Operator: Welcome to Perpetual's Half Year 2026 Market Briefing. [Operator Instructions]. Press the documents icon to see today's files. Select the document to open it. You can still listen to the meeting while you read. The audio queue is now open. I'll now hand over to Suzanne Evans, Chief Financial Officer.

Suzanne Evans: Fantastic. Thanks, Michelle. Good morning, everyone, and good afternoon or evening to those who are joining us from other parts of the world. Welcome to Perpetual's half year briefing for 2026. Before we begin today, I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians of the land on which we present from for today. Here in Sydney, that is the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We recognize their continuing connection to land, waters and community. We pay our respects to Australia's first peoples and to their elders, past and present. We would also like to extend our respect and welcome to any Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people who are listening to this briefing. We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the various lands on which all of you work today. Presenting our results today will be our Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Bernard Reilly; and myself, the Chief Financial Officer, Suzanne Evans. There will be an opportunity, as you've heard, to ask questions at the end of the presentation. Can we please ask that we start with just 2 questions per person to ensure that we have time for everybody who would like to participate today. Before I hand over to Bern, we'd just like to also draw your attention to the disclaimer that's contained on Page 2 of the presentation. Bern, over to you.

Bernard Reilly: Thank you, Suzanne. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us today for Perpetual's First half '26 results briefing. Reflecting on the overall group performance this half, we delivered a solid result, achieving both revenue growth and underlying profit growth as well as making good progress on our strategic objectives. As you'll see from the table below, our headline results showed total operating revenue of $697.9 million for the first half, up 2% underlying profit after tax of $112.7 million, up 12%. We reported a statutory profit after tax of $53.9 million. The Board has determined to pay an interim dividend of $0.59 per share unfranked, and diluted EPS on NPAT was $0.971 per share, 9% higher than the first half of 2025. We maintained disciplined cost management, resulting in an improvement in our expense guidance for the full-year. We continue to make strong progress on our simplification program. To-date, we have now delivered $60 million in annualized savings, and we remain on track to achieve the targeted $70 million to $80 million by FY '27. In Asset Management, earnings growth was supported by improved market conditions and cost management, partially offset by currency and net outflows, primarily in global, international and U.S. equity strategies. Importantly, over the period, our Australian boutique performed well and Barrow Hanley's contribution improved. Corporate Trust continued to perform consistently, delivering strong growth across all 3 business segments and reinforcing its importance as a diversified earnings engine for the group. The business benefited from strong securitization markets and client growth throughout the half. Wealth Management showed resilience during the half by maintaining focus on delivering for clients as the sale progress -- has continued to progress. While we've made good progress with Bain Capital and are progressing documentation, there is no certainty that a binding agreement with Bain will be reached or that a transaction will proceed. Turning to the next slide. I want to now spend some time framing our asset management business in the broader industry environment. Quality asset managers come into their own during down markets and periods of heightened volatility. We continue to expect more flows between active managers. As you can see on the chart on the bottom right-hand side of the slide, flows between core active funds still dwarf flows from active to passive funds. The line between public and private markets is blurring with private capital increasingly accessed through mainstream vehicles across wealth, retirement and insurance. McKinsey also know the convergence of traditional alternative assets. For Perpetual, this underscores a clear path to growth. High conviction, differentiated active capabilities and increasingly ETF wrapped strategies aligned to new distribution channels. With that context, let me now turn to performance and flows across our boutiques. Our multi-boutique model provides earnings diversification across capabilities, client segments and importantly, regions. As you can see in some of the points on this slide, we saw pockets of strong performance across a variety of our capabilities in the first half, with 54% of strategies delivering outperformance over the important 3-year time frame, reinforcing our relevance in an environment where active flows increasingly reward demonstrated performance. During the half, we saw $22 billion of gross inflows and $32 billion of gross outflows, resulting in a net $10 billion of outflows. While collectively, we saw outflows in U.S. global and international equity capabilities, emerging markets and Australian equity strategies saw areas of investor inflows. This was supported by a strong half for fixed income capabilities, highlighting the benefits of a diversified asset management platform. Net outflows in the half were offset by stronger equity markets and foreign exchange movements, supporting earnings growth and increased AUM over the half. We remain focused on active client retention and delivering strong investment performance, which together underpin improvements in our flow profile over time. Turning to the next slide for some more detail on our Australian asset management business. The integration of our Australian distribution capabilities has materially strengthened our local platform. We now have a large and diversified footprint across both the intermediary and retail channel, which I'll refer to as wholesale and the institutional channel with $71 billion of AUM across Australia. If we look more closely at the wholesale channel, we managed $32 billion of AUM. Of the over 15,000 ASIC registered financial advisors, nearly 11,000 have holdings in Perpetual Group products. We also have key sales and distribution team members working closely with asset consultants and subchannels, including high net worth researchers and brokers. Wholesale delivered $1.5 billion in net inflows for the half. In our institutional channel, we managed $25 billion of AUM across superannuation funds, government clients, insurers, endowments and foundations. We did see outflows for the institutional channel in the half. However, we saw an improvement on the second half of 2025, and we've secured several wins in the first half. These flows include a $250 million contribution from a super client into Australian equities, $110 million contribution from a large institutional client in J O Hambro's emerging markets capability and $100 million new multi-asset mandate from a large superannuation client. Important to note, we also manage $14 billion of AUM in the cash channel. Importantly, our Australian distribution is now a unified platform with strong expertise in distributing across asset classes and boutique brands through a single coordinated team. Our team of 46 includes sales, marketing and client services and is one of the largest local distribution teams in the industry. We're also seeing the benefits of strong product development, including the launch of contemporary investment solutions, and I'll touch on them in more detail on the next slide. A key priority for asset management is ensuring our product range is aligned to evolving distribution channels and strategies where we see sustained client appetite, particularly in fixed income. During the half, we launched the Perpetual Diversified Income Active ETF, which performed well relative to other ETF launches in the period and held over $215 million in AUM as at the 31st of December. We also successfully raised $268 million for the Perpetual Credit Income Trust with assets now in excess of $800 million. In working with our client base globally, we were able to successfully launch Barrow Hanley's U.S. Mid-Cap Value Fund into the U.K. market in June with the fund reaching over AUD 165 million in assets in or $110 million by the end of December 2025. This represents a significant achievement, especially given Broadridge's global market intelligence data, which indicates that fewer than 1% of newly launched funds surpassed the $100 million of assets in AUM. Looking ahead, we have an active pipeline of strategies under development and where appropriate, we will support them through seed investments to target attractive growth areas. Suzanne will talk further about our seed capital program shortly. We expect the continued convergence between traditional and alternative capabilities to remain a feature of the industry globally, driving a forecasted $6 trillion to $10 trillion of capital reallocation over the next 5 years. To that end, our discussions with Partners Group have advanced and an early-stage product design is now being introduced to the market to assess interest. We're also looking at the launching of a direct bond SMA in Australia to expand our suite of fixed income solutions for advisers and platforms. Turning to ETFs. The U.S. active ETF market represents a significant opportunity. While active ETFs remain a relatively small portion of overall AUM, they are becoming an increasingly important channel, capturing a high share of industry flows and revenues. We will continue to build on our established ETF platform here in Australia, and we're going to apply some of these learnings to the U.S. market. We've decided to enter the U.S. ETF market in a risk-managed basis by a third-party provider of multi-series trust structures. This structure is lower in cost and offers quicker speed to market, helping us to bring scale before we need to invest more heavily. If we now turn to the work we're doing with J O Hambro. I've spoken previously about restoring J O Hambro to its heritage strength, and it remains a key priority for us. We've made progress on revitalizing the business, and this will continue through the second half and beyond. In September last year, we announced the appointment of Bill Street as CEO. Building off the work we've already started with J O Hambro, Bill has quickly commenced implementing a clear strategic direction, beginning with the simplification of J O Hambro's operating model to create J O Hambro International an aligned platform that better positions the business for growth. The future success of J O Hambro is an important component of our global offering, and we look forward to updating you on its progress over time. Turning now to Corporate Trust. On the next slide, please. Thanks. The business experienced another strong half and continues to deliver steady growth across all 3 of its business segments. The Australian securitization market remains robust, supporting continued growth in debt market services. Importantly, we continue to see growth across the non-bank lenders, contributing to a more favorable mix of mandates for us. Managed Fund Services growth was driven by custody and our Singapore business, benefiting from both new and existing client growth. Digital and Markets also delivered a 5% uplift in assets under administration compared to the second half of 2025, reflecting continued investment and expansion of our client offerings. Highlighting its strength in the market more broadly for the 10th straight year, Corporate Trust was awarded the KangaNews Australian Trustee of the Year. Looking forward, the business remains focused on executing its 5-year growth strategy, including investing in its core business and digital markets. Corporate Trust has proven time and again to be a highly resilient and growing business. UPBT has grown steadily at a CAGR of 11% from around $22.4 million in first half of '19 to approximately $49 million in the first half of 2026. The cost-to-income ratio has remained broadly stable in the mid-50s range, underscoring our disciplined investment in the business as revenue has continued to grow. This slide also illustrates what is driving that growth across each of our business segments. Notably, Corporate Trust's service-led operating model is aligned both to the credit-linked and equity market growth, which provides a stable, diversified earnings base that is less exposed to equity market volatility. That diversification is particularly relevant in the context of asset management's market sensitivity, reinforcing Corporate Trust's role as a consistent and resilient earnings business within the group. Moving now to Wealth Management. In the half, the business remained focused on delivering for its clients while the sale process continued. Underlying profit before tax was lower, reflecting expense growth. However, wealth management was resilient. Funds under advice grew by 6% over the half, supported by institutional flows and strong equity markets. It was also pleasing to see the strength of this business recognized externally. Five of our advisers were recognized in the Barron's Top 150 financial adviser list, reinforcing our position as a trusted provider of high-quality client-focused financial advice. We were again recognized as a finalist in 2 categories of the 2025 IMAP Managed Account Awards, marking our third straight year of distinction. Wealth Management is at the core of Perpetual's 139-year history and has all the hallmarks of a successful business. Strong funds under advice, 12.5 years of consecutive net inflows as well as being one of Australia's largest managers of philanthropic funds with a very strong client advocacy measure, as you can see here. In relation to the sale process more specifically, I'd like to reiterate that while we have made good progress with Bain and are progressing documentation, there is no certainty that a binding agreement will be reached or that a transaction will proceed. In parallel, we are establishing a clear stand-alone operating perimeter for the business to support a potential sale and ensure continuity with minimal disruption for our clients and for our teams. Our Wealth Management business is a high-quality profitable business with growing funds under advice, and the Board and I are focused on ensuring that any transaction that Perpetual may ultimately enter into is in the best interest of our shareholders. Turning to the next slide. Our simplification program remains on track to deliver our overall target of $70 million to $80 million in annualized savings by June 2027. Importantly, the benefits are now flowing through into reported earnings alongside a simpler, more streamlined operating model. The chart on the right-hand side of the page highlights our planned program of work, which, as you can see, is well advanced. As at 31, December, we have delivered $60 million in annualized savings, of that $26.9 million of actual savings was reflected in the first half '26 results. The majority of savings to-date have come through workforce-related efficiencies, supported by ongoing rightsizing across the global business and the removal of duplication as we simplify structures and reinforce organizational or reduce organizational complexity. We incurred $4.4 million of additional cost savings in additional costs to achieve these savings during the half, and they are recorded as significant items. Looking ahead, the areas of focus for the second half of FY '26 remain finance systems transformation, back-office simplification and the ongoing rightsizing of functions across the group. Total costs to achieve the program are expected to remain at approximately $55 million. In summary, we are pleased with the progress we've made so far, acknowledging we still have more work to do. I'll now hand over to Suzanne to walk through the financials in more detail.

Suzanne Evans: Fantastic. Thanks, Bern. It's great to be able to present a little bit more detail around Perpetual's half year results for the period ended 31, December 2025. We'll start by moving just to the next slide, Slide 15, that has a summary of our results. Operating revenue of $697.9 million was 2% higher than the 6 months ended 31, December 2024 or the prior corresponding period, driven by continued AUM and further growth across the group. As noted in our recent second quarter update, revenue included performance fees of $10 million, mainly generated by our Perpetual and J O Hambro boutiques. Total expenses of $547.8 million were within our guidance of 2% to 3% growth for the financial year 2026. I'll step through some of the drivers of our expense growth and also the basis for our improved expense guidance range shortly. Underlying profit after tax was $112.7 million, 12% higher than the prior corresponding period, supported by improved contributions from asset management, continued momentum in Corporate Trust and reduced funding costs following the refinancing of our debt facilities in the last financial year. The effective tax rate on UPBT was lower at 24.9% compared with the prior corresponding period. Now this was a combination across the halves due to a write-off of a deferred tax asset in the prior corresponding period and in the current half and unrelated prior period adjustments lowering the effective tax rate. If I look forward in the medium-term, we would expect the effective tax rate to normalize around the 27% to 28% range. Significant items for the half year were predominantly non-cash in nature, and I'll cover those in more detail later. Earnings per share on UPAT was 9% higher. Finally, on the summary slide, the Board has declared an interim dividend of $0.59 per share, unfranked and to be paid on the 7th of April 2026. Now if I move to the next slide. On here, we've just got a high-level visual snapshot of performance across our divisions. I'll step through each division in slightly more detail, beginning with Asset Management. Asset Management underlying profit before tax increased 4% to $106.9 million, demonstrating top line growth, but also how our cost discipline is beginning to translate into an improved cost-to-income ratio when compared to the prior corresponding period. Higher average AUM drove higher management fees. However, performance fees were slightly lower than the prior corresponding period. Total expenses declined 2%, reflecting some of the early benefits from the simplification program that Vern has outlined. These were partly offset by foreign currency movements and continued investment in upgrades to our fund technology platforms. Now moving on to Corporate Trust. Corporate Trust experienced steady UPBT growth in the half, up $5 million on the prior corresponding period across all 3 of its business lines. Increased volumes in Debt Market Services, along with new client flows, further supported underlying FUA growth in the securitization portfolio. The result was 10% growth on the prior corresponding period revenue. Managed Fund Services revenue increase was driven by growth in custody services and continued momentum in our Singapore operations, both from new and existing clients. Digital Market Services experienced particularly strong growth with revenue up 20%. Some of that reflected an elevated level of implementation fees for Perpetual's intelligence SaaS offerings as well as continued growth in markets and the fixed income platform management solution. Operating expenses were higher, supporting growth and increased client volumes as well as continued investment to enhance digital capabilities across the business lines. Moving now to Wealth Management. Wealth Management's UPBT decreased by $5.5 million. Given the backdrop of the ongoing sale process, the business remained resilient. Revenue was broadly flat at $118.8 million. Market-related revenue increased modestly, supported by stronger equity markets, while non-market revenue declined slightly, mainly due to lower fiduciary and risk advisory income. Total expenses were up 6% with increases across staff, technology and premises costs. Funds under advice were up 6% on the first half to $21.9 billion with positive market movements and net inflows from new institutional clients. Moving now to the final division, our Group Support Services. Underlying loss before tax decreased by $3.3 million, with higher revenue over the half compared to the prior corresponding period. Revenue was supported by higher income from seed investments, interest received on cash balances and some foreign currency revaluations. Compared to the prior corresponding period, interest expense declined, reflecting the benefit of the refinanced debt facilities in May last year that I referenced earlier. Moving now to the next slide with a reconciliation between underlying profit after tax to net profit after tax. Significant items for the half were $58.8 million and were predominantly non-cash in nature. During the period, we undertook a review of significant items and began developing a clearer policy around classification, which resulted in some age projects being closed or where appropriate, moved back above the line. If I step through our results from UPAT to NPAT, the main drivers were costs relating to the Pendal transaction, the proposed sale of the Wealth Management business and our simplification program. I will call out on Pendal, these are the final costs associated with the transaction, and we're expecting no more to occur by the end of financial year 2026. The simplification program and any associated costs with Wealth Management are expected to continue into the financial year 2027. The remaining significant items are non-cash in nature and include revaluation adjustments. Reflecting the impact of these significant items, we reported a net profit after tax of $53.9 million. Now if I move to a bit more detail around our expenses. Controllable cost growth was 1%, largely attributable to expenses in Corporate Trust and Wealth Management as well as variable remuneration linked to improved contributions from Barrow Hanley and also our Australian boutiques. Now this was partially offset by simplification program benefits, which also helped to mitigate inflation-related cost pressures. Cost growth was also impacted by foreign exchange movements, albeit not as negatively as the prior 6 months. Looking ahead, we've improved our FY '26 expense guidance, and it's now reduced to between 1% to 2%, down 100 to 200 basis points on the prior guidance provided. It is important to note, however, included in this guidance is that expenses will continue to fluctuate depending on FX movements and interest rates. We've provided our currency assumptions in the footnotes to this slide. Moving now to cash flow. Free cash flow of $33.8 million for the half included $82.9 million in net cash receipts in the course of operations. There was a net increase in free cash flows in the half compared to the prior corresponding period. Borrowings did increase by $10 million over the period, but that was predominantly due to timing differences in drawings on our working capital facility relative to the upstreaming of dividends across our global operations. After paying dividends totaling $60.3 million and adjusting for timing on seed repayments and foreign currency movements, total cash at 31, December 2025 was $325.6 million. Moving now to the balance sheet. The balance sheet at 31, December 2025 remains robust and is supported by operating activities across our diverse sources of earnings. The majority of our cash is held for working capital, but also for regulatory capital purposes and predominantly in the United Kingdom. For greater clarity, we have also disaggregated the other financial assets in the balance sheet into 3 segments: seed capital, IIP balances and a loan receivable. By way of background, the IIP units is where Perpetual is hedging employee incentive obligations. Of course, there is an offsetting item in the liability side of the balance sheet. Importantly, we have $150 million of surplus liquid funds available, of which the majority relates to undrawn lines of credit. Now moving on to one of these categories, seed capital. Our seed capital is deployed to support organic growth and product development. Capital is deployed selectively, recycled actively and governed through a formal committee oversight process. The average holding period is approximately 3 years. We've included some case studies here to illustrate how seed capital can be used, whether it's to build early scale, launch strategies, develop track record and then recycle capital once external demand is established or the sometimes difficult and more challenging part to exit where scale is not achieved or commercialization does not occur. Now finally, turning to dividends. The Board has declared an interim dividend of $0.59 per share for the half, which will be unfranked and paid on the 7th of April 2026. The interim dividend represents a UPAT payout ratio of 60% for the half, which is lower than the prior corresponding period where the payout ratio was set at 70%. Dividends are expected to remain unfranked in the second half of this financial year. We will, of course, continue to assess the appropriate payout levels within our stated range, taking into a number of factors into account, including our ability to frank. I'll now pass back to Bern for some comments on the outlook.

Bernard Reilly: Thanks, Suzanne. Before we move to questions, I want to spend some time talking about the progress that we've made on our strategy over the half. Thanks. Next slide. Great. Our strategy is aligned to 3 pillars, as you can see here on the page, simplifying our business, delivering operational excellence and investing for growth. We've made progress within each of these pillars over the half. Firstly, with Simplify, as I've already spoken to today, our simplification program has streamlined the group's operating model and delivered an additional $16 million in annualized savings for the half. Progress has also been made on our finance and transformation projects. Delivering on operational excellence. Our 3 businesses are now established as focused, largely decentralized business lines with greater accountability for delivery and financial outcomes, supported by continued group oversight and governance. Additionally, we have delivered on our cost commitments, resulting in an improved expense guidance for 2026. Finally, as we discussed earlier today in investing for growth, we have supported the launch of new product innovation in asset management with an example being the Perpetual Diversified Income Active ETF. Our Corporate Trust business also completed the acquisition of IAM's term deposit broking business, increasing scale in markets, broking and fixed income areas. Corporate Trust will continue to look for additional capabilities that will help drive business growth. We have also progressed AI transformation initiatives, embedding AI into core workflows to enhance decision-making, productivity and scalability across the business. These 3 pillars will remain the platform for execution for our business activity for the remainder of 2026. Now looking ahead, we have a clear and focused set of priorities. We'll continue to deliver on our cost reduction commitments. We'll retain our leadership position in Corporate Trust by investing in capability to drive further growth for that business. We'll continue to target investment in new products and capabilities across our asset management business, and we'll work to remove complexity to create a leaner, more efficient structure for the group. Thank you for listening this morning. Suzanne and I are now happy to take questions that you may have. I'll hand back over to Michelle, our operator, to manage these questions. Thanks, Michelle.

Operator: [Operator Instructions]. Our first question comes from Elizabeth Miliatis from Macquarie.

Elizabeth Miliatis: The first one is just on the sale of the Wealth division. If you could give a little more color on why things are taking a little longer than perhaps we'd expected. There's also been press reports that the brand is potentially up for sale as part of that transaction. Yes, just a little more color would be much appreciated.

Bernard Reilly: Sure, Liz. I'll start and maybe Suzanne can add in. The process for the sale of the wealth has taken longer than I think the market would have liked. I think to put it into context, I think it's important. Firstly, this is a business that we've owned -- Perpetual's owned for 139 years, and it is intertwined in particular with the other businesses that we have, in particular, Corporate Trust. If you think about the prior transaction that we had contemplated, we were selling 2 businesses together to one buyer. Now we are selling one business to -- potential progressing selling one business to one buyer. We need to untangle that business from the broader organization to be able to do that. There's an element here of negotiating a sale while also untangling the business to be able to do that. It's actually quite a complex process to be able to do. I think the one point that I'd like to reiterate that I have said in my formal remarks, was that the Board and I are very focused on delivering the best outcome for our shareholders. So we're very focused on that, and so understanding the complexity that's in front of us, we're driving to get to an outcome of clarity for the market, but also for our team and our clients as quickly as we can. I was focused on the first bit. Really, we don't comment on media speculation, but when we thought about the sale process, brand was an important part of the consideration for us. I'll probably leave it at that.

Elizabeth Miliatis: Then just the upgrade to the guidance for OpEx, so now 1% to 2% from 2% to 3%. It seems like most of that change is currency. Can I just confirm that? Then also secondly, I mean, just the rates in there look pretty conservative. Obviously, we'll see how things progress over the next 4 months or so, but potential upside risk to that number as well just because of currency?

Suzanne Evans: Yes. Liz, you're spot on. In fact, that was probably one of the big swing factors in the full-year last year. Fair to say that probably has made me quite conservative as the CFO. Yes, I mean, FX is a big swing factor for us, and we've tried to capture that when we've provided the guidance. What I would say, though, is we're already 2 months into the second half, and there's a lot of things there which are still controllable costs. I think that's given us the confidence to tighten the range. Obviously, the combination of us staying quite vigilant on the expense base and also some of the benefits coming through from the simplification program, I'd like to think that we can comfortably deliver within the guidance we've given.

Operator: Our next question comes from Nigel Pittaway from Citi.

Nigel Pittaway: Just first question on -- just on J O Hambro. It seems as if your aims there to restore it to its heritage strength is still being somewhat hampered by the net outflows from the international and global select strategies. I was just wondering, do you feel you're any closer to be able to extend those outflows? Or is that something that we can expect unfortunately to go on for some time?

Bernard Reilly: Nigel, yes, with J O Hambro, the select strategies have still -- you're right, still experienced outflows. You're 100% correct there. What we are seeing is a real focus on client retention, in particular with a lot of the wholesale clients in the U.S. The team are very focused on that. I think what drives investment outflows or inflows is performance, right? Performance there has still remained soft, and that makes that challenge a little bit harder. What I would say on the other side of that, our other global strategies and our emerging market strategies in J O Hambro have actually been receiving inflows as well. They do -- you do see some of the offset there as well. It remains a focus...

Nigel Pittaway: Then just, I mean, following up, those 2 strategies, the outflows from there seem to be the main explanation as to why the revenue margin in asset management ex-performance fees dipped quite a bit in the second half last year. There seems to have been some partial recovery in that this half despite those outflows continuing. Is there anything going -- else going on within that revenue margin for asset management? I say stripping out performance fees that made it improve this half?

Bernard Reilly: You're right. The margin compression that we saw in the prior half was related to the outflows in Select. You're also seeing at the margin, you're seeing the asset mix is changing. We touched on some of the strategies that we launched in the most recent half, and we've seen those fixed income strategies, which are a lower basis point average relative to equities where we've seen the inflow. You do see some of it is in that. It's not in all in outflow. We've also seen a pickup in some of the Barrow strategies as well.

Suzanne Evans: Yes. I think as Nigel just called out, the way we report it includes performance fees.

Operator: The next question is from Andrei Stadnik from Morgan Stanley.

Andrei Stadnik: Can I ask my first question around distribution efforts in U.S. and U.K.? Are you pleased with the progress there as you are in Australia? Or what's the update on U.S. and U.K. European distribution?

Bernard Reilly: Sure, Andre. We highlighted the Australian distribution in this half because we've actually spoken about the global in the prior half or the half before. I can't remember now. I thought it was an opportunity given a lot of the work in the Australian -- bringing the Australian teams together was really finalized. I wanted to highlight that and the fact I think they've done a great job in delivery on coming together as a unified team and delivering positive flows for the business. I suppose that's the first point, I suppose to explain why we put it in there for you to give you some context. I also think the size of that team and our footprint is something that we don't always talk about, and I think it's actually a great asset for the business. Reflecting that, I think, is important. It is far -- that team is far more advanced than our international distribution footprint would be a fair assessment to make. The work that we're doing with the team is continuing to drive that. Am I happy where it's at? I'm probably never going to be happy enough with where it's at from a distribution perspective. I might say the Australian team, some of them are listening have done a good job. There's still more that they can do. I suppose we're focused on continuing to drive what we can on both on -- I think the market segment piece is important. If I think about the U.S. and the U.K., I think a great example of some of the work that we've done was launching the Barrow Hanley strategy in the U.K., which was effectively a strategy we have in the U.S. that there was a real appetite for that opportunity in the U.K. The multi-boutique model allowed us to actually offer that in a different market that the Barrow team never would have been able to access had we not had they not been part of the group. I think a good fact point around the business strategy and structure that we have. An example of that. I think there's more we need to do in the intermediary space, wholesale space in the U.S. It is a little bit hampered, to be honest, by some of the outflows we're seeing in the select strategy, but that's an area of focus that I can assure you the team are clearly focused on that. The other part to, I think, think about in the U.S., given you raised the U.S. is how that market is changing. Active ETFs are clearly -- while it's a small start, right, but active ETFs garnering an outsized share of flow. We've talked about it in the past, us having a footprint in the active ETF space in the U.S. is going to be important for the future. As I mentioned in my remarks, we've made some steps there to go down the path of actually using a third-party provider. The reason we're doing that is a couple of fold. I think from a risk of execution perspective, we're taking some of the risk off the table by using someone who is using a multi-series fund. We're effectively using their scale to help us launch. It's quicker to market for us. We don't have to spend all the time building and getting approvals. We can get to market more quickly. Then we can assess the success of that and the progress of that before we look to invest more heavily. I hope that answers.

Andrei Stadnik: I can ask the second question. Just on the seed capital, $183 million of seed capital. Can you talk a little bit about how that's shaped evolved over time, where you would like to see that number? How many strategies might be behind that $183 million of seed capital?

Suzanne Evans: Yes to take that one. Thanks, Andre.

Bernard Reilly: Suzanne is the Chair of the Committee, so she can take that.

Suzanne Evans: Look, the thing is to deal with one of your questions, it is very diversified. We've got a lot of strategies that only required a relatively small amount of seed either to build the initial portfolio construction to build a track record. We've got quite a few bets in there. There'd be more than 20 capabilities that we've got ceded today. Also included in that number is investments in our CLO business via Barrow Hanley. Now those are obviously longer-term structures, so not liquid. Those ones have more duration to them. I think the important thing there is we're quite focused on, I think the size that we have deployed at the moment is appropriate. Obviously, the discipline that we're very focused on is how do we recycle. It's quite easy putting money into funds. It's sometimes a lot harder at recycling or as I sort of called out, if something isn't working, and that may just be that the market demand wasn't where you expected it to be. You have the discipline around closure and bringing that capital back. I wouldn't see us looking to materially increase the pool that we have today. I think with what we've got and with some of the recycling we're starting to think about, we'll be able to continue to support some of the innovation and product development that has spoken about.

Operator: The next question is from Lafitani Sotiriou from MST.

Lafitani Sotiriou: Can I start off with the wealth management business and sale process? $14 million spent in the last half is quite a lot of money for a business you may not sell in addition to the $5 million odd you spent the half before. Can you talk us through exactly what that money is being spent on? Have you got a better idea on potential stranded group costs and further separation costs if you are successful?

Bernard Reilly: Sure, Laf. If you look at the $14 million pretax number, that is spent in -- there's obviously legal and other costs in there, but I think the larger part of that is around actually the separation of the business, which, to be honest, as part of our simplification strategy, we would do anyway. There's a part there where we are creating -- bringing the team into a separate perimeter and systems and other sorts of things that we are -- the technology that we're implementing that's in that number. You're right, $14 million is not an insignificant number, and it's one that we are keeping a very close eye on in addition to the $5 million you mentioned from the prior half.

Suzanne Evans: I think it's a good point, Laf, because I think it's -- some of that is obviously cost that we may otherwise have incurred, but maybe in a slightly more accelerated time frame with some of the work we're doing around putting more autonomy into each of our business lines. The stranded cost, obviously, is something I'm very focused on. I would say we've already had a mind to that through the simplification program. Wherever we end up with the sale process, I'm pretty confident that those will be relatively immaterial. Now that does require us to do some more work just as we've done across the rest of the organization, but that's not something that probably touches my mind that much. The other part that around what will it cost if we are successful with the sale. I think we're going to have to progress a little bit further with that process to be able to articulate that in a way that I wouldn't be giving you a misleading number. I guess it's fair to say we have had a reasonable amount of spend already. That's some cost, which we can leverage if there is a sale that proceeds.

Lafitani Sotiriou: Can I clarify? I understand that there are costs that you can move around, but one of the criticisms has been you had the strategic review and simplification cost program previously, that was over $130 million. Now you've got a new simplification program, which is $60 million. This is even separate to that, right? This wealth management $20 million spend is another one-off program that is being kept off and separated from the underlying cost. There seems to be a lack of consistency. On the one hand, you've got one-off costs for your tax you've reduced your tax cost in the underlying number this period, but it's from one-off capital gains losses that you would typically strip out, but you've then stripped out a lot of costs from your wealth business, which you still have, and you've also stripped out still $6 million from your Pendal business. I'm just not sure how we should reconcile and think about one-off costs going forward?

Suzanne Evans: Yes. Thanks, Laf. Just one point of clarity and sorry if I wasn't clear before. Some of the impact that we've had in the prior period around the deferred tax asset wasn't actually a capital gain loss. We had a deferred tax asset that was sitting there, which was a timing part. We took a view around our Singapore business, and that was reversed. It's just slightly different and sorry if I didn't clarify it. I think we've definitely heard from the market views around significant items, and I made a commitment at the last half that we would start to look at that. I can't change some of the history, but I think I have been very focused on working with both the executive team and the Board around how we do have more discipline as to what gets classified as a significant item. I think there will be items from time-to-time and the potential sale of the wealth business is one of them, which I think if we don't break that out and provide some clarity around it, it is going to be very hard for people to think about the ongoing expense base. I will say we've heard you. We've heard what the market has given us this feedback, and we're starting that process. I think by the time we come back at 30, June, I think we can be much clearer as to what you should expect on a go forward in terms of the classifications for significant items.

Lafitani Sotiriou: Just to be clear, so the wealth management business, some of that is actually BAU that's in that perimeter that's been separated. The teams -- that's people headcount that are part of the wealth business that are being excluded from the underlying number. That tax piece, that Singaporean thing still, whether it's a CGT thing or not, that's one-off in nature.

Suzanne Evans: Yes, you're correct on the one-off. That's right. It's not people in the wealth business. We do have a team at the moment that are assisting us with the separation process. That separate team makes up some of that cost. I wouldn't categorize this as BAU spend. It is something that we're doing over and above. Obviously, if this was a BAU process, we would take a lot longer around some of these separation activities. The fact is, as Bern said, we're trying to separate 2 businesses that have operated together quite closely for close to 140 years. There's a lot of unwinding to do. Some of that's quite technical in nature around the co-sharing of licenses and operations that have existed for a long time.

Lafitani Sotiriou: Just finally, so can you just clarify why the one-off tax gain is included in underlying the one-off BT Pendal-related expenses still being excluded from underlying?

Suzanne Evans: The Pendal one, I think -- and forgive me if I haven't got a little of the history, but I understand at the time the Pendal transaction occurred, it was indicated that it would take approximately 3 years for those costs. In that program, as I'm aware, all of the integration work is completed, but there is still a bit of a tail around some of the incentive arrangements that is still coming through in that number. That won't be there from FY '27, which is what I called out. As with the tax, I guess what we're trying to do is mirror both above and below the line. In terms of the one-offs, those were highlighted previously in significant items. I guess it's an open call as to whether you think they're material enough to call out. Given the movement that also pushed us below what we would expect our effective tax rate to be on a medium-term basis, which, as I said, is around the 27% to 28%, we wanted to call it out.

Operator: There are no further questions. I'll now hand back to Bernard Reilly.

Bernard Reilly: Thank you, Michelle, and thank you, everyone, for joining us on the call today for our update on our first half '26 results. Thank you.