JACKSONVILLE, Fla.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–FIS(TM) (NYSE:FIS), a global leader in financial services technology, today reported its second quarter 2021 results.

“FIS delivered an exceptional quarter,” said Gary Norcross, FIS chairman and chief executive officer. “Our transformation has created strong demand with our clients. Even as the world slowed, we continued to invest in our talent and our cloud-native solutions portfolio, creating a significant pipeline with our clients and prospects. With strong new sales and our largest revenue synergy quarter to-date, we are raising our guidance for the second time this year.”

Second Quarter 2021

As compared to the prior year period, revenue grew by more than $500 million, or 17%, to approximately $3.5 billion. Revenue growth accelerated across all three operating segments, including Merchant to 45%, Banking to 8%, and Capital Markets to 6%. Net earnings attributable to common stockholders was $341 million or $0.55 per diluted share.

Organic revenue growth, which reflects the impact of foreign currency exchange fluctuation (FX), was 16%. Adjusted EBITDA margin expanded by 460 basis points (bps) over the prior year period to 43.7%, primarily reflecting high contribution margins of revenue growth as well as ongoing revenue and expense synergies. Adjusted net earnings and adjusted net earnings per share each increased by 40% to approximately $1 billion or $1.61 per diluted share, respectively.

Operating Segment Information

Merchant Solutions:

As compared to the prior year period, revenue grew by nearly $400 million, or 45%, to approximately $1.2 billion, which includes 31% eCommerce revenue growth. On an organic basis, which reflects the impact of FX, revenue increased 41%. Adjusted EBITDA margin expanded 910 basis points over the prior year period to 50%, primarily reflecting high contribution margins from new revenue as well as ongoing synergies.

As compared to the prior period in 2019, Merchant revenue grew 9% during the second quarter, including 12% growth in the U.S., proforma for the Worldpay acquisition. We expect Merchant revenue growth to further accelerate into the mid-to-high teens in the second half of the year as compared to the 2019 periods on a proforma basis, primarily driven by continued recovery in International revenue and discretionary verticals, like Travel & Airlines.

Banking Solutions:

As compared to the prior year period, revenue grew by more than $100 million, or 8%, to approximately $1.6 billion. Banking’s strong second quarter performance is primarily due to strong new sales execution and a growing backlog of revenue under contract. On an organic basis, which reflects the impact of FX, revenue increased 7%. Adjusted EBITDA margin expanded 410 basis points over the prior year period to 46%, primarily reflecting high contribution margins from new revenue as well as ongoing synergies.

Capital Market Solutions:

As compared to the prior year period, revenue grew by nearly $40 million, or 6%, to $630 million. Capital Market’s strong second quarter performance is primarily due to robust new sales of our end-to-end SAAS solutions. On an organic basis, which reflects the impact of FX, revenue increased 4%. Adjusted EBITDA margin expanded 100 basis points over the prior year period to 46%, primarily reflecting high contribution margins from new revenue.

Integration Update

The Company achieved synergies related to the Worldpay acquisition, exiting the second quarter of 2021 as follows:

Revenue synergies of approximately $450 million on an annual run-rate basis, including strong cross-selling wins spanning the Premium Payback loyalty network, digital banking, issuer, core software and data wins.

Reflecting strong attainment of revenue synergies to date, the Company increased its 2021 revenue synergy target. Annual run-rate revenue synergies are expected to be approximately $700 million exiting 2021, an increase of $100 million above the previous target of $600 million.

Cost synergies of approximately $850 million, including approximately $450 million of operating expense synergies. Annual run-rate cost synergies are expected to be approximately $900 million exiting 2021, including operating expense synergies of approximately $500 million.

Balance Sheet and Cash Flows

As of June 30, 2021, debt outstanding totaled $19.4 billion. Second quarter net cash provided by operating activities was $1.0 billion, and free cash flow was $1.0 billion.

FIS paid dividends of $242 million and repurchased approximately 2.7 million shares during the quarter for $400 million.

Third Quarter and Full-Year 2021 GAAP Guidance

Third Quarter and Full-Year 2021 Non-GAAP Guidance

COVID-19 Update

We have continued to prioritize investments in solutions and services that help address the needs of our clients throughout the ongoing global pandemic in order to increase the Company’s potential to accelerate revenue growth. During the second quarter, the Company’s revenue growth continued to accelerate across all three operating segments as COVID-19’s impact on our financial results lessened due to the gradual opening of markets.

Webcast

FIS will sponsor a live webcast of its earnings conference call with the investment community beginning at 8:30 a.m. (EDT) Tuesday, August 3, 2021. To access the webcast, go to the Investor Relations section of FIS’ homepage, www.fisglobal.com. A replay will be available after the conclusion of the live webcast.

About FIS

FIS is a leading provider of technology solutions for merchants, banks and capital markets firms globally. Our employees are dedicated to advancing the way the world pays, banks and invests by applying our scale, deep expertise and data-driven insights. We help our clients use technology in innovative ways to solve business-critical challenges and deliver superior experiences for their customers. Headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, FIS is a Fortune 500(R) company and is a member of Standard & Poor’s 500(R) Index.

To learn more, visit www.fisglobal.com. Follow FIS on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter (@FISGlobal).

FIS Use of Non-GAAP Financial Information

Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) is the term used to refer to the standard framework of guidelines for financial accounting in the United States. GAAP includes the standards, conventions, and rules accountants follow in recording and summarizing transactions and in the preparation of financial statements. In addition to reporting financial results in accordance with GAAP, we have provided certain non-GAAP financial measures.

These non-GAAP measures include constant currency revenue, organic revenue growth, adjusted EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA margin, adjusted net earnings, adjusted EPS, and free cash flow. These non-GAAP measures may be used in this release and/or in the attached supplemental financial information.

We believe these non-GAAP measures help investors better understand the underlying fundamentals of our business. As further described below, the non-GAAP revenue and earnings measures presented eliminate items management believes are not indicative of FIS’ operating performance. The constant currency and organic revenue growth measures adjust for the effects of exchange rate fluctuations, while organic revenue growth also adjusts for acquisitions and divestitures and excludes revenue from Corporate and Other, giving investors further insight into our performance. Finally, free cash flow provides further information about the ability of our business to generate cash. For these reasons, management also uses these non-GAAP measures in its assessment and management of FIS’ performance.

As described below, our Adjusted EBITDA and Adjusted Net Earnings measures also exclude incremental and direct costs resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Management believes that this adjustment may help investors understand the longer-term fundamentals of our underlying business.

Constant currency revenue represents reported operating segment revenue excluding the impact of fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates in the current period.

Organic revenue growth is constant currency revenue, as defined above, for the current period compared to an adjusted revenue base for the prior period, which is adjusted to add pre-acquisition revenue of acquired businesses for a portion of the prior year matching the portion of the current year for which the business was owned, and subtract pre-divestiture revenue for divested businesses for the portion of the prior year matching the portion of the current year for which the business was not owned, for any acquisitions or divestitures by FIS. When referring to organic revenue growth, revenues from our Corporate and Other segment, which is comprised of revenue from non-strategic businesses, are excluded.

Adjusted EBITDA reflects net earnings before interest, other income (expense), taxes, equity method investment earnings (loss), and depreciation and amortization, and excludes certain costs and other transactions that management deems non-operational in nature, the removal of which improves comparability of operating results across reporting periods. It also excludes incremental and direct costs resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. This measure is reported to the chief operating decision maker for purposes of making decisions about allocating resources to the segments and assessing their performance. For this reason, adjusted EBITDA, as it relates to our segments, is presented in conformity with Accounting Standards Codification 280, Segment Reporting, and is excluded from the definition of non-GAAP financial measures under the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Regulation G and Item 10(e) of Regulation S-K.

Adjusted EBITDA margin reflects adjusted EBITDA, as defined above, divided by revenue.

Adjusted net earnings excludes the impact of certain costs and other transactions which management deems non-operational in nature, the removal of which improves comparability of operating results across reporting periods. It also excludes the impact of acquisition-related purchase accounting amortization and equity method investment earnings (loss), both of which are recurring. It also excludes incremental and direct costs resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Adjusted EPS reflects adjusted net earnings, as defined above, divided by weighted average diluted shares outstanding.

Free cash flow reflects net cash provided by operating activities, adjusted for the net change in settlement assets and obligations and excluding certain transactions that are closely associated with non-operating activities or are otherwise non-operational in nature and not indicative of future operating cash flows, including incremental and direct costs resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, less capital expenditures excluding capital expenditures related to the Company’s new headquarters. Free cash flow does not represent our residual cash flow available for discretionary expenditures, since we have mandatory debt service requirements and other non-discretionary expenditures that are not deducted from the measure.

Any non-GAAP measures should be considered in context with the GAAP financial presentation and should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for GAAP measures. Further, FIS’ non-GAAP measures may be calculated differently from similarly titled measures of other companies. Reconciliations of these non-GAAP measures to related GAAP measures, including footnotes describing the specific adjustments, are provided in the attached schedules and in the Investor Relations section of the FIS website, www.fisglobal.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

This earnings release and today’s webcast contain “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the U.S. federal securities laws. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about anticipated financial outcomes, including any earnings guidance or projections of the Company, projected revenue or expense synergies, business and market conditions, outlook, foreign currency exchange rates, deleveraging plans, expected dividends and share repurchases, the Company’s sales pipeline and anticipated profitability and growth, as well as other statements about our expectations, beliefs, intentions, or strategies regarding the future, or other characterizations of future events or circumstances, are forward-looking statements. These statements relate to future events and our future results and involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Forward-looking statements are based on management’s beliefs as well as assumptions made by, and information currently available to, management.

Actual results, performance or achievement could differ materially from those contained in these forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties to which forward-looking statements are subject include the following, without limitation:

the outbreak or recurrence of the novel coronavirus (“COVID-19”) and measures to reduce its spread, including the impact of governmental or voluntary actions such as business shutdowns and stay-at-home orders in certain geographies;

the duration, including any recurrence, of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts, including reductions in consumer and business spending, and instability of the financial markets in heavily impacted areas across the globe;

the economic and other impacts of COVID-19 on our clients which affect the sales of our solutions and services and the implementation of such solutions;

the risk of losses in the event of defaults by merchants (or other parties) to which we extend credit in our card settlement operations or in respect of any chargeback liability, either of which could adversely impact liquidity and results of operations;

changes in general economic, business and political conditions, including those resulting from COVID-19 or other pandemics, intensified international hostilities, acts of terrorism, changes in either or both the United States and international lending, capital and financial markets and currency fluctuations;

the risk that the Worldpay transaction will not provide the expected benefits or that we will not be able to achieve the revenue synergies anticipated;

the risk that other acquired businesses will not be integrated successfully or that the integration will be more costly or more time-consuming and complex than anticipated;

the risk that cost savings and other synergies anticipated to be realized from other acquisitions may not be fully realized or may take longer to realize than expected;

the risks of doing business internationally;

the effect of legislative initiatives or proposals, statutory changes, governmental or other applicable regulations and/or changes in industry requirements, including privacy and cybersecurity laws and regulations;

the risks of reduction in revenue from the elimination of existing and potential customers due to consolidation in, or new laws or regulations affecting, the banking, retail and financial services industries or due to financial failures or other setbacks suffered by firms in those industries;

changes in the growth rates of the markets for our solutions;

failures to adapt our solutions to changes in technology or in the marketplace;

internal or external security breaches of our systems, including those relating to unauthorized access, theft, corruption or loss of personal information and computer viruses and other malware affecting our software or platforms, and the reactions of customers, card associations, government regulators and others to any such events;

the risk that implementation of software, including software updates, for customers or at customer locations or employee error in monitoring our software and platforms may result in the corruption or loss of data or customer information, interruption of business operations, outages, exposure to liability claims or loss of customers;

the reaction of current and potential customers to communications from us or regulators regarding information security, risk management, internal audit or other matters;

the risk that policies and resulting actions of the current administration in the U.S. may result in additional regulations and executive orders, as well as additional regulatory and tax costs;

competitive pressures on pricing related to the decreasing number of community banks in the U.S., the development of new disruptive technologies competing with one or more of our solutions, increasing presence of international competitors in the U.S. market and the entry into the market by global banks and global companies with respect to certain competitive solutions, each of which may have the impact of unbundling individual solutions from a comprehensive suite of solutions we provide to many of our customers;

the failure to innovate in order to keep up with new emerging technologies, which could impact our solutions and our ability to attract new, or retain existing, customers;

an operational or natural disaster at one of our major operations centers;

failure to comply with applicable requirements of payment networks or changes in those requirements;

fraud by merchants or bad actors; and

other risks detailed in the “Risk Factors” and other sections of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, in our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and in our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other unknown or unpredictable factors also could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are inherently subject to uncertainties, risks and changes in circumstances that are difficult to predict. Except as required by applicable law or regulation, we do not undertake (and expressly disclaim) any obligation and do not intend to publicly update or review any of these forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.