Mr. James O'Sullivan reports

IGM FINANCIAL STREAMLINES ORGANIZATION TO UNLOCK SAVINGS AND DRIVE GROWTH

IGM Financial Inc. is further streamlining and simplifying its operating model to better align with business priorities.

When fully completed, these strategic initiatives are expected to generate approximately $65-million pretax, or $48-million after-tax, in annualized run-rate savings. IGM intends to use these savings to reinvest in its businesses, including IG Wealth Management and Mackenzie Investments, and contribute to sustainable expense reduction. During the second quarter, the company will record a one-time charge of approximately $103-million pretax, or $76-million after-tax.

"The initiatives we're rolling out are an extension of our ongoing focus to optimize operations to better support key business priorities and invest in growth," said James O'Sullivan, president and chief executive officer, IGM Financial. "We have demonstrated strong expense discipline in recent years, but these changes will further streamline our operations and structurally reduce our costs. We will use the resulting savings to both reinvest in our future to accelerate growth and reduce expenses. This will help ensure our businesses continue to be competitive and sustainable."

To achieve these goals, IGM has completed a review to further align its organizational structure to advance the growing needs of the business and deliver against key strategic priorities across IG Wealth Management and Mackenzie Investments. This includes optimizing its resources and talent structure to address duplication of roles, enable partnerships across the business, and operate more efficiently and effectively to better position the company for the future.

"We will continue to invest in the growth and development of our talent to build a strong succession pipeline and continue to offer our people opportunities for fulfilling experiences and careers. This will help ensure we have the right talent, knowledge and skills to enable growth," said Cynthia Currie, executive vice-president and chief human resources officer, IGM Financial.

In addition, IGM is building on the success of its most recent digital transformation -- one of the most ambitious in the Canadian financial services industry -- to help secure its competitive advantage. The company will retire duplicate systems and will continue to automate and modernize its information technology infrastructure and delivery to enhance efficiencies and its ability to service client needs.

The company also intends to consolidate some of IG Wealth Management's real estate footprint to better reflect the makeup of its adviser network and client needs. "With the widespread adoption of hybrid work and new technologies, people want more flexibility in how they work and live and how they interact with businesses," said Mr. O'Sullivan.

"Together, these initiatives will allow us to both invest for growth in IG and Mackenzie and sustainably reduce costs," said Keith Potter, EVP and chief financial officer, IGM Financial. "We intend to achieve this by reinvesting approximately 50 per cent of the resulting savings in our businesses and allocating the other half to sustainable expense reduction."

With efficiencies gained through these initiatives, the company expects to reduce its 2023 operations, support and business development expenses by approximately $10-million, net of reinvestments, and is reducing its 2023 expense guidance to 2-per-cent growth relative to 2022, down from 3 per cent. Cumulative annual expense savings of $25-million are expected to be realized in 2024 with savings of over $30-million expected in 2025, representing approximately half of the annual run-rate savings. Restructuring and other charges to support these activities reflect severance and other costs.

"We believe these foundational changes will enable us to take full advantage of improving economic conditions as the year progresses and will ensure our continued place among Canada's leading wealth and asset management companies," said Mr. O'Sullivan.

About IGM Financial Inc.

IGM Financial is one of Canada's leading diversified wealth and asset management companies with approximately $257-billion in total assets under management and advisement at May 31, 2023. The company provides a broad range of financial planning and investment management services to help more than two million Canadians meet their financial goals. Its activities are carried out principally through IG Wealth Management, Mackenzie Investments and Investment Planning Counsel. IGM Financial is a member of the Power Corp. group of companies.