Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc. (NYSE:MMC) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Martin South: Thanks, John. As we said, we had a great strong organic growth of 10% in the second quarter, which is on top of 9%, which we posted in the second quarter of ’22, and better than full year growth of 8%. As you said, great balance international was 10%, Latin America is 17%, EMEA 11%, APAC 6%, U.S. and Canada 9%. I’d say the growth has been, it’s a really nice balance across all the geographies. The specialties growth was strong. Credit specialties, construction, aviation, energy and power strong, our advisory business, part of the risk advisor of the future, very strong double-digit growth. MMB was strong. Renewal growth was strong. So, it’s just a nice mix of business across the board, both new business and renewal.

John Q. Doyle: Yes. Thanks, Martin. And again, the consistency of growth has been just outstanding in addition to the total. Do you have a follow-up, Rob?

Robert Cox: Yes, thanks. And so maybe switching to Oliver Wyman, growth came in well above the levels you guys had guided from last quarter. And there have been a number of positive economic data points as of late, do you see the pipeline reflecting that? And is it looking like growth in the back half?

John Q. Doyle: Yes, we’re – thanks Rob. We’re very pleased with the growth at Oliver Wyman. I’ll ask Nick to talk a bit more about in detail. Nick?

Nick Studer: Yes, thank you, Robert. We still see a relatively wide range of possible future outcomes. When we gave guidance at the end of the first quarter. That was based on what we saw in our sales pipeline, which was ticking up nicely, but not aggressively. In the second quarter, we saw quite strong growth in sales. It’s a, I would say, a reflection on places where Oliver Wyman’s being selected to support our clients really transformative moments led by our public sector practice, led by our banking practice, transportation and services and our telco teams. And then also some of our other businesses, our economic research consulting nearer and our brand consulting business, Lippincott showing strong growth and our digital practice is showing strong growth.

So, I wouldn’t say yet that it’s correlated with economic uptick. Clients need to use this for that performance transformation as well as for their growth strategy. But sales in the second quarter have been better than we’ve expected and in the near term, I’m relatively optimistic. And the longer term, the economic outcomes are still fairly widely ranged.

John Q. Doyle: Thank you, Nick. Operator, do we have a follow-up?

Robert Cox: I’m sorry. Next question actually that was the follow-up.

Operator: Question comes from the line of David Motemaden with Evercore ISI.

David Motemaden: Hey, thanks. Good morning. Just had another question on the increased outlook to high single-digit for the year. Just sort of high-level question. Was that improved outlook more function of the results you’ve achieved to-date or has your outlook improved at all going forward?

John Q. Doyle: Thanks, David for the question. It’s really a function of both, right? We’ve had again a terrific start to the year, very, very pleased with the growth. And again, not just growth in parts of the business, just broad based, good execution and a lot of hard work by the team and really a reflection of the value that we’re creating for clients. And so, we remain positive with that outlook. And again, geopolitical environment particularly but also the macroeconomic outlook or there’s volatility there. So, we want to be mindful of that, but we feel very good about the second half.

David Motemaden: Got it. Thanks. And maybe just a question on Mercer career. So, I saw that decelerated a little bit, the growth decelerated, and the compare wasn’t that much harder than the first quarter. So, I’m just wondering is there anything that you’re seeing there on the pipeline front or just anything that would indicate that any clouds on the horizon?