Citigroup, Inc.

Hello, and welcome to Citi's first quarter 2025 earnings call. Today's call will be hosted by Jen Landis, head of Citi Investor Relations. We ask that you please hold all questions until the completion of the formal remarks, at which time you'll be given instructions for the question and answer session. Also, as a reminder, this conference is being recorded today. If you have any objections, please disconnect at this time. Ms. Landis, you may begin.

Thank you, operator. Good morning, and thank you all for joining our first quarter 2025 earnings call. I'm joined today by our Chief Executive Officer, Jane Fraser, and our Chief Financial Officer, Mark Mason. I'd like to remind you that today's presentation, which is available for download on our website, citigroup.com, may contain forward-looking statements, which are based on management's current expectations and are subject to uncertainty and changes in circumstances. Actual results may differ materially from these statements due to a variety of factors, including those described in our earnings materials as well as in our SEC filings. And with that, I'll turn it over to Jane.

Thank you, Jen, and a very good morning to everyone. First, I'm going to discuss our first quarter results and then talk about the environment we're operating in and how we are positioning the bank for it. This morning, we reported net income of $4.1 billion and earnings per share of $1.96 with an ROTCE of 9.1%. Overall, it was a strong quarter marked by continued momentum in each of our five businesses. We maintained a disciplined approach to our expenses, which declined by 5% year over year. We delivered our third consecutive quarter of positive operating leverage for each of our five lines of business and the fourth consecutive quarter for the firm overall. We increased both our return on tangible common equity in each business and our return of capital to our shareholders. And this quarter is a further proof point of how the consistent execution of our strategy is improving our performance. Services recorded its highest first quarter revenue in a decade. TCS continues to demonstrate momentum in the key underlying drivers across U.S. dollar clearing and cross-border activity. Security services gained share and grew its assets under custody and administration to $26 trillion. Markets had a good quarter with revenue up 12%. The three most significant fixed income businesses, rates, spread products and FX, each contributed to an overall 8% increase over last year. And in a good macro quarter for equities, we were up 23% as we continued with our long-term strategy to augment our high derivative share with a larger prime business. Banking was up 12% as we continued to gain share in investment banking across most industry sectors. Most notably, M&A revenue nearly doubled. We're seeing the benefits of our talent investments, as you can see by the leading role we played in some of the year's biggest transactions, such as advising Altair on the Siemens acquisition and on the recently announced intracellular transaction by J&J. Turning to wealth, all three businesses contributed to overall growth of 24%, and fee revenue drove non-interest revenue growth of 16%. We remain focused on capturing assets our clients have off us, as demonstrated by the roughly 11% organic growth in client investment assets. Andy and his new team are making excellent progress executing our strategy, with the business delivering record revenue this quarter and improved efficiency and returns. USPB was up 2%, driven mainly by increased loan balances and spending in branded cards. The high credit quality of our cards portfolio reflects the focus we've put on prime consumers, and our portfolio continued to perform in line with our expectations. Overall, USPB's return increased to nearly 13%. During the quarter, we returned $2.8 billion in capital to our shareholders, including 1.75 billion of buybacks as part of our $20 billion plan, which is about 250 million more than we had originally guided. Now, that's our highest quarterly amount since 2022 and demonstrates our commitment to returning capital. We ended the quarter with a CET1 ratio of 13.4%, and our tangible book value per share crossed $90. Turning to our strategic priorities, our transformation investments continue to modernize our infrastructure, simplify our processes, and reduce manual touchpoints. During the quarter, we retired legacy applications and automated reconciliations to name but a few accomplishments. We are also integrating AI directly into our business operations to improve the client experience. The latest example is Agent Assist, our first generative AI tool for customer service in U.S. personal banking. It is designed to help our team resolve inquiries faster and is now being piloted in credit cards. From quarter to quarter, we are building on our track record of progress, and I am confident in our ability to continue delivering despite the uncertainty of the moment. In terms of the macro environment, I am not going to try to predict the unpredictable. While our corporate and consumer clients are resilient and in good financial health, the world is in a wait-and-see mode and is facing a more negative macro outlook than anyone had anticipated at the beginning of the year. And we know that prolonged uncertainty generally hurts confidence. The changes underway globally will go beyond trade and tariffs. In the US, for example, regulation and tax policy are all likely to look different in a year's time. And these changes will not only have economic impact, but geopolitical and cultural ones as well. We appreciate the administration taking a fresh look at regulations across all industries to unlock growth. We welcome the changes being discussed in our own industry to place more focus on material financial risk and to make it easier for banks to contribute to economic growth and to improve client service. When all is said and done, and these long-standing trade imbalances and other structural shifts are behind us, the US will still be the world's leading economy, and the dollar will remain the reserve currency. The deep knowledge and breadth of capabilities that we have from decades on the ground in so many local markets are real points of distinction when serving our clients. From reconfiguring their supply chain to addressing their hedging and funding approaches to advising on their strategic agendas. I am very confident that we have built a strategy based on a diversified business mix that will perform in a wide variety of macro scenarios and is differentiating in times like these. With capital strength, plentiful liquidity, and strong reserves, we can navigate through any environment from a position of strength. In periods of stress, we have shown that we are a port during the storm for our clients, the global markets, and the economy. And this time is no different. we are ready to lean in. As I look forward to the rest of the year, we shall remain disciplined about returning capital and managing our expenses whilst protecting necessary investments in our businesses as well as our transformation. And we shall not allow the uncertainty to distract us from executing our strategy and improving our returns. Now, Over to Mark, and then we will be happy to take your questions.