Ladder Capital Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

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March 17, 2025

There are 6 speakers on the call.

Operator

Good afternoon, and welcome to Getty Images Fourth Quarter and Full Year twenty twenty four Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. We have allocated one hour for prepared remarks and Q and A. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Stephen Canner, VP of Investor Relations and Treasury at Getty Images. Thank you.

Operator

You may begin.

Speaker 1

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Getty Images Fourth Quarter and Full Year twenty twenty four Earnings Call. Joining me on today's call are Craig Peters, Chief Executive Officer and Jen Laden, Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, we would like to note that due to the ongoing regulatory review process, we will not be able to comment on the status of the merger with Shutterstock or the fourth quarter Shutterstock operating results. We appreciate your understanding and will share updates as soon as we are able. This call will include forward looking statements with the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

Speaker 1

These statements are subject to various risks, uncertainties and assumptions, which could cause our actual results to differ materially from these statements. These risks, uncertainties and assumptions are highlighted in the Forward Looking Statements section of today's press release and in our filings with the SEC. Links to these filings in today's press release can be found on our Investor Relations website at investors.gettyimages.com. During our call today, we will also reference certain non GAAP financial information, including adjusted EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA margin, adjusted EBITDA less CapEx and free cash flow. We use non GAAP measures in some of our financial discussions as we believe they represent our operational performance and underlying results of our business.

Speaker 1

Reconciliations of GAAP to non GAAP measures as well as the description, limitations and rationale for using each measure can be found in our filings for the SEC. After our prepared remarks, we'll open the call for your questions. With that, I will hand the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Craig Peters.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Steven, and thanks to everyone for taking the time to join us today. I will touch on Q4 and full year 2024 business performance and progress before Jen takes you through the full results in more detail and the 2025 outlook. I want to start by briefly touching on the merger with Shutterstock. As announced earlier this year, Getty Images and Shutterstock entered into a definitive merger agreement that will result in a company with a strong financial foundation and opportunities for superior value creation for customers, creators and our combined shareholder base. This is an exciting and transformational opportunity for our companies at a time when Getty Images is building positive organic performance momentum as evidenced in the results we will take you through today.

Speaker 2

I was also pleased to complete a refinancing on our term loans in this quarter, which extended maturities on $1,000,000,000 of debt to 2,030. Jen will share more details on this transaction. Moving to results. In the fourth quarter, we grew revenue to $247,300,000 representing growth of 9.5% or 8.5% on a currency neutral basis. The top line performance was coupled with strong profitability with adjusted EBITDA rising to $80,600,000 up 11.7 or 10.4% on a currency neutral basis.

Speaker 2

For the full year 2024, revenue was $939,300,000 an increase of 2.5% on both a reported and currency neutral basis. Our adjusted EBITDA finished at 300,000,000 for the full year with a healthy margin at 32% of revenue. With these results, we delivered on the full year return to to top line growth, exceeding the midpoint of our guidance and finished this year with a strong Q4. Just this last week, Getty Images celebrated its thirtieth year in business. Over those thirty years, we built a respected brand.

Speaker 2

We produced and preserved iconic imagery. We cultivated deep customer and partner relationships, delivering real value in each instance, and we embrace the spirit of continuous evolution in the face of an extremely dynamic market. Over our three years, we've experienced an aggregated immense change. The introduction and universal embrace of digital photography, the growth of the Internet and e commerce, the introduction of the smartphone and explosion of mobile photography, access to broadband and the shift from print to digital media, now artificial intelligence. Throughout 2024, we continued to invest in core assets of our company and evolve.

Speaker 2

We renewed and added to our roster of long standing world class partnerships. We produced award winning comprehensive photo and video coverage across the world of news, sport and entertainment. We added Motorsport Images talent, relationships and archive. We conducted deep and broad based research across cultures, demographic, industries and creative trends. We work closely with our exclusive network of talented contributors to develop content that reflects this research.

Speaker 2

We launched natural language search across our websites. We expanded our integrations across the broader creative and editorial ecosystems. We rolled out new commercially safe AI capabilities to our customers. We continue to grow our annual base of annual subscribers. Our delivery in 2024 serves as a foundation for 2025 and the decades to come.

Speaker 2

2025 has already delivered its own challenges with the horrific fires in Los Angeles impacting so many individuals and businesses just to name one. But I'm confident in the future of Getty Images given our unique position and assets and our unwavering focus on delivering sustainable customer value by helping our customers to create and engage end audiences, saving them time and money and reducing their risk. I look forward to our announced merger with Shutterstock as a means to further delever our balance sheet, increase our margins and cash flow and accelerate investment where we see opportunity. And I'm extremely energized to take Getty Images into its fourth decade. With that, I'll turn the call over to Jen to take you through more financial details.

Speaker 3

We continue to build momentum as we move through 2024, culminating in a strong finish to the year with a strong Q4 financial performance. We delivered high single digit top line growth while maintaining north of 30% adjusted EBITDA margins. We surpassed both the midpoint of the updated guidance we shared on our last call and the guidance we started the year with. Q4 revenue was $247,300,000 with year on year growth of 9.5% or 8.5% on a currency neutral basis. Full year revenue was $939,300,000 up 2.5% on both a reported and a currency neutral basis.

Speaker 3

Geographically, the Americas region, our largest region with respect to revenue, was up 15.9% in Q4 on a currency neutral basis, with APAC also up 0.4% and EMEA down just under 1%. Annual subscription revenue was 54.9% of total revenue in the fourth quarter. Subscription revenue grew approximately 11% on both a reported and a currency neutral basis. This growth was driven by our premium access and our e commerce subscription offerings. We added 78,000 active annual subscribers to reach 314,000 in the Q4 LTM period, an increase of approximately 33% over the comparable LTM period.

Speaker 3

This was driven by our e commerce businesses, iStock and Unsplash Plus. Of the 314,000 annual subscribers in the LTM period, 54% were brand new customers and 32 were customers in our key growth markets across LatAm, APAC and EMEA. Our annual subscription revenue retention rate continues to strengthen at 92.9% in the 2024 LTM period, up from 92.4% in the corresponding 2023 period and also up from 92.2% in LTM Q3 twenty twenty four. Paid downloads were down slightly at $93,000,000 while our video attachment rate remains in growth, rising to 16.5% from 14.1% in the Q4 twenty twenty three LTM period. Q4 editorial was $90,100,000 an increase of 19% year on year and 17.7% on a currency neutral basis.

Speaker 3

This performance was a continuation of the trends we discussed last quarter with elevated demand for our editorial content fueled by major even year events, which drove a shift in downloads towards editorial amongst our premium access subscribers. Key drivers this quarter included our coverage of the U. S. Elections, global sporting events, as well as good compares for our entertainment and archive verticals, which were materially impacted in 2023 by the Hollywood strikes. Creative revenue was $142,400,000 down 2.4% year on year and 3.1% on a currency neutrality assist.

Speaker 3

This decrease was primarily due to that shift in download consumption from creative to editorial given the robust editorial event calendar, which I just mentioned. This is an impact we discussed last quarter as well. In the fourth quarter, this represented approximately 3.2 points of downward pressure on creative results. Adjusting for that impact, on a pro form a basis, Creative revenue was in growth. Digging in a bit further to some of the revenue performance trends we saw in Q4.

Speaker 3

Within our Creative business, we continue to see positive momentum in our iStock annual subscriptions, which grew by 10.7% on a reported basis and 9.9% currency neutral, while our Unsplash Plus subscription grew once again by double digits as this newer subscription offering continues to thrive. Corporate remains healthy and made growth for the quarter. Within Media, we saw double digit growth across our broadcast and motion picture production customers, which reflects the ongoing recovery from the twenty twenty three Hollywood strikes impact. Agency, which saw some strengthening in Q3, was in high single digit decline in Q4, impacting our creative a la carte revenue. While we did see a decline in Q4, this still improvement from the double digit declines we have seen in Agency over the past several years.

Speaker 3

Other revenue was $14,800,000 an increase of $10,400,000 from Q4 twenty twenty three, primarily due to two new multi year creative content deals that included some level of AI rates. The growth was also driven by ongoing revenue recognition in the quarter from deals signed in previous quarters. Revenue less our cost of revenue as a percentage of revenue remained strong at 73.5% in Q4 compared with 72.3% in Q4 twenty twenty three and for the full year, 73.1, up from 72.7% in 2023. Q4 SG and A expense was $105,500,000 up $3,900,000 year on year with our expense rate decreasing to 42.7% of revenue from 45% last year. The lower expense rate was due primarily to a $6,000,000,000 decrease in stock based compensation.

Speaker 3

For the full year, SG and A increased by $5,300,000 to 43.4% of revenue, down from 43.9 percent last year, with that decrease in rate also driven by the decrease in stock based compensation. Excluding stock based compensation, SG and A increased to $101,100,000 in the quarter or 40.9% of revenue, up from 91,100,000 or 40.3% of revenue in Q4 twenty twenty three. The higher year on year spend reflects an increase in incentive based staff compensation and commissions tied to our strong financial performance. For the full year, adjusted SG and A increased to $385,900,000 or 41.1% of revenue compared to 39.8% of revenue in the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA was $80,600,000 for the quarter, up 11.7% year over year and 10.4% on a currency neutral basis.

Speaker 3

Adjusted EBITDA margin was 32.6%, up from 31.9% in Q4 twenty twenty three. For 2024, adjusted EBITDA was $300,300,000 down 0.4% reported and 0.3% on a currency neutral basis. Adjusted EBITDA margin was 32% compared to 32.9% in 2023. CapEx was $15,100,000 in Q4, essentially flat to the prior year. CapEx as a percentage of revenue was 6.1%, down from 6.7% in the prior year period.

Speaker 3

For the full year, CapEx was $57,400,000 or 6.1% of revenue, again, fairly flat to prior year and well within our range of 5% to 7% of revenue. Adjusted EBITDA less CapEx was $65,500,000 up $8,400,000 year over year representing an increase of 14.8% or 12.2% on a currency neutral basis. Adjusted EBITDA less CapEx margin was 26.5% in Q4, an increase from 25.2% in Q4 of twenty twenty three. For the full year, adjusted EBITDA less CapEx was $242,800,000 a decrease of 0.7% on both a reported and a currency neutral basis. Free cash flow was $24,600,000 in Q4 compared to $18,600,000 in Q4 twenty twenty three.

Speaker 3

The increase in free cash flow during Q4 was largely driven by the increase in EBITDA. Free cash flow is stated net of cash interest expense of $22,700,000 and cash taxes paid of $13,300,000 in the fourth quarter. For the full year, we generated $60,900,000 in free cash flow compared to $75,700,000 in 2023, with that full year decrease primarily driven by an increase in cash paid for interest and taxes. We finished the year with $121,200,000 of balance sheet cash, up $11,300,000 from the end of the third quarter and down $15,400,000 from Q4 twenty twenty three. The lower cash balance relative to 2023 is due to $57,800,000 of voluntary debt pay downs executed during the year.

Speaker 3

This includes $2,600,000 in the fourth quarter. As of December 31, we had total debt outstanding of $1,300,000,000 which included $300,000,000 of 9.75% senior notes, $579,200,000 of USD term loan with an applicable interest rate of eight point eight five percent 435,200,000 of euro term loan converted using exchange rates as of 12/31/2024, with an applicable rate of 7.88%. We also have a $150,000,000 revolver that remains undrawn. We ended the quarter with a net leverage of 3.97 times. This is down from 4.2 times at year end 2023.

Speaker 3

This marks the first time in over a decade that our net leverage has fallen below four times. While we remain focused on continuing to bring down our leverage, we are extremely proud of crossing below that four times net leverage mark, given that this company has in its thirty years seen its leverage be as high as 10 times. As Craig mentioned, in February, we completed the refinancing of our existing term loan structure. We replaced our old term loans, which were set to mature in February 2026 with new loans now maturing in February 2030. We maintain roughly $1,000,000,000 of term loans outstanding.

Speaker 3

Our new facilities include $580,000,000 of USD term loans with an 11.25% fixed rate and $440,000,000 of Euro term loans with an applicable interest rate of 600 basis points plus EUROBIR equivalent to 8.63% as of 02/21/2025. We will continue to assess market conditions with respect to any future potential refinancing or redemption of our $300,000,000 of bonds. In addition, as we advance on the regulatory front and gain clearer insight into the merger's timeline, we will decide on any additional financing actions required to close the Shutterstock transaction. Considering the foreign exchange rates and applicable interest rates on our debt balance as of December 31 and also factoring in the impact of the debt refinancing including mandatory amortization on the euro term loan, our estimated cash interest expense for 2025 is projected to be $133,000,000 To recap, we finished 2024 by delivering on the guidance we shared at the beginning of the year. We returned our business to top line growth, while maintaining strong profitability margins.

Speaker 3

We drove meaningful subscriber growth and we ended the year with a net leverage below four times. As we approach the end of the first quarter of twenty twenty five, we are excited to continue to build on the momentum with which we closed 2024. With that, let's move into our 2025 guidance. We anticipate revenue of $918,000,000 to $955,000,000 down 2.3% to up 1.6% year over year and down 1% to up 3% on a currency neutral basis. Embedded in this guidance is an assumption for FX rates with the euro at 1.05 and the GDP at 1.26, which implies a headwind on revenue of $12,500,000 of which approximately $3,000,000 is expected in the first quarter.

Speaker 3

However, in recent days, we have seen increased volatility in FX rates following the ECB rate decision with the dollar weakening relative to both the euro and the GDP. This change may lessen the impact of FX on our financial results in the Q2 through Q4 periods. We expect adjusted EBITDA of $272,000,000 to $290,000,000 down 9.5 to 3.3% year over year or down 8% to 1.7% currency neutral. Included in the adjusted EBITDA expectations is a similar cadence for estimated FX impact with an approximate $5,000,000 headwind in 2025, of which approximately $1,500,000 is expected in the first quarter. Please note this guidance includes the anticipated impacts of the odd year versus even year event calendar comparisons, as well as impacts from disruptions in production activity due to the Los Angeles fires and some continued lag in a return to pre Hollywood strike production levels.

Speaker 3

On the cost side, our guidance includes approximately $8,000,000 in one off increases in SG and A as we accelerate our SOX compliance efforts in 2025. This acceleration is to prepare for what we anticipate being a necessary shift in resources and focus on merger and integration related activities upon the close of the transaction. Please note all other merger related costs are not included in this guidance as they are considered one time in nature and therefore are excluded from adjusted EBITDA. With that operator, please open the call for questions.

Operator

We'll take our first question from Cory Carpenter with JPMorgan. Your line is open.

Speaker 4

Good afternoon. Thank you. I think Craig, one for you and one for you, Jen. So Craig, this is generative AI hoping for an update on the consumer update that you're seeing and your latest thoughts on how you expect monetization to ramp. And Jen, on the financials, just could you expand a bit on what drove the outperformance in 4Q relative to the guide you gave last quarter on revenue, but especially on EBITDA?

Speaker 4

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Great. Thanks, Corey. I will take the first and leave the second to Jen. On the AI take up, we continue to see take up of the AI service both on Getty Images and on iStock. I would say it continues to grow, but at a relatively modest pace, which from all accounts seems to match kind of corporate adoption of generative generally in terms of end deployment within the business versus internal deployment within the business.

Speaker 2

And where we're seeing that take up is largely with existing customers using the capability not to generate from a text prompt, but to utilize the technology to modify the imagery. And that's been something that has kind of exceeded our expectations in terms of how customers are adopting it and using it. In the fall, we launched the ability to insert products into the imagery. And that's been really received well across the customer base. And it's addressing something that they haven't historically been able to do with our imagery on the creative side of things and at least do that without significant effort.

Speaker 2

And so this is something that really simplifies that down. But it's it continues to be there, but the core value that we continue to deliver is on the pre shop. And we see those two really be inventory with the customer base. And so we're pleased to kind of continue to roll out those capabilities, leveraging the technology that really help our customers save time and money.

Speaker 3

Hey, Corey, I'll take the question on Q4. So I mean the good part about the Q4 performance is really it was driven by a strong top line. So you mentioned a bit of improvement on EBITDA. That's really mostly about a drop through of strong top line performance, a bit of favorability on the gross margin side, which is almost always for us a product mix story. And that can vary a bit quarter to quarter, but as you know, we're always within roughly that 72% to 73% range.

Speaker 3

So some favorability there on margin. And then that top line was a few different things. Obviously, as we move through the year, we continued as we indicated to see that production side of things start to come back, still not quite fully back to pre strike levels, but for sure, we saw that come back in Q3, Q4, some nice year on year comps there as we comp to the 2023, second half of '20 '20 '3 that was really adversely impacted by the strikes. Event year calendar continued to see some strong momentum from that in Q4 as well as Q3. And we mentioned some of the a couple of content deals that included an AI licensing element that also impacted Q4.

Speaker 3

As we've spoken about before, those tend to come with heavy upfront revenue recognition. So a few different things driving revenue, but ultimately profitability story is a drop through of strong top line.

Speaker 4

Great. Thank you, both.

Speaker 3

Yes.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Mark Skutowicz with The Benchmark Company. Your line is open.

Speaker 5

Thank you. Good evening, Craig and Jen. Maybe a three part if I could on the outlook for 2025. Just looking for revenue growth by segment, Jen, I don't know if you can provide a little color there. Also curious how much data licensing revenue is expected next twelve months?

Speaker 5

And then just in terms of your visibility this year for agency corporate and media client spend, just if you can compare that to this time last year, that'd be helpful. Thanks.

Speaker 2

Jen, do you want to take the first two and I can maybe provide some commentary on the agency's upfront?

Speaker 3

Yes. Hey, Mark. So we don't guide at that segment or product level. Broadly speaking, I think agency for us, we've spoken before, we don't anticipate agencies suddenly flipping into a growth part of our business. We'd hope to see sort of a continued stabilization on that side of things.

Speaker 3

Media, I mentioned, we're still not back to pre Hollywood strike levels. That's more broadly the industry, not just us. So probably still a little bit of improvement to go there as we navigate through that, but we do have unfortunately the new impact from the LA fires on that segment. So we'll see what that does, but definitely seeing a bit of slowdown delays on the production side of things as it relates to the impact of those fires. And of course corporate for us always our biggest opportunity for growth.

Speaker 3

So we'd expect to continue to see that into growth. On the data licensing side, again there we don't guide to a specific number there. Nothing heroic assumed in our guidance there, a bit of a continuation of the levels that we saw in 2024, which by all accounts is fairly modest, but the guidance is not dependent on that becoming a very large piece of our

Speaker 2

business. Thanks, Jen. Yes, low single digits there. And then I would say just one of the things that we're watching is we are watching the creative agencies, Mark. WPP put out their performance for Q4 and for the full year.

Speaker 2

Their full year creative agency part of their business was down about 4%, but their Q4 was down around 6.5%. And so it looked like it got a little softer in Q4 and it seems like that we're still kind of processing across the full agency space, but that seems indicative. So which aligns to kind of some of the commentary that Jen had about our Q4 where we continue to see that portion of our business down. And so we're kind of watching a little bit. Obviously, right now, there is a lot of uncertainty in the macro sense.

Speaker 2

And so that tends to show up first in the agency side of things. So but as Jen highlighted, we've kind of factored those into our guidance to our best of ability at this point. But that is typically the area where we see impacts more earlier and more acute, where the rest of our business is much more heavily weighted into subscriptions and much more stable in terms of the usage and everything there.

Speaker 5

That's helpful. And yes, on the subscription side, it was nice to see that net retention number continue to improve. So appreciate all the color. Thanks.

Speaker 2

Yes. And that should continue. Again, we're getting as we kind of mentioned within our e commerce business, we were pushing a lot into first year cohorts and that those cohorts just aren't as we don't retain at the same level as later stage cohorts. And we're seeing that already within the cohorts as we move into kind of year two and such. The cohorts look identical to more seasoned cohorts, older cohorts in the business.

Speaker 2

So yes, should continue to see that.

Speaker 5

Great. Thank you.

Operator

And it does appear that there are no further questions at this time. This does conclude today's program. Thank you for joining. You may disconnect at any time.

Speaker 2

Thank you.

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