Bridgepoint Group plc 2026 Interim Results

Thank you, Ralph. I'm going to take you through a really strong first half performance, which has helped de-risk the full year numbers. Successful fundraising in the first half helped deliver a 16% increase in management fees, excluding catch-up fees, which is bang in line with guidance. And as you heard Ralph say, we're increasingly confident of achieving our recently revised fundraising target. The standout performance today is in the PRE line, where 121 million pounds of carry recognition and co-investment gains has delivered 2/3 of the PRE expected for the full year. Combined, FRE and PRE resulted in underlying EBITDA of 227 million pounds, a margin of 61% which is slightly above the top end of guidance. And finally, our liquidity has continued to improve at 3.3 times last year's average daily traded volume in the first half. With the final IPO lockup expiry later this month, the free float will increase, and this will be reflected in FTSE Russell index weightings at the next rebalancing in September. The flywheel of capital deployment and exit continues to turn in the middle market. In line with our consistent tempo of deployment, we have made seven new platform investments in private equity. And in infrastructure, we have invested in the largest service provider to the nuclear power industry in North America. Capital invested in the last 6 months totaled 3.6 billion euros. BE 7 has made its final investment, and BE 8 has announced its first. Along with further investments in the pipeline, we expect to deploy approximately another 2 billion euros in the very short term. Moving on to capital returned, we have set a new record of 16.6 billion euros sent back to fund investors. Thanks in no small part to the closing of the Calpine transaction. Excluding Calpine, capital returns of around 4 billion euros in the first half would still compare favorably to prior periods. And the consistency of capital returns remains a key point of differentiation for us with our LPs. Returns in infrastructure have been nothing short of extraordinary, with Symmetry, Calpine, and Cornerstone all achieving money multiples between 4.4 and 6.4 times. And this has contributed to the strength in PRE we are reporting today. And encouragingly, the pipelines for both deployment and exits remain strong for the second half of the year and beyond.

I'm going to take a little time now on both AUM bridges, as there were a number of moving parts in the first half, including a particularly positive increase in fee paying AUM of 28%. Starting with AUM since year end, fundraising added $3.2 billion and Newbury Bridgepoint added $3.9 billion. Divestments total $17.9 billion and of that total around $14 billion was from the Calpine exit. This includes both the cash received on closing and the co-investors have chosen to take their capital in specie. That is to say they have taken locked up shares in Constellation rather than waiting for cash proceeds. Value progression in the funds added $5.2 billion and FX was a headwind of $1.3 billion. On the fee paying AUM side, successful fundraising added $11.3 billion while the addition of Newbury Bridgepoint added $3.5 billion and deployment in credit funds added a further $0.7 billion. Realizations totaled $1.3 billion while step-downs accounted for $0.6 billion. The significant difference between the fund divestment movements in AUM and the realizations and step-downs in fee paying AUM is due to the quantum of co-investment which was required alongside fund capital to fund the Calpine transaction at the outset. The co-investment for Calpine was not fee paying and therefore not included in fee paying AUM. And lastly on fee paying AUM, FX was a headwind of $0.8 billion. With new flagship funds being raised in private equity and infrastructure, the group management fee remains broadly flat at 1.17%.

In PRE, the 120.7 million pounds recorded in the first half leaves us well positioned to reach our guidance of around 25% of total income for the full year. Due to the strength of PRE in the first half, our EBITDA margin reached 61%. With 2/3 of the PRE expected for the full year recorded in the first half, the EBITDA margin for the full year is likely to be a little lower while still comfortably within the guided range of 55%. So you have everything in one place, here is a reminder of the guidance for Cain. With nothing having changed in the last 2 weeks, I'll move straight on to the next slide. Which is guidance for the group. Prior to the acquisition of Cain. A handful of things have changed since we last spoke on the 29th of June and are shown here in black and red font. BEA 8 has now raised 7 billion euros with the final close expected in Q1 2027 at between 8 and 8 and 1/2 billion euros and has begun to pay fees sooner than originally expected in early June. BDE 4 held its final close at 5.1 billion euros of investable capital and ECP 6 held a further large close on the 30th of June to reach 7 billion dollars. Meaning that fees on that additional capital were payable in the first half. As I flagged was possible in my comments 2 weeks ago. All other guidance shown in gray is unchanged since we last spoke. And with that, I'll hand back to Ralph.