Thomson Reuters Corp (TRI) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

For the period ending March 31, 2023

May 2, 2023 9:00 a.m. ET

Prepared Remarks

Questions and Answers

Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the Thomson Reuters first quarter earnings call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Gary Bisbee, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Gary Bisbee

Thank you, Paula. Good morning, and thank you for joining us today for our first quarter earnings call. I'm joined today by our CEO, Steve Hasker; and our CFO, Mike Eastwood, who will discuss our results and take your questions following their remarks. [Operator Instructions]

Throughout today's presentation, when we compare performance period-on-period, we discuss revenue growth before currency as well as on an organic basis. We believe this provides the best basis to measure the underlying performance of the business. Today's presentation contains forward-looking statements and non-IFRS financial measures. Actual results may differ materially due to a number of risks and uncertainties discussed in reports and filings that we provide to regulatory agencies. You may access these documents on our website or by contacting our Investor Relations department.

Let me now turn it over to Steve Hasker.

Stephen Hasker

Thank you, Gary, and thanks to all of you for joining us today. I'll start by reviewing our Q1 highlights. Solid momentum continued in the first quarter with revenue and margins meeting our expectations. Total company organic revenues rose 6%, driven by 6% recurring revenue growth. The Big 3 segments grew 7% organically.

We continue to see strong momentum from many areas in our business. Westlaw Precision's fast start continues with more than 1,400 sales to date. The SurePrep acquisition is going well and remains positioned to deliver revenue growth in excess of 20%.

Our international businesses had a strong quarter with Latin America, Asia and emerging markets and Canada all delivering double-digit organic growth and many of our other products remain double-digit growers, including Confirmation, HighQ and Practical Law. Despite this optimism, the macroeconomic backdrop remains highly uncertain, and we continue to closely monitor our customer sales activity.

The sales cycle lengthening that we have seen in recent quarters continues and has broadened out slightly but not enough to impact our 2023 outlook. We are maintaining our full year 2023 outlook, including for organic revenue growth and adjusted EBITDA margins. The one adjustment is to lower total revenue growth to incorporate the pending sale of the majority stake in Elite, which we expect to close in the second quarter. Mike will discuss this in more detail later in the call.