Brian Schell
Analyst · Dan Perlin from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead
Thanks, Rahul, and good day everyone. As noted in our press release, our Q3 2024 GAAP results reflect revenues of $1.466 billion, net income of $164 million, and diluted earnings per share of $0.65. Our adjusted non-GAAP results include revenues of $1.467 billion, an increase of 7.3% over Q3 2023, and adjusted diluted EPS of $1.29, a 10.3% increase over Q3 2023. The adjusted revenue increase of $100 million over Q3 2023 was primarily driven by incremental revenue contributions from the WIT alternatives, GIDS and Intralink businesses. Acquisitions contributed $8 million with about $4 million attributable to Battea, and foreign exchange had a favorable impact of approximately $5 million. As a result, adjusted organic revenue growth on a constant currency basis was 6.4%. Our core expenses increased 6.8% or $58 million excluding acquisitions and on a constant currency basis. Adjusted consolidated EBITDA was $566 million or 38.6% of adjusted revenue, an increase of $32 million or 6% from Q3 2023. Net interest expense for the third quarter of 2024 was $110 million, a decrease of $11 million from Q3 2023. Adjusted net income was $327 million, up 10%, and adjusted diluted EPS was $1.29, an increase of 10.3%. The effective tax rate used for adjusted net income was 26%. An increase in the average share price drove the diluted share count up to 254.1 million from 252.3 million at Q2 ‘24. SSNC ended the third quarter with $694.7 million in cash and cash equivalents and $7.2 billion in gross debt. The higher-than-normal cash balance reflects opportunistic borrowing that will be deployed during the fourth quarter. SSNC’s net debt, as defined in our credit agreement, which excludes cash and cash equivalents of $159 million held at DomaniRx was $6.7 billion. Our last 12-month consolidated EBITDA used for covenant compliance was $2,279 billion. Based on net debt of approximately $6.7 billion, our total leverage ratio was 2.9 times. As we look forward to the fourth quarter and the remainder of the year with respect to guidance, note that we will continue to focus on client service and assume that retention rates will remain in the range of our most recent results. We will continue to manage our expenses with a cost disciplined approach by controlling and aligning variable expenses to ensure efficiency, increasing productivity to improve our operating margins and leverage our scale and create capacity and effectively investing in the business through marketing and sales and R&D to take advantage of future growth opportunities. Specifically, we have assumed foreign currency exchange and interest rates to remain at current levels. A tax rate of approximately 26% on an adjusted basis, which is unchanged from prior guidance, capital expenditures to be 4.1% to 4.5% of revenues, which is also unchanged from prior guidance, and a stronger weighting to share repurchases versus debt reduction, subject to changes in market conditions or financing needs. For the fourth quarter of 2024, we expect revenue to be in the range of $1.46 billion to $1.5 billion and 2.4% organic revenue growth at the midpoint; adjusted net income in the range of $329 million to $345 million; interest expense, excluding amortization of deferred financing costs and original issue discount, in the range of $110 million to $112 million; diluted shares in the range of 254.6 million to 255.6 million; and adjusted diluted EPS in the range of $1.29 to $1.35. For the full year 2024, we expect revenue to be in the range of $5.815 billion to $5.855 billion and 4.9% organic revenue growth at the midpoint; adjusted net income in the range of $1.299 billion to $1.315 billion; diluted shares in the range of 253.6 million to 253.8 million; adjusted diluted EPS in the range of $5.12 to $5.18; and cash from operating activities to be in the range of $1.33 billion to $1.37 billion. And now back to Bill.