Aegon N.V. (NYSE:AEG) Q1 2023 Earnings Conference Call May 17, 2023 3:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Jan Weidema - Head of IR

Lard Friese - CEO

Matt Rider - CFO

Conference Call Participants

Andrew Baker - Citi

Michael Huttner - Berenberg

Nasib Ahmed - UBS

Sudarshan Bhutra - Societe Generale.

Jason Kalamboussis - ING

Ashik Musaddi - Morgan Stanley

Benoit Petrarque - Kepler

Michele Ballatore - KBW

David Barma - Bank of America

Operator

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Aegon Q1 2023 Trading Update Call. At this time all participants' are in a listen-only mode. After the speakers' presentation there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded.

I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Jan Willem Weidema, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Jan Weidema

Thank you, Sharon, and good morning to everyone. Thank you for joining this conference call on Aegon first quarter 2023 trading update. Before we start, we would like to ask you to review our disclaimer on forward-looking statements, which you can find at the back of the presentation. With me today are Aegon's CEO, Lard Friese; and CFO, Matt Rider. We will take you through the highlights of the first quarter and the progress we are making in the transformation of Aegon. After that, we will continue with our Q&A session.

On that note, I will now give the floor to Lard.

Lard Friese

Thank you, Jan Willem, and good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining us on the call today. The format of today's disclosure is different from what you are used to. As previously announced, we have changed the reporting format for the first and third quarters to trading updates.

These will focus on sales and capital metrics and we will also update you on the progress that we are making on our strategic priorities. We will, of course, report full IFRS results for the first half year and second half year to align with a.s.r.'s reporting cycle.

Moving on to Slide number 2, I want to start by highlighting our achievements this quarter. Aegon has had a good start to the year. In the first quarter, we demonstrated strong commercial momentum and advanced on our strategic priorities.

I am especially pleased with the progress that we're making in light of the continued global volatility, specifically in financial markets. Preparations for the closing of the a.s.r. transaction continue at pace. And I am confident that we will be able to complete the transaction in the second half of the year as planned.