T. Rowe Price Group, Inc.

Good morning. My name is Norma, and I will be your conference facilitator today. Welcome to T. Rowe Price's fourth quarter 2023 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode until the question and answer period. I'll give you instructions on how to ask questions at that time. As a reminder, this call is being recorded and will be available for replay on T. Rowe Price's website shortly after the call concludes. I will now turn the call over to Lindsay Cooley, T. Rowe Price's Director of Investor Relations.

Hello, and thank you for joining us today for our fourth quarter earnings call. The press release and a supplemental materials document can be found on our IR website at investors.teraprice.com. Today's call will last approximately 45 minutes. Our CEO and President Rob Sharps, CFO Jen Dardis, and Head of Global Investments Eric Vial will discuss the company's results for about 20 minutes, and then we'll open it up to your questions. We ask that you limit it to one question per participant. I'd like to remind you that during the course of this call, we may make a number of forward-looking statements and reference certain non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to the forward-looking statement language and the reconciliations to GAAP in the supplemental materials as well as in our press release. All investment performance references to peer groups on today's call are using Morningstar peer groups. Now I'll turn it over to Rob.

Thank you, Lindsley, and thanks to all of you for joining us. Before we get started, I want to share that in late November, Eric was named head of global investments in recognition of his strong leadership, as well as his extensive investment experience. I know he will continue to focus on pursuing superior outcomes for our clients and both Jen and I congratulate him on his expanded role. Eric will provide today's update on our investment organization, followed by Jen who will cover our financial results. With that, I will turn to 2023 results. While 2023 was a challenging year for us with substantial net outflows, it also brought progress. Investment performance improved, and we advanced important work to ensure our firm is positioned for future growth. We are already seeing a number of early indicators that support our confidence that better days are ahead. We have a long and solid track record of putting clients first and pursuing excellence. As we near our 88th anniversary, I am confident that we will build on this tradition, delivering compelling value for our clients, our associates, and our shareholders. As I mentioned, we made meaningful progress against our strategic priorities in 2023. Our active ETF business is gaining traction, with assets under management over $2.7 billion at the end of January. We launched the T. Rowe Price OHA Select Private Credit Fund, or O-Credit, with over $1.5 billion of investable capital and are in the early stages of bringing this product to the wealth management channel. We acquired Retiree, Inc. to enhance our ability to expand and retain relationships with pre-retiree and retiree clients by providing tax-aware retirement income and Social Security claiming strategies. This acquisition demonstrates our commitment to broadening and evolving our already strong retirement capabilities and deepens our position as a retirement leader. We partnered with the International Finance Corporation to create the T. Rowe Price Emerging Markets Blue Economy Bond Strategy, a pioneering blue bond strategy that will focus on private companies operating in emerging markets. We expanded our capital appreciation suite with the launch of the TRO Price Capital Appreciation and Income Fund for investors seeking an income-oriented fund. We have an industry-leading position in our target date franchise, with strong investment performance and net inflows of $13.1 billion last year. Building on this strength, we continue to innovate and add new capabilities, including moving beyond accumulation. The engagement and collaboration among our investment teams got back to what I would characterize as healthy pre-pandemic levels. Our culture thrives on the energy around our teams engaging with corporate management teams, traveling together, and debating risks and opportunities. This is how our investment platform delivers its best for clients. We are evolving as markets and our clients demand more, and we are ready to compete with additional vehicles new capabilities, and new experiences. Leading indicators support our confidence that there will be a slower pace of net outflows this year. We are seeing improved performance in large cap growth funds and expect that the rebound in 2023 will reduce redemptions in 2024. Key elements of strategic initiatives are delivering. We're seeing improving gross sales in our individual investor channel, with Q4 having the highest gross sales of any quarter over the last two years. We saw positive momentum for net flows in our U.S. wealth management platform segment in Q4. And in EMEA, we were recently selected by a large U.K. wealth management firm to manage a custom multi-asset income fund. Despite a challenging year, our balance sheet remains solid. with $2.5 billion of cash and discretionary investments at the end of 2023. We continued to prioritize the dividend while maintaining ample liquidity to support our seed capital program, opportunistic buybacks, and potential M&A. We recently announced a quarterly dividend of $1.24, which increased for the 38th consecutive year. I want to underscore that the progress I've highlighted is a result of our associates commitment to investment excellence, to superb client service, and to driving our corporate strategy forward. We are grateful for their hard work and are confident that together we will return the firm to organic growth. I'll now turn to Eric.