Swiss Life Holding AG

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Swiss Life Q1 2020 Fixed Trading Update Conference Call and Live Webcast. I am Sandra, the Core School Operator. I would like to remind you that all participants have been listened only mode and the conference has been recorded. The presentation will be followed by a Q&A session. You can register for questions at any time by pressing star and 1 on your telephone. Webcast viewers may submit their questions or comments in writing by the relative field. Currently note that webcast questions will be answered after the call. For operator assistance, please press star and zero. The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it is my pleasure to hand over to Matthias Ehrig, Group CEO of Swiss Life. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for dialing in and for your interest in Swiss Life. Today, we are reporting on selected top line figures for the first quarter of 2026. I will start with an overview, and our Group CFO, Marco Gerussi, will give you more details. We had a good start to the year, with pleasing top-line growth in the first quarter of 2026. Both the fee and the insurance businesses contributed to this growth. Swiss Life increased its fee and commission income by 6% in local currency to $686 million, with all businesses contributing. Brought to it in premiums, fees and deposits received increased by 5% in local currency to 8.2 billion. Switzerland asset managers reported strong net new assets of 4.2 billion in third-party asset management, compared to 9.3 billion in the exceptionally strong prior year period. The asset-to-year ratio was estimated to be around 210% at the end of March 2026. I'm particularly satisfied with the growth in our fee income across all divisions and businesses, meaning asset managers, owned IFAs, and owned and third-party products and services. We are well on track with our Swiss Life 2027 program. In addition to our first quarter disclosure, we are announcing today the acquisition of Thielitz Group at Swiss Life Germany. With around 1,800 advisors and a fee income of more than 200 million euros, Helis is one of the leading German IFAs. With the acquisition, Swiss Life Germany will further strengthen its position as a leading financial advisory company. Combined, we will have in Germany around 8,000 certified advisors and a total fee income in excess of 1 billion euros. This was a unique opportunity that we have seized from the founding family, who will stay with us in an advisory role. I'm pleased that with this transaction, we accelerate our profitable growth in the German IFA market. And I would like to welcome Thelis within the Swiss Life Group and look forward to their contribution to Swiss Life Germany. With that, I hand over to Markus.

Thank you, Matthias, and good morning. I'm pleased to walk you through our trading update, looking at our good first quarter 2026. As usual, all figures are unedited. Figures for the group are reported in Swiss francs and for each business division in local currency. Growth rates are stated in local currency. Let me start with our business division, Switzerland. Premiums increased by a strong 10% to 5 billion. The life insurance market remained flat. Premiums in group life grew by 10% to 4.5 billion, while the market decreased slightly. Single premiums increased by 25%, driven by higher premiums from existing clients and new business. Periodic premiums declined by 3%. Assets on the management in our semi-autonomous foundations were at 8.1 billion compared to 8.4 billion at the end of 2025. The decline is due to negative market performance and the net transfer into our full insurance business. Premiums in individual life grew by 7%. The overall market was up by 5%. Single premiums grew by 20%, driven by the unit-linked business. Periodic premiums declined by 1%. Premium commission income was up by 2% to 93 million, mainly due to higher income from Unilink and investment solutions for private clients. Earnings go to French, German and international business divisions, which all report in euros. Let me start with France. Premiums were down by 2% to 2 billion. The total market was up by 11%. In our live business, premiums were down by 1%, driven by lower premiums in the savings and pension business. The overall market grew by 14%. The unit link share in our live premiums increased to 73% compared to the market average of 41%, reflecting our unchanged focus on unit link solutions. We generated live net inflows of 0.6 billion. Auto market net inflows were at 19.3 billion. In health and protection, we kept our focus on profitability before growth. This resulted in a 10% decline in premiums. Market growth was at 7%. EMC premiums grew by 4%. P&C income rose by 8% to $166 million due to higher unit-linked fee income based on higher average unit-linked reserves and net inflows. The income contribution from structured products remained stable at the pleasing level. I continue with Germany. Premiums were up by 3% to 425 million, driven by modern and disability products, as well as a higher single premium. The market decreased by 6%, mainly in single premiums. Fee and commission income rose by 5% to 238 million, supported by both a higher productivity and a higher number of financial advisors as owned IFBs. Compared to the first quarter in 2025, the number of financial advisors grew by 3% to 6,154. These numbers do not reflect the acquisition of Thales Group, which we announced today. With this transaction, we will further strengthen our position as a leading financial advisor in Germany and further grow our advisory base and the fee results. Closing of the transaction is expected in the third quarter of 2026. Turning now to international. Premiums decreased by 3% to 1.1 billion. Higher premiums with corporate clients were more than offset by lower premiums with private clients. PM commission income increased by 2% to 94 million, driven by higher income from owned IFAs. In February 2026, we announced the partnership between TwistLife Network and Generali concerning a small part of our employee benefits business. The income reported today excludes this business. Let's move on to asset managers, which report in Swiss francs. For your information, we have expanded our disclosure for Q1 and Q3 in line with our full and half-year reporting. We now disclose total income, which consists of the commission income and the alternate income, including the real estate project developments. Asset managers' total income rose by 12% to 261 million. In our PAM business, total income increased by 4% to 90 million. The increase is mainly driven by higher real estate transaction income. In our TPAM business, total income grew by 16% to 171 million. The increase in recurring income is due to higher assets, while the higher non-recurring income is largely real estate transaction income. The share of total non-recurring income for TPM, meaning commission income and alternate income from real estate project development, was at 13% compared to 6% in the prior year. As mentioned at our full year results disclosure, for each 2026 and 2027, we expect to achieve a share of around 25%, which is in line with our Swiss Life 2027 targets. Many assets in our deep-end business amounted to $4.2 billion compared to $9.3 billion in the first quarter of 2025, which was exceptionally strong. We saw continued strong inflows in our index business, and inflows in real assets amounted to $0.8 billion. Both these inflows were slightly offset by outflows, in particular from money market funds. Assets under management in our deep-end business increased to 148 billion compared to 146 billion at year-end 2025. Net inflows were partly offset by negative performance. Turning to our investment results. Direct investment income decreased by 142 million to 0.9 billion due to lower income from equities and infrastructure, which included the sale of infrastructure assets in the prior year. Additionally, we had diverse movements in the foreign exchange rates, particularly related to the US dollar. The non-annualized direct investment yield was at 0.7% compared to 0.8% in the prior year period. Looking at the net investment income, we had a stable development compared to the first quarter in 2025. Real estate continues to be an attractive and important asset class for backing our long-dated liabilities. Vacancy rates decreased to 2.9% compared to 3.1% at year-end 2025. Real estate fair value changes, which is non-annualized, were positive at around 0.3%. For the full year 2026, we expect a similar trend as in 2025, with further positive real estate fair value changes driven by our Swiss real estate portfolio. Moving to solvency, cash, and payout. At the end of the first quarter of 2026, the S&P ratio was estimated to be around 210%, and therefore marginally below year-end 2025. This is due to market movements, which more than offset the positive impact from a hybrid issuance in January 2026. As of today, we estimate our FST ratio to be at the same level as at year-end 2025, well above the ambition range of 140 to 190%. At the end of the first quarter, liquidity at holding amounted to around 0.6 billion. Our ongoing share buyback of 750 million is well on track and will run until the end of May 2026. As of 15th of May 2026, we repurchased shares worth 26 million. Let me sum up. We are pleased with the performance of Swiss Life in the first quarter of 2026. We grew both our fee and our insurance business. Moreover, net new assets in our third-party asset management business increased, and our asset ratio is at a strong level. With this, we are well on track to achieve all of our group financial targets of our Swiss Life 2027 program. And, with this, I hand back to you, Matthias.