管理層發言
Welcome to the Colliers International Second Quarter Investors Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. Legal counsel requires us to advise that the discussion scheduled to take place today may contain forward-looking statements that involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties. Actual results may be materially different from any future results, performance, or achievements contemplated in the forward-looking statements. Additional information concerning factors that could cause actual results to materially differ from those in the forward-looking statements is contained in the company's annual information form as filed with the Canadian Securities Administrators and in the company's annual report on Form 40-F as filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. Today is Thursday, July 30, 2026. And at this time, for opening remarks and introductions, I would like to turn the call over to the global chairman and chief executive officer, Mr. Jay Stewart Hennick. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, operator, and good morning. I am Jay Stewart Hennick, global chairman and chief executive officer of Colliers. Joining me today is Christian Mayer, our chief financial officer and chief executive of Colliers Commercial Real Estate. Today's webcast and presentation materials are available on the investor relations section of our website. Colliers delivered another strong quarter with double-digit revenue growth across all three platforms, healthy internal growth, and continued improvement in earnings quality. In commercial real estate, we are seeing a broader recovery across our markets. Capital markets and leasing revenues each increased by more than 20% supported by improving transaction activity, better financing conditions, and market share gains in most of our major markets. Engineering continues to be an important strategic differentiator for Colliers. Revenue increased 30% driven by strong demand across critical infrastructure, transportation, water, property, and buildings. The acquisition of Ayesa expanded our global capabilities and strengthened our position across Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, and Australia. Engineering gives Colliers recurring revenue, stronger visibility, and new ways to grow our enterprise. Harrison Street continued to add strength and differentiation as well with assets under management reaching $110 billion and revenues increasing by 17%. Having built two large global platforms at Colliers, in commercial real estate and engineering, we are now building our third. We are bringing our investment management capabilities together across real estate, credit, infrastructure, and private wealth. We are creating more investment opportunities for our clients, and greater long-term value for our shareholders. Together, the recovery in commercial real estate, the growth of engineering, and the expansion of our Harrison Street business are changing the quality and composition of our earnings. Today, approximately 70% of our earnings come from resilient recurring revenue streams giving Colliers greater flexibility, greater stability, stronger cash flow, and perhaps most importantly, more ways to grow our business. What further differentiates Colliers is how our platforms are working together. Commercial real estate gives us market intelligence and deep client relationships. Engineering adds technical expertise and execution capability. Harrison Street brings capital formation, investment discipline, and ownership expertise. Together, they create a much more integrated Colliers, one that can engage clients earlier, serve more of the value chain, and replicate that model across high-growth ecosystems. Data centers are just one example. We can help clients identify and acquire sites, provide engineering and technical services to design, build, and operate these facilities, and deploy capital through Harrison Street, which over the past six years has invested more than $6 billion in digital and data centers already. And after the fact, we can deliver leasing, sales, facility management, and other advisory services as those facilities come on stream. That same opportunity exists across many other ecosystems within our business. By combining client relationships with specialized platform capabilities, we can create additional avenues for growth beyond the stand-alone opportunities inherent in each of our businesses. So in summary, our second quarter results reinforce the confidence that we have in our future. Step by step, we are building Colliers into a stronger global company with broader capabilities, more resilient in our performance, and better positioned to create lasting value for our clients, our professionals, and our shareholders. Now let me turn things over to Christian to review our financial results in more detail. Christian?
Thank you, Jay, and good morning, everyone. Please note that the non-GAAP measures discussed on this call are defined in our press release and quarterly presentation. Unless otherwise noted, all revenue growth figures are presented in local currency. Our second quarter consolidated revenues were $1.6 billion, up 16% and net revenues also increased 16% to $1.4 billion. Adjusted EBITDA was $205 million, up 14%. Adjusted EPS increased 6% to $1.83 and was tempered by higher interest expense. These results met our expectations and our momentum gives us confidence as we enter the second half of the year. Capital markets rose 23% with growth across all geographies led by the Americas and Asia Pacific. Activity in industrial property sales was up notably in all geographies. Leasing revenues were also up 23% led by U.S. industrial, with all global regions contributing to growth. The segment net margin was 11.9%, up slightly over the prior year. Engineering second quarter net revenue was up 27% from a mix of recent acquisitions including a partial quarter of Ayesa, and solid 5% internal growth. Our net margin was 14.5%, up slightly over last year. Our engineering backlog stood at 12 months as of June 30, indicating strong momentum for the back half of the year. Investment management net revenues increased 15% driven by a recent acquisition and internal growth from new capital. The net margin was 36.5%, as expected, given ongoing planned global platform building under the Harrison Street Asset Management brand. These costs will continue to impact margins for the second half of the year, and we expect margins to stabilize in the low 40% range for 2027. During the quarter, asset realizations generated strong gains and resulted in the return of $1.9 billion of capital to our limited partners, and $3 billion year-to-date. Our demonstrated ability to monetize high-quality portfolios at attractive prices and make meaningful distributions to investors has always been a key differentiator for us. We raised $2.2 billion in new capital commitments in the second quarter and just under $3 billion for the 6-month period. To date fundraising is on plan and we expect an acceleration in the second half. Our annual fundraising target for 2026 remains unchanged at $6 billion to $9 billion. Turning to our balance sheet. We completed the Ayesa acquisition late in the quarter, and despite significant capital deployment for this strategic platform, finished the second quarter with leverage of 2.8x. We expect to delever significantly in the second half of the year as the majority of our seasonal cash flows come in and should finish the year in the 2.3x range. Given this leverage profile, and given the current undervaluation of our shares, we may choose to deploy capital on a stock buyback as we progress through the second half of the year. We are reaffirming our full-year 2026 outlook. The key forward-looking indicators across our business segments—transaction pipelines, engineering backlogs, and fundraising pipelines—are up nicely over the prior year. Geopolitical risk and macroeconomic volatility continue to be elevated as we all know. However, we believe that these risks should not materially impact our overall results. That concludes my prepared remarks. Operator, can you please open the line for questions?
分析師問答
We will now begin our Q&A. If you would like to ask a question, please press *1 to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press *1 again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first question is from the line of Himanshu Gupta with Scotiabank. Himanshu, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Thank you, and good morning, everyone. So first on commercial real estate, looks like industrial was strong for leasing. Industrial was strong for capital markets as well in Q2. So just wondering what led to the strength and how do you see momentum in Q3?
Yeah. Thanks, Himanshu. So industrial is one of our key historical strength areas, and it continues to be the case. In the quarter, we saw strong demand in the Americas, in the U.S. in particular. That was, I think, partially a reflection of some uncertainty that happened last year, which was in the second quarter last year. So an easier comparison led to some stronger growth in that area. As we look ahead, momentum is strong, but we do have some tougher comps ahead in the third quarter.
Okay. And overall, how do you see leasing revenue or capital markets in Q3?
We expect leasing revenues to be up in the mid-single-digit range and capital markets to be, again, strong, 15% or thereabouts year-over-year growth.
Got it. Okay. Thank you. And then just moving to investment management, especially the margins. I mean, is the recovery pickup in margins getting pushed to next year and not likely to be in Q4? Any color on the margin side?
Yes. As Jay mentioned, we are building a global investment management platform with Harrison Street. We have taken additional integration steps this year, including RoundShield rebranding and integrating with our Harrison Street Europe business, which announced just a few weeks ago. We are taking our time to integrate this business and build it for the future, and that will impact the margins for the remainder of the year. We expect the margin profile to increase in 2027, as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, to the low-40s range.
Thank you. And maybe just last question. I think over $2 billion was raised during the quarter. Has this capital been deployed? I am trying to see when this raise will lead to EBITDA pickup in the numbers.
We did raise $2.2 billion of new capital in the second quarter. That capital comes from a mix of fund types. Some of the closed-end funds' capital becomes fee-bearing immediately. In other fund types, it will take some time to deploy that capital and then that capital will at that point become fee-bearing. So this is a normal part of the fundraising process. Some capital becomes fee-bearing immediately; some takes time to be deployed and then becomes fee-bearing. That is reflected in our expectations for the year.
Thank you so much, and I will turn it back. Thank you.
Your next question is from the line of Stephen Sheldon with William Blair. Stephen, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hey. Thanks. I wanted to start on the engineering side—just curious if you can talk a little bit more about how internal organic growth there has been trending in the first half of the year and then how you are thinking about it in the back half and potentially in early next year. And then also, I really appreciate the color, Jay, on how engineering ties into the rest of your businesses. I think that has been an area of focus for the buy-side—how much cross-selling opportunity there is between engineering and the core CRE business. So do you think it will take some time for some of the cross-selling opportunities to be realized, or are you already starting to see some of those come in? Just a little more color on engineering.
Great question. I will take the internal growth question on engineering. Year to date, internal growth in engineering is 5%. We expect that to continue for the remainder of the year. I will pass the question on the cross-sell opportunity in engineering to Jay.
Stephen, it is frustrating for me because we have not been able to articulate the full power of the differentiation that we are trying to create at Colliers. The engineering platform is not good—it's awesome. If you think about it, and I tried to give you an example in my prepared remarks, all the work done in many ecosystems—and it is not just data centers—whether you are building a building or any asset, we are designing, building, and project managing all through our engineering business. The connectivity between the different platforms, which since inception many did not fully understand because they saw commercial real estate as a stand-alone platform and engineering and Harrison Street as separate, is now working together. More and more clients are retaining us to do more along the whole value chain. With Ayesa, and opening up markets where we did not truly have engineering presence, now Ayesa is already doing business with both our commercial real estate and our investment management business. They are pitching business together as a complete end-to-end solution. We think that over the next couple of years, being able to handle the entire life cycle of assets will create a differentiator for Colliers that none of the other peers have. Some have bits and pieces, but we have a truly strategic differentiated plan that is bearing fruit. These are global platforms run by people who have vested equity stakes in our businesses through our partnership philosophy, and that creates glue and collaboration. So it is a bit of a frustration for me because we have not been able to articulate the power of the three platforms working together, and we are going to dial up our efforts to do that over the next number of quarters until that finally hits home.
That is great to hear. Very helpful commentary, Jay. And then just as a follow-up in investment management: One, it seemed like management fees as a percentage of AUM stepped up nicely this quarter. What drove that and is that structural and can keep moving higher? Two, could it get easier for fundraising activity as capital market activity picks up and as institutional LPs start to see more capital distributions—does that make it easier to raise more money?
One of the keys is we are building a global platform with Harrison Street, bringing together unique strategies we have around the world. We built this platform step by step since 2018 through four acquisitions of very good operators who had a vested interest in their strategies. Now we are bringing them all under the Harrison Street banner globally. We are standardizing distributions that were previously done across different platforms. All of our distribution team—about 45 people—are in front of clients, and the clients are deciding which strategies interest them. In the case of proven funds, Harrison Street X is in the market now, Basalt V is in the market now. There are several strategies that have stood the test of time and new strategies that have been introduced where investors want to learn more. If you do not do this in a streamlined way, you miss a great way to leverage relationships. Harrison Street core can introduce other strategies to strong LP relationships. Building a platform takes time and expense, bringing together teams. We are pleased with the results. All of the partners had the choice to stay separate or roll into Harrison Street Asset Management. To a professional, they all rolled up, and together they own about 25% of the equity of this valuable platform. Doing what we are doing is making it much more valuable.
Makes a lot of sense. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Erin Kyle with CIBC Capital Markets. Erin, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. Maybe going back to the engineering segment on the margin side: The prior two quarters had seen some margin contraction on lower utilization that you had called out in the past, and then we saw net margins expand year over year this quarter. Is utilization back up where you expect it to be? Are there any other productivity metrics or anything you can point to in the engineering segment?
Erin, the margin in the engineering business will vary on a quarterly basis because there is seasonality in our business. We operate in Canada and the northern parts of the U.S. where winter is a significant factor in driving revenue levels as well as utilization levels. In the past few quarters, we have called out some utilization areas in certain end markets, and that is always going to be a factor. We have a multi-disciplined diversified business with multiple end markets, multiple client types, and a diversity of clients between public and private sectors. Nothing major to call out this quarter. The Ayesa acquisition has higher margins, so that will impact the margin profile a little in the back half of the year as we bring that business on stream.
The only thing I would add is that Ayesa also softens the seasonality and creates more geographic diversification into markets with different climates. Its seasonality is almost nonexistent; it generates roughly 24% to 26% of its revenues and EBITDA in any given quarter given the markets it operates in and without the weather-related seasonality.
Okay. So that is helpful. On a go-forward basis, maybe in 2027, we see a little bit less of that quarter-to-quarter variability there?
Yes.
Maybe if I switch gears to the commercial real estate segment: Growth has been quite strong for the past two quarters in capital markets and leasing this quarter as well, despite an interest rate environment that has not been as constructive as expected heading into the year. Would you say that is mainly a function of pent-up demand in the market, or is Colliers winning share here? I know you have been recruiting new team members across the CRE segment as well.
Erin, we certainly believe all of that is the case. We have been winning market share. In particular, in terms of our recruiting efforts, we have been disciplined but aggressive on recruiting and have added more producers than others. I think relative to our publicly traded peers in the U.S., we have added more producers on a percentage basis and I think that is starting to show in our numbers. It has been a modest drag on our margins over the last few quarters as we ramp these folks up. We are feeling very good about our business and both the trajectory and the rate environment, which of course is top of mind for real estate investors. As long as rates remain in a range, activity levels will continue, and those ranges are fairly wide. As long as geopolitical events remain at reasonable levels, we should see strong activity through the balance of the year.
Thank you. That is helpful. I will pass the line.
Your next question comes from the line of Jimmy Shan with RBC Capital Markets. Jimmy, your line is open. Please go ahead.
You mentioned share buybacks. With the stock trading where it is, how are you prioritizing between share buybacks versus tuck-in M&A, especially as leverage comes down? At what leverage level do you feel comfortable accelerating either?
Stock buybacks have been top of mind for us. Some senior executives have been buying significant amounts of stock personally. We did not think it prudent to use our normal course issuer bid while the Ayesa transaction was in process, which is now completed. As Christian mentioned, leverage was expected around 3.0x at the time we contracted for the transaction; it came in at 2.8x, which is positive. Our cash flow conversion is significant, so as we approach the balance of the year we expect leverage to fall, which will open up the ability to consider using our issuer bid to acquire additional shares, particularly at current prices. Acquisitions continue to be abundant for us and there is lots of opportunity—not just with Ayesa, which opens new markets and adjacencies. We don't want to slow down acquisition activity. If there is an exceptional acquisition that will pay dividends over a long period, we will always default to a great acquisition. We have done that for 30 years. I hope that gives you more color around our thinking on the issuer bid.
That is helpful. Maybe as a follow-up: The last few acquisitions have been on the engineering side. With uncertainty around AI and its potential impact on the business, have you observed any change in multiples that people are paying for engineering firms? How would you underwrite AI risk when you underwrite those businesses?
I can tell you from experience: technology and AI are important elements, but they've been evolving for years. For years, we have used technology to automate workflows, get productivity gains, and create specialized insights for clients. With the renewed focus on AI, we tasked teams to identify ideas that can improve our business, and we increased technology spend on the highest-priority initiatives. AI has been a benefit in that it raised focus on making changes to become more competitive and to unlock embedded datasets. But at the end of the day, it is about professional judgment, specialized expertise, and trusted relationships, which do not change. For both commercial real estate and engineering, these areas will get more efficient, but the most important aspects remain. We are adjusting purchase prices in some acquisitions because some argue AI will have a major impact on certain businesses—my view is it will not materially do so for the larger players who have scale and capital. The smaller firms may struggle, and that can create acquisition opportunities for us at better valuations than last year. So AI is an opportunity and a focus, but not a disruptive existential threat to our strategy.
Okay. Appreciate the comment. Thanks.
Your next question comes from the line of Daryl Young with Stifel. Daryl, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone. First question is around real estate services and outsourcing activity. Given the strength in transaction activity, I might have expected to see a little bit stronger performance in outsourcing advisory. Is there something specific you can speak to on the Europe and Asia weakness you highlighted?
The primary challenge in our outsourcing business right now is the local project management in those two markets—Europe and Asia. There is some timing of projects which I think we will start to see come through in the fourth quarter of this year. Other parts of the business—property management, valuation, loan servicing—were all up nicely in the second quarter and we expect that to continue through the balance of the year.
Got it. And on the data center theme: One of your peers provided outlooks for significant long-term growth and revenue targets, and there have been some early mover wins in that sector. Is there a more formalized strategy evolving around data centers for Colliers?
Short answer: in each of our businesses we are focusing closely on growth in data centers, and we believe we are getting a strong share—whether in engineering or through Harrison Street, which has invested about $6 billion in these centers. We have not formalized a single uniform strategy across all platforms yet; I expect that may develop over time. There is a lot of growth. When we do data center work for a client in engineering and that client does another project elsewhere, we generally get the first call, so there is a great opportunity to take more share with the same clients in different geographies. We are very busy with data centers right now and it's an important growth area, but we have been prioritizing execution and scaling rather than formalizing one uniform cross-platform playbook at this stage.
Okay. And just one last one: On the NCIB, did you say you would be willing to take the leverage back to 3.0x in the back half of the year to get aggressive on the NCIB? Or did I mishear that?
Daryl, to be very clear, we did not say that. In my view, 2.8x is the high-water mark. We are going to delever through the balance of the year, and we may, at these prevailing prices, spend—just for illustration—$100 million which would buy back roughly 2.1% of our float. That could be nicely accretive without being materially impactful on our leverage. We do not expect a material increase in leverage as a result of stock-buyback action.
It really depends on M&A opportunities as well. We have quite a pipeline of deals and will see how the balance of the year shakes out before executing on buybacks.
Got it. Thanks and congrats on a good quarter.
Your next question comes from the line of Mitch Germain with Citizens Bank. Mitch, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Jay, while I recognize engineering and investment management are very nuanced and differentiated, is there thought around having Ayesa, Englobe, and other key executives maintain their existing brands but develop a unified strategy around the engineering business? For example, leveraging back office or best-in-class practices to spread competencies on a more global basis?
They are doing that today. Technology is run centrally and there are shared services within the overall Colliers structure. On the business front, engineering businesses in different geographies are working closely with our commercial real estate and investment management professionals to bring together complete client solutions. It's still early to have a highly formalized global approach, but we are pursuing internal rationalization and simplification to create efficiencies and lower data costs. The new business connectivity is developing because client relationships produce cross-border opportunities. For example, if a client is building something in one country, they will often call us for another project in a different region. We need another year or two to fully capitalize on these opportunities and see how everyone naturally comes together, but efforts around internal cost structures and efficiency are ongoing.
Got it. That is super helpful. Can you remind me what you view as the long-term leverage target? I know in 2024 you were around 2.0x, it has come up with acquisitions, and you forecast it to come down by year end. Longer term, is there a target range you are striving for?
Yes, Mitch. Our target leverage range is 1.5x to 2.0x, with a bump-out for significant acquisition activity, which Ayesa certainly falls in that category, or unusually low share values where we can capitalize.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
Your next question comes from the line of Frederic Bastien with Raymond James. Frederic, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. It is still early days for Ayesa under the Colliers fold, but are there any early surprises, positive or negative, that you can share?
It has been a very positive experience so far. The team is excited about becoming partners and real equity partners in the business—something they had not had under the prior ownership structure. They are very engaged internally in their growth and with our commercial real estate and other engineering teams around the world to explore opportunities to work together. These deals generally take a year or more to fully realize, so we had a long time to work with the team and understand motivations and opportunities they could not pursue previously. They are exceptional operators, and there is an opportunity to bring their capabilities and relationships into other markets where we operate.
Great. Building on that, are there any specific areas of expertise or capabilities within Ayesa that you are particularly excited about to potentially cross-sell across the broader Colliers platform?
They have very strong expertise in desalination; they designed, built, and operate several large desalination plants in the Middle East using technology they have developed. That is an interesting area. They also have marine engineering and water expertise which we think we can transfer to other markets. Each engineering platform brings different competencies, and Ayesa brings two or three that we can transfer more easily to our other businesses.
Perfect. Thanks. That is all I have.
Your next question comes from the line of Stephen MacLeod with BMO Capital Markets. Stephen, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, guys. Lots of great color on the call so far, so thank you. Specifically on cross-selling opportunities and the long-term opportunities: You talked in your prepared remarks about having very strong back-half visibility into all three segments. I'm curious what the foundation of that visibility is. Maybe starting with CRE, what are your customers saying about the rate environment? And in engineering, you mentioned a 12-month backlog—how has that trended relative to prior quarters?
We track our pipeline in commercial real estate in a very disciplined manner, which we have done for a long time. We certainly look at the 10-year Treasury as a bellwether for the U.S., which at about 4.7% is on the higher end but moves around. With the information we have and our judgment, we see a strong list of transactions that will happen over the next year. We have more visibility into near-term transactions over the next quarter or next six months, and that gives us confidence. For engineering, we have four engineering businesses that operate around the world, with Ayesa being the newest. Each tracks its revenue backlog and our goal is to have a 12-month backlog of work under contract, which is where we sit today. That can vary seasonally, but right now the backlog provides the visibility we need to support our outlook.
To summarize our near-term priorities: finish building out Harrison Street Asset Management as a global player, bringing our unique strategies together under one banner. We've accelerated integration steps in Europe and are expanding into Australia and New Zealand as well. There are opportunities to consolidate and bring other exceptional strategies into the fold. Engineering continues to be a growth engine and commercial real estate has interesting opportunities like strengthening debt origination to enhance access to capital. We are focused in the right areas, building a highly diversified and resilient business with three global platforms that create many avenues for long-term value.
That is great. Thanks, Jay and Christian. Appreciate the color.
We have reached the end of our Q&A session. I will now pass the call back to Mr. Jay Stewart Hennick for some closing remarks.
Thank you, everyone, for participating. We look forward to speaking again at the end of the third quarter. So thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes the conference call. Thank you for your participation and have a nice day.