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Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. (FIS)

Q4 2016 Earnings Call· Tue, Feb 7, 2017

$46.22

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the FIS Fourth Quarter 2016 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later we'll conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions will be given at that time. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. I'd now like to turn the conference over to your host, Pete Gunnlaugsson. Please go ahead, Pete.

Peter Gunnlaugsson - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thank you, Sean. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the FIS's fourth quarter and full-year 2016 earnings conference call. Turning to slide 2, Gary Norcross, President and Chief Executive Officer will begin with performance highlights for the company. Woody Woodall, Chief Financial Officer, will continue with the financial results for the fourth quarter and full year. As always, today's news release and corresponding supplemental slide presentation are available on our website at fisglobal.com. Turning to slide 3. Today's remarks will contain forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties as described in the press release and other filings with the SEC. The company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. Please refer to the Safe Harbor language on the slide. The materials presented today will also include references to non-GAAP financial measures in order to provide more meaningful comparisons between the periods presented. Reconciliations between the GAAP and non-GAAP results are provided in the attachments to the press release and in the appendix of the supplemental slide presentation. Turning to slide 4. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Gary to discuss the business highlights for the quarter and the full year. Gary?

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thank you, Pete. Good morning and thank you for joining us today. I am very pleased to open this morning's call affirming another strong quarter for FIS, concluding a very good year of performance and earnings growth. Turning to slide 5. In the year, we exceeded our financial goals delivering total shareholder returns of 27%, and more than doubling the returns provided by the S&P 500. This was accomplished by delivering full-year financial results, encompassing 11% EBITDA growth, 19% adjusted earnings per share growth, $1.5 billion in free cash flow, and $341 million return to shareholders in dividends. We're significantly improved the revenue and margin profile of our Global Financial Solutions segment. With the full year of SunGard results through consistent growth of high margin, IP-led solutions, and cost synergies, we exceeded our integration commitments putting FIS ahead of schedule allowing us to increase our synergy targets twice in 2016. As part of this call, we're increasing them again, with the current overall target to now exceed $275 million exiting 2017. This continues our track record of delivering on and exceeding our synergy targets on large, transformational acquisitions. We also successfully divested the public sector and education businesses, bringing us capital to pay down debt, as well as to reinvest into our long-term core businesses within IFS and GFS. Turning to Q4. Our results were underpinned by the strongest sales quarter of the year and despite ongoing financial institution consolidation, we built on the positive momentum established in the prior three quarters allowing us to exit the year with solid sales performance. Strategically, we are investing in the business to drive innovation into our different markets to deliver long-term growth and superior shareholder returns. Our SunGard acquisition, one year later, has been a meaningful value creator for our shareholders. Our…

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thanks, Gary. I will begin on slide 9 with a summary of our consolidated results for the quarter and for the full year of 2016. Today, consistent with our prior 2016 earnings announcements, all adjusted numbers and calculations are on an adjusted combined basis, as if SunGard was owned in both periods. In the fourth quarter, revenue increased 4.8% on an organic basis and EBITDA grew to $846 million, a 15.2% increase compared to the prior year. Adjusted net earnings from continuing operations was $377 million and adjusted earnings per share increased 22.6% to $1.14 per share. For the year, revenue increased 4.6% on an organic basis and EBITDA grew to $2.9 billion, an 11.1% increase compared to the prior-year period. EBITDA margin expanded 220 basis points to 31.2%, and adjusted earnings per share grew 18.6% to $3.82 per share. We finished the year marginally exceeding our run rate synergy goal of $200 million for 2016. Moving to slide 10. In the four quarter, IFS revenue grew on an organic basis by 2.5%, while EBITDA grew 5%, primarily driven by a favorable shift in revenue mix, coupled with executing ongoing cost management initiatives. For full-year 2016, IFS revenue increased 5% on an organic basis and EBITDA increased 4.2% compared to the prior-year period. Adjusting for the absence of incentive accruals discussed in the prior quarter, EBITDA would've increased 5.7% for the year, reflecting margin expansion of 20 basis points on an apples-to-apples basis. Turning to slide 11. Banking and Wealth was relatively flat for the quarter. This was primarily driven by the full quarter impact of the completion of the previously disclosed professional services project. Absent this, the IP-led product business grew approximately 3%. Payments grew 1.1% for the quarter. As we've discussed previously, EMV growth comparables will become more…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our first question will come from the line of David Togut with Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.

David Mark Togut - Evercore ISI

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Thank you. Good morning.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Good morning, Dave.

David Mark Togut - Evercore ISI

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Could you help us gauge the impact of President Trump's executive order last week to repeal elements of Dodd-Frank? In particular, I'm wondering about the possible impact on regulatory and compliance-related spending, which has been a nice growth tailwind for you over the last couple of years; and secondarily, whether this generally reorders bank IT spending priorities.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Dave, that's a good question, and frankly, we don't know what the outcome's going to be and what the impact's going to be overall for FIS. As Woody talked about, we've been very conservative and assume that there'll be no impact. We do believe that if some regulatory reform did occur, that you could see some improvement in IT spending in financial institutions, but also keep in mind the nature of our sales cycles, the nature of our implementation windows, you really wouldn't start seeing any of that impact really until 2018. But we're going to continue to monitor it but, at this point in time, we haven't seen any impact.

David Mark Togut - Evercore ISI

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Understood. And as a quick follow-up, net interest margin has expanded nicely for banks since President Trump was elected. Could you talk about CEO confidence and whether that is going to impact IT spending at all over the next 12 to 18 months?

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, I've met with a number of CEOs over the last quarter and actually already into this year, and I will say that there is a genuine sense that the CEOs are getting more confident in the execution of their business and the profitability of their businesses. Obviously, with that, you do hope that that would turn to increasing spend towards IP-led type solutions, deployment. You still have the same need, though, that they still have to continue to lower their cost, improve their overall efficiencies, even in an expanded net interest margin environment. So once again, all these things would be good things that would indicate and push towards the – not only the end of 2017, but into 2018 if we start seeing the results of that. Q4 was our largest sales quarter of the year. We talked about that. We've got good pipeline coming into this year, so a number of these things will be attributable, but as I said, those things, even after you book them, you start seeing the revenue after implementation, which is typically a 12-month, give or take, period.

David Mark Togut - Evercore ISI

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Got it. Just a quick final question for me. Woody, I think you called out a late 2016 client loss tied to an acquisition. Can you bracket for us the impact that'll have on 2017 revenue growth, and is that all IFS? And then is there a contract term fee associated with that as well?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yes, that sits in the Corporate and Other segment. It was a commercial services customer, David. The impact to consolidated organic growth is about a point with a combination of that loss and declining check volumes in that segment. The IFS and GFS segments were not affected by this. Again, their growth being in line with what we talked about back in May. And there was a relatively small term fee associated with the transaction.

David Mark Togut - Evercore ISI

Analyst · Evercore ISI. Please go ahead

Understood. Thank you very much.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thanks, David.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question, it'll come from the line of Dan Koning (sic) [Dave Koning] (26:26) from Baird. Please go ahead. David J. Koning - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc.: Yeah. Hey, guys. Thanks. Yeah, I guess my first question, I guess, is if that Other segment is $400 million of revs, is it actually going to be down like the what, $90 million, $100 million, or something like that? I mean that's kind of the dollar figure to think that little segment's down to create a 1% headwind to the total company.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

That's correct, Dave. It overall is a drag on total company organic growth in that zone. David J. Koning - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc.: Got you. Okay. And then the tax rate, I mean, you guys have done really a nice job there. Is there anything one-off in the 32% this year? And then I guess corollary to that, is this a tax rate that can keep coming down in future years from the 32% to be lower?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, a couple of things. One, I tried to highlight the components of what's driving it. Of the 300 basis point reduction, about 1 point or 100 basis points is really driven by the accounting change in stock comp, where everybody should get some level of benefit there. 200 points is really driven off of tax planning strategies and lower rate geographies. It can continue to go down in the current environment, as we continue to work through tax planning strategies, and as our international revenue base continues to grow. David J. Koning - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc.: Got you. And then finally, just a real quick one. The way to start thinking about the base of 2016 revs to grow from is basically something right around $9.2 billion, I believe, right? That's what your guidance is predicated off of the reported number less the divestiture?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah. You've got three moving parts around reported to organic. You've got the $9.2 billion base you're talking about. If you remember, we had a deferred revenue acquisition adjustment around SunGard of about $200 million. We've got expectations of around $75 million of currency impact being a negative, and then the PS&E sale being about 3 points and that would drive you from reported of 1% to 2% to organic of 2% to 3%. David J. Koning - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc.: Got you. Great. Thank you.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question now comes from the line of Ashwin Shirvaikar from Citigroup. Please go ahead.

Ashwin Shirvaikar - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.

Analyst · Citigroup. Please go ahead

Thanks, guys. I guess my first question was to – and you might have mentioned this. I hopped in a little bit late on the call. The fiscal 2018 range that you talked about previously, are we still on track to – what part of that range, if you can clarify?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah. As we talked about in May, we really gave 3% to 7% organic revenue guide over the horizon, with 13% to 18% earnings per share growth. I would not anticipate changing that guide. We do have an adjustment associated with PS&E. But the individual earnings per share growth per year we think is very close to that. If you adjust out PS&E this year, you're in 12% to 16% underlying growth in the business.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Absolutely.

Ashwin Shirvaikar - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.

Analyst · Citigroup. Please go ahead

And I guess what I meant was the $4.70 to $5.10 EPS.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, if you remember specifically, we tried to give you an implied number associate, but we're trying to give percentage growth over that horizon. It will be difficult to get to that full $4.70 number, Ashwin, with the sale of PS&E, but we do anticipate in that 13% to 18% EPS growth.

Ashwin Shirvaikar - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.

Analyst · Citigroup. Please go ahead

Just to clarify, it will be difficult to get to the range or the lower part of the range?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

It will be difficult to get to a $4.70 number with the sale of PS&E. The growth, we believe, will be in the 13% to 18% range for 2018.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah. Our percentage guide on EPS, Ashwin, we feel very, very comfortable with, but obviously, now that we've sold or divested that business then that number wouldn't participate in that growth percentage. But we're very comfortable with the ranges we gave in May and, frankly, very comfortable with the underlying business and how it's operating. When you look at the sales pipeline, you look at the sales closures, you look at the concentration now, and the increase of the percentage of revenue that's highly recurring, it just gives us a lot of confidence, not only going into this year, but in our long-term guidance we've provided.

Ashwin Shirvaikar - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.

Analyst · Citigroup. Please go ahead

Got it. And last quick question, the divestiture that you had in December, PS&E business, can you explain sort of the difference between the $500 million of net cash proceeds versus the gross amount. That $350 million gap seems rather large. We get a number of questions about that. And also, your debt pay down does not seem to include anything further beyond the proceeds of that divestiture. Is that roughly right? The $350 million net expense, I can't get that.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, the $850 million was a gross number on the proceeds. We ended up with a net number of around $500 million. What that read-through is that you had very little tax basis...

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

That's right.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

in the PS&E assets through SunGard and our tax-free acquisition of SunGard. So, you ended up having a tax bill associate with that. Beyond that, we're prepaying all our prepayable debt in 2017, combination of PS&E proceeds, as well as free cash flow, and then anticipate continuing to have additional cash to be able to use for other purposes later in 2017.

Ashwin Shirvaikar - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.

Analyst · Citigroup. Please go ahead

Got it. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question will come from the line of Tien-Tsin Huang from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

Tien-Tsin Huang - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Thank you. Good morning. Just wanted to follow up on the comments around new market entrants and aggressive competition and whatnot. Is that a Global comment? Is it more IFS-specific? And then I'm curious if you can just maybe quantify what that might mean to the growth outlook for 2017.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Well, we talked a little bit about it, Tien-Tsin, but yeah, no, it's a very competitive environment. We're seeing record levels of money flowing into new start-ups, new disruptors. And frankly, we're competing very effectively with them. If you look throughout 2016, we had a very strong year. We got a very strong pipeline. We were just trying to point out the fact that you are dealing with a very competitive market, frankly, across IFS and GFS. There's a lot of technology innovation going on. Certainly, we talked about what we're doing with our private cloud to address some of that, not only our cost structures, which allows us to compete effectively and grow. But in IFS, you've got a further issue with consolidation. So, we want to give a balanced view of what the market is and a balanced view is you've got consolidation in IFS, you've got strong competition across both segments, but when you look at our guide, our long-term guide, we're very comfortable with it. When you look at our earnings per share percentages, as Woody talked about, we're very comfortable with it. So, we've got the portfolio necessary to compete in the market, but we're going to have to continue to drive our innovation in a similar manner. And one of the things Woody highlighted in the deck is our 6% to 7% of revenue back investment into the products and to new innovations, and that's going to continue.

Tien-Tsin Huang - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

Okay. That's helpful to hear. Just as a quick follow-up, I guess I've been curious about India and the demonetization and what impact that might have on the ATM work that you're doing there.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, no, we're kind of fortunate in how we structured a lot of our ATMs. A lot of our ATMs are tied to more of a flat fee approach on deployment, and so we don't have as much transaction exposure on it. So, it really had very minimal impact to us. We have now converted well over 90% of all of our ATMs for new currencies. So frankly, it's been business as usual for us this quarter, so we really didn't see much exposure at all on that.

Tien-Tsin Huang - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead

All right. That's great to hear. Thank you, Gary.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question will come from the line of Brett Huff from Stephens. Please go ahead.

Brett Huff - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens. Please go ahead

Good morning, guys. Thanks for taking my questions.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Hey, Brett.

Brett Huff - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens. Please go ahead

I have one question on Brexit and any update on that? It seems like the consulting business kind of came in as we expected, and I know that's a little bit of the canary in a coal mine in that, but any further commentary on that? I know you said kind of single-digits or maybe high single-digits for consulting this year, so it sounds good but just want commentary on that. And then I have a second question on the tax rate. I think 300 basis points is worth about $0.15, and so, that means that you guys are getting a $0.15 tailwind, which is included in your guidance, and that just makes that revenue growth guidance seem a little more conservative than maybe I thought it was. So, if you guys could address those, that'd be great. Thank you.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, on the Brexit front, certainly, I wouldn't say we're seeing a massive tailwind on our consulting business with related to Brexit. I will say that our European consulting group has performed very well, and we continue to see growth there. We still – the opportunity for that to be a tailwind certainly exists, but I wouldn't tell you that we're attributing Brexit as a major growth engine for us in 2017.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

If you go into the tax rate, Brett, if you go back to May, we looked at the bridge of earnings growth over the next couple of years. The tax rate was a component of that. We're just getting it a little faster than we anticipate. And to your comment with regard to revenue growth, we wanted to make sure we put together another conservative guide that we felt very comfortable being able to meet or exceed.

Brett Huff - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens. Please go ahead

Great. That's what I needed. Thanks, guys.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question will come from the line of Joseph Foresi from Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead.

Joseph Foresi - Cantor Fitzgerald Securities

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Hi. On the SunGard acquisition, maybe could you give us some color on what phase of the synergies you're in at this point and where your key focus is.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Well, Joe, we started on this journey, as we've talked about a number of times. I mean FIS has a very clear playbook that we like to execute on these large transformational acquisitions. That takes us about two years. At the end of two years, what we would tell you is by then the companies are so integrated it's really hard to determine what is truly based on synergies and what are just operating efficiencies that our teams continue to drive in. So, we're really halfway through the process at this point in time. 2016 was an outstanding year from an integration standpoint. We raised guidance on our synergies twice in 2016. Frankly, at the time we started this, we thought there were $200 million of synergies. Over two years, we got that in year one on an exit rate, as Woody talked about. We just raised it again now to we think we'll exit 2017 with $275 million. So, we've got roughly 11 months to go here, left on where we're really focused on what I would say executing our plans and playbook, and then it'll just become part of the operating unit. But we're very focused on it. We think there's a lot of opportunity. I think I've shared on prior calls, this has been the best combination we've been through as a company. The teams have come together very well. The cultures have come together very well. The clients have been very receptive. We're actually starting to see some nice cross-sell and upsell across the existing SunGard base. Frankly, we've talked about where they had not pooled their products up under common sales forces to get cross-sell and upsell of their own solution suite. I highlighted a couple of those on the call today. So, 11 months ago, but I would tell you, we're very confident in continuing to integrate this company, and the teams are very focused to continue to discover opportunities to get cost out and operate more efficiently and drive value back to our shareholders and also to our clients.

Joseph Foresi - Cantor Fitzgerald Securities

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Okay. And my second question, Gary, can you talk about where you're seeing the most strength in that 4Q sales quarter and provide just a little bit more color on the I&W business for 2017? Thanks.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, well, we're trying to help everybody kind of understand the new norm in our product portfolio mix. When you really look at the Institutional/Wholesale side, it's always going to have a strong quarter in Q4. And that's very traditional with license businesses. You've got people wrapping up their budget years. They're wanting to sign on and license products and get projects kicked off so that they can then get deployed throughout the next year. So, you'll always see Q4 being a heavier weight on Institutional/Wholesale. Frankly, we saw it across the board in that group. I mean very strong production out of the asset management group, out of a lot of our risk and compliance solutions. So, we're just very pleased with where that revenue flowed in, and frankly, the results of the team. I think some of it is we are starting to get cross-sell and upsell across the SunGard portfolio, which would push that growth rate a little higher. The leadership team has done excellent. The sales team consolidating that. We've got a fantastic sales leader over that group and really driving the team appropriately. So, it really came in as expected, but from that standpoint, with regards to the quarter, but it was across all the major business lines.

Joseph Foresi - Cantor Fitzgerald Securities

Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question will come from the line of Jim Schneider from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. James Schneider - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I was wondering if you could maybe talk – and apologize if I missed this before – talk a little bit about the magnitude of the impacts that the customer consolidation is going to have on your results in IFS, please.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

We don't have a specific one. We talked about in May, if you look back to the guide, we talked about in May, what would drive to the lower end of the 3% to 6% and what would drive you to the higher end of the 3% to 6%. Continued higher levels of consolidation would drive you towards the lower end and that's where we're at. We're still at a high level of consolidation and there's very little to no de novo activity in the marketplace.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Right. James Schneider - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Fair enough. And then can you maybe just remind us about in terms of the outlook for the kind of capital markets, focused business, and GFS, whether you're basically assuming the same level of capital markets activity as you saw in Q4? Or are you assuming that maybe it's at a lower normalized clip and maybe as you saw back in the first quarter of 2016? Just trying to get a handle on that piece.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

The business, as I talked about earlier, Jim, the business really does run. It's got a seasonality effect to it. So you'll see the quarters of I&W behave very much like they did last year. We did have a very large license fee on a renewal in Q1 last year. You won't see that repeat. But that's just due to timing of the renewal. Frankly, the business, the pipelines are very strong, but expect the seasonality in this business to follow very similar to what you saw in 2016. So once again, this year we'll have a very large Q4, heavily weighted around license fees, which is traditional in the business, but the other quarters will follow pretty much in alignment with last year's. James Schneider - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question will come from the line of Dan Perlin from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Daniel Perlin - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Thanks. I want to follow up on that a little bit. So, IFS running at the low end of the guidance range. Woody, you're just saying that's a function of consolidation that's pushed it down to that? And then, how do you reconcile that with the commentary around increased competition coming in? If you're talking about new startups and fintech money, these are not huge companies. Are they pressuring your pricing or are they actually winning business or like – I'm just trying to reconcile why that would be the case?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

I think the broader commentary is really going to be around continued consolidation. You've seen IFS running in the lower end of that for a few years. We've got some tailwinds specifically this year in EMV and the people-based project. But we think that that lower end, that 3% to 4% zone, is where you're at really given consolidation being the broader driver there.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Dan, just to build on that. I mean you're really seeing consolidation run 5% to 6% per year, no de novo activity. We've only had two de novos, what, since 2010. So, you really have no additional customers coming in. The new disruptors – I want to be careful about that – we're not seeing an increased level of competition in 2017 that we didn't see in 2016. So, the reality is we do, as we've talked about for years, see pricing compression in this segment, but I would tell you when you look at our guide for 2017, there really is no material changes in expectations from our standpoint. We're not materially seeing increased competition over 2016 or increased pricing compression. We're also not seeing a decline. We haven't modeled the decline in compression. And as we talked about in May that just naturally pushes IFS to the lower end of that range we gave. We think the guide says, as Woody said, conservative for the year because, frankly, we want to make sure that we have something we're very comfortable in meeting. But we haven't seen any material shift in it but it is the fact. That's what's going on in the industries right now.

Daniel Perlin - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Okay. And can you just outline again for me this one quarter, first quarter 2017, kind of drawdown relative to the consensus numbers? What are the main drivers of that again? I mean, obviously, we've got some stuff with PSF (45:08). Our model reflected that. So, it was still a little bit lower than that. So can you hit me with like the top three major drivers to that difficult comp again, please?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yes. You had a people-based services project in IFS that was completed in the third quarter that won't recur in the first quarter. You've got accelerated EMV growth in first quarter of 2016 that will be a difficult grow over in 2017, and we had a large license renewal in the I&W, the Institutional and Wholesale Group, and global trading that will not recur in the first quarter. Those are the three biggies that are headwinds for Q1.

Daniel Perlin - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Okay. That's super helpful, and then the last question from me. To the extent that banks do pivot a bit away from their kind of regulatory mentality and framework – and I understand they got to still spend on that, but they're going to pivot more towards growth at some point. And the question I have is, do you think your product portfolio from a competitive position is well suited for that pivot? Or are you thinking about using some of that capital now that you've divested this asset to look for some tuck-in to maybe satisfy what the banks' growths are going to be? Thanks.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah. Now, in 2017, certainly, let's answer your first question, we believe we've got the strongest solutions suite in the industry, in both Retail Banking Payments and Institutional/Wholesale. So, we're very confident in the capability. Frankly, the sale of public sector, we disclosed that as we were pulling together the SunGard acquisition. We said we're going to look at our non-strategic assets and see if we can find a more strategic home for those assets because they don't fit in the company, so that's just us following a very focused strategy and deployment. When we look around, are there going to be some tuck-ins that need to be occur? Frankly, we don't have those on the whiteboard at this point. We see some investment that we're making in our products. I highlighted the stuff we're doing around our private cloud deployment that's going very well. We also have very, very strong growth in our digital capabilities. Some of our next generation payment capabilities as highlighted with BP are doing very well. But even in our traditional businesses, we continue to sign and take share. So, we're very comfortable with our product suite. We're very comfortable where we compete. And so, 2017, we're going to look to repeat what we did in 2016 with that and sell very aggressively in the market.

Daniel Perlin - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Next question comes from the line of George Mihalos from Cowen. Please go ahead. George Mihalos - Cowen & Co. LLC: Great. Thanks for taking my question, guys. Woody, just wanted to go back, I think it was to Ashwin's question. If you could just maybe clarify what your outlook is now, not to jump the gun, but for 2018, given the divestiture in 2017 and your outlook for sort of continued double-digit growth in EPS?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

I'm glad you asked the question because I think I actually misspoke to on Ashwin's question. I want to make sure we've got it clear. This year we've got a $4.15 to $4.30 range I just outlined. We believe we can grow that 13% to 18% in 2018, which I still think that collective will imply $4.65, $4.68 to almost $5.00. That guidance has stayed intact. What I was trying to isolate was PS&E around the original guide would be difficult. But our range of $4.15 to $4.30 should grow 13% to 18% in 2018, to be clear. I think I misspoke earlier. I'm glad you asked the question to clarify. George Mihalos - Cowen & Co. LLC: Great, thanks. Thanks for that. That's very helpful. Just two quick ones, if I can sneak in. Firstly, just again to be clear, the organic revenue outlook to 2% to 3% for 2017, that's off a $9.2 billion number adjusted for the sale? And then the consulting business, should that grow in line to the 4% to 5% you're looking for for overall GFS growth? Thank you.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, the reported number, $9.2 billion, $9.241 billion is the base to grow off of. Again, you have got three moving parts. You've got the sale of PS&E of about 3 points negative. You've got our deferred revenue acquisition adjustment from the SunGard acquisition, and then we've got about a $75 million expected headwind from FX. So, you definitely got that right in terms of your base there.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah. To add, as far as on the consulting business, as we talked about, George, in prior remarks, very comfortable with the leadership team, very comfortable of the refocus back towards transformational consulting engagements going very well. Certainly, as we talked about on prior calls, that business will continue to grow in alignment with FIS's numbers going forward so very complementary to our solution set, engaging them in opportunities where we also have product penetration, and that's working very well.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And our final question comes from the line of Ramsey El-Assal from Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Ramsey El-Assal - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies. Please go ahead

Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to get your perspective on how to think about the future of your non-strategic assets, the check in the commercial business, granted the growth profiles, they're probably not as attractive as the PS&G (sic) [PS&E] (50:50) business. But are you attempting to divest them? Is that something we should think about as more permanent or something that may go away at some point?

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Ramsey, it's a good question. We've talked about it a lot. Certainly, we wanted to isolate our non-strategic businesses for our investors so they could get some transparency around it. What remains in that business is our former – our Certegy Check business, which we all know what's going on with the declines around checks, especially at the point of sale. You've also got a global commercial services business, which is really just IT infrastructure sales, both of them a non-strategic force at this time. In a perfect world, if there was a valid divestiture to be had, certainly, we would do that. But we're also, at FIS, we're not going to make a bad business decision. Frankly, we've got good leadership over both of those groups, very focused on serving the clients. And so, they'll deal with the macro issues that they're facing very effectively. But if there was an opportunity that presented itself and it made financial sense, we absolutely would consider it.

Ramsey El-Assal - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies. Please go ahead

Okay. I noticed that the retail check processing organic growth rate in the quarter was positive. Is there a pass there? Is that something that we should expect to continue or was there some driver there that sort of bounced it positive just this quarter?

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Pure play, holiday play. You always see a bump in Q4 around the holidays because you see some volumes come in and nothing more than that.

Ramsey El-Assal - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies. Please go ahead

Okay.

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

We still expect that to be a decliner over time.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, absolutely.

Ramsey El-Assal - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies. Please go ahead

Got it. Okay. And then last quick one from me, when should we contemplate you guys potentially getting back in the market with buybacks? Is that something we could see towards the end of this year or is that more of a future-looking thing?

James Woodall - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Yeah, we tried to add some color around the commentary. We believe we'll be able to prepay all our prepayable debt in 2017 and still generate excess cash flow that in late 2017 and into 2018, we could be buying back shares.

Ramsey El-Assal - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies. Please go ahead

All right. Got it. That's all for me. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And please go ahead.

Gary A. Norcross - Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.

Management

Thank you for joining us today, for your questions and your continued interest in FIS. We are very pleased with our results, concluding a very strong year of performance and earnings growth. We had a solid pipeline heading into 2017, and we are confident in our strategy and our business model. This provides us continued belief in our ability to consistently execute and deliver tangible value to both our clients and shareholders. Thank you to our loyal clients who depend on and trust us to keep their businesses competitive every day. Thank you also to our FIS leaders and our more than 55,000 employees around the globe for their hard work and commitment. It's because of them that FIS continues to empower the financial world. Thank you for joining us today.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this conference will be available for replay after 11:00 AM today through February 21, 2017. You may access the AT&T TeleConference replay system at any time by dialing 1-800-475-6701 and entering the access code of 414535. International participants, please dial 320-365-3844. Those numbers again are 1-800-475-6701 and 320-365-3844 with an access code of 414535. That does conclude our conference for today. Thanks for your participation and for using AT&T Executive TeleConference. You may now disconnect.