Virtus Investment Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRTS) Q1 2023 Earnings Conference Call April 28, 2023 10:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Sean Rourke - IR

George Aylward - President and CEO

Mike Angerthal - CFO

Conference Call Participants

Sumeet Mody - Piper Sandler

Michael Cyprys - Morgan Stanley

Operator

Good morning, my name is Michelle and I will be your conference operator today. I would like to welcome everyone to the Virtus Investment Partners Quarterly Conference Call. The slide presentation for this call is available in the Investor Relations section of the Virtus website at www.virtus.com. This call is being recorded and will be available for replay on the Virtus website. [Operator Instructions]

I will now turn the conference over to your host, Sean Rourke.

Sean Rourke

Thank you and good morning everyone. On behalf of Virtus Investment Partners, I'd like to welcome you to the discussion of our operating and financial results for the first quarter of 2023. Our speakers today are George Aylward, President and CEO and Mike Angerthal, Chief Financial Officer. Following the prepared remarks, we'll have a Q&A period.

Before we begin, please note the disclosures on page two of the slide presentation. Certain matters discussed on this call may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and as such are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties including but not limited to those factors set forth in today's news release and discussed in our SEC filings. These risks and uncertainties may cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed in the statements.

In addition to results presented on a GAAP basis, we use certain non-GAAP measures to evaluate our financial results. Our non-GAAP financial measures are not substitutes for GAAP financial results. It should be read in conjunction with the GAAP results. Reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures to the applicable GAAP measures are included in today's news release and financial supplement, which are available on our website.

Now, I'd like to turn the call over to George. George?

George Aylward

Thank you, Sean and good morning everyone. I'll start today with an overview of the results we reported earlier before turning it over to Mike to provide more detail. Key highlights of the first quarter included a meaningful improvement in our open-end fund flows from lower redemptions and a strong increase in sales of equity strategies, positive net flows in retail, separate accounts and ETFs, solid investment performance across product types, a sequential improvement in our operating margin excluding seasonal items and we continue to have a well-positioned balance sheet with modest net leverage at quarter-end.