Good morning, this is the Chorus Call Conference Operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the illimity 9 Months 2024 results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing Star and zero on their telephone. At this time I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Passera, Chief Executive Officer of illimity. Please go ahead sir. Thank you and good morning. Welcome to illimity's nine-month results presentation. Let's start from slide three. We are at a pivotal moment at illimity. Our strategic shift is setting the stage for greater resilience and long-term growth. Historically, as you certainly remember, our focus was on the one side on SME lending, performing and reperforming as well as on the other side as NPE portfolio investments, the latter contributing significantly to our results. However, due to regulatory changes and market conditions, we exited direct NPE investments last year, simplifying operations and aligning with our long-term goals. Now as a streamlined SME bank, we are concentrating on performing and reperforming lending huge markets where we have unique strengths. While short-term profitability faces challenges, our strategy focuses on SME lending growth, cost reductions and unlocking value from non-core assets. In line with these, our strategy of executing major annual transactions continues and today we are pleased to announce our latest initiative that further leverages our technology assets. Let's move on slide four for a closer look. We just announced a partnership with Apax Partners to advance our asset valorization strategy, unlocking the value of Fin tech investments and enhancing our competitive edge. The partnership will form a new company focusing on digital products, tech consulting and banking services. We hold 48% stake of the new company. We will outsource our IT systems to this entity for 10 years, ensuring IT cost savings while maintaining top tier digital client services. Moving to slide five, we are expecting significant financial gains adding approximately EUR 54 million to our profit once completed, expected by December 31st, 2024 or early 2025. The transaction will also boost our capital by around 70 basis points, providing a stronger base for future growth. Outsourcing IT to the new company will lead to long term cost savings while ensuring high quality digital services for our clients. Our ongoing stake in the new company also ensures additional revenue from its tech driven activities. Such future revenues will add to the royalties we expect from our successful partnership with Engineering. Let's now move to slide 6 with key highlights of the results. The 9 month net profit stands at EUR 31 million with a resilient underlying operating profitability. Corporate and investment banking profitability increased with pre-tax profit up 9% year- on- year. Business origination in specialized credit is steadily growing year to date. Capital and liquidity positions remain strong. Core Tier 1 ratio is at 14.4% with a liquidity buffer of EUR 1.1 billion. Asset quality remains under control with the gross NPL ratio excluding public guarantees confirmed at 0.6% and the cost of risk at 69 basis points down from the previous quarter. Tech Ventures, HYPE and b-ilty have confirmed their positive trends. Moving to Slide 7 despite exiting from direct NPE portfolio investments, our underlying operating profitability remains largely in line with last year. Operating profits came in at EUR 68 million from EUR 71 million. Excluding extraordinary revenue from the IT partnership. Operating income reached EUR 222 million from EUR 228 million. Underpinned by fee growth and SME lending. Business costs have started decreasing compared to the same period of last year, with further reductions expected to accelerate in the fourth quarter. We anticipate stronger cost reductions ahead, in particular in 2025 d riven by savings on due diligence and servicing cost for NPE portfolios. Slide 8. We confirm a solid capital and liquidity position. The Core Tier1 ratio stands at 14.4% as indicated by the regulator. With regard to the prudential treatment of a specific senior note securitization which positively impacted the Q4 2023 P&L, we sterilized its effect on capital resulting in a 40 basis point reduction. This impact may reduce over time due to collections and disposals. This reduction has been largely offset by the removal of reserves on government bond holdings effective since July under CRR regulation. Furthermore, we agreed with the regulator to complete an additional analysis of specific asset classes represented by senior notes and fund units by year-end. On the liquidity front, our buffer remains strong at EUR 1.1 billion with regulatory ratios well above the minimum requirements. Slide 9. Our corporate and investment banking business reported continual growth in profitability. SME lending origination rose by 15% year- on- year, reflecting high demand from structured lending. In the corporate sector, pre-tax profit increased by 9% year- on- year. Cost income at 21% demonstrates excellent operating leverage. Slide 10. Asset quality remains under control. 57% of total loans are backed by public guarantees or credit insurance. The organic NPE ratio excluding state guaranteed positions continues to stay very low at 0.6%. The total organic NPE ratio including public guarantees is at 5.4%, almost entirely represented not by NPL positions but by UTP positions under restructuring. The annualized cost of risk is down from the previous quarter at 69 basis points. Let's move to Slide 11. This year our Specialized Credit division is completing its transition. New business origination has been steadily growing since the beginning of the year and is up 37% quarter- on- quarter. We expect core revenues to benefit over time from volume growth. Costs down 14% year- on- year with savings that will become more visible in the next quarters following the business mix change. Moving to Slide 12, ARECneprix, our asset management company specializing in large real estate UTP positions, posted a remarkable profitability progression. EBITDA posted a strong increase to EUR 11.2 million, significantly up from EUR 4.7 million last year driven by third party mandates, structuring and advisory fees. Slide 13. Our SGR posted a significant increase in profitability. Pre-tax profit increased by 62% year-on- year driven by assets under management g rowth with new funds in preparation. Now let's move from core businesses to other activities. Slide 14. Technology has consistently driven our success. The partnership we announced today with Apax Partners along with the partnership with Engineering will contribute to our future profitability. On top of that, we can rely on our tech ventures to generate additional capital for future growth. Starting with HYPE on slide 15. HYPE, one of Italy's leading retail fintech platforms, showed strong improvement year on year. Nine-month net profit is at EUR 1.3 million, a significant turnaround from EUR 5 million loss in the same period last year. Both accounts and transactions continue to grow steadily. Moving to b-ilty on slide 16. b-ilty, our LandTech for small corporates, posted another strong quarter in business origination. Net customer loans steadily progressed, all backed by public guarantees. Profitability improved further. Slide 17: Quimmo. Quimmo, our PropTech has consolidated its leading position in the judicial market by increasing its market share and is progressing in its development in the non-judicial market. Results are still impacted by the reduction in national judgment bankruptcy figures over the last two years, but this trend started reversing recently with expected benefits on future profitability along with ongoing cost reduction. Silvia, our CFO, will now provide a comprehensive review of our Q3 2024 results. Thank you Corrado and good morning everyone. Let's move straight ahead to the balance sheet figures on slide 9. Net customer loans grew by 12% in the quarter, driven by robust growth in SME lending which increased by 3% quarter on quarter. This growth was strongly supported by contribution from Structured Finance, Special Situation Desks and b-ilty, which altogether posted a notable 6% growth on a quarterly basis. Additionally, it reflects the shift of the specialized credit division towards asset-based components. Our excess liquidity remains robust and is invested largely in government bonds with less than a three-year duration and about 3% average yield. All in all total assets stood at EUR 8.3 billion up 3% quarter on quarter and 22% on a yearly basis. Our funding also increased this quarter driven by the wholesale component. We will provide more details shortly. Moving to profit and loss on slide 20, profitability on a nine-month basis remains broadly stable if compared to the same period last year if we exclude the IT platform revenue booking 2023. What is down on a quarterly basis is affected by the seasonality of some of our businesses. Point number one, net interest income was down 3% quarter- on- quarter. This dynamic reflects the lack of the funding related to the bond issued in May whilst interest income was up in the quarter supported by corporate banking activity. Year-on-year trend is affected by higher cost of funding and reduction in direct distressed credit investments. Point number two, net fees in Q3 are affected by the unfavorable seasonality in August for credit servicing and real estate brokerage businesses and also reflected lower business origination in corporate banking compared to Q2. Year- on- year trend shows a 21% growth driven by business origination advance, an increase in investment banking activity and new third party mandates in the servicing business. Point number three. Other income reported a subpar performance quarter on quarter owing to limited trading, quiet activity of placing derivatives for corporate clients and little contribution from revenue arising from assets at fair value. The comparison on a yearly basis was affected by the profit recorded on the partnership on our IT platform booked in the first half of last year and by the shift in our distressed credit business which used to generate significant profit from closed positions. Point number four. Operating costs have started declining both on a quarterly and on a yearly basis. We have implemented cost cutting measures following the shift in distressed credit strategy. Reduction in operating costs is set to continue in the next quarter. Point number five, loan loss provision charges are down quarter on quarter and stabilizing at 69 basis points. Now let's move to slide 21. Our capital base is solid with a Common Equity Tier 1 ratio at 14.4% and a total capital ratio at 18.4%. This quarter was characterized by some moving parts that you can see highlighted in the slide as indicated by the authority about the prudential treatment of a specific senior note securitization transactions that led to a positive impact on NPE in Q4 of around EUR 28 million net. We sterilized its effect on capital. This impact amounted to a negative 40 basis point is largely offset by the benefit of coming from the removal of reserves and government bonds according to the CRR regulation and is expected to reduce over time as a result of collections and or disposals risk c redit assets remain stable despite volume growth thanks to the implementation of optimization measures. Finally, let's move to our funding on slide 22. Funding was slightly up in the quarter while keeping a well diversified mix. Retail funding from our retail platform illimitibank.com remained largely flat while we tactically reduced our funding from the HYPE platform. Wholesale funding was up quarter on quarter due to some collateralized interbank funding transactions. Our blended cost of funding stood at 4% in September in line with expectations and we expect a gradual decline from 2025. I now hand back to Corrado for final remarks. Thank you, Silvia. Our current profitability certainly does not yet reflect illimity's true potential. The temporary impact of our strategic decision t o exit NPE direct investments along with t he peak funding costs has affected the short term result as planned. However, our potential will be clearly demonstrated i n the new business plan which will. Leverage on three important points: the growth opportunities in our SME lending activities, s ignificant cost reduction initiatives to enhance efficiency. Further strategic valorization of our non-core assets. With regard to the timing of the new business plan presentation, in order to incorporate the effect of the recent transaction on tech assets and other potential valorizations into limited growth estimates, we deemed it appropriate to postpone the presentation of the new business plan to 2025. Thank you for your attention. We now look forward to addressing your questions. This is the Chorus Call Conference Operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press and one on the Touchstone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press and one at this time. The first question is from Manuela Meroni in Intesa Sanpaolo. Please go ahead. Yes, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. The first one is on the Apax transaction. The positive impact on the capital base is a huge and clear 90 basis points. Could you share with us the recurrent impact on the P and L in its different components? So I'm thinking to the annual fees, the expected income from the stake in the Newco, the earn out and the cost savings you mentioned EUR 13 million in four years and other elements that we should consider. Again on a Apax transaction in the press release you stated that the full outsourcing achieved provides a greater for the future growth opportunities in your business. Could you please elaborate on those opportunities? What are you seeing and what is the evolution of the business that you are considering? Also taking into consideration the presentation of the business plan in 2025. Third question is on if you can share your thoughts on the potential evolution of your partnership with Azimut. We have read some press articles that were not very clear to me. So where we are now with Azimut and what could be the potential evolution of such a partnership, if any. Then in the press release you mention the review of a selected asset class foreseen in the first quarter of the year. Could you please elaborate on that? And what is the magnitude of the impact that we may expect? And the last question is on your NII. So the sensitivity of your NII to rates decline. Thank you. Thank you. I will leave a number of details to Silvia a s far as the Apax transaction is c oncerned, it's an important one. The combination of what we got through the partnership with Engineering last year that is developing successfully and what we are getting from the Apax transaction this year make in the round of EUR 100 million. That means that we have recovered practically 100% of our investments in technology, and we will benefit from now on not only from the capital implication and per capital- royalties from both companies, profits from our 48% share in the company we are creating with the Apax group. Silvia, maybe you can add some more. Going in terms of the run-rate savings. We commented in the press release that we expect the annual saving to be in the region of 6% or what is today our running costs for the IT platform which is EUR 3.4 million per year in terms of cost savings. Then we are also expecting a nice contribution in terms of profits from equity shareholdings into the newco. Those are the two main [crosstalk] positive of the transactions on top of the ability to reinvest the capital generation into investments in our core business clearly Exactly. In terms of opportunity, growth opportunities, t he business plan will develop on this point but we will be more and More centered on our main and core business t hat is SME lending. SME lending means performing growth, credit, acquisition credit structured finance and reperforming credit. That means special situation restructuring kind of financing where we clearly and objectively developed a quite a distinctive position on the market. Asset-based financing is growing in its importance but again is one way we can support SMEs where asset-based opportunities are available. Partnership with Azimut, you said that what? Came out on the press is not clear. I agree. It's not clear to us either because we know what we have done with Azimut. We are long term partners with them. We developed and we are providing their current accounts with a number of banking. Services and that's certainly something we are proud of and that will develop. Nothing else today is on the table in terms of further collaborations, but certainly. We have been close to Azimut and w e are proud of that. The fourth question I missed. Maybe Sylvia, you missed maybe. First I'd like to comment on the questions regarding what we mean when we say that we do have flexibility on the contract. So basically the agreement provides for the full outsourcing of our information system to Engineering with a 10-year contract. So we signed a service agreement. We have agreed upon paying a certain level of service fee, but we clearly bid on flexibility around the annual renewal, which means that upon certain conditions the annual service fee can be lower. So we believe that in that way we can manage the growth business and we have a clear operating leverage built within the service fee. And at the same time we can manage other strategic options. That's why we say we build a flexibility within the contract and at the same time we are making sure that we remain on top of the technology evolution. You can keep going on the net interest income sensitivity. Net interest income sensitivity is mid-single-digit low to mid-single-digit. Please review. Yes, you can hear from Andrea. As you mentioned, we took the commitment to complete by year-end an analysis aimed at verifying the valuation classification of our senior note transaction funds unit contribution, and we don't see any relevant impact. Also, considering the benefit coming from the valorization of our tech assets, and please take into account that the performance so far of these vehicles are above or in line with our initial expectations. Okay. Any other question? The next question is from Davide Giuliano Equita. Please go ahead. Hi, good morning and thank you for taking my question. I have some. The first one is how much revenues do you deconsolidate with the Newco? And are there some perimeter overlaps with the engineering royalties for the future? The second one on the capital gain, you have always indicated that you want to use it to finance growth of the SME business or increase shareholder remuneration. So I was wondering, with this 90 basis points of additional capital, what do you intend to do? Are you considering an additional dividend at least in part? And the third one on the specialized credit division, net interest margin, it continues to be particularly subdued compared to the NPL business despite the gradual ramp up. How does this fit into the goal of profitability in line with the previous profitability of the NPL business? Is it only a matter of cost of funding or there is something more, and just a fourth one. If I may, can we consider 45 basis points as a reasonable organic core for the next few years? Thank you. Okay. As far as the revenues and the overlapping of the two partnership, we have designed this partnership in a way that does not create any overlap between the two. The partnership with Engineering that we signed l ast year and that is developing successfully. Is the commercial partnership to market a number of applications that illimity developed in t he first years of our life. They are clearly interesting for a n umber of potential buyers. The focus on the partnership with Apax is more on software products that illimity developed in the area of artificial intelligence, of cloud management and of ESG r eporting. The way we will use the equity that we are freeing will be more clear in the business plan. As you said, the two main directions are growth. Probably we can say it is the priority for us in order to reach t hat critical size that will optimize our profitability. But at the same time we cannot e xclude that revenues coming from non-core assets disposal might also be used in. The future for increasing shareholders' remuneration. All these issues will be clearly explained i n the business plan. I will leave the specialized credit issues to Andrea and then to Sylvia. It's not an issue, it's an opportunity. I say in relation to the ABF, we have a profitability that is in a range of 11-13%. Take into account that now we have a book that is EUR 130 million that is very low compared to our previous book. Take into consideration that transformation book with securitization with funds quotes counts for more than EUR 1 billion a nd this book has an IRR of in the range of 5%. Then what we have to do is to decrease to this back book to increase the new book. That is as an IRR that is in line with our previous IRR. That was, I guess, with the questions on the organic cost of risk that we might foresee for the future. We posted 45 basis points in Q3 in the nine months. The number is in the region of 70 basis points. Probably we could be between 70 and 80 basis points for the full year 2020. Thank you. As a reminder, if you wish to register for a question, please press star then one on your telephone. The next question is from Violeta Baraboi Société Générale. Please go ahead. Good morning. Thank you very much for taking my questions. Actually, I might have missed mine. Because unfortunately I had to join a little bit later. My question relates, and maybe that was asked, but my question relates to the capital structure and I'm trying to understand a bit. Sorry, your question relates to what? To the capital structure. Capital structure. Okay. Yes, capital structure. So yes, I was trying to understand a little bit in terms of funding if there's any appetite for illimity to issue an Additional Tier 1. And so that's the first question and also understanding a little bit if how do you see, you know, think of funding in terms of Tier 2 and senior potentially into next year? I mean we are always looking at opportunity to optimize our capital stock. We are very aware that there is a market there for the AT1 but you know we are open to consider every form of optimization of the capital stack. I mean our capital base today is very solid per se but. Certainly one a rea that will support the further strengthening of our capital structure is the area of the disposal or the valorization of our non-strategic assets. As you know, we announced that we h ave in mind to have at least o ne main transaction every year. We started last year with the partnership o n our IT platform. We continue this year with the Apax partnership. But we will try to keep this pace and prove with this kind of deals the value we created in the last years in our tech ventures. Understood. So the focus would be more on disposing and then kind of building CET1 ratio rather than optimizing. Is that a correct understanding? And then a second question. Sorry I might have missed it but there were headlines on Azimut being interested in buying some of your assets. Maybe you've mentioned something during the call and I missed it. Can you comment on that? Thank you. I will elaborate a bit on the first question in your comments. Non-strategic asset disposal is one of. The way we will use to accelerate the creation of capital and equity to finance our growth. Obviously the main source will remain the profits coming from our activities, and another area of source of equity is the optimization that we are trying t o apply to any of our activities to reduce the equity component. So these are the three main levers we will use t o accelerate the creation of equity and availability of equity for both growth on t he one side and the shareholders remuneration on the other side. As far as Azimut is concerned, what we said before you joined is that we have a useful interesting collaboration with Azimut. We have powered, if you can use this word, their current accounts and we are providing their customers a number of banking services. These partnerships, this collaboration has increased during the years and we cannot exclude that other collaboration can arrive. But as of today, there is nothing else on the table. For any further questions, please press star and one on your telephone. Mr. Passera, there are no more questions registered at this time. If there are no other questions, I t hank all the people that attended our call. As I said, we are going through. A very important shift, strategic shift. And we are becoming more and more an SME banks that use all these assets to grow and increase its profitability. Thank you very much to everybody. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over. You may disconnect your telephones.