Fiera Capital Corporation

... ... Thank you. Good morning and welcome to FIERA Capital's earnings call to discuss financial results for the first quarter of 2026 I will now turn the conference over to Nathalie Medac, Director, Investor Relations. You may begin your conference.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to the FIERA Capital Conference Call to discuss our financial and operating results for the first quarter. A copy of today's presentation can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website. Comments made on today's call, including replies to certain questions, may deal with forward-looking statements which are subject to risks and uncertainties, that may cause actual results to differ from expectations. Please refer to the forward-looking statements on page two of the presentation. Our speakers today are Maxime Menard, Global President and CEO, and Lucas Pontillo, Executive Director, Global CFO, and Head of Corporate Strategy. Also available to answer questions will be John Valentini, President and CEO, Private Markets. I will now turn the call over to Maxime.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. Before we begin, I would like to briefly acknowledge my return following a period of medical leave. I want to thank Gabriel Castiglio for his leadership during my absence and to recognize the management team and colleagues across the firm for their professionalism and continued focus. I am excited to be back and I'm eager to continue to expand on the momentum we have built in the recent months. With that, let me turn to our first quarter results. Our results reflect resilience in an unpredictable market and macroeconomic environment. Our private markets platform delivered AUM growth for the quarter, highlighting the benefit of private investment strategies during times of market turbulence. We continue to streamline operations, reducing expenses by 7% year-over-year, and we produce year-over-year margin growth. I will expand on our progress against our strategic priorities later in the call. Turning to our assets under management, total AUM ended the quarter at $160.2 billion, down approximately 2.4% from the end of prior quarter, mostly reflecting equity market volatility in the last month of the quarter, along with net outflows of $1.3 billion. AUM was also reduced by $650 million from the planned wind-down of our Canadian equity small-cap core strategy during the quarter. Excluding the previously announced wind-down of select strategies, AUM was flat year over year as positive market performance was largely offset by net outflows from sub-advised AUM. Turning to AUM and flows by platforms. Public market AUM ended the quarter at 137.9 billion, down 3% from the prior quarter, primarily as a result of equity market volatility in March and the wind down of our Canadian equity small cap core strategy. We generated close to 350 million in new mandates during the quarter, mostly into equity strategies. We also captured an additional 100 million in net inflows from new Canadian sub-advisory relationships that were established over the last year. We expect that growing exposure to the sub-advisory intermediary space will benefit support organic growth and contribute to our more consistent flow profile. Excluding sub-advised AUM, net outflows were approximately 800 million in the quarter. Our fixed income strategies saw positive flows However, these were more than offset by outflows from equities, reflecting client portfolio rebalancing given the run-up in equity markets and interest rates. Excluding sub-advised AUM on their trailing 12-month basis, net organic growth improved $2.4 billion from the same period last year, reflecting good flow momentum in our core public market business. Subsequent to quarter-end, Within our sub-advised business, we have received notification from two clients who intend to transfer assets totaling $3.6 billion directly to Pinestone. We continue to expect transfers to Pinestone in 2026 to be lower than direct transfers in the prior year. Turning to our private market platform, private markets AUM increased approximately 1% during the quarter. we raised $140 million of new mandates primarily into real estate and private credit strategies. In particular, our market-leading Canadian core real estate strategies saw good demand in the quarter, benefiting from broad consultant support. We generated approximately $120 million of net inflows, which were offset by disciplined return of capital in our closed-end fund business. During the quarter, close to $300 million of capital was deployed into new projects, and our pipeline of undeployed capital remained strong at $2 billion. Early in the second quarter, we began deploying capital into our Canadian Built Opportunities Funds, and we expect fees earned from investments in this fund to begin contributing to earnings in the second quarter and gradually increase as additional capital is deployed. We continue to view private markets as a key driver of long-term value creation. Over the last five years, private markets AUM has grown at a 10% compound annual rate, while revenue have expended at a 15% rate, reflecting both scale and improved revenue mix. On the trailing 12-month basis, Private markets contributed 37% to total revenue while representing 14% of AUM. During the quarter, we took the opportunity to buy out the remaining 25% of FIERA infrastructure, giving us full ownership of the business. An upfront payment of $17.5 million was made and the transaction was closed early in the second quarter. A final amount is expected to be paid in the third quarter to account for minority earnings up to the closing date and any purchase price adjustment following an independent valuation. The transaction directly supports our strategy of growing private markets by reinvesting in high-quality strategies we know well and believe in. Taking a closer look at our Canadian business, Canada remains the foundation of our franchise, where we benefit from established scale broad distribution, and a multi-strategy platform that serves institutional intermediaries and private wealth clients. Ontario and Quebec together represents more than 80% of AUM, with strong penetration across both regions. Importantly, client growth outside these four markets, particularly in Western Canada, is accelerating, highlighting meaningful white space opportunities. Within our Canadian business, Outside of sub-advised AUM, we have seen clear trends towards improvement in net organic growth, supported efficient distribution, and our multi-strategy platform. Outside Canada, we have seen good traction in the U.S., our U.S. fixed income strategy, with net contribution of close to $200 million in the quarter. We also captured new mandates into our global emerging market equity strategies, on the back of solid investment performance. In AMIA, we saw net organic growth of more than $200 million into global emerging market equities and integrated fixed income strategies. Turning to investment performance, global equity markets began constructively in the first quarter of 2026, but weekend through the quarter, amid rising geopolitical tension and renewed concerns around AI-driven valuation and credit market volatility. Most indices ended the quarter down, although losses have more than recovered in the second quarter to date. Against this backdrop, our public market equity performance relative to benchmarks remain challenged. Over the past year, market gains have been increasingly narrow and driven by a small group of higher-beta, lower-quality stocks creating a difficult backdrop for high-conviction, quality-focused managers such as FIERA. Year-to-date performance has further been influenced by geopolitical development and the associated energy shock where relative underexposure weighted on results. More positively, our emerging markets and Canadian equity core strategies have been performing well, generating first quartile results versus their respective peers in Q1. with the latter recently taking steps to further align the strategy to a more core focus offering for clients. In contrast to the equity landscape, our fixed income platform delivered strong absolute and relative performance. 96% of our fixed income AUM outperform benchmarked over the one-year period. Our private market strategies continue to perform in line with expectations with nearly all flagship strategies boasting positive returns in the quarter. Before I move on, I want to briefly address private credit, given the broader market focus on the sector. We view recent headlines as idiosyncratic events rather than indicators of systemic issues. Our private credit teams operate with rigorous underwriting standards, and robust portfolio monitoring practices with a consistent focus on downside protection, documentation discipline, and proactive risk management. Moreover, Fiera's investor base is primarily institutions and high net worth clients who are accredited investors with established relationships with Fiera advisors. Our funds are not sold to retail investors and our private credit strategies have no exposure to software which is where sector concerns mostly lie. With that, I'll turn over the call to Lucas to walk us through the financials.