NYSE:EVR Evercore Q1 2024 Earnings Report $233.14 +16.24 (+7.49%) Closing price 03:59 PM EasternExtended Trading$232.94 -0.20 (-0.09%) As of 04:39 PM Eastern Extended trading is trading that happens on electronic markets outside of regular trading hours. This is a fair market value extended hours price provided by Polygon.io. Learn more. Earnings HistoryForecast Evercore EPS ResultsActual EPS$2.13Consensus EPS $2.20Beat/MissMissed by -$0.07One Year Ago EPSN/AEvercore Revenue ResultsActual Revenue$585.00 millionExpected Revenue$652.70 millionBeat/MissMissed by -$67.70 millionYoY Revenue GrowthN/AEvercore Announcement DetailsQuarterQ1 2024Date4/24/2024TimeN/AConference Call DateWednesday, April 24, 2024Conference Call Time8:00AM ETUpcoming EarningsEvercore's Q2 2025 earnings is scheduled for Wednesday, July 23, 2025, with a conference call scheduled at 8:00 AM ET. Check back for transcripts, audio, and key financial metrics as they become available.Conference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptPress Release (8-K)Quarterly Report (10-Q)Earnings HistoryCompany ProfilePowered by Evercore Q1 2024 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrApril 24, 2024 ShareLink copied to clipboard.There are 10 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good morning, and welcome to the Evercore First Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is scheduled to last about 1 hour, including remarks by Evercore Management and the question and answer session. I will now turn the call over to Katie Hafer, Managing Director of Investor Relations and ESG at Evercore. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:00:35Thank you, operator. Good morning and thank you for joining us today for Evercore's Q1 2024 financial results conference call. I'm Katie Haber, Evercore's Head of Investor Relations and ESG. Joining me on the call today is John Weinberg, our Chairman and CEO and Tim Lalonde, our CFO. After our prepared remarks, we will open up the call for questions. Speaker 100:00:55Earlier today, we issued a press release announcing Evercore's Q1 2024 financial results. Our discussion of our results today is complementary to the press release, which is available on our website at evercore.com. This conference call is being webcast live in the For Investors section of our website and an archive of it will be available for 30 days beginning approximately 1 hour after the conclusion of this call. During the course of this conference call, we may make a number of forward looking statements. Any forward looking statements that we make are subject to various risks and uncertainties and there are important factors that could cause actual outcomes to differ materially from those indicated in these statements. Speaker 100:01:32These factors include, but are not limited to those in Evercore's filings with the SEC, including our annual report on Form 10 ks, quarterly reports on Form 10 Q and current reports on Form 8 ks. I want to remind you that the company assumes no duty to update any forward looking statements. In our presentation today, unless otherwise indicated, we will be discussing adjusted financial measures, which are non GAAP measures, which we believe are meaningful when evaluating the company's performance. For detailed disclosures on these measures and the GAAP reconciliations, you should refer to the financial data contained within our press release, which is posted on our website. We continue to believe that it is important to evaluate Evercore's performance on an annual basis. Speaker 100:02:12As we have noted previously, our results for any particular quarter are influenced by the timing of transaction closing. I will now turn the call over Speaker 200:02:19to John. Thank you, Katie, and good morning, everyone. We've started 2024 on a strong note, having advised on 5 of the 15 largest global deals announced in the Q1. Based on the current competitive landscape and our success so far this year in announced transactions, eviCore finished the Q1 among all firms ranked 4th in the global league tables and 3rd in the U. S. Speaker 200:02:46Consistent with our commentary from a few months ago, we continue to see momentum build as client activity levels remain high. Additionally, the dollar value of industry wide global deal announcements, particularly of larger size transactions has increased. We also continue to see the broader market environment improve, including significantly increased equity issuance and leveraged finance volumes indicating better financing availability for transactions. This has led to a further build of our backlogs. That said, activity levels in smaller to midsized transactions have been less robust and while it is encouraging to see a significant increase in larger deals, the timeline to close these transactions can be longer and the process more complex. Speaker 200:03:36As for sponsor activity, we've seen sizable transactions in April and we believe sponsor activity should continue to gain momentum. We continue to watch the trajectory of interest rates, which may have some impact. Overall, our Q1 financial results do not yet meaningfully reflect the improvement in the announcement activity levels, which we expect to see realized in revenue later this year and into next. That said, we continue to closely monitor the geopolitical, economic and regulatory environment, which could further alter the trajectory of the recovery. As we have discussed at length last year, we hired our largest class of Investment Banking Senior Managing Directors in the firm's history, and we are pleased to have all 11 new SMDs now at Evercore, including one who joined us in January who covers the real estate sector. Speaker 200:04:35Building on that momentum, we recently hired an investment banking SMD who has committed to join later this quarter to cover the asset management sector. We will continue to recruit A plus talent into areas where we see significant opportunities, including those of geographic, sector and product white space. We currently have a strong pipeline of high quality candidates, though it is too early in the year to know the outcome of many of these discussions. In addition to our externally hired SMDs, we started the year off with a class of 7 promoted investment banking SMDs. This newly promoted group coupled with our other ramping SMDs continue to be critical to our future growth. Speaker 200:05:21In our equities business, 3 SMDs have joined, including our Chief Strategist of International Political Affairs and Public Policy, our new Head of Sales and a senior analyst covering semiconductors. Now, let me briefly discuss the quarter. There were several highlights in our investment banking business during the Q1. We advised on some of the most notable transactions that have been announced year to date, including General Electric on its spin off of GE Vernova for 37,000,000,000 Synopsys on a $35,000,000,000 acquisition of ANSYS, CD and R on its acquisition alongside Stone Point Capital of Truist Insurance from Truist Financial for $15,500,000,000 Global Infrastructure Partners on its $12,500,000,000 sale to BlackRock and Chesapeake Energy on its $11,300,000,000 combination with Southwestern Energy. Our European advisory team had a slower start to the year and deal closing timelines remain elongated compared to years past. Speaker 200:06:37However, we are seeing an encouraging pickup in deal announcement activity and we expect that to be significantly more heavily weighted in our results toward the second half of the year. Our strategic defense and shareholder advisory business started the year on an active note as the team continues to maintain leadership in many high profile defenses and expand its footprint. The momentum in our liability management and restructuring practice has continued in the Q1. While credit markets have been accommodative, lower quality credit still face financing challenges, which will continue to drive activity. Our private capital advisory and fundraising groups have had an active start and the pipeline continues to grow. Speaker 200:07:26While the fundraising environment industry wide has faced some headwinds, our business has performed well. Our teams once again continue to be recognized for their achievements, including having been named Secondaries Advisor of the Year in the Americas and Europe and Placement Agent of the Year by Private Equity International. Turning to underwriting, both the market and Evercore have seen a robust return of activity in the market generally and the beginning of a recovery among IPOs. Our first quarter results in this business represented our best quarter since the Q4 of 2021. Our activity in the quarter was diversified across sectors, including healthcare, tech and consumer. Speaker 200:08:11Evercore was a book runner on 2 of the 3 largest IPOs in the quarter, including Asteria Labs' $820,000,000 offering, which is the best performing IPO year to date among IPOs greater than $50,000,000 Our equities business had a solid quarter despite operating in a market with the lowest levels of volatility to start the year since 2017. Our sales and trading teams remain highly engaged with our clients, especially with our increased ECM activity. Our research analysts continue to produce some of the best content on Wall Street and hosted numerous high impact and 13,000,000,000 and long term performance and client retention rates remain very strong. Looking forward, we remain optimistic. We have a stronger and deeper team of professionals than at any time in our history. Speaker 200:09:14The economy to date has been more stable and resilient than broadly anticipated, though we continue to monitor it closely. The capital raising environment has shown signs of strengthening and we are experiencing a pickup in transaction activity. This environment should provide a solid foundation for Evercore as we continue to execute on our strategy and we believe we are well positioned for sustained growth and success in the medium and long term. With that, let me now turn it over to Tim, who will discuss our financial results in more detail. Speaker 300:09:47Thank you, John. Through the end of the Q1, we saw several themes play many of which we have discussed on our previous earnings call. Global announced M and A activity on a dollar volume basis in the Q1 was up 42% year over year and U. S. M and A volume on the same basis was up 81%. Speaker 300:10:09Larger transactions have led the way. With the total number of deals announced globally above $100,000,000 down 7%, but the number of announced deals over $1,000,000,000 is up 47%. Evercore has played a meaningful role in that with, as John said, advising on 5 of the 15 largest global transactions year to date. Our larger announced transactions are generally expected to close in the latter part of this year and into the following year. Given this dynamic, our Q1 financial results do not yet fully reflect the increased momentum we are experiencing. Speaker 300:10:52Overall, we continue to feel positive about the trajectory of the broader M and A, Capital Markets and financing environment as our backlogs continue to build, and we expect to see greater revenue strength in the second half of this year and into the next year. I will now discuss our Q1 financial results. For the Q1 of 2024, net revenues, operating income and EPS on a GAAP basis were $581,000,000 80 $4,000,000 $2.09 per share respectively. My comments from here will focus on non GAAP metrics, which we believe are useful when evaluating our results. Our standard GAAP reporting and a reconciliation of GAAP to adjusted results can be found in our press release, which is on our website. Speaker 300:11:49Our first quarter adjusted net revenues of $587,000,000 increased 2% versus the Q1 of 2023. 1st quarter adjusted operating income of $91,000,000 decreased 22% versus the Q1 of 2023. Adjusted earnings per share of $2.13 decreased 1% versus the Q1 of last year. Our adjusted operating margin was 15% for the Q1, in line with our operating margin in the last couple of quarters, and we had a net tax benefit this quarter for which we will provide additional commentary. Turning to the businesses. Speaker 300:12:381st quarter adjusted advisory fees of $431,000,000 declined 7% year over year. While our advisory fees were lower versus the prior year period, we believe the trajectory of the business today is much better than a year ago. After 2 difficult years, our first quarter underwriting revenues were $56,000,000 up 143% from a year ago. Commissions and related revenue of $48,000,000 in the Q1 was flat year over year, primarily reflecting higher subscription fees, partially offset by lower trading commissions. 1st quarter adjusted asset management and administration fees of $20,000,000 increased 17% year over year, primarily reflecting an increase in AUM. Speaker 300:13:351st quarter adjusted other revenue net was approximately $33,000,000 which compares to $27,000,000 a year ago. The primary driver of the other revenue reflects higher interest income earned on short term investments. The balance primarily reflects gains in our investment funds portfolio, which is used as a hedge for our DCCP commitments as equity market values increased in the quarter. Turning to expenses. The adjusted compensation ratio for the Q1 is 66%. Speaker 300:14:14It is still early in the year, and so this figure represents our best current estimate based on things like expected revenue, headcount, market levels of compensation at year end and other relevant factors. But our visibility on full year revenues at this point in the year is still limited. It is important to note, however, that we are striving to make improvements in our compensation ratio and to appropriately balance this with our plan to continue building the firm in an effort to best serve our clients and create value for our shareholders in the medium and long term. Shifting to non compensation expenses, they were $109,000,000 this quarter, up 14% from a year ago and up 2% from last quarter. The increase from a year ago is primarily driven by 3 things. Speaker 300:15:10First, professional fees increased, reflecting higher client related expenses, including certain billable fees, which were collected but not offset in this expense line. 2nd, travel and related fees reflected an increase in client engagements and consequently an increase in the number of flight and hotel bookings in this quarter compared to a year ago. As we have said previously, though we work hard to manage our expenses, increased activity with our clients is a good thing and we expect to see a corresponding increase in revenues. 3rd, communications and information services expense increased due to continued investment in IT services to support firm growth, including certain technology initiatives, as well as higher license and research fees. However, to provide some perspective, I would mention 2 things. Speaker 300:16:121st, our non comp expenses have been roughly correlated with our employee headcount. And on that basis, our non comp expense per employee is up from the Q1 of 2019, the pre COVID year, about 5.6% or a little more than 1% per year. 2nd, we anticipate that our full year non comp expense ratio should be consistent with or compare favorably to our pre COVID non comp expense ratio. Our adjusted tax rate for the quarter was a benefit of 9.3% compared to an expense of 15.2% in the Q1 of last year. The tax rate for this quarter reflects a tax benefit associated with the vesting of stock compensation awards similar to a year ago and most prior years prior to that, which is why our Q1 effective tax rate typically is lower than that of subsequent quarters. Speaker 300:17:20This year, we received a greater benefit as our stock price appreciation was higher than last year, and in fact, than in any prior year. We would anticipate that our effective tax rate for the remaining three quarters of this year should be similar to what we have experienced in prior years in those periods. Turning to our balance sheet. As of March 31, our cash investment securities totaled nearly $1,400,000,000 which is down approximate from approximately 2,000,000,000 at the end of last year due to the payout of bonus compensation in March and repurchase of 1,500,000 shares. We continue to maintain a strong cash position, taking into consideration the current economic and business environment, cash needs for the implementation of our strategic initiatives, including hiring plans and preserving a solid financial footing. Speaker 300:18:23We remain committed to our goal of returning excess capital to our shareholders. In the Q1, we returned a total of $309,000,000 to shareholders through dividends and repurchases of 1,500,000 shares at an average price of $177.04 Consistent with historic practice, in the quarter, we bought back stock through net settlements and in the open market, offsetting the dilution from the RSU grants that were issued in the quarter as part of our annual bonus compensation process. Additionally, our Board declared a dividend of $0.80 per share, an increase of 5% from the prior dividend declared. Our first quarter diluted share count was 43,700,000 essentially flat from the prior year and prior quarter. As John mentioned, it is still early in the year, but we are pleased with our position thus far. Speaker 300:19:32Based on our increased backlogs and building on the momentum from announcements in the last couple of quarters, we have confidence in the trajectory of the market recovery and in our results as the year progresses. We also expect to see improvement in our comp and non comp ratios this year and into the future. We believe we are well positioned to continue to execute on our strategy and deliver strong performance. With that, we will now open the line for questions. Operator00:20:07Thank you. The floor is now open for your questions. Our first question will come from Devin Ryan with Citizens JMP. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:20:39Hey, thanks. Good morning, Jonathan. How are you? Speaker 300:20:43Good. Speaker 400:20:45Good. I Speaker 300:20:47just want to ask Speaker 400:20:47a question digging a little bit more around what you're seeing in the sponsor community. So I know in prepared remarks you talked about sponsor activity picking up, but then on the other hand interest rates could play a factor. So just wanted to talk a little bit about what you're seeing with that client segment and how much the mood has shifted with sponsors just with maybe the view that we're going to be in a higher for longer interest rate environment and how that's kind of evolved over the last few months? So just like how the tone has changed with that group and whether their enthusiasm has been shifting with that interest rate change as well? Thanks. Speaker 200:21:30Thank you, Devin. It's interesting. I think the sponsor community is becoming more set on moving forward than has been in the past. And I think part of it is that there's just an intensity level that they need to get back to business. I think that there is clearly going to be a higher for longer that there is that people are looking at. Speaker 200:21:55But I think that there's a lot of dynamics in and around the sponsor population that really is going to play into how the deals go forward. And I think our observation would be that there is the activity levels are very high and there is a real intention to start making things happen. One very important factor is the LP community, which really is very much of the view that they would like to see transactions happen and get some capital returned, frankly, so they can put capital back to work. It's been a long time since they've really had really healthy returns and they really need that. GPs are thinking about how they raise funds. Speaker 200:22:36And I think generally there is a view that it's important to start really showing activity. As you know, there's about $3,800,000,000,000 of dry capital ready to go. And I think that really the sponsors are feeling like they need to move. Our experience with the sponsors is that there's a level of intensity and intention that we haven't seen for quite some time. So our view is that it's going to pick up. Speaker 200:23:06Clearly, rates will have some impact. I certainly don't want to paint the picture that that's not important. But I think that there are some other factors that play here that are going to make sponsors push much harder. Speaker 400:23:21Yes, that's great color. Thanks, John. Operator00:23:26Thank you. Our next question will come from Brennan Hawken with UBS. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:23:33Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I'd like to clarify on Tim's comments on the non comp ratio. So when you say pre COVID, if I take a look at the average of years 2013 to 2019, I get to about 17%. Is that the sort of approach that you would suggest? Speaker 500:23:55Or were you looking at a narrower band of years and how should we interpret that? Thanks. Speaker 300:24:01Yes. And thanks for the question, Brennan. If you look at the pre COVID years, it bounced around a bit and some of it depends on how the revenue is. And honestly, we think we can do better than that is what we're anticipating. Speaker 600:24:19Okay. Speaker 500:24:20So we should more It's Speaker 300:24:20going to depend of course to where the revenues fall out, right? Because that's part of the equation, but we think we can do better than that. Speaker 500:24:31Okay. Okay. So we should more think about it like the range of the pre COVID years rather than like just a single Speaker 600:24:37average? Yes. Speaker 300:24:38Okay. Speaker 600:24:38Thanks for clarifying. Operator00:24:44Thank you. Our next question will come from Steven Chubak with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead. Speaker 700:24:51Good morning. This is Brendan O'Brien filling in for Steven. So I guess I just want to touch on the election. I mean, last quarter, it sounded like you and your peers have yet to see the election have any noticeable impact on your dialogues with clients. However, with the election at least in the U. Speaker 700:25:07S. Now just 7 months away, I want to get a sense as to whether that has changed at all and if you see any risk of the election having a dampening effect on M and A activity in the back half of the year? Speaker 200:25:22It's always hard to look forward that far. Having said that, if you look at past elections, they haven't really had a major impact on the merger market generally. Now that can always change and this could be different. Our premise really in the way we're thinking about the world is that it's not going to change with respect to how people think. Now there are other factors that we are looking at very closely, whether it's how the market performs, the geopolitical stability, how we know what's going to happen with inflation. Speaker 200:25:56Those are all things that are important. And obviously, interest rates, which we've already mentioned, will be something that I think will have a real impact. But with respect to the election, we're not looking for that to have really major game changing impact. Speaker 700:26:15Great. Thanks for taking my question. Operator00:26:20Thank you. Our next question will come from James Yaro with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Speaker 600:26:25Good morning and thanks for taking my You did talk about continued strength in restructuring in the quarter. Maybe if you could just help us contextualize your outlook for this business over the course of the balance of 2024 and maybe it's 2025 given higher for longer interest rates? Speaker 200:26:43Our view on restructuring has been consistent, which is it's a very strong business for us and it's continuing that way. And higher for longer, obviously, will impact the business in a positive way. But even when we thought that rates were going to go down, a very big part of our business is liability management. There are many companies that really have capital structures built on very low interest rate environments and some of those are coming up for refinancing. And so the liability management side of the business is going to continue strong and really from the prospects that we see in our backlogs continuing along at the pace where we feel very comfortable that they're going to continue to perform at a high level. Speaker 200:27:32So as we look at our projections and we're looking at how things are going, we believe the business will continue along the path of being quite strong. Speaker 500:27:44Thank you. Operator00:27:52We'll go next to Ryan Kenny with Morgan Stanley. Speaker 800:27:56Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. Just wanted to dig in a little bit on the comp ratio side and the comment around aiming to improve this year. Is that an improvement from last year's level or from the Q1 level? And how should we think about the likelihood of comp ratio maybe decreasing in the back half of the year as revenues pick up? Speaker 300:28:16Right. So let me just expand my commentary a little bit around the comp ratio. And so we talked about it being kind of generally similar to our full year estimate based on what we know today and more importantly as our best estimate of depend heavily on the timing and magnitude of improvement in revenue, among other factors, which also of course include things like headcount, market level of comp for non partners and so on. But we are committed to making progress on our comp ratio. We're intending to balance that objective with our plan to continue building the firm. Speaker 300:29:11And as I said, where we land at the end of the year is largely going to be a function of the strength of the revenue in the latter part, which is not perfectly knowable at this point. Speaker 800:29:31Thanks. Operator00:29:35Thank you. Our next question comes from Aidan Hall with KBW. Please go ahead. Speaker 900:29:41Great. Thanks for taking my question. Just wanted to dig in on the recruiting commentary. It sounds like conversations remain robust. But I guess can you just give us a better sense of your expectations on the SMD hiring front as it relates to the remainder of the year? Speaker 900:29:58And as we think of building pipelines across the industry, how that might maybe elongate some of the recruiting timelines? Thanks. Speaker 200:30:11Thanks for the question. And obviously, we focus a great deal on recruiting and really making sure that we continue that momentum of the organization and our growth. The pipeline is from our standpoint for us is robust, although I would say that there is it's really hard to know exactly where that's going to come out. It's recruiting and the numbers of people we bring in is more of an output than an input, meaning that really we have a very strong set of dialogues going on with some very talented people. And it's hard to know which ones are going to actually land. Speaker 200:30:51I would say that if you're trying to figure out where we are is we're going to continue to look for A plus talent in areas where we think there's real significant growth ahead for us. We've always what we said in the past is 4 to 8 that last year as you know we went to 11. We're not going to be constrained by any number, but we think we'll have a good year this year and we're very much in the middle of many different dialogues that we think are with very strong people. So I think you can assume that we're not going to change dramatically. Speaker 900:31:35Great. Appreciate the color. Operator00:31:39Thank you. We do have a follow-up question from James Yaro with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Speaker 600:31:44Thanks for taking the follow-up. Just a quick one on the advisory revenue quarter on quarter decline this quarter. So I think this did appear somewhat weaker than the publicly available data, which is all that we have to go on. And I think your quarterly spend is a little bit weaker than some of the peers that have reported so far. So maybe you could just help us understand what the drivers were? Speaker 600:32:05Was that M and A? Or was there some other business that slowed down relative to to Q4? And then anything that you could just add on the pull forward of revenue into the Q4 and then again into the Q1? And maybe that would help explain some of those moving parts? Speaker 200:32:21Sure. Well, as you know, the business is quite lumpy for us. And what you really will see if you look at it quarter to quarter is hard because several big transactions or 3 or 4 big transactions can change a lot. And I would just generally say activity levels for us are high. Our backlogs are robust and strong. Speaker 200:32:46And really anywhere you look across our systems, the dialogs internally are very, very active. Engagement letters conflict checks, very strong. Last quarter, Europe had a lumpy quarter the quarter before, which was strong. And last quarter, they were relatively weaker. But I would say that that would not that's not an indication of the strength of the business. Speaker 200:33:21It's just a fact of what happens. So I would if you're really thinking about how to think about us, I think you should really assume that we're feeling quite constructive about how we're going to go. And as we said, we could see a real build over the pipe balance of the year and then the next year in terms of both announcements and revenue. Speaker 600:33:49Very clear. Thank you. Operator00:33:53Thank you. And we'll take our next follow-up question from Brennan Hawken with UBS. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:33:59Good morning again. Thanks for taking the follow-up. Sure. Speaker 600:34:02Would love to sort of Speaker 500:34:04take a step back and hear about your perspectives. You guys have added a lot of senior banking talent. And one of the big metrics that I like to focus on is revenue per trailing MD, right? So looking at trailing 12 month MD count. And excluding the go go years of 2021 and 2, the prior high watermark was about $20,000,000 and that was in 2018. Speaker 500:34:34When you think about the level and caliber of some of these stem winding bankers, John, as you refer to them, how should we think about that productivity number? And how much upside do you think there could be in thinking about an upcoming cycle given what you've done to the team on the field? Thanks. Speaker 200:34:58Brandon, thanks for the question. And we think about a lot of the same things that you just mentioned and really kind of assess really what the impact of bringing really high quality people is with respect to our growth. We've always taken the approach and we continue to and we will continue to really take the approach that high quality talent is going to be significantly additive to the growth of the firm. We have right now 30 plus people ramping, both the high level recruits that we brought in as well as the partner promotes that we've had over the last couple of years. So we think it's going to keep going. Speaker 200:35:43In terms of the revenue per partner level, we actually think it's going to be strong. Now, will it get to the 2021 level? Maybe not immediately. Certainly, you have to have a really strong market to get to something like that. But we think that the revenue per partner is going to reflect the fact that we have a really strong high quality group of partners who are really focused on their clients right now and activity levels across the board are picking up. Speaker 200:36:14But as you know, one of the big things to think about is, are the right factors in place for the market to pick up. And those, as we've talked about before, things like CEO confidence, access to capital, stability of the markets and sponsor recovery. And if you think about it, each one of those right now looks to be pointing in the right direction. And so with those coming together in the right way, I could easily see revenue per partner levels picking up materially. Speaker 500:36:51Okay. Thanks for taking my follow-up. Operator00:36:57Our next question will come from Brian Kenny with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Speaker 800:37:03Hey, thanks for taking my follow-up. Question on underwriting. So there's a really large increase year over year, revenues more than doubled, strongest quarter in several years. Should we think of that as lumpy in the Q1, maybe it was exceptionally good for Evercore or is this a good base to build off of as underwriting activity picks up? Speaker 200:37:25It's always hard to take 1 quarter and make that be multiplied out for the year. The underwriting business tends to be somewhat lumpy, although it is building. We're feeling strength in our underwriting business and the backlogs are good. We've been involved in several and we certainly have a lot of activity going on. So I guess the best and most fair way to answer your question is, we feel very constructive. Speaker 200:37:53We think that the Q1 was a good Q1. We anticipate that throughout the next three quarters, the year will come together in a way that where we certainly outperformed last year and we think we'll feel good about really the ENDRA results. But it's very hard for me to call the shots with respect to the 2nd and third quarters at this point. But I would say that the backlog levels are very robust. Speaker 800:38:22Great. Thanks. Speaker 300:38:24Look, I think in the just to add a little bit of detail, if you look at the equity markets in terms of dollar value, issuance is up 131% over last year. So our revenues were up 143% over last year. And we're certainly not sitting here saying you should annualize what you saw in the Q1. But what we are saying is there's a noticeable change in the environment and the deals that we have seen getting priced in this last quarter have tended to have better performance both with respect to the pricing itself and to where they traded in the aftermarket. And so we're optimistic that at least those days of 2023 are kind of behind us. Speaker 800:39:17Thank you. Operator00:39:21Thank you. We have no further questions in queue at this time. I would like to turn the call back to management for any additional or closing remarks. Speaker 200:39:30Thank you all for joining us. We look forward to next quarter. Operator00:39:41And this does conclude today's Evercore First Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. You may disconnect your line at this time and have a wonderful day.Read morePowered by Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallEvercore Q1 202400:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2x Earnings DocumentsPress Release(8-K)Quarterly report(10-Q) Evercore Earnings HeadlinesIs Evercore Inc. (EVR) the Best Mid-Cap Dividend Aristocrat to Invest in Now?May 7, 2025 | insidermonkey.comBreaking Down Evercore: 9 Analysts Share Their ViewsMay 3, 2025 | nasdaq.comThis Signal Only Flashes Once Every 4 Years – And It Just TriggeredThis same signal has appeared twice before in the past 8 years — both times, it kicked off major moves in crypto. Now it’s back, and the smart money is already positioning. A free training reveals the step-by-step strategy and altcoin picks designed to help you capitalize on the next wave.May 12, 2025 | Crypto Swap Profits (Ad)Evercore Inc. (NYSE:EVR) Q1 2025 Earnings Call TranscriptMay 1, 2025 | msn.comEvercore, Inc. (EVR) Q1 2025 Earnings Call TranscriptMay 1, 2025 | seekingalpha.comEvercore Inc (EVR) Q1 2025 Earnings Call Highlights: Strong Growth Amid Market VolatilityMay 1, 2025 | finance.yahoo.comSee More Evercore Headlines Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like Evercore? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on Evercore and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About EvercoreEvercore (NYSE:EVR), together with its subsidiaries, operates as an independent investment banking advisory firm in the United States, Europe, Latin America, and internationally. It operates through two segments, Investment Banking & Equities, and Investment Management. The Investment Banking & Equities segment offers strategic advisory services, such as mergers, and acquisitions, strategic, defense, and shareholder advisory, special committee assignments, and real estate strategic advisory; private capital advisory and fundraising, market risk management and hedging, private capital markets and debt advisory, liability management and restructuring, and equity capital markets execution and advisory services; and research, sales, and trading professionals services on a content-led platform to its institutional investor clients. The Investment Management segment provides wealth management services to high-net-worth individuals, foundations, and endowments; and manages financial assets for institutional investors. The company was formerly known as Evercore Partners Inc. and changed its name to Evercore Inc. in August 2017. 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There are 10 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good morning, and welcome to the Evercore First Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is scheduled to last about 1 hour, including remarks by Evercore Management and the question and answer session. I will now turn the call over to Katie Hafer, Managing Director of Investor Relations and ESG at Evercore. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:00:35Thank you, operator. Good morning and thank you for joining us today for Evercore's Q1 2024 financial results conference call. I'm Katie Haber, Evercore's Head of Investor Relations and ESG. Joining me on the call today is John Weinberg, our Chairman and CEO and Tim Lalonde, our CFO. After our prepared remarks, we will open up the call for questions. Speaker 100:00:55Earlier today, we issued a press release announcing Evercore's Q1 2024 financial results. Our discussion of our results today is complementary to the press release, which is available on our website at evercore.com. This conference call is being webcast live in the For Investors section of our website and an archive of it will be available for 30 days beginning approximately 1 hour after the conclusion of this call. During the course of this conference call, we may make a number of forward looking statements. Any forward looking statements that we make are subject to various risks and uncertainties and there are important factors that could cause actual outcomes to differ materially from those indicated in these statements. Speaker 100:01:32These factors include, but are not limited to those in Evercore's filings with the SEC, including our annual report on Form 10 ks, quarterly reports on Form 10 Q and current reports on Form 8 ks. I want to remind you that the company assumes no duty to update any forward looking statements. In our presentation today, unless otherwise indicated, we will be discussing adjusted financial measures, which are non GAAP measures, which we believe are meaningful when evaluating the company's performance. For detailed disclosures on these measures and the GAAP reconciliations, you should refer to the financial data contained within our press release, which is posted on our website. We continue to believe that it is important to evaluate Evercore's performance on an annual basis. Speaker 100:02:12As we have noted previously, our results for any particular quarter are influenced by the timing of transaction closing. I will now turn the call over Speaker 200:02:19to John. Thank you, Katie, and good morning, everyone. We've started 2024 on a strong note, having advised on 5 of the 15 largest global deals announced in the Q1. Based on the current competitive landscape and our success so far this year in announced transactions, eviCore finished the Q1 among all firms ranked 4th in the global league tables and 3rd in the U. S. Speaker 200:02:46Consistent with our commentary from a few months ago, we continue to see momentum build as client activity levels remain high. Additionally, the dollar value of industry wide global deal announcements, particularly of larger size transactions has increased. We also continue to see the broader market environment improve, including significantly increased equity issuance and leveraged finance volumes indicating better financing availability for transactions. This has led to a further build of our backlogs. That said, activity levels in smaller to midsized transactions have been less robust and while it is encouraging to see a significant increase in larger deals, the timeline to close these transactions can be longer and the process more complex. Speaker 200:03:36As for sponsor activity, we've seen sizable transactions in April and we believe sponsor activity should continue to gain momentum. We continue to watch the trajectory of interest rates, which may have some impact. Overall, our Q1 financial results do not yet meaningfully reflect the improvement in the announcement activity levels, which we expect to see realized in revenue later this year and into next. That said, we continue to closely monitor the geopolitical, economic and regulatory environment, which could further alter the trajectory of the recovery. As we have discussed at length last year, we hired our largest class of Investment Banking Senior Managing Directors in the firm's history, and we are pleased to have all 11 new SMDs now at Evercore, including one who joined us in January who covers the real estate sector. Speaker 200:04:35Building on that momentum, we recently hired an investment banking SMD who has committed to join later this quarter to cover the asset management sector. We will continue to recruit A plus talent into areas where we see significant opportunities, including those of geographic, sector and product white space. We currently have a strong pipeline of high quality candidates, though it is too early in the year to know the outcome of many of these discussions. In addition to our externally hired SMDs, we started the year off with a class of 7 promoted investment banking SMDs. This newly promoted group coupled with our other ramping SMDs continue to be critical to our future growth. Speaker 200:05:21In our equities business, 3 SMDs have joined, including our Chief Strategist of International Political Affairs and Public Policy, our new Head of Sales and a senior analyst covering semiconductors. Now, let me briefly discuss the quarter. There were several highlights in our investment banking business during the Q1. We advised on some of the most notable transactions that have been announced year to date, including General Electric on its spin off of GE Vernova for 37,000,000,000 Synopsys on a $35,000,000,000 acquisition of ANSYS, CD and R on its acquisition alongside Stone Point Capital of Truist Insurance from Truist Financial for $15,500,000,000 Global Infrastructure Partners on its $12,500,000,000 sale to BlackRock and Chesapeake Energy on its $11,300,000,000 combination with Southwestern Energy. Our European advisory team had a slower start to the year and deal closing timelines remain elongated compared to years past. Speaker 200:06:37However, we are seeing an encouraging pickup in deal announcement activity and we expect that to be significantly more heavily weighted in our results toward the second half of the year. Our strategic defense and shareholder advisory business started the year on an active note as the team continues to maintain leadership in many high profile defenses and expand its footprint. The momentum in our liability management and restructuring practice has continued in the Q1. While credit markets have been accommodative, lower quality credit still face financing challenges, which will continue to drive activity. Our private capital advisory and fundraising groups have had an active start and the pipeline continues to grow. Speaker 200:07:26While the fundraising environment industry wide has faced some headwinds, our business has performed well. Our teams once again continue to be recognized for their achievements, including having been named Secondaries Advisor of the Year in the Americas and Europe and Placement Agent of the Year by Private Equity International. Turning to underwriting, both the market and Evercore have seen a robust return of activity in the market generally and the beginning of a recovery among IPOs. Our first quarter results in this business represented our best quarter since the Q4 of 2021. Our activity in the quarter was diversified across sectors, including healthcare, tech and consumer. Speaker 200:08:11Evercore was a book runner on 2 of the 3 largest IPOs in the quarter, including Asteria Labs' $820,000,000 offering, which is the best performing IPO year to date among IPOs greater than $50,000,000 Our equities business had a solid quarter despite operating in a market with the lowest levels of volatility to start the year since 2017. Our sales and trading teams remain highly engaged with our clients, especially with our increased ECM activity. Our research analysts continue to produce some of the best content on Wall Street and hosted numerous high impact and 13,000,000,000 and long term performance and client retention rates remain very strong. Looking forward, we remain optimistic. We have a stronger and deeper team of professionals than at any time in our history. Speaker 200:09:14The economy to date has been more stable and resilient than broadly anticipated, though we continue to monitor it closely. The capital raising environment has shown signs of strengthening and we are experiencing a pickup in transaction activity. This environment should provide a solid foundation for Evercore as we continue to execute on our strategy and we believe we are well positioned for sustained growth and success in the medium and long term. With that, let me now turn it over to Tim, who will discuss our financial results in more detail. Speaker 300:09:47Thank you, John. Through the end of the Q1, we saw several themes play many of which we have discussed on our previous earnings call. Global announced M and A activity on a dollar volume basis in the Q1 was up 42% year over year and U. S. M and A volume on the same basis was up 81%. Speaker 300:10:09Larger transactions have led the way. With the total number of deals announced globally above $100,000,000 down 7%, but the number of announced deals over $1,000,000,000 is up 47%. Evercore has played a meaningful role in that with, as John said, advising on 5 of the 15 largest global transactions year to date. Our larger announced transactions are generally expected to close in the latter part of this year and into the following year. Given this dynamic, our Q1 financial results do not yet fully reflect the increased momentum we are experiencing. Speaker 300:10:52Overall, we continue to feel positive about the trajectory of the broader M and A, Capital Markets and financing environment as our backlogs continue to build, and we expect to see greater revenue strength in the second half of this year and into the next year. I will now discuss our Q1 financial results. For the Q1 of 2024, net revenues, operating income and EPS on a GAAP basis were $581,000,000 80 $4,000,000 $2.09 per share respectively. My comments from here will focus on non GAAP metrics, which we believe are useful when evaluating our results. Our standard GAAP reporting and a reconciliation of GAAP to adjusted results can be found in our press release, which is on our website. Speaker 300:11:49Our first quarter adjusted net revenues of $587,000,000 increased 2% versus the Q1 of 2023. 1st quarter adjusted operating income of $91,000,000 decreased 22% versus the Q1 of 2023. Adjusted earnings per share of $2.13 decreased 1% versus the Q1 of last year. Our adjusted operating margin was 15% for the Q1, in line with our operating margin in the last couple of quarters, and we had a net tax benefit this quarter for which we will provide additional commentary. Turning to the businesses. Speaker 300:12:381st quarter adjusted advisory fees of $431,000,000 declined 7% year over year. While our advisory fees were lower versus the prior year period, we believe the trajectory of the business today is much better than a year ago. After 2 difficult years, our first quarter underwriting revenues were $56,000,000 up 143% from a year ago. Commissions and related revenue of $48,000,000 in the Q1 was flat year over year, primarily reflecting higher subscription fees, partially offset by lower trading commissions. 1st quarter adjusted asset management and administration fees of $20,000,000 increased 17% year over year, primarily reflecting an increase in AUM. Speaker 300:13:351st quarter adjusted other revenue net was approximately $33,000,000 which compares to $27,000,000 a year ago. The primary driver of the other revenue reflects higher interest income earned on short term investments. The balance primarily reflects gains in our investment funds portfolio, which is used as a hedge for our DCCP commitments as equity market values increased in the quarter. Turning to expenses. The adjusted compensation ratio for the Q1 is 66%. Speaker 300:14:14It is still early in the year, and so this figure represents our best current estimate based on things like expected revenue, headcount, market levels of compensation at year end and other relevant factors. But our visibility on full year revenues at this point in the year is still limited. It is important to note, however, that we are striving to make improvements in our compensation ratio and to appropriately balance this with our plan to continue building the firm in an effort to best serve our clients and create value for our shareholders in the medium and long term. Shifting to non compensation expenses, they were $109,000,000 this quarter, up 14% from a year ago and up 2% from last quarter. The increase from a year ago is primarily driven by 3 things. Speaker 300:15:10First, professional fees increased, reflecting higher client related expenses, including certain billable fees, which were collected but not offset in this expense line. 2nd, travel and related fees reflected an increase in client engagements and consequently an increase in the number of flight and hotel bookings in this quarter compared to a year ago. As we have said previously, though we work hard to manage our expenses, increased activity with our clients is a good thing and we expect to see a corresponding increase in revenues. 3rd, communications and information services expense increased due to continued investment in IT services to support firm growth, including certain technology initiatives, as well as higher license and research fees. However, to provide some perspective, I would mention 2 things. Speaker 300:16:121st, our non comp expenses have been roughly correlated with our employee headcount. And on that basis, our non comp expense per employee is up from the Q1 of 2019, the pre COVID year, about 5.6% or a little more than 1% per year. 2nd, we anticipate that our full year non comp expense ratio should be consistent with or compare favorably to our pre COVID non comp expense ratio. Our adjusted tax rate for the quarter was a benefit of 9.3% compared to an expense of 15.2% in the Q1 of last year. The tax rate for this quarter reflects a tax benefit associated with the vesting of stock compensation awards similar to a year ago and most prior years prior to that, which is why our Q1 effective tax rate typically is lower than that of subsequent quarters. Speaker 300:17:20This year, we received a greater benefit as our stock price appreciation was higher than last year, and in fact, than in any prior year. We would anticipate that our effective tax rate for the remaining three quarters of this year should be similar to what we have experienced in prior years in those periods. Turning to our balance sheet. As of March 31, our cash investment securities totaled nearly $1,400,000,000 which is down approximate from approximately 2,000,000,000 at the end of last year due to the payout of bonus compensation in March and repurchase of 1,500,000 shares. We continue to maintain a strong cash position, taking into consideration the current economic and business environment, cash needs for the implementation of our strategic initiatives, including hiring plans and preserving a solid financial footing. Speaker 300:18:23We remain committed to our goal of returning excess capital to our shareholders. In the Q1, we returned a total of $309,000,000 to shareholders through dividends and repurchases of 1,500,000 shares at an average price of $177.04 Consistent with historic practice, in the quarter, we bought back stock through net settlements and in the open market, offsetting the dilution from the RSU grants that were issued in the quarter as part of our annual bonus compensation process. Additionally, our Board declared a dividend of $0.80 per share, an increase of 5% from the prior dividend declared. Our first quarter diluted share count was 43,700,000 essentially flat from the prior year and prior quarter. As John mentioned, it is still early in the year, but we are pleased with our position thus far. Speaker 300:19:32Based on our increased backlogs and building on the momentum from announcements in the last couple of quarters, we have confidence in the trajectory of the market recovery and in our results as the year progresses. We also expect to see improvement in our comp and non comp ratios this year and into the future. We believe we are well positioned to continue to execute on our strategy and deliver strong performance. With that, we will now open the line for questions. Operator00:20:07Thank you. The floor is now open for your questions. Our first question will come from Devin Ryan with Citizens JMP. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:20:39Hey, thanks. Good morning, Jonathan. How are you? Speaker 300:20:43Good. Speaker 400:20:45Good. I Speaker 300:20:47just want to ask Speaker 400:20:47a question digging a little bit more around what you're seeing in the sponsor community. So I know in prepared remarks you talked about sponsor activity picking up, but then on the other hand interest rates could play a factor. So just wanted to talk a little bit about what you're seeing with that client segment and how much the mood has shifted with sponsors just with maybe the view that we're going to be in a higher for longer interest rate environment and how that's kind of evolved over the last few months? So just like how the tone has changed with that group and whether their enthusiasm has been shifting with that interest rate change as well? Thanks. Speaker 200:21:30Thank you, Devin. It's interesting. I think the sponsor community is becoming more set on moving forward than has been in the past. And I think part of it is that there's just an intensity level that they need to get back to business. I think that there is clearly going to be a higher for longer that there is that people are looking at. Speaker 200:21:55But I think that there's a lot of dynamics in and around the sponsor population that really is going to play into how the deals go forward. And I think our observation would be that there is the activity levels are very high and there is a real intention to start making things happen. One very important factor is the LP community, which really is very much of the view that they would like to see transactions happen and get some capital returned, frankly, so they can put capital back to work. It's been a long time since they've really had really healthy returns and they really need that. GPs are thinking about how they raise funds. Speaker 200:22:36And I think generally there is a view that it's important to start really showing activity. As you know, there's about $3,800,000,000,000 of dry capital ready to go. And I think that really the sponsors are feeling like they need to move. Our experience with the sponsors is that there's a level of intensity and intention that we haven't seen for quite some time. So our view is that it's going to pick up. Speaker 200:23:06Clearly, rates will have some impact. I certainly don't want to paint the picture that that's not important. But I think that there are some other factors that play here that are going to make sponsors push much harder. Speaker 400:23:21Yes, that's great color. Thanks, John. Operator00:23:26Thank you. Our next question will come from Brennan Hawken with UBS. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:23:33Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I'd like to clarify on Tim's comments on the non comp ratio. So when you say pre COVID, if I take a look at the average of years 2013 to 2019, I get to about 17%. Is that the sort of approach that you would suggest? Speaker 500:23:55Or were you looking at a narrower band of years and how should we interpret that? Thanks. Speaker 300:24:01Yes. And thanks for the question, Brennan. If you look at the pre COVID years, it bounced around a bit and some of it depends on how the revenue is. And honestly, we think we can do better than that is what we're anticipating. Speaker 600:24:19Okay. Speaker 500:24:20So we should more It's Speaker 300:24:20going to depend of course to where the revenues fall out, right? Because that's part of the equation, but we think we can do better than that. Speaker 500:24:31Okay. Okay. So we should more think about it like the range of the pre COVID years rather than like just a single Speaker 600:24:37average? Yes. Speaker 300:24:38Okay. Speaker 600:24:38Thanks for clarifying. Operator00:24:44Thank you. Our next question will come from Steven Chubak with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead. Speaker 700:24:51Good morning. This is Brendan O'Brien filling in for Steven. So I guess I just want to touch on the election. I mean, last quarter, it sounded like you and your peers have yet to see the election have any noticeable impact on your dialogues with clients. However, with the election at least in the U. Speaker 700:25:07S. Now just 7 months away, I want to get a sense as to whether that has changed at all and if you see any risk of the election having a dampening effect on M and A activity in the back half of the year? Speaker 200:25:22It's always hard to look forward that far. Having said that, if you look at past elections, they haven't really had a major impact on the merger market generally. Now that can always change and this could be different. Our premise really in the way we're thinking about the world is that it's not going to change with respect to how people think. Now there are other factors that we are looking at very closely, whether it's how the market performs, the geopolitical stability, how we know what's going to happen with inflation. Speaker 200:25:56Those are all things that are important. And obviously, interest rates, which we've already mentioned, will be something that I think will have a real impact. But with respect to the election, we're not looking for that to have really major game changing impact. Speaker 700:26:15Great. Thanks for taking my question. Operator00:26:20Thank you. Our next question will come from James Yaro with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Speaker 600:26:25Good morning and thanks for taking my You did talk about continued strength in restructuring in the quarter. Maybe if you could just help us contextualize your outlook for this business over the course of the balance of 2024 and maybe it's 2025 given higher for longer interest rates? Speaker 200:26:43Our view on restructuring has been consistent, which is it's a very strong business for us and it's continuing that way. And higher for longer, obviously, will impact the business in a positive way. But even when we thought that rates were going to go down, a very big part of our business is liability management. There are many companies that really have capital structures built on very low interest rate environments and some of those are coming up for refinancing. And so the liability management side of the business is going to continue strong and really from the prospects that we see in our backlogs continuing along at the pace where we feel very comfortable that they're going to continue to perform at a high level. Speaker 200:27:32So as we look at our projections and we're looking at how things are going, we believe the business will continue along the path of being quite strong. Speaker 500:27:44Thank you. Operator00:27:52We'll go next to Ryan Kenny with Morgan Stanley. Speaker 800:27:56Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. Just wanted to dig in a little bit on the comp ratio side and the comment around aiming to improve this year. Is that an improvement from last year's level or from the Q1 level? And how should we think about the likelihood of comp ratio maybe decreasing in the back half of the year as revenues pick up? Speaker 300:28:16Right. So let me just expand my commentary a little bit around the comp ratio. And so we talked about it being kind of generally similar to our full year estimate based on what we know today and more importantly as our best estimate of depend heavily on the timing and magnitude of improvement in revenue, among other factors, which also of course include things like headcount, market level of comp for non partners and so on. But we are committed to making progress on our comp ratio. We're intending to balance that objective with our plan to continue building the firm. Speaker 300:29:11And as I said, where we land at the end of the year is largely going to be a function of the strength of the revenue in the latter part, which is not perfectly knowable at this point. Speaker 800:29:31Thanks. Operator00:29:35Thank you. Our next question comes from Aidan Hall with KBW. Please go ahead. Speaker 900:29:41Great. Thanks for taking my question. Just wanted to dig in on the recruiting commentary. It sounds like conversations remain robust. But I guess can you just give us a better sense of your expectations on the SMD hiring front as it relates to the remainder of the year? Speaker 900:29:58And as we think of building pipelines across the industry, how that might maybe elongate some of the recruiting timelines? Thanks. Speaker 200:30:11Thanks for the question. And obviously, we focus a great deal on recruiting and really making sure that we continue that momentum of the organization and our growth. The pipeline is from our standpoint for us is robust, although I would say that there is it's really hard to know exactly where that's going to come out. It's recruiting and the numbers of people we bring in is more of an output than an input, meaning that really we have a very strong set of dialogues going on with some very talented people. And it's hard to know which ones are going to actually land. Speaker 200:30:51I would say that if you're trying to figure out where we are is we're going to continue to look for A plus talent in areas where we think there's real significant growth ahead for us. We've always what we said in the past is 4 to 8 that last year as you know we went to 11. We're not going to be constrained by any number, but we think we'll have a good year this year and we're very much in the middle of many different dialogues that we think are with very strong people. So I think you can assume that we're not going to change dramatically. Speaker 900:31:35Great. Appreciate the color. Operator00:31:39Thank you. We do have a follow-up question from James Yaro with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Speaker 600:31:44Thanks for taking the follow-up. Just a quick one on the advisory revenue quarter on quarter decline this quarter. So I think this did appear somewhat weaker than the publicly available data, which is all that we have to go on. And I think your quarterly spend is a little bit weaker than some of the peers that have reported so far. So maybe you could just help us understand what the drivers were? Speaker 600:32:05Was that M and A? Or was there some other business that slowed down relative to to Q4? And then anything that you could just add on the pull forward of revenue into the Q4 and then again into the Q1? And maybe that would help explain some of those moving parts? Speaker 200:32:21Sure. Well, as you know, the business is quite lumpy for us. And what you really will see if you look at it quarter to quarter is hard because several big transactions or 3 or 4 big transactions can change a lot. And I would just generally say activity levels for us are high. Our backlogs are robust and strong. Speaker 200:32:46And really anywhere you look across our systems, the dialogs internally are very, very active. Engagement letters conflict checks, very strong. Last quarter, Europe had a lumpy quarter the quarter before, which was strong. And last quarter, they were relatively weaker. But I would say that that would not that's not an indication of the strength of the business. Speaker 200:33:21It's just a fact of what happens. So I would if you're really thinking about how to think about us, I think you should really assume that we're feeling quite constructive about how we're going to go. And as we said, we could see a real build over the pipe balance of the year and then the next year in terms of both announcements and revenue. Speaker 600:33:49Very clear. Thank you. Operator00:33:53Thank you. And we'll take our next follow-up question from Brennan Hawken with UBS. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:33:59Good morning again. Thanks for taking the follow-up. Sure. Speaker 600:34:02Would love to sort of Speaker 500:34:04take a step back and hear about your perspectives. You guys have added a lot of senior banking talent. And one of the big metrics that I like to focus on is revenue per trailing MD, right? So looking at trailing 12 month MD count. And excluding the go go years of 2021 and 2, the prior high watermark was about $20,000,000 and that was in 2018. Speaker 500:34:34When you think about the level and caliber of some of these stem winding bankers, John, as you refer to them, how should we think about that productivity number? And how much upside do you think there could be in thinking about an upcoming cycle given what you've done to the team on the field? Thanks. Speaker 200:34:58Brandon, thanks for the question. And we think about a lot of the same things that you just mentioned and really kind of assess really what the impact of bringing really high quality people is with respect to our growth. We've always taken the approach and we continue to and we will continue to really take the approach that high quality talent is going to be significantly additive to the growth of the firm. We have right now 30 plus people ramping, both the high level recruits that we brought in as well as the partner promotes that we've had over the last couple of years. So we think it's going to keep going. Speaker 200:35:43In terms of the revenue per partner level, we actually think it's going to be strong. Now, will it get to the 2021 level? Maybe not immediately. Certainly, you have to have a really strong market to get to something like that. But we think that the revenue per partner is going to reflect the fact that we have a really strong high quality group of partners who are really focused on their clients right now and activity levels across the board are picking up. Speaker 200:36:14But as you know, one of the big things to think about is, are the right factors in place for the market to pick up. And those, as we've talked about before, things like CEO confidence, access to capital, stability of the markets and sponsor recovery. And if you think about it, each one of those right now looks to be pointing in the right direction. And so with those coming together in the right way, I could easily see revenue per partner levels picking up materially. Speaker 500:36:51Okay. Thanks for taking my follow-up. Operator00:36:57Our next question will come from Brian Kenny with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Speaker 800:37:03Hey, thanks for taking my follow-up. Question on underwriting. So there's a really large increase year over year, revenues more than doubled, strongest quarter in several years. Should we think of that as lumpy in the Q1, maybe it was exceptionally good for Evercore or is this a good base to build off of as underwriting activity picks up? Speaker 200:37:25It's always hard to take 1 quarter and make that be multiplied out for the year. The underwriting business tends to be somewhat lumpy, although it is building. We're feeling strength in our underwriting business and the backlogs are good. We've been involved in several and we certainly have a lot of activity going on. So I guess the best and most fair way to answer your question is, we feel very constructive. Speaker 200:37:53We think that the Q1 was a good Q1. We anticipate that throughout the next three quarters, the year will come together in a way that where we certainly outperformed last year and we think we'll feel good about really the ENDRA results. But it's very hard for me to call the shots with respect to the 2nd and third quarters at this point. But I would say that the backlog levels are very robust. Speaker 800:38:22Great. Thanks. Speaker 300:38:24Look, I think in the just to add a little bit of detail, if you look at the equity markets in terms of dollar value, issuance is up 131% over last year. So our revenues were up 143% over last year. And we're certainly not sitting here saying you should annualize what you saw in the Q1. But what we are saying is there's a noticeable change in the environment and the deals that we have seen getting priced in this last quarter have tended to have better performance both with respect to the pricing itself and to where they traded in the aftermarket. And so we're optimistic that at least those days of 2023 are kind of behind us. Speaker 800:39:17Thank you. Operator00:39:21Thank you. We have no further questions in queue at this time. I would like to turn the call back to management for any additional or closing remarks. Speaker 200:39:30Thank you all for joining us. We look forward to next quarter. Operator00:39:41And this does conclude today's Evercore First Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. You may disconnect your line at this time and have a wonderful day.Read morePowered by