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Text: Specifically, during the call, you will hear references to various non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe provide insight into the company's operations.
Reconciliation of non-GAAP numbers to their respective GAAP numbers can be found in today's materials and on our website.
On slide 3, you see our GAAP financial results at the top of the page for the second quarter.
Below that, you see our adjusted operating results, which management believes enhances the understanding of our business by reflecting the underlying performance of core operations and facilitates a more meaningful trend analysis.
As you saw in our release, Ameriprise had another strong quarter and I feel good about how we're performing at this point in the year.
The environment in the US continues to improve as the economy reopens more fully and equity markets remain strong.
Recent spikes in the virus are putting some pressure on Europe's recovery.
But overall, there is a lot to be hopeful for, as we look ahead.
As I consider this landscape, we are executing well across our businesses, driving growth through our lower capital fee-based businesses and freeing up capital to generate shareholder value.
We delivered another quarter of excellent organic growth in wealth and asset management and strong productivity across our system.
This included strong client flows with more than $16 billion of inflows in Wealth Management and Asset Management in the quarter, and we ended with assets under management and administration of 28% to $1.2 trillion, another new high.
With regard to recent strategic moves, we completed the RiverSource Life's fixed annuity reinsurance transaction.
This further advances our mix shift to capital-light businesses and frees up approximately $700 million of excess capital.
And our acquisition of BMO's EMEA asset management business, which we announced in April is on track to close in the fourth quarter.
Let's turn to our adjusted operating results for the quarter.
Momentum in the business continues with revenues coming in strongly at $3.4 billion or 22% fueled by organic growth in markets.
Earnings increased 34% excluding the reversal of the NOL a year ago with earnings per share up 39% reflecting strong business growth and capital return and ROE remains exceptionally strong at 37.5%.
As always, we continue to manage expenses well.
Let's move to Advice and Wealth Management, where we are consistently generating good growth.
Our strategic investments continue to be an important part of what we're doing.
People are coming to Ameriprise for a high-quality advice experience backed by leading-edge technology.
Client satisfaction remains high and clients are engaging with us personally and through our extensive digital capabilities.
Importantly, our advisors are embracing our training, coaching, and powerful suite of tools that are fully integrated with our CRM platform, and we continue to add capabilities, including testing a new e-meeting tool that helps advisors prepare for client meetings in minutes.
Our ongoing investments in the technology ecosystem are helping advisors connect with more clients and prospects and run their practices more efficiently.
This high level of engagement is leading to really good client activity, asset flows, and client acquisition.
Total client inflows were up 54% to $9.5 billion and that continue the positive trends we are seeing over the past several quarters.
Consistent with strong client flows, wrap net inflows were $10 billion continuing a very strong run rate.
Transactional activity also grew nicely, up nearly 30% over last year with good volume across a range of product solutions.
All of this momentum along with positive markets drove nice growth in advisor productivity up 14% adjusting for interest rates to a record of 731,000 per advisor.
On the recruiting front, we had 42 experienced advisors join us in the quarter, a bit below where we've been.
We're hearing that advisors have been focused on all that comes with reopening and some held off on transitioning firms of delayed the start dates.
That said, people are getting back to a more normal rhythm.
We are now hosting in-person meetings that complement our virtual recruiting, and we feel good about our pipeline for the third quarter.
Turning to the bank, total assets grew to $9.7 billion in the quarter, we continue to move additional deposits to the bank, and we have adjusted our investment strategy to extend duration a bit.
We are also seeing a good pickup in demand for our lending solutions.
Loan volumes are steadily increasing led by our pledge product, which represents a nice opportunity for future growth.
Wrapping up, AWM on metrics and financials remain very strong.
Margin increased 380 basis points year-over-year and in the quarter at 21.4% showing consistent expansion since the Fed cut short-term rates a year ago.
Moving to retirement and protection solutions, results were good and we continue to advance our strategic initiatives.
With regard to annuities, we had strong variable annuity sales with total sales up 88% from a year ago.
This was driven by increased demand for both our structured variable annuity product and our RAVA product without living benefits.
Together, this represented over two-thirds of sales in the quarter, a continuation of the shift that we're driving.
On the insurance side,Life and Health insurance sales approximately doubled driven by our VUL product which is appropriate product to this rate environment.
Now let's discuss Asset Management, where we continue to grow the business consistent with our plans.
Assets under management rose to $593 billion, up 25% over last year from strong business results and positive markets.
Regarding investment performance, the team continues to generate excellent performance for clients across equity, fixed income, and asset allocation strategies with more than 80% of funds above median over the longer-term time frames on asset weighted basis.
This quarter, we had net inflows of $6.7 billion, an improvement of $4.1 billion from a year ago.
Excluding legacy insurance partner outflows, net inflows were $8.1 billion.
These results build upon the favorable net flows we saw over the past several quarters.
Global retail net inflows were $4.2 billion, driven by another quarter of strong results in North America.
Engagement with clients and intermediaries remain excellent.
Sales and flows traction is broad based with 15 of our investment capabilities generating over $100 million of net inflows in the quarter and in EMEA, retail sales have been weaker given the risk off environment.
As I said, we're hopeful that EMEA flows will strengthen in the second half as the post pandemic reopening and economic recovery continue.
In terms of Global Institutional, we saw a nice improvement with net inflows of $3.9 billion ex legacy partner outflows with wins across equity and fixed income strategies in both North America and EMEA.
I feel good about our sales pipeline.
Turning to BMO, as we discussed with you, the acquisition will add important capabilities and build on our reach in EMEA.
The business remains in positive flows, and we continue to receive good feedback from clients and institutional consultants.
As I mentioned, we're on track to close in the fourth quarter.
In terms of the balance sheet, our capital management is excellent.
The business continues to generate substantial free cash flow, and we're freeing up additional capital.
In fact, the approximately $700 million of our reinsurance deal largely pays for the BMO acquisition giving us additional flexibility to return capital to shareholders at an attractive rate.
In summary, Ameriprise is in a terrific position.
We are performing well and generating strong results.
Our team is serving more clients and deepening relationships.
We are delivering an excellent organic growth in both Wealth and Asset Management, and the BMO transaction will add an additional growth opportunity, and we're accelerating our business mix shift with the reinsurance of the fixed annuity block.
I'd like to close by talking about our team.
Our people have been coming back to the office a few days a week this summer and reacclimating.
It's been great to be together again in person.
We're looking forward to be in more fully back to school where conditions are safe to do so while maintaining a level of flexibility.
Ameriprise delivered very strong financial results across the firm with adjusted operating earnings per share up 39% to $5.27.
We continue to demonstrate excellent metrics, earnings growth, and margin expansion in our core growth businesses of Advice and Wealth Management and Asset Management.
Sales of our retirement and protection products were up significantly from last year, and we're focused in low risk and higher margin offerings.
We are already seeing a shift in our enforced block and expect this to continue going forward.
As Jim mentioned, in the quarter, we continue to advance our strategic priorities to expand our growth businesses and reduce our risk profile.
We remain on track to close the acquisition of BMO's EMEA asset management business in the fourth quarter, which will expand our core geographic and product capabilities in attractive and growing market segments.
Additionally, we entered into an agreement to reinsure approximately $8 billion of fixed annuities and closed on the RiverSource Life transaction in early July.
As noted, we will free up approximately $700 million of capital, and we will have a marginal projected impact on fixed annuity profitability.
In addition to the reinsurance transaction, we continue to effectively manage our risk profile through product mix shift to lower risk and higher margin retirement and protects solution offerings.
Our diversified model generates robust free cash flow and strong balance sheet fundamentals.
We returned 92% of adjusted op earnings to shareholders in the quarter, aligning us to our projected 90% target for the full year.
In the quarter, Ameriprise's adjusted operating net revenues grew 22% and PTI increased 35%, reflecting continued excellent business performance.
Revenue and earnings in our capital-light businesses of AWM and asset management drove nearly 80% of the total, excluding corporate and other, a significant shift from a year ago even normalizing for the unusually high earnings in RPS last year.
We remain disciplined on expenses.
G&A expenses were well managed, up 6% given the strong business growth in the quarter.
Overall, we delivered another excellent quarter that underscores the strength of the business model that continues to yield robust profitable growth.
Turning to slide 7.
Advice and Wealth Management delivered another quarter of excellent organic growth with total client assets up 28% to $807 billion.
Total client flows were $9.5 billion, the third consecutive quarter of total client flows at or above $9 billion, demonstrating the sustainability of our organic growth.
Our focus is not only on growth, but profitable growth.
In the quarter, our pre-tax adjusted operating margin was 21.4%, an increase of 380 basis points from the prior year and an increase of 70 basis points sequentially despite continued low interest rates.
On page 8, financial results in Advice and Wealth Management were very strong with pre-tax adjusted operating earnings of $423 million, up 56%.
Adjusted operating net revenues grew 29% to 2 billion, fueled by robust client flows and a 29% increase in transactional activity in addition to strong market appreciation.
On a sequential basis, revenue increased nicely to 5%.
Ameriprise Bank continues to grow at a solid pace reaching nearly $10 billion in the quarter after adding $700 million of sweep cash to the balance sheet.
Expenses remain well managed, and we continue to exhibit strong expense discipline.
G&A expense increased 3%, reflecting increased activity and the timing of performance-based compensation expense.
Going forward, we remain committed to managing expense and margin in a disciplined manner.
Turning to page 9, Asset Management delivered another strong quarter, driven by excellent investment performance and sustained inflows, resulting in an outstanding financial results.
Net inflows were 8.1 billion, excluding legacy insurance partners, which is a continuation of an improved solid flow trends.
Adjusted operating revenues increased 32% to $879 million, a result of the cumulative benefit of net inflows and market appreciation.
On a sequential basis, revenues were up 6%.
Our fee rate remained strong at 52 basis points reflecting the strong momentum we are seeing across the board with strength in both equity and fixed income strategies.
Expenses remain well managed and in line with expectation given the revenue environment.
G&A expenses grew 12%, primarily from the timing of compensation expense related to strong business performance as well as foreign exchange translation and higher volume related expenses.
As with AWM going forward, we will manage expense tightly.
Pre-tax adjusted operating earnings grew 79%, and we delivered a 45% margin.
Moving forward, we expect strong financial performance to continue and anticipate that margins will remain in the mid 40% range over the near term driven by current robust equity markets.
Let's turn to page 10, retirement and protection solutions continue to perform in line with expectation in this environment.
Pre-tax adjusted operating earnings were $182 million.
Sales in the quarter were up significantly off a low base in the prior year driven by the pandemic.
Sales were above pre COVID levels resulting in an increase in distribution expense in the quarter.
Additionally, earnings in the prior year were positively impacted by the lower surrenders and withdrawals relating to the pandemic environment.
Importantly, we continue to reduce our risk profile by growing sales of retirement products without living benefits.
Retirement sales increased 88% during the quarter with two-thirds of the sales and products without living benefits.
This has shifted in the overall book and now only 62% of our block has living benefit riders, down over 200 basis points from a year ago.
In protection, sales nearly doubled as we continue to see a meaningful increase and higher margin in VUL and a significant decline in IUL.
This mix shift in both Retirement and Protection products are expected to continue going forward.
Now let's move to the balance sheet on the last slide.
Our balance sheet fundamentals remain extremely strong, including our liquidity position of $3 billion at the parent company and substantial excess capital of $2 billion, which does not include the capital release from the recently announced fixed annuity transaction.
Adjusted operating return on equity in the quarter remained strong at 37.5%.
We returned $585 million to shareholders in the quarter through dividends and buyback, and we are on track with our commitment to return 90% of adjusted operating earnings to shareholders for the year.

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q2 adjusted operating earnings per share $5.27.
quarter-end assets under management and administration were up 28% to $1.2 trillion.

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