Motilal Oswal Financial Services Limited (MOTILALOFS) Q2 2027 Earnings Call Transcript

Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Murtila Loswal Financial Services Q2FY27 Earnings Conference Call. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star and then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Manish Gayan. Thank you, and over to you.

Thank you, Yashashvili. Good afternoon, everyone. I welcome all the participants on behalf of Motila Losol Financial Services Limited to take time out to attend our Q2-FI27 Earnings Conference. We hope that you had an opportunity to go through our investor deck and press release uploaded on stock exchanges and on our website yesterday. We have also uploaded our Excel data book on our website that has all the operational and financial numbers. Please note that today's discussion may include forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on our macro assessment and the actual outcome may vary. To represent the group, we have the senior leadership members on this call. We will start this call with an opening remark by Naveen, our group MD, and then we will have a Q&A session. Over to you, Naveen.

Thank you, Manish, and good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to our earnings call for the quarter ended September 26th to discuss the group's overall performance. Let me first, before I get down to the quarter performance, share some broader sense of the roof strategic direction which could drive. You know, continued strong performance like we have been delivering over the last decade. Motral is one of the largest integrated capital market players with rising share of annuity revenue, and he is offering a strong growth runway, leveraging the opportunities available with financialization of Indian savings. Our operating businesses have delivered a decadal... Compounded growth of 33%. EPS has grown at 26%. Compounded return on equity for a decade has averaged at 23%. This strong growth is supported by our investment book also, which has been growing compounded for a decade at 41%, led by strong IRRs as well as reinvestment of the operating profit post the dividend distribution that we do to shareholders. Since our listing in 2007, we have never diluted equity, while consistently paying out dividends and executing three buybacks. This has only been possible due to our unique twin engine business model, wherein our large investment book serves as a strong backbone to all the operating businesses, which have seen regulatory changes, rising funding needs. Strong underlying business growth and a market share gain. All this required huge capital which would only have been possible through this twin engine business model. Sustainable growth is witnessed in our ARR, annual recurring revenues and profit share. ARR revenues now contribute 66% of the group's revenues. This number was 55% in FY24. This has helped us in reducing the fiscality in our revenues led by the transaction businesses. All this has happened mainly on account of the asset and private wealth profit after tax growing by 44% year on year. These businesses now contribute 57% of the group's profit after tax in first half. This number was 39% in FY24. The non-broking revenue share, even in the wealth management business, has increased to 65% in the first half versus 53% in FY24. This transition is led by strong performance in all businesses, comprehensive... which now spans all listed products to the less understood alternates. As long as the asset management business continues to grow and currently stands at 2.23 lakh crores, including MO Alternates, which is a new milestone for the group. This AUM has witnessed a compounded growth of 32% over the last five years since March 2021, with strong market share gains. Also, during the second quarter, the group received license from SEBI to act as a custodian of securities. Please. This approval allows Mothgar Luswal to Complete institutional product offering. This was after more than a decade that the regulator gave this license to a non-bank. We've already hired CEO and the senior management team for this business, and this business will commence operations in the fourth quarter of this fiscal year, subject to the completion of operational readiness. Our market cap ranking has also consistently improved along with our profit after tax ranking among listed players. We are currently ranked among top 151 companies on trailing 12-month profit after tax. This number 10 years back was 345, and 15 years back was at 373. Also, by market cap, we rank 175 now. 10 years back, this number was 285. 15 years back, this number was 365. We see the next decade offering equally exciting opportunities and prospects, which should drive improvement in these rankings further. Now, starting with the detailed second quarter performance highlights, our profit after tax grew by 29% on year-on-year basis to 718 crores, set by Asher and private self-businesses, which grew by 43% year-on-year. These businesses, I repeat, now contribute 58% of the total operating profit versus 49% in FY26 and 42% in FY25. We expect the share of asset and private wealth businesses to continue to rise as these businesses have strong tailwinds and have been outgoing the rest of the businesses for the last few years. We have stepped up investments on all fronts, including people, brand, technology in the past couple of years, and we expect these to bear fruits in the coming years in terms of continued market share gains and improvement in profitability. Turning now to individual segments, I'll start with the asset and private wealth businesses, which comprise of the asset management listed, the MO alternate unlisted, and the private wealth management businesses. The asset and private wealth business continued its momentum during the quarter, with robust flows of 12,477 crores of net inflows, taking the AUM to 5.2 lakh crores as of September 26, which is up by 42% year on year. The operating leverage from rising AUM should be a strong driver to our profit growth. I'll start with the asset management business, which includes mutual fund, PMS, and AIF. As of 30th September, 99% of our AUM outperformed their respective benchmark in the past three years. Our product decay has not only widened, but also grown significantly. We now have 24 schemes that have crossed 1,000 crore. This number was 16 schemes last year. in terms of performance since inception, and are in the mainstream categories. That should help in continued strong flows, as well as diversification of the AUM across more schemes. Our trend of net mutual fund flow market share improvement, which currently stands in the month of September, stands at 6%. Our flow market share continues to be well above our AUM market share of 2.7%. Our passive fund AUM crossed 50,000 floor milestone, demonstrating our focus on going even the passive business along with the active business. We are ranked 5. In the passive business, excluding the low-yield broad market indices like Nifty, which have very large institutional capital deployed at low yield. The unique PAN catered by our AMC is more than one crore as of September 26. And so one in six investors in the mutual fund industry are now investors in Mutlal Uswal Asset Management. Showing strong confidence by retail investors in our franchise. The revival in 2Q has propelled our average AUM to grow from 1.67 lakh crores as of March 26 to 2.01 lakh crores as of September 27, reflecting the continued momentum in the business. The Chupu SIP flows remain strong at 4,170 crores. Market share was 4.4%. The SIP AUM stood at 42,000 crores as of September 26. We have a strong distribution reach with 2,400 plus distributors now contributing over a crore of gross flows in the last 12 months. And 30% plus of our ex-digital sales now come outside of the top 10 market. We believe that the ANC AUM growth will be supported by several factors. 99% of the AUM is outperforming its respective benchmark on a clear basis. This strong performance should drive net growth growth. Analyze SIT run rate of about 18,000 crores should drive AUM growth. It's here Vintage. Current average AUM of 2 lakh crores is 28% higher than the 1.57 lakh crore AUM average in S.I.F. And he had our driver. This has a vintage of over two decades. We already have a strong franchise in growth capital and real estate and are constantly delivering industry-leading IRRs to our clients in all the products that we offer. We are in the process of executing our final close of our maiden private credit fund of 3,000 crores. Our maiden commercial offices real estate fund has just been launched. We are witnessing increasing allocation from family offices. As well as institutions in this segment, this business is, in my opinion, at the same stage of evolution as the mutual fund business was over a decade back. In summary, alternate asset management business 2 will be an important road driver and ARR driver for Mozilla Luskal on the back of increasing fund sizes in every subsequent series that we have demonstrated over the last 20 years, entry into newer categories like private credit, commercial offices, and more funds entering the carry income recognition threshold, which will boost our carry income run rate. The asset management business now contributes 43% of the group operating profit after tax in the second quarter. This number in the same quarter last year was at 31% and we believe should continue to rise in the overall profits. Turning to our private health business, due to ARR, revenue is strong at 180 crores. Net flows was up 65% quarter-on-quarter to 6,357 crores, leading to an AUM growth of 58% year-on-year to 2.96 lakh crores. Our 443 RMs will also witness productivity improvement as the vintage increases. Only 33% of the RMs have a vintage of over three years. For second quarter, profit after tax is up 2% year-on-year due to a high base of the second quarter of last year. However, the three- and five-year profit after tax growth for the private health business has been at 25% and 29% respectively, and we expect the second half profit after tax growth to also be much higher than the first half. We have made large investments in senior leadership, R&D, and we will continue to do the same in a calibrated manner going forward as well. The focus is to grow the ARR AUM through various initiatives, including advisory solutions on both equity and debt, including B-Scope advisory segment, a product called Delphi, which is seeing strong traction, strengthening leverage solutions as a value add for the UHNI clients, exclusive co-investment, leveraging group synergies. In summary, we expect a strong growth in the private wealth business on the back of rising monetization and improving product and people proposition. Turning to our wealth management business, which includes retail brocading, distribution, and our retail lending book, we continue to have sharp focus on growing our ARR revenue, which includes distribution income as well as NII, that to the share of these businesses in the wealth management franchise. increasing from 33% in FY21 to 58% in 2QFY27. ARR revenue grew by 10% on a YOY basis to 328 crores this quarter. Distribution book grew by 26% to 48,000 crores year-on-year. We are confident that our distribution book will grow meaningfully as we continue to harness the cross-sell potential of our franchise. It stands at 18%. Our loan book in this segment rose by 42% to 10,200 crores. Our NPF market share is close to 7% and will improve going forward. Our broking business continues to retain its leadership as a full-service broker amongst the non-bank players. We are the largest broker in the cash segment on revenue market share in the non-bank segment. Our overall retail broking market share, including commodities, stood at 7.9% this quarter, led by market share gains in F&O premium segment from 7.6% to 8.8% quarter-on-quarter, and our cash market share in the same time period has improved from 6.8% to 8%. Edmonds for broking revenues due to regulatory changes and flat markets over the last quarter, we believe are in the base and expect growth to improve going forward. Turning to the capital market businesses comprising of institutional equities and investment banking, despite challenging market conditions, our investment banking businesses have successfully closed 41 deals in the first half, cumulative raise of 99,000 crores, fee income of 39% growth quarter on quarter to 94 crores. We rank number one in QIPs and number three in IPOs in the first half of this financial year. As per the capital market fee table, in the institutional equities business, we are continuously increasing our coverage. We have crossed 400 companies' coverage and are on track to cover 500 companies, which will not only increase our research depth, but also improve opportunities to engage with these corporates for other businesses. In summary, we have built a strong franchise and diversified our product portfolio over the years. Our size per deal is higher than in the past, and with a strong deal pipeline, we are well positioned to benefit from any market survival. Turning to the housing finance business, the disbursements grew 29% year-on-year to 701 crores. AUM grew by 24% to 6,476 crores. We expect housing finance business to witness similar growth as we have delivered in the last quarter. In the coming three years' time, business has a high capital adequacy ratio, low leverage. Giving us enough growth levers without any external equity capital dependency. Our treasury investment book grew by 27% year-on-year to 11,346 crores. I repeat this business as this book has witnessed a compounded growth of 41% since March 2014, led by strong IRRs and reinvestment of the operating profit. We believe that the regulatory headwinds of the broking business are in the base. Indian investors continue to display resilience as far as the SIP flows are concerned. I spoke about the rising share of ARR in our overall businesses and those businesses having strong tailwinds in terms of market share gains, and they should be an important road driver for us in the second half of the year, like we've delivered in the second quarter. Just in the recently concluded second quarter. I will now open the floor for Q&A. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and 1 on their touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and 2. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. We'll take our first question from the line of Sagar J. Twani from Philip Capital PMS. Please go ahead.

Yeah, congratulations on a good Q2, but also on getting the custodian license. My first question is on the custodian business. How do you see the scale up in the next two years? Is it ARR accretive given the combination of transaction fees and custodian fees linked to the AUC? So that is my first question.

Very tough to comment anything. We are only hoping to launch this business in the fourth quarter of the year. The team has just come in place. The product offering is still getting formulated. So I think we'll hopefully be able to guide you on the broad product positioning strategy for this business, maybe at least three quarters down the line. It's anyways not going to contribute, you can say, anything in the, even in the next financial year, ending March 28th.

Okay. When second is on, you know, second is on the private wealth management, what are your hiring plans and RM hiring plans in H2? And, you know, the RM hiring done in the last three years under this segment. What percentage of RMs have not broken even or generating less than 1x?

So, yeah, in the private, well, if you recollect when we had spoken, a lot of the hiring that we have done, the plan is to harness the operating leverage from these bankers. About one third of the bankers are vintaged and two thirds of them are less than three years vintage. Now, typically what happens is that within a year, the RMs break even on their cost. And then, you know, they start contributing to the organization. So, within two to three years, generally, they are profitable for the organization. So, largely, if I look at it from the two-thirds, about 15% are less than one-year vintage. So, those are the RMs. That is the cohort which would have not yet broken even. But otherwise, the rest of them would have broken even. And in terms of hiring, we continue to hire, but more judiciously, and a lot of the addition is happening in the Ultra H&I segment this year.

Okay. And, you know, our lending book has, you know, grown by a strong 90% under PWL segment. And, you know, since last four quarters, there is a sudden fast pickup in the lending book. So, do we see this as a normalized growth?

Yeah, so, as far as the book growth is concerned, you know, bulk of the growth has also come from, you know, MTF book within this for, you know, the H&I and H&I segment. So, which is largely in line with, you know, how the cash volume growth has also happened in the market. So, as the cash volume keeps growing, much to that extent. And a portion of the book is loaned in shares also. Which is growing at, you know, normally about 20-25% a year.

Understood. Thank you. I'll fall back in the queue for any further questions. Thank you. All the best.

Thank you. Before we take the next question, we'd like to inform participants. To ask a question, please press star and one on your phone. Next question is from the line of Nidesh Jain from Investec. Please go ahead.

Thanks for the opportunity, sir. The first question is on the booking business, wealth management business. Market share in cash and FNO has picked up on a sequential basis. So what is driving that and what are the steps we have? Because if you look at the data for some time, our market share was sliding downwards, but this quarter we have seen as we pick up in market share. So what is driving that if you can just share some light on that?

So mainly on the cash market side, if you look at it, the market share growth is mainly because of the MTF book which has grown corresponding to the market growth. So to that extent, we have been able to grow the cash market market share also focusing on the MTF book and the overall cash market volumes. So that is connected to mainly the MTF. In the economic side, if you look at it, we have always been on the side where we try to advise customers to be playing the options market very safely. So, when the market volumes are much lower, we tend to do better. So, to that extent, our market share has grown in this market in the options side. And surely, on the futures, we have been better off on the overall market. So, to that extent, the options market share is a little up on the overall perspective.

Sure. And so coming to AMC business, our net flows have been with moderate for last few quarters. Last year, the trend was very strong. From that base, the net flows have moderated. So what is driving that and how do you see your net flow market share on AMC panning out in coming quarters and effort on the end?

Thank you. So, quarter two, net flows are a tad higher than quarter one. So, you know, active quarter two was 3,400. All were negative. Active was 1,600 and SIP over 1,400 crores. SIP is 1,400 crores a month crore that she has. Now, yes, you are right, we underwent 2-3 months of lean period, but happily, September saw us get in 2,400 crores of net active inflows, and as we speak, October, again, we should do over 2,000 net on active. So, the trend has definitely come back to how it used to be earlier. Performance is a large part of what drives inflows. And with a very strong performance, you know, our funds did 6% kind of alpha. We believe traction and flows should continue.

Sure, sir, sir. Can you quantify the carry income in the quarter, carry income booked in this quarter?

Yeah, that is, yeah, that is, let me see, that is 108 crores.

And the last question is on Alternate. What are the plans for new fund launches over the next two quarters in the Alternate business?

Yeah, so as I explained in my opening call remark to Dej, we are at the verge of closing. We've already crossed a 90% threshold for the private credit fund. The pipeline is actually more than that 10% right now. So, we just had some... The domestic institutional flows for which we are holding back the pipeline as you have reported a closure along with this quarterly concord. In the meantime, given that that fundraise is complete, we have launched our maiden commercial offices real estate fund. This is the first of its kind. We already have a very strong resi real estate credit franchise. So this It will be the... This will be the fourth offering by the alternate business. Clearly, you know, as I explained, this business is probably at the same stage of evolution as a mutual fund business was 10-15 years back, and so just the number of product offerings themselves will... You know, continue to go up every year. You will hopefully see the closure of this commercial offices fund over the next six months' time and the launch of potentially the next series of product in the calendar year 2027. So you'll see us broadening these product offerings. There's a lot of white spaces that we have to cover. India has to cover, importantly, as the allocation of alternates, both by institutions as well as by family offices. In their overall equity allocation continues to rise.

Yes, sure, sir. Thank you. That's it from my side.

Thank you. Next question is from the line of Dipanjan Ghosh from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Hi. Good morning, everyone. So a few questions from my side. First, on the insurance revenues that you book in your wealth and private wealth arm, or at the percentage of your total operational revenue, if you can quantify that and give some break-up between the segments, that would be useful, and if you expect some impact because of the proposed consultation paper. My second question is going up to one of the previous participants' questions, which is, if you look at the difference between your lending AUM and your MTF, that portion has also grown considerably to almost like 8,000 crore plus around that number. Just wanted to get some sense of what's the mix and customer quality in that segment. So that would be my second question. My third question is on your ex-custody transactional AUM within the PWM arm. That has meaningfully increased quarter-on-quarter. I would presume that mark-to-market probably would have been tagged negative on a closing basis. So what explains that, and was there any particular activity on the transactional side that you expect going ahead or something like that or during the quarter? Last question is on the housing piece. Do you foresee any pressure on asset quality?

Yeah, so the answer to the insurance portion in the operating revenues in the wealth management business, that number is about 3% of our operating revenues. Predominantly, this number includes from the life insurance segment at this juncture. Coming to the question on the lending book. The insurance component on the housing finance revenues is actually about 7% of the revenues in the housing business and 3% of the operating revenues in the wealth management business. Coming to the lending book composition, so actually, you know, from the lending book composition of about 18,000 crores in the group, 9,500 crores is MTF book. Six and a half thousand crores is housing finance book, and the rest, three thousand crores is loan against shares book. So, this is a broader composition of the book, against which bulk of the growth has come, actually, from the MTF side, and even housing has grown at about 25%. Coming to the question on the asset quality on home finance business. Asset quality across, you know, on the overall book has been pretty good. If you look at, you know, all 1+, 30+, 90+, pools, all of them on a year-on-year basis have come down. So all the delinquencies are lower than what was there in H1, FY26. Further, even in H2 of the year, we expect, you know, asset quality to further improve because H2, there is a bulk of recoveries which happens. H1 generally is seasonal, so there is some amount of delinquency which increases. H2, we would be expecting to normalize the GNPA number around 1.1, 1.2 percent. As far as the rules of the privacy and business...

So, on the transaction area, essentially, if you see, there has been some growth in custody assets, and essentially what happens is when you onboard large promoter accounts, there are a few promoters who also transfer their own shareholding into our DMAT account. Plus, like mentioned earlier, I think the MTF book has helped us drive broking assets as well. So, it's a combination of custody and broking assets which has led to the transaction assets going up.

Thank you. Just one clarification on the MTF and the lending AUM. If I look at your lending AUM in PWM and wealth management, that's together around probably 17,000 crore. And your MPF, I think, is around 9,000. So the difference looks more like 8,000, 9,000 crores, whereas your last is around 3,000 crores, as you mentioned. So I'm just trying to understand, is there some overlap between segments? And can you just explain the divergence?

Yeah, so actually, to clarify that, you know, because there is also, you know, bank guarantee financing typically. We also add that as a part of our lending book, where we substitute the collaterals of the client to the bank guarantee financing. So that book, if you consider, that book is about four and a half thousand crossings.

Got it. Fair enough. And sorry, if I can squeeze in one small question regarding your AEM per family in your PWM, it seems that even on an organic basis, there has been an increase in wallet per customer. So, in terms of the flows that you are expecting or you have seen over the past few quarters in your PWM, between monetization-led flows and, let's say, organic increase from existing customers, what would be the broad split?

Typically, I think we had mentioned this in our earlier calls as well. The flow from new customers is around 20% of overall net flows, but it's steadily increasing. Bulk of the flows will come from mining existing customers, which have been acquired in the previous year or the years before that.

Sure. Thanks, and all of us.

Thank you. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, to ask a question, please press star and 1 on your phone now. Next question is from the line of Lalit Mohandeyer from Equirus Securities. Please go ahead.

Yeah, hi, sir. Congratulations on a good set of numbers. Sir, just two, three questions. So, firstly, on this carry income, we have seen an increase from around 65 crores to almost like 110, 115 crores in this quarter. So, how should we look at this number in the incremental quarters? Secondly, we are seeing some strong revival in the net active MF inflows to more than 2,000 crores, so could you just also give us a rough breakup, like which channels are mostly contributing to this increased inflows, and lastly, like within the EMC business, as you have highlighted that we are looking to launch SIF and hybrid, so typically what would be the time, any expected timelines over there in terms of the product pipeline?

As far as the variable returns are concerned, you know, as we had explained over, you know, even our calls are recognized because, you know, select funds have actually progressed to a stage where the recognition criteria is met now, and our systematic accruals have commenced. And currently, you know, this is accruing from, you know, largely two mature schemes. Because there is also a very significant headroom to actually scale up because as our fund ventures expand on our alternate side, this number will keep gradually increasing. Even the IRR accrues gets added every year, so naturally also this number will look up as we come closer to the exit. This is going to be a recurring and growing contributor to our alternate business. You know, going forward as, you know, visibility and certainty of realisation have actually materially improved through our investment performance and, you know, achievement of hurdles and as we progress more towards the realisation.

I mean, just to give another colour, basically we see many quarters of visibility for this in the bag and so the booking of this will obviously... Happen as the maturity of these funds come closer, and so the unique thing that I want to leave you with is that, you know, being 20-year vintage with 10-year fund sizes imply, and with every series having 2x AUM compared to the previous, implies that the variable annual return pool also will keep, you know, rising. With every quarter, every year. I mean, this is, I would say, more predictable than given any ARR income that we receive, given the long duration of the funds and the nature in which it is booked. Yeah, I think you can take the ARR.

So, in terms of what we look forward for enhancing sales momentum and market share, I'm just broadening the question a bit, is that several of our large positions cross three-year vintage over the next six to seven months. It starts with small cap. Now, small cap is the single largest inflow category. Small and mid are two large inflow categories. It crosses three-year vintage in December, followed by large cap over the next three months, followed by... So, these are these categories, you know, for our cross three years, we should see us, you know, benefit from that because a lot of distributors look at minimum three years. We will keep launching, but they will not be such a large driver of net sales. Something that we are looking forward to is the SIF launch, which should happen in the Jan 2 quarter.

I just wanted to check one thing on the commodity brokerage yields. We see that it has fallen sharply in the last two quarters. Are there anything to read over there?

Actually, on the commodity side, mainly what we have seen is that most of the discount brokers have just started their commodities division in a big way. And there has been some volumes which has gone up in the last one quarter because of the volume, the crude and the gold, if you know that. So, accordingly, there has been a slight impact on the market share in this quarter, which I think is more of a trend which will be recovering very fast.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, to ask a question, please press star and one on your phone. Next question is from the line of Venkatesh, an individual investor. Please go ahead.

My only one question, what is the split of our treasury investment?

Yeah, Treasury book is almost about, you know, 98% equity.

Yeah.

So, predominant book is all equity. There is no debt. And within the equity book, you know, about 55% is our AMC funds, 20% is our alternate funds, and rest 25% is direct equity book. 23% is direct equity book.

Thank you. Participants who wish to ask a question are requested to press star and one on their phone now.

On behalf of Mutilal Oswal Financial Services, I would like to thank every participant for attending the Q2 F527 CONCOL. In case if you have any further questions, please do get in touch with our investors' listeners. Thank you and have a good day.

Thank you, members of the management team. On behalf of Motilal Oswal Financial Services, that concludes this conference. Thank you all for joining us, and even now, disconnect your lines.