Hi, everyone. So why don't we get started? Good morning. My name is Jeff Schmitt, and I cover Wealth Tech stocks here at William Blair. I'd like to introduce Envestnet, which is the leading provider of Wealth Tech solutions for financial advisors. They serve around one-third of financial advisors in the United States. We have with us today Josh Warren, the CFO, to discuss the business. But before we begin, for a complete list of research disclosures and potential conflicts of interest, please visit our website at williamblair.com. With that, I will turn it over to Josh. Cool. Thank you. I've got my own set of disclaimers and disclosures, but just to, I know this is a generalist conference, so let me just give you a bit of a background on Envestnet, who we are, you know, why, you know, why we may be of interest. So Envestnet, as mentioned, leading wealth management platform in the United States. Our focus is delivering to financial advisors. We deliver software and the technology solutions and the investment tools that power that advice. I know it's a generalist conference, but my supposition is many of you have a financial advisor. That financial advisor likely is an Envestnet client. Our perspective is that bringing together all of the pieces of people's complicated financial lives into a single place helps provide for both better financial advice and better outcomes, and ultimately a better relationship between the advisor and their clients. We believe we've developed a platform to do that, and we believe that's very difficult to replicate. But that's what Envestnet has done over the last 25 years. So just maybe a bit of background, 'cause I appreciate that many of you are sort of new to the name. Company was founded 25 years ago, focused on serving financial advisors in the United States. What's the industry today? There are approximately 290,000 financial advisors. These include about 40,000 in various wirehouses, you know, Morgan Stanley, Smith Barney, UBS, Bank of America, Merrill, Wells Fargo, and that leaves 250,000 independent financial advisors. And today, 109,000 of that 250,000 advisors are Envestnet clients. To understand Envestnet, you really need to understand the industry. So I've got two parts to this presentation. The first is just an overview of the industry, and then we'll get into some specifics about the company. So maybe just an overview of the industry. First, I'm just gonna assume some of you DIY it, some of you use a financial advisor, but the reality is millions of Americans use financial advisors. And the financial advice industry has been one of evolution. It's sort of gone from, you know, the, the Wolf of Wall Street, to more of financial wellness coaching. When you layer in regulation, when you, when you layer in competition, when you layer in all the trends, toward more personalization, what that's meant is advisors have needed to adapt to that and rely on a tech stack, so they can spend their time doing what they do best, which is serving clients, helping clients grow, and also helping grow their own, what's effectively, in many cases, a small business. Simultaneously, and really specifically for financial advisors, the business model has changed. So think of a first phase as, you know, that kind of Wolf of Wall Street thing, you know, call the investor center, the name of the company, Aerotyne... I always want to do that. So advisor was basically a stockbroker, $200 per trade. That was the 1980s. There was a second phase where the advisor was really a mutual fund seller. Between, you know, 1990 and 2000, mutual funds grew 10x, right? They grew from about $500 billion to $5 trillion. And with the advent of what was called a 12b-1 fee, and what's still known as a 12b-1 fee, really the transaction model shifts to more of an ongoing support model, an ongoing recurring revenue model for an advisor. The third stage, and the advisor became more of a portfolio constructor, you know, with websites and with internet platforms, you know, the E*TRADE baby from the crib, like, so easy, a baby can do it. More individuals could buy a mutual fund, and the role of the advisor was to assemble a portfolio. It was in between that second and third stage that Envestnet was founded. It was formed in 1999 by Judd Bergman and, at his right hand, Bill Crager, and the idea was democratize access to the broadest selection of financial products. The company, just, and we'll get into it, 25 years, it, it's undergone a few chapters. Think of the first chapter as the first 20 years. The focus was on growth, largely through acquisition. The company acquired the key areas of real estate on the advisor desktop, where it built up that industry-leading position, where it built up, that advisor count, that we referenced. But in many respects, the company was a series of vertical businesses, and it meant for maybe a confusing and somewhat muddled proposition. Bill became the CEO in 2020, quickly announced an investment cycle, a replatforming initiative. This was kind of the second chapter that was fusing together all of the component parts, so we could operate as one Envestnet. We had several different user experiences, several different support teams. The advisor was wanting better, faster, cheaper, and to do more with us, but we had, you know, we struggled with delivery. We're entering a new chapter now.... This new chapter is focused on scale, this new chapter is focused on operational excellence, and it's made possible because of the platform infrastructure investments made during the last few years. All of that brings us to today. So, Bill announced his intention to step down earlier this year. As the company is at this moment in time, our client feedback has been super strong. The early indications of scale, they're evident. It's starting to show through in our results. The strategic priorities, they're really execution ones. They revolve around delivering what Envestnet has, delivering Envestnet products to Envestnet clients. We'll, of course, compete for every incremental new logo, but our strategy is really to go deeper with the clients that we have. Our top 25 clients, the average duration is 15 years. The company is 25 years old. Our average duration of our top clients is 15 years. So what does that mean as far as the industry? So first, we benefit from, and we drive the secular tailwinds that are underpinning really what is today a large and established client base. The secular tailwinds in the industry, you know, they're here. The shift toward more planning led business models for Envestnet to deliver from planning through to portfolio implementation. The growth of fee-based assets, advisors moving from more packaged products to customized portfolios, outsourcing investments to free up time to do more in terms of direct indexing, to do more in terms of overlays, to allow for greater customizations. Advisory firms also need to spend more on technology, spend more on data. Given all of that, the strategy remains to go deeper with the existing clients we have and add more than 109,000 advisors, approaching 20 million accounts, greater than $6 trillion of assets. That's a great base to expand from. So in addition to that real estate that I mentioned, we have service, and great service is the foundation to our ability to go deeper. Advisors don't want to be a CTO. Advisors want to partner with an all-in-one platform. The industry wants to go deeper with fewer partnerships, and we believe we have lots of room to grow wallet share with the clients that we have. So those trends, you know, grow the pie. That's, you know, why wealth is an attractive market to be in. That's why we believe Envestnet is uniquely positioned to capitalize on it. And so let me go through sort of each of these trends: scale, personalization, technology integration, and ultimately recognizing that advisors themselves are small businesses, so practice management has been an increasing area of focus. So first, the number of individuals that identify as affluent may be declining, but the number that consult a financial professional is growing. Despite there's a lot of attention to the rise of the self-directed investor during the pandemic, but for more affluent investors, they increasingly value and are willing to pay for financial advice. Increasingly, individuals that work with a financial advisor are more confident in achieving financial security. So the need for advice is growing, the demand for advice is growing, but at the same time, advisor headcount is not. So this is a straight-up census. It has not been growing. I think it's reasonable to expect that that will continue. There may be some mix shifting that occurs, you know, people leaving wirehouses and moving toward RIAs, for an example, but the overall population of advisors is not really growing. As demand grows, as assets grow, you can see the pain point that's starting to emerge and the need for clients to scale. At the very same time that's happening, every advisor recognizes the need to transform their practice to a more personalized, to be more configurable. You know, information amount about investing is more widely available, expectations for technology have grown. That's another pain point. Maybe similar to medicine, where you have individuals showing up informed or maybe with a perspective about, like, private markets and crypto and wanting their portfolio to reflect certain values. Information is out there. Advisors need to tailor the advice that they give to the clients that they have. And then you have the workflows to support all of that. The same way clients' expectations for technology have grown, so too have their expectations for advisors. What we hear consistently from advisors is they just want it to work. They want a sort of always on, a stable platform where stability is the first feature, you know, dial tone type of service. I mentioned that advisors don't want to be a CTO and kind of cobble together best of breed and compare API documentation. The advisor desktop, if you read any of the industry reports out there, it's a messy place with a series of point solutions. And the way Envestnet typically wins is we can retire point solutions, replacing them with a holistic solution. That integration is essential because advice is getting broader. It now encompasses saving, it now encompasses spending, it now encompasses investing. These are like real-life decisions about retirement. Advice is more comprehensive, it's more holistic, but that holistic advice requires the embrace of a common set of information in one place, and that is what the power of the Envestnet Platform can offer. So maybe with that, a bit about the company. So hopefully I've given you some context about the power of the platform, the need for it in today's market. Let's just go into the company. So, this is some of our key stats from our earnings supplement, and I'll kind of go through each of these sort of as we go. Maybe this placemat slide, these are just some of our facts and stats today. I mentioned the over 109,000 advisors. That's the foundation of the firm. We're approaching 20 million accounts, 19.6 million, a little over 19.6 million as of March 31st. Given the trends in the wealth industry, Envestnet's a structural grower. The market may go up, the market may go down, but Envestnet has been in inflows every quarter since it's gone public in 2010. During Q1 of this past year, purely at the headline level, Envestnet had its biggest flow quarter since 2015. It's a reflection of the focus, it's a reflection of the commitment that the folks, my partners at Envestnet have for our clients. We don't lose sight of the fact that in any quarter, you know, these numbers can get to be immense. In any quarter, they get to be... You know, $33 billion is kind of a huge number. Every dollar is a flow, a flow. That's an advisor using the Envestnet Platform, putting money to work in service of an objective, in service of, of a real financial lead. These structural inflows that I described, these are one of the most enduring features of the Envestnet Platform. They're one of the most enduring features of our wealth franchise. From quarter to quarter, they may vary, but over time, every quarter, we have seen structural growth. To bring it all together, and this is what has me excited about the future, this is why we believe we are positioned for success. It's a leading market position to grow from. We have the secular tailwinds behind us that make that position that is so strong grow further. We believe we can grow with our clients to enable productivity, to effectively sell more of Envestnet products to those same clients going deeper. Now, I mentioned some of the chapters in the introduction that Envestnet's been through. Now that some of those acquisitions have been combined, have been fused together, because of that replatforming, we now have operating leverage that we can grow from. Specifically, going deeper with our clients. So I mentioned that advisors are flat, and you'll notice that our advisor count has grown a little over time. It's grown, you know, 2% if we were to take it on a year-over-year basis. But more importantly, we are growing accounts faster than we are growing advisors. For example, taking kind of a long view of history, since 2020, accounts per advisor are up 50% because of the platform investment cycle. You've not seen costs grow at that level. Our growth algorithm for this new chapter does not depend on advisor account growth. It depends on going deeper with the clients we have. Given the operating leverage we now have, every incremental dollar of revenue flows down the income statement. It's caused a bit of a rebound in our margins, and you should expect to see more of that for 2024. You know, we expect our wealth solution segment to grow in the mid- to high-single digits, and we're also expecting our total expense base, whether stock comp, whether capitalized software, whatever the source, the total economic expense base, to decline in the mid- to high-single digits as well. Our biggest opportunity, I mentioned, to go deeper with our clients. Here's a view of our platform by assets and by accounts. This should evidence the opportunity to upsell. This should evidence the opportunity to bundle with the clients that we have. Our clients select the pricing model construct, asset-based in a fiduciary construct, subscription-based in more of a technology construct that's more suitable to them. Having both enables us to fit the needs of the industry. And asset-based pricing, it's great. You get sort of the market plus a risk premium, and it provides a way for Envestnet to effectively monetize a client channel. We've taken sort of an either/or approach, so the sum of the parts total, if you will. But traditionally, we've defined asset-based revenue as primarily consisting of the variable fees that we provide for use of our platforms. Most clients, most of our large clients have both, and we believe that building out from this base is, is where we see a lot of opportunity. We report in two segments. Our segments depend on the client. I mentioned the, the focus on financial advisors. Our Wealth Solutions segment, which has both asset-based and subscription-based revenue, year-over-year, 11%, growth. Our Data & Analytics segment, it has struggled recently. I would describe that business as stabilizing. This was a business that Envestnet acquired in 2015, called Yodlee. During 2023, it did not perform as well as Envestnet had hoped. During Q4, we took nearly a $200 million impairment charge. We believe this business is stabilizing, and I would point to the results here as early evidence.... of some of the returns from a series of initiatives that we have in flight. These initiatives include improving the quality of API exchanges, improving uptime, reduced incident response time, securing several contract renewals. But we are excited to ultimately stabilize and return that business, the data and analytics business, to future growth. Adjusted EBITDA, defined in our credit metrics, it's a useful metric for all of you for comparison purposes. I think I mentioned we're up 350 basis points in terms of our adjusted EBITDA margin, in terms of its expansion, year-over-year. However, with our refreshed focus and entering into this new chapter, our focus is on free cash flow. We believe that's in the best interest of our shareholders. You may have noticed in our proxy filed a few weeks ago that we were very careful and scrupulous in terms of how we aligned incentives. Free cash flow is now kind of a KPI that we report. Free cash flow during Q1 was negative $20 million. But that involves $42 million more than the previous year. So free cash flow in Q1 2023 was negative $62 million. Free cash flow in Q1 2024 was negative $20 million. We're excited to have exited Q1 with more cash on hand, with a lower leverage ratio, and importantly, a structurally more profitable franchise, and we expect that momentum to continue into Q2. Last thing I just want to touch on, we are making progress on our balance sheets. Specifically, over the last 12 months, we took the leverage ratio down a turn, and we have more cash on hand. I mentioned on, you know, in terms of where we're leaving Q1. During 2024, you should expect us to continue to reduce our leverage ratio and continue to grow our cash position. So that's Envestnet. I know that was a speed of light overview, but I would describe us as the leading platform for independent financial advisors in the U.S. It is a true platform. It's a multi-product offering, but it gives financial advisors everything they need. And as we enter into this new chapter and this new phase, we are making progress. We're excited about the position we're in, and we're excited about the road ahead to the next chapter. So, with that, let me turn it back. I don't know if there are any questions. Happy to, happy to dig in. I think we'll have the breakout session.
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