increase in variable compensation and the non-utilization of vacation days. Computer and communication expenses increased by 20%, and totaled ILS 10.8 million. The increase resulted mainly from an increase in the maintenance cost of new computer system. Marketing expenses increased by ILS 500,000 compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 1.3 million. Most of the increase stems from the launch campaign in Q1 2024. Depreciation and amortization expenses increased by 5% compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 13.5 million. The increase is due mainly to the upgrading of infrastructure and the launch of new products. Financing incomes totaled ILS 1.14 million compared to financing income of ILS 2.5 million in the corresponding quarter last year. Although other financing income for Q1 2024 increased due to the interest income on the deposit, there was an increase in our financing expenses as a result of loan obtained at the end of 2023. Taken together, this resulted in a reduction of the net financing income. Now, I would like to review our financial position highlights at the end of Q1 2024, as shown in slide number 10. Our equity totaled ILS 630.7 million, and comprises 70% of the balance sheet, excluding open derivatives position balance from our clearinghouse activity, and the total deferred income from listing fees. We hold ILS 483 million in cash and investment financial assets. The balance of the bank loan totaled ILS 137.3 million. The surplus equity over regulatory requirement at the end of Q1, 2024, totaled ILS 545 million, compared to ILS 318 million at the end of 2023. The increase in the surplus equity is due to the two hundred and forty-two million shekels in proceeds from the sale of the Arrangement shares. The consideration received by TASE was carried directly to equity, and will be used for investment in TASE technological infrastructure. The surplus liquidity over regulatory requirements at the end of Q1, 2024, totaled ILS 130 million, compared to ILS 145 million at the end of 2023. The board of directors also approved the safety cushion, which serves as an additional layer of protection for handling stress scenarios, and its use is at the discretion of the board of directors. Now, we'd like to go to slide number 11 to review our cash flow in Q1 2024. TASE's free cash flow increased by ILS 4.3 million compared to the corresponding quarter last year, and totaled ILS 39.1 million. The increase is mainly from investments in technological infrastructure that were funded by the proceeds from the sale of the Arrangement Shares, totaling ILS 12.4 million, which was offset by a reduction of ILS 6.3 million in the cash flow for operating activities. Cash flows for financing activity resulted in negative cash flow of ILS 45.1 million, compared to negative cash flow of ILS 23.8 million in the corresponding quarter last year. The increase is due mainly to two dividend payment that amounted to ILS 272.7 million. This was offset by an amount of ILS 242 million from the sale of the Arrangement Shares. And with that, I will return the call to our moderator to conduct the Q&A. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we will begin the question and answer session. If you have a question, please press star one. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you're using speaker equipment, kindly lift the handset before pressing the numbers. Your questions will be polled in the order they are received. Please stand by while we poll for your questions. The first question is from Dan Fannon of Jefferies. Please go ahead. Yeah. Hi, good evening, gentlemen. This is actually Rick Roy on for Dan today. So I have a number of questions here, if you don't mind. So very strong quarter for data revenues, ILS 23 million. Saw you attributed it to an increase in the index fees. Is there anything one time you'd call out in this line item, or would you consider this a fair run rate? And also, if you could comment kind of on index AUM levels, you know, outside of pricing changes. Sure. Good morning, Rick, in California. In terms of the index- Thank you. I would say that we don't have any one-time effect. We had a pricing change that took place in 2023, and now it's the second leg of the same pricing change. So from this year and on, this will be the normalized fees that we run our indexes. We also started in the past year to do some tailor-made indexes. So overall, you can look at it as a steady state, and hopefully over time, our AUM will grow as well, so the number will be correlated. I think overall, clearly in October, you know, we've seen a decline when October seventh took place. But after a couple of weeks, the market came back. So overall, AUM is quite steady, as... As I mentioned before, we actually saw an increase, if you compare Q1 2024 to a year before, in terms of our aggregated market cap in equities. So that's where we are at the moment. ... And, on that, do you have any of those new indices and/or existing indices you could call out where you're seeing, you know, maybe pronounced momentum? Well, we do have—we do launch, like, the tailor-made indices, but I would say that it's not like any one of them has, like, a material impact of what we do. It's part of our value proposition, and clearly we see advantage, and we bring more, we bring more products to the Israeli retail, which is also important. But in terms of, you know, the money that we generate out of it, it's not material. Not at all. Got it. And then, if I could move on, into the income statement. Where would you anticipate your biggest areas of revenue growth to be over the next year? And then, following that, do you have any changes to your expense growth outlook for the year, you know, especially considering the new labor agreement? Yeah. So in terms of, you know, our revenues, we anticipate that we will continue to grow organically in all of our core activities. Clearly, as it was in the first quarter, you know, the data and the connectivity currently have a higher growth rate than the rest of it. And I think, you know, to look at 2024, when you observe the overall things that we have, it makes sense. But I also think that, you know, the split that we have between the transaction and non-transaction, which is usually 60% non-transaction and 40% transactional, which has been the case for the past few years, we believe that it will continue to be throughout 2024. In terms of the expense, the new agreement that we signed, actually, as I mentioned, has no material impact on our expenses in the next few years, so we don't see a material impact throughout the year. I think it's worth mentioning that in the expenses that we had in the first quarter of 2024, you know, one of the outcome of the war is clearly that employees have nowhere to go for holidays. So we had, like, a ILS one million additional expense because of accounting that employees couldn't take vacations, which is something that over time will be normalized. Understood. And is there anything else, maybe on the non-comp side, which, you know, you foresee changes or one-time items? Nothing which is material. You know, we did have, you know, some expenses in, like, cyber-related activities, this quarter, but again, none of the numbers are material in terms of the income statement of the company. So we don't see anything material throughout the year. Okay, thank you. And then if I could move on to maybe products. I think last quarter you called out, you know, the role or, you know, the launch of a futures business in the quarter. Could you, you know, provide detail on how that launch has gone, and, you know, what early feedback has been, if any? Yeah. So we launched, you know, a big derivatives scheme, which talks about futures, but only some changes that we did with the options market that we have. Now, because we do it together with the members of the exchange, you know, the banks and the brokers, we got some feedback that they need more time to adjust their IT system protocols, collateral, et cetera. So the futures market will start operating at the beginning of September, and the change that we did to our derivatives market, changing the multiples, declining the multiples, so also retail can have more accessibility to that, will take place at the beginning of June. There are some changes that we did, like launching more, options, like options on Sunday, that we already see a positive impact on the trading. But I think that, only during the fourth quarter of 2023, we'll be in a phase that everything that we talked about will be already in place, and we can see everything, in operation. That was very helpful updates there. And also on products, are there any specific areas or asset classes where, I don't know, maybe similar to like indices, where pricing might be a bigger primary contributor to growth, looking ahead here? Not in the moment. Not in the moment. Understood. Right, and also... Yeah, I was also thinking in context of the OTC Reg cap from a little while ago. Understood. And then maybe finally here, have you seen any slowdown in terms of the globalization trends you've seen in your markets? I guess, you know, how are conversations going with international clients or, you know, remote member pipeline and things of that nature? ... Yeah, so I think in terms of us as a public company, again, because we went through demutualization only a few years ago, we still have many players that are not active or are not active enough in our market. So in terms of our business development, we're having a lot of discussions, and as I mentioned in the past, it will take us a couple of years before we can maximize the full potential that we have. We haven't seen any change whatsoever in discussions that we have with different market participants in all of the areas that we operate. However, we also have a role that we speak with global investors in trying to make the market more accessible and to have global investors invest in our public companies. We do a lot of things in order to make the Israeli companies invest more in their IR and in English translation, so they can speak with more international investors. And clearly, we do hear from time to time by global investors that even though some of the Israeli public companies that they track, they think the valuation is relatively attractive because of the current situation that we have in the state of Israel, some of those investors are waiting for the right time to enter or to increase their position in those specific companies. So we do see a certain impact on the situation in this respect, but in terms of us as a public company, we continue having many conversation with global players. Sorry, just one more follow on that, and I promise I'll be done here. But I think- All good. You mentioned Jump began operating- All good. Continue to talk. Yeah. Thank you. So Jump began operating this quarter, and then I think last quarter you had called out, I believe it was four membership approvals, two non-banking, you know, 1 remote, et cetera, and then two approvals for the custodian house or the clearing house. What is kind of the timeline for the onboarding of those clients, you know, understanding that, you know, some might be bigger than others or what have you? Yeah. So, you know, for the trading brokers that basically, you know, can approach retail and help the retail participation, and I think it's quite natural. It takes some time for them to make sure that everything is up and running, so we don't see the full impact yet of all of the new members of the exchange. If I look at the history of the past few years that we have seen more and more retail participation, usually when new members come, it takes them a few quarters before we see the influence arising. So I guess it will take some more time before it will happen. We cannot, you know, control, like, the amount of money they will invest on marketing and other elements. But I think the overall direction is clearly a positive direction. Got it. Understood. All makes sense. Thank you guys so much for your time today, and you guys have a, you know, stay safe and have a great rest of your night. Thank you very much, Rick. Take care. If there are any additional questions, please press star one. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. Please stand by while we poll for more questions. There are no further questions at this time. This concludes the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange Q1 2024 Results Conference Call. Thank you for your participation. You may go ahead and disconnect.