Arion banki hf.

Good morning, everyone, and a warm welcome to this presentation of Ariane Bank's full year and Q4 2022 results. My name is Benedikt Gislason, I'm the CEO of Ariane, and joining me here today for the presentation are our chief economist, Erna-Björk Sverdestottir, and our CFO, Oliver Høskulsson. As always, I'll start by running through the main events for the year, and then my colleagues will take over. It's fair to say that this was a challenging year when it came to financial markets, but despite that, we had a really good performance. We saw our core income, which we define as interest and commission income, and obviously insurance income growing by 17.5%. in the year. Our deposits grew by 15%, and the economy, obviously on the back of an economy, that probably grew somewhere between 6% and 7%. So we ended up with a 13.7% ROE for the year, which is above our financial target. And as you can see in this slide, we have been revising some of these targets to reflect better on the current economic situation and our business model as well. I mentioned the financial income, which is a volatile income line and will be a component of our business as we own and operate an insurance company with an investment portfolio. So we changed two of our financial targets into core income-related targets rather than income. which we think will reflect better on our core operating performance. And you will see an extended version of this deck, which we published yesterday, which illustrates how these two new financial targets or revised targets have retroactively kind of been. With other targets, they are either met or close to being met. And you see, for example, on the dividend payout ratio, that we effectively had more than 100%. In the ERAs, we released some of the surplus capital. And in the last two years, we've been able to release about 64 billion of capital through the means of dividends and buybacks, which is close to 30% of current market cap. And we foresee to continue to do so with the proposed 50% payout ratio of dividend, 8.5 kroner per year, and then relaunching our buyback program this morning. And it obviously would depend on loan growth for the year and external growth, to what extent we were able to continue to release surplus capital. I think it's an interesting fact that five years ago, this bank had outstanding shares of 2 billion, and the current number is 1,510, and we will see our treasury shares being canceled after the AGM. So there's been a substantial reduction in our share capital, our outstanding number of shares, throughout the year, and this will continue. I mentioned the loan growth target, or loan growth. As you can see, we have removed that target. It doesn't mean that this is a complete U-turn. I think it's a bit harder to predict the economic situation for the year. Inflation is on the move, GDP forecast as well, and also I think it's important to flag that are original to distribution strategy which means that not everything that we do ends up on our balance sheet is working very efficiently and we might expand on that operation this year. Now key milestones of the year. I think the sale of Valetor is obviously one of the key milestones and impacts our financial income. We are very pleased with the outcome and the sales proceeds, which amounted to $112.5 million. And it's one of the reasons why I've been returning or returned so much capital throughout the last year. You might remember that Arjon and Werder joined operations with Werder moving into the headquarters. And so we, together, the three companies, which also include Stepnir, our fund management business, can better leverage their different strengths and offer our customers a comprehensive and accessible range of financial and insurance services. And this is precisely one of the competitive advantages that we have here in the local market. strong activity in corporate investment banking, and some progress with our real estate assets, which I will cover later on, and some strides on the ESG front as well. Now, I mentioned that GDP growth has probably been between 6% and 7% for last year. We're waiting for the final numbers. And it clearly makes Iceland an outlier in a global macro context of last year. And it begs the question, obviously, why was Iceland so resilient in these turbulent markets? And I think this slide here captures quite well why that was the reason. Following the aftermath of the financial crisis, leverage was brought down considerably in the economy through means of restructuring and debt relief programs and more prudent finances of households and corporates, where we have seen very high savings rates for the past eight years at least. And so leverage is low, and leverage towards the rest of the world is actually extremely low on the positive side. The reserves, FX reserves are high, and the net international position is positive. And I think it's actually a sign of strength that we've seen the central bank being able to raise the policy rates higher than in Europe. It's certainly not a sign of weakness. Now, I mentioned the cooperation with Vörður, our subsidiary insurance business, which continues to grow. It delivered on its financial target of increasing its net premium by three percentage points more than the market, and did so in a year. And here you can see some of the financial targets that we internally look at every quarter. The bank assurance ratios. which are on the rise, and we have an ambition to grow this substantially further this year. And I don't need to remind investors that the insurance businesses, not only in Iceland but in Northern Europe, enjoy a healthy valuation on the back of good operating leverage and high profitability. Now, I mentioned some strides on the ESG front, and last year we received a review from Sustain Analytics, which placed us in the top six percentile of banks, and there we're comparing ourselves with the regional banks. And this has been a key focus for us and operating obviously in an economy which is mainly driven on renewable energy. And we did an exercise as well with our credit portfolio, calculate the emissions. And this is obviously to use as a comparison for next year. And we were aiming for improvements between years. And we've made considerable funding efforts and acquiring assets on the green asset and liability side. Now, the Arctic region is part of our business model, and we saw a relatively strong growth in our credit portfolio in 2022, 62%, and the compounding annual growth rate since 2019, when we sort of started looking at it and then presented this as a key strategy in 2021. has been 48%. This is a very interesting sort of area. It enjoys robust economic growth at the moment, rich of natural resources, and is enjoying some of the main trends that the global economy is seeing, like ecotourism. I mentioned the land... development assets that Arion holds. All of them are related to some kind of debt restructuring towards our clients. And this is obviously not a core asset for the bank, and we are deliberately now consolidating these assets under one umbrella, Lante, which is held directly on a balance sheet with employees of Arion working actively on this, both on the operational side and with board representation. I think the key milestones here will be the local planning process, which we will be continuing to work on this year and maybe a little bit into next year with relevant municipalities. And then it remains to be seen what we will do with it, whether we divest this in pieces or fully, or if we distribute this through an extraordinary dividend to our shareholders. But this is a... the potential here for value creation is substantial. And with that, I'm going to hand over to my colleague and chief economist, Erna Björk.

Thank you, Bendigt. Good morning, everybody. I hope you had a pleasant winter so far. It's been a record-breaking winter here in Iceland. December was the coldest December in over 50 years. And actually, in Reykjavik, it was the coldest December in over 100 years. But thankfully, we rely on hydro and geothermal energy, which means that the biggest impact on most households was probably the temporary closing of several swimming pools for a couple of days. At least winter hasn't had any visible effects on household consumption as 20% of the population went abroad in October and payment card turnover reached record heights in December. So freezing winter, but consumption continued to run hot and consumption running hot is nothing new. I think this is the fourth time in a row that I stand upon this very stage and say, GDP growth was driven by a record breaking private consumption because that was the case. Yet again. According to preliminary figures from Statistic Iceland, GDP increased by 7.3% between years in the third quarter, exceeding expectations by a significant margin. While private consumption had the biggest impact, growth was mainly driven by exports, largely thanks to tourism. Although increasing economic activity has been reflected in strong imports growth, exports increased even more, leading to a positive contribution of foreign trade to GDP, and a current account surplus for the first time since 2021. Nevertheless, it is a short respite, as a current account deficit is the most likely result for the year as a whole. We're still waiting for the Q4 figures. And most analysts are expecting and forecasting a current account deficit for this year as well, even though tourism has regained its former strength. which it certainly has in 2022, 1.7 million tourists visited Iceland, 150% increase between years and 86% of the total number of 2019. In this context, we have to keep in mind that we began the year with COVID restrictions, both domestically and at the borders. But once the impact of the pandemic began to recede, we saw the tourist arrivals climb to 2019 levels fairly quickly. No less important is the fact that each tourist stayed for a longer period of time and spent more money than before the pandemic. According to the leading airlines flying to the country, the outlook is still bright, despite the cost of living crisis raging on. With booking patterns, they have slowly begun to return to normal, and bookings out of North America especially strong. Still, the uncertainties remain at large, as you can see reflected in the wide range of the tourist arrival forecast. They range from 10% increase this year to 40% increase. According to Isavia, which handles operations and developments of the international airport, we can expect 2.2 million tourists to visit the country this year, which, don't get me wrong, it would be a fantastic result, but I'm afraid it would create a challenging environment both for the labour market and for tourism-related infrastructure. So, the Icelandic economy is still set for a pretty strong GDP growth, mainly export-driven, with a consensus among domestic analysts at 2.1% GDP growth this year followed by a 2.7% GDP growth next year. However, the consensus doesn't tell the whole story as currently analysts are very busy revising their forecast upwards due to preliminary figures on disposable income, which grew more strongly in the past two years than previously estimated. This means that the saving ratio has remained high and is well above its pre-pandemic average, so therefore households, they can maintain a higher level of spending than previously anticipated. Furthermore, the conditions on the labour market have and will most likely continue to support private consumption. The labour market is very tight, unemployment is low, and significant labour shortage remains. More importantly, and in my opinion, this is probably one of the biggest news of the quarter, new collective wage agreements were signed in December for a large part of the private market. The agreements are short term, they expire in January 2024, and they provide a generous wage increases. General wages increased by 6.75% and significant changes were made to wage tables and pay scales. So I think it's safe to assume that the nominal wage index will reflect a slightly higher relative change or closer to perhaps 8% increase on average in 2023. So while the new wage agreements certainly support private consumption, they are also inflationary. Strong household demand, albeit slower growth than we've seen over the previous quarters, just because we're coming from such high levels, will most likely be reflected in Icelanders' trips abroad, imports, continued spending, and thus putting continued pressure on the ISK. So the Monetary Policy Committee of the central bank certainly has its work cut out for it. The labour market remains tight. The wage growth is not consistent with the inflation target. Households continue to spend like never before. The trade deficit has been growing. The ISK has been weakening quite sharply, especially in the fourth quarter of last year. Inflation expectations appear to be less firmly anchored, and inflation is much more persistent than previously expected. Despite this obvious setback, it's not all doom and gloom for the central bank in its battle against inflation, as the housing market, the main driver of inflation here in Iceland, is rapidly cooling off. House prices in the capital area have fallen over the past two months, taking the three-month change into negative territory for the first time since 2019. The year-over-year change is still positive, currently at 17%, but with less activity in the markets, increased number of properties advertised for sale, rising interest rates, and the central bank's imposition of borrower-based measures, it is expected that the year-over-year change will fall quite rapidly, even into negative territory. As our inflation composition differs significantly from Europe, we're not facing the same energy crisis or a cost of living crisis, Our main hope of getting inflation down fairly quickly is by taming the housing market, which currently accounts for 40% of our inflation rate. And we are certainly on the right path in that sense, but still inflation is coming in hot, measuring 9.9% in January, which has compelled the central bank to continue to raise interest rates, despite strongly indicating in October that the rate hike cycle was over. Since then, The central bank has raised rates by 75 basis points with the latest hike announced yesterday of 50 basis points. Now, households have certainly felt the effects of rising interest rates because debt service of non-index mortgages relative to wages has reached an all-time high. This has increased the popularity of inflation index mortgages, which in return reduces the effectiveness of the monetary policy. I guess you win some, you lose some. We still have very high inflation, imbalances in the housing market. We have strikes on the labour market starting last Tuesday and probably more to come next week, currently targeting certain hotel chains. And we have way to expansionary fiscal policy. But still, Iceland is in a pretty enviable position with very strong foundations, as So hopefully, we'll continue to have more wins than losses in our future. That being said, I would like to welcome all our høskultur, our CFO to the stage to go over the financials. Thank you.

Thank you, Erna, and good morning, all. So I'll now look more closely at the numbers, and starting as I usually do with my key highlights for the quarter. So a solid net profit in the quarter of 5 billion resulted in a very strong 25.4 billion profit for the year, representing an ROE of 13.7%. Again, pleasingly, the result is driven by continued momentum in our core income, which has increased by 18% over the year. Second, we see another quarterly growth in net interest income, and the net interest margin for the quarter and for the year ends at 3.1%. As we have guided in recent quarters, we are starting to see rate sensitivity slow somewhat as a result of funding costs on the wholesale side and increasing competition in deposits. Third, a very strong year in net fees and commission. The quarter ended with $4 billion in fees. which ends the year at 16 billion, which is the highest on record for the group. And fourth, our capital funding and liquidity position continue to be very robust. We continue to make progress on our capital optimization project and end the year with a common equity tier one ratio of 18.8%, representing a buffer of 300 basis points above requirements. And this includes a dividend proposal of 12.5 billion and the ongoing buyback program which we are launching the remaining 3 billion today. Again, we have a very strong liquidity position and a light maturity profile and have optionality when it comes to issuance plan over the near term. So looking more closely at the quarter. Operating income was 15.5 billion and a net profit of 5 billion in the period, resulting in an ROE of 10.7%. For the year, again, net earnings 25.4 billion and an ROE of 13.7%. I will discuss the key line items in more details on the following pages, but just highlighting a couple of points here. In terms of operating expenses, we are provisioning for a full payment related to the group incentive scheme in this quarter of 1.6 billion, as the KPIs are expected to be met. As was the case last year, we are provisioning this in the fourth quarter, as we now have sufficient visibility on these performance indicators. As we have discussed before, this variable incentive scheme is a key driver for the group to manage fixed costs. Second, the net impairments are positive by 400 million in the quarter. I'll discuss this in more detail on the following page, but this is primarily due to single-name recoveries of previously written down exposures. We then have a 360 million negative impact from discontinuous operations in the quarter. This is partly a result of revaluation of Stocksberg's assets as we transfer them into subsidiary land day. The remaining assets within the health for sale line now is effectively the holding of the bank in travel agency through Solberg, which is accounted for at zero. And going forward, we therefore expect very little activity in this health for sale line going forward. So looking at net interest income, it's increased by 21% compared to the fourth quarter of last year and 1% between quarters. During the quarter, net interest-bearing assets increased by 4%, mainly through corporate loan growth at the end of the year. We also pre-financed both an upcoming Euro senior maturity and Tier 2 call dates later in the year. The result is that net interest margin is slightly down from the third quarter at 3.1%. We have added some more granularity under our disclosure on this page, especially around change in net interest income between quarters. As you can see here, there are two key items which are served to lower the net interest income between quarters. Firstly, we see cost of borrowings for wholesale funding rise by close to 900 billion between quarters. This follows, of course, the recent Euro senior issue and the tier two issuance, which for the first time in a relatively long time means that our funding cost is increasing. Secondly, we see a 550 million impact from lower inflation in Q4 versus Q3. And while, of course, inflation remains elevated, the increase was greater in Q3 than Q4, and this means that there is a lower net interest income in the fourth quarter. We also show at the top right corner of this page a high-level view of how our key drivers of net interest income have been tracking. Here, the slight uptick in cost of borrowings can be seen, and also that the cost of deposits have been increasing considerably over the past two quarters. In terms of guidance, we simply continue to highlight that this is a very dynamic market, especially in terms of cost of deposits, and it is difficult to provide a firm view over the medium term. We do provide a sensitivity analysis in the notes of the account, but continue to view this as one scenario instead of guidance as such. But over the longer horizon, we would anticipate that the net interest margin would settle around the 3% area. So looking at fees and commissions. 4 billion in the quarter concludes what has been a record year for the group, with 16 billion in net fees and commissions over the year. This means that despite a challenging year in the insurance business, we again see net fees and insurance income covering 70% of our operating expenses, and this is up from 50% in 2018-19. It is again very pleasing to see the value of the diversity in our fee-generating businesses, with five key pillars contributing to this fee income for the year. The capital markets business finished a very strong year with a good quarter and ranked number one both in equities and bond trading in Iceland. On the positive, we continue to see robust premium growth of 12% for the year, resulting in a top-line record year for the company. It is however fair to say that this concludes a challenging year for the insurance industry in Iceland. The combined ratio for the year ended up at 99% compared to 93% last year, and this is a result of claims increasing by 21% year on year. There are several factors contributing to this, which we've discussed in previous quarters, but the general view was that this is an unusual year, and there's optimism that this will turn around in the near term. This year, of course, the economy came out of COVID very fast, and there was an unusual year as well in terms of weather in Iceland. which impacted a number of our insurance areas. As Benny did mention, we continue to see momentum in the bank assurance strategy, and we are very optimistic around this business going forward. So quickly on the financial income, which was broadly flat in the quarter. Included in the bond holdings loss in the quarter is a 180 million loss on the housing financing fund bonds, which we guided to in the Q3 presentation. During the past year, we have been actively managing down unlisted equity exposures, and these now stand at 6.7 billion versus 11.4 billion at the end of 2021. This is important both in terms of managing Pillar 2 capital requirements and from an S&P RAC perspective. So we get operating expenses. Again, the story is relative stability and the cost base despite inflationary pressures. and significant increase in operating income. This is reflected in the cost to core income of 45.6% compared to just under 52% last year and 62% in 2019. We also see this in terms of core income generated per employee, which is 78 million for the year versus 50 million in 2019. Another measure which we highlight on this page in terms of efficiency of the business is that total office space of the group has decreased by 40% from 2020, with the move into our headquarters this year being the last in several measures over the past years in this regard. Total operating expenses for the year were $27 billion, and again, this includes the $1.6 billion provision for the employee incentive scheme, which is accounted for in Q4. Again, this is a variable scheme which does not impact fixed costs into next year. So moving on to the balance sheet. So there are three highlights effectively that I want to highlight on this page. Firstly, as I mentioned, the sale of Valetor and the transfer of the assets of Stocksberg into Lante. The health for sale line in our balance sheet is effectively reduced to zero. This further simplifies our balance sheet going forward. The Staxberg asset is now revalued as a development plot and is accounted for as investment property in other assets. Secondly, we continue to emphasize the focus of being competitive in terms of deposits. And while competition in this area is intensifying, we are growing deposits in the quarter by 2% and 15% over the year. And this has supported the 16% loan growth in the year. And finally, our liquidity and stable funding positions remain very robust, with an LCR ratio of 158% and a net stable funding ratio of 119%. So in terms of loans, we continue to see growth in the loan book, which increased by 40 billion, or 4% in the quarter, and 16% over the year. This was primarily driven in this quarter by the corporate side, which had a very active end of the year, and grew by 6% in the fourth quarter. The mortgage growth is slowing, however, as a result of the rising rates, and growth in the retail site was under 2%. It should be noted that out of the $40 billion increase in the quarter, around $11 billion was the result of ISK depreciation, which impacts our FX loan portfolio, and inflation impact on our CPI-linked loans. As Benedict mentioned, we continue to see capital velocity as the key to our CIP strategy going forward, and during the year we sold just under 22 billion of corporate loans to institutional investors. The loan book is very well balanced, with 47% in mortgages, 6% other loans to individuals, and 46% to corporates. So looking at our provisioning position. Total loss allowance at the end of the year stands at 0.6% of the loan book. This is slightly down from the third quarter, mainly due to single name recoveries of stage three exposures. During the year, we have reflected worsening economic outlook in our IFRS 9 assumptions by increasing the likelihood weight of pessimistic and base case scenarios and reducing the likelihood of optimistic scenario. We have also worsened somewhat the negative view within the pessimistic scenario. This has to some extent been countered within the loss allowance from single name exposures which have been recovered and this is mostly from tourists in the tourist sector. We continue to see through the cycle expected loss on the loan book of 25 to 30 basis points based on the current loan book composition. So growth in deposits has been a key theme over the past couple of years, and this continued in 2022, with total deposits growing by 110 billion, or 15% over the year. For the quarter, we continued to see growth in total deposits, which grew by just over 2%. In terms of core deposits, which we define as deposits from individuals, SMEs, and corporates, we have also increased by 15% over the year, but these were slightly down in the quarter. This is partly a seasonal trend, as tax payments from corporates are due at the end of the year, which usually means a shift from corporates to the public sector at the end of the year. Deposits are now 60% of the bank's total liabilities, up from 50% in 2019. Loans to deposits have also continued to trend down, and now stand at 144% versus 180% in 2018. Competition for deposits is strong and is increasing, and this is evident both in the retail and corporate side. We expect this to be a trend that continues into the coming year and will be a key determinant of lending growth in the year. We have, for an example, seen significant volatility in deposits from some of our peers in the Nordics, and it is something that we expect to become more frequent over the coming years in the sector. We are in a very good position to compete in this market, with our multi-product long-term partnerships with most of our deposit clients, and with a very efficient, agile, and diversified business model. So moving on to wholesale funding. During the quarter, as I mentioned earlier, we successfully issued $12 billion in Tier 2 in ISK, but which both serves to optimize our capital position by filling our available Tier 2 capacity and also pre-funding a call date later in the year. It is pleasing and important that the market for capital instrument and senior funding in the domestic market seems to be increasing. This follows a successful senior Euro issue that was completed in September, and together these two issues pre-fund all our maturities and call dates in the year. In terms of Euro spread development for the Icelandic banks, it is very positive that we are starting to see the reversal of the whitening that continued for most of the second part of last year. Our funding position allows us to be optimistic in terms of issuance plans in the coming year, and in terms of pursuing profitable growth opportunities should they arise. We have Euro senior maturities in May and December in 2024, which we will be considering during the issuing windows this year. So looking at our capital position. Our position remains very strong, despite taking very large steps in capital optimizations over the past year. Following the upcoming dividend payment, we have paid over 80 billion to our shareholders since the beginning of 2021, or around 35% of the current market cap of the bank. And despite this, we end the quarter with a robust 18.8% common equity ratio, which is 300 basis points above requirements, and above our 150 to 250 management buffer. This position, as mentioned, includes a foreseen dividend payment of 12.5 billion, corresponding to 50% dividend payout ratio, and includes a full impact of the ongoing buyback program. The non-risk-based measure of capital, the leverage ratio, of course, continues to be very strong at 12%, which, as you all know, is probably double what you'll see of most of our peers in Europe. Capital optimization remains the focus for the group. Our current 18.8% common equity ratio indicates around $9 billion in surplus capital above our midpoint target buffer. However, while we are not fully utilizing our AT1 capacity, we are required to use common equity capital to meet the Tier 1 capital requirements. This means that around $5.5 billion of common equity surplus is used to meet the Tier 1 target. We will be considering options for optimizing the 81 allowance over the near term, but clearly this is market dependent. In terms of MREL, we currently have a 9.5% buffer above our 23% requirements as a percentage of risk exposure amount. This will be lowered by approximately 5% in May when 300 million euro senior issue that is maturing in May 2024 is within a year of maturity. So before I turn over to Q&A, I want to again highlight some of the key themes going forward. 2022 was a very strong year for the group. We continued to simplify the business with a successful sale of Valetor, and core operations have never been stronger. Our key strengths lie in the diversified pillars of the business, which all support each other through the cycle. The foundations of the business are also very strong. We have a robust balance sheet, a very strong capital and liquidity position, and a funding position which allows for flexibility in the coming months. The Icelandic economy is also, in many ways, in a relatively strong position, as Benedikt and Ertna highlighted earlier. We have a good opportunity in Iceland to manage a smooth stabilisation of the economy in the coming years. The sharp change in rate environment will, however, continue to add volatility into this year, especially on our funding markets. We are in a very strong position to navigate this with, as mentioned, our light maturity profile on the wholesale side and a robust deposit base with long-standing multi-product relationship clients. It is then very positive that spreads are starting to tighten in the euro market, which hopefully will continue in the near term. We continue to emphasize the importance of agility in the current environment. We are in a strong position with diverse, profitable businesses and broad funding options. The current environment can bring growth opportunities as well as require changes to plans. And therefore, agility is very important. Our updated medium-term targets reflect a positive view of retaining the current operational momentum while enhancing agility around growth and focusing, as Benedikt mentioned earlier, the effectiveness of our key KPIs. So on that note, I want to thank you and now move over to Q&A and welcome Theodor Irna-Fribergsson to manage questions.