SS&C Technologies (NASDAQ:SSNC) reported record fourth-quarter results and issued 2026 guidance calling for continued organic growth, margin expansion, and more than 100% cash flow conversion, as management emphasized the company’s positioning in regulated markets and its plans to prioritize share repurchases absent “high-quality, accretive acquisitions.”
Fourth-quarter results: record adjusted revenue, earnings, and EBITDA
Chief Executive Officer Bill Stone said fourth-quarter performance “demonstrate[d] SS&C’s strength,” highlighted by record adjusted revenue of $1.655 billion, up 8%, and adjusted diluted earnings per share of $1.69, up 18%. SS&C also posted record adjusted consolidated EBITDA of $651 million, up 9%, with a margin of 39.3%.
Stone also said Intralinks showed “signs of improvement, with modest growth in Q4,” and that the company was seeing momentum heading into 2026.
Chief Financial Officer Brian Schell provided additional detail, saying GAAP fourth-quarter revenue was $1.654 billion and net income was $193 million, or $0.77 per diluted share. On an adjusted basis, the $124 million year-over-year revenue increase was “primarily driven” by incremental contributions from GIDS ($49 million) and GlobeOp ($40 million), plus $27 million from acquisitions, partly offset by a $16 million favorable foreign exchange impact.
Core expenses (excluding acquisitions and on a constant-currency basis) rose 4.6%, or $44 million. Net interest expense in the quarter was $111 million, down $2 million, which Schell attributed primarily to lower short-term rates. Adjusted net income was $425 million, up 16.8%, and the effective non-GAAP tax rate was 19.2% for the quarter and 22% for the full year.
Cash flow and capital returns: more than $1 billion in repurchases during 2025
For the 12 months ended December 31, 2025, SS&C generated $1.745 billion in cash from operating activities, up 26% year over year. Schell said operating cash flow per share was $6.89, driven by earnings growth, improved working capital utilization, and lower cash taxes paid. He added that the company’s cash flow conversion has exceeded 100% in each of the last three years.
In the fourth quarter, SS&C returned $384 million to shareholders, including $319 million of share repurchases (3.7 million shares at an average price of $85.81) and $66 million in common stock dividends. For the full year 2025, the company repurchased more than $1 billion of stock, buying 12.3 million shares at an average price of $84.12. Stone said management’s “conviction around share repurchase has strengthened” at current levels and that the company would prioritize buybacks unless compelling acquisition opportunities emerge.
SS&C ended the quarter with $462 million in cash and cash equivalents and $7.5 billion in gross debt. Net debt was $7.0 billion, and last-twelve-months consolidated EBITDA was $2.5 billion, resulting in a net leverage ratio of 2.8x, according to Schell.
Strategy: outsourcing demand, lift-outs, and early Calastone progress
President and Chief Operating Officer Rahul Kanwar said the company is seeing a consistent trend of clients making “long-term decisions to outsource, simplify, and scale their accounting models” on SS&C’s platform through multi-year partnerships that generate recurring revenue and expand over time.
Kanwar and Stone pointed to “lift-outs” as examples of that dynamic, citing mandates such as Insignia and Humana as part of a repeatable process in which clients outsource complex, mission-critical operations at scale. Kanwar said the emergence of similar opportunities across regions and business lines reinforced management’s confidence that lift-outs are a “sustainable growth engine.”
Stone also said the company was “pleased with the early progress” of the Calastone acquisition, describing work with leadership, deeper client relationships, and the ability to go live with projects “strategically meaningful” to clients. He said SS&C expects that momentum to continue through the year.
AI and competition: “tailwind” in regulated markets
Stone opened the call by addressing volatility in software shares tied to “AI-driven automation tools” launched across multiple functions, saying SS&C takes competitors seriously but believes it has a “wide and deep moat.” He characterized AI as a “tailwind” and said SS&C is deploying AI solutions “rapidly and with conviction,” emphasizing that ownership of its software and code enables the company to leverage AI “in ways that only we can for our customers.”
Kanwar said SS&C is well-positioned due to its data sets, processing technology, established client relationships, and ability to deploy solutions at scale in regulated environments. In the Q&A, management also emphasized that clients and regulators are conservative, noting the need for controls around large language models.
On intelligent automation, management said it felt “really good” about that business entering 2026, noting that prior-year comparisons were affected by a very large license in the year-ago period and that much of the company’s AI innovation—such as AI agents, use of large language models, orchestration platforms, and AI governance—was centered in that segment.
2026 outlook and business-line commentary from Q&A
Schell said SS&C’s 2026 guidance assumes retention in line with recent results and continued focus on expense management, productivity, and technology leverage, while investing in marketing, sales, and R&D. The company also assumed short-term interest rates remain at current levels, an adjusted effective tax rate of about 22.5%, and capital expenditures of 4.4% to 4.8% of revenue.
- Q1 2026 guidance: revenue of $1.608 billion to $1.648 billion; adjusted net income of $404 million to $420 million; adjusted diluted EPS of $1.62 to $1.68.
- Full-year 2026 guidance: revenue of $6.65 billion to $6.74 billion, with 5.1% organic revenue growth at the midpoint; adjusted net income of $1.662 billion to $1.762 billion; adjusted diluted EPS of $6.70 to $7.02 (about 12% growth at the midpoint); and operating cash flow of $1.713 billion to $1.813 billion.
Management said the organic growth cadence implied by Q1 and full-year guidance reflected greater predictability and stronger recurring revenue. Stone said the company expects to be “pretty strong” throughout the year and hoped to have an opportunity to improve as 2026 progresses.
In additional Q&A, Stone addressed healthcare organic weakness, describing the business as “lumpy” due to large license timing and noting that a “notable multimillion-dollar license” closed in the first 10 days of January 2026. He said SS&C is bringing out Amisys, rewritten “to a very large degree,” alongside OneHealth with Amisys and DomaniRx, and remains optimistic long-term despite preferring stronger growth. He also said the healthcare segment is a $260 million to $270 million business with “pretty healthy EBITDA margins” that adds to cash flow.
Stone also commented on the Elevance relationship, saying DomaniRx is “ready and waiting,” but that longstanding relationships can be difficult to break and that the original sponsor at Elevance moved on several years ago. He said management believes there are still “rays of sunshine at the end of the tunnel.”
On wealth management, Stone said SS&C’s Black Diamond platform is “approaching $3.5 trillion” in administration for RIAs, with “something close to 4,000 RIAs” using the platform. He said SS&C has moved “over 500–600” Morningstar wealth management clients onto Black Diamond and called the business a “crown jewel.”
Regarding alternative fund administration, Stone said assets under administration growth in the fourth quarter included the acquisition of Curo Fund Services, estimating that about $92 billion of the change was organic with the remainder from the acquisition.
Closing the call, Stone said SS&C’s 40-year history has required nimbleness through market shifts and that management believes it has the talent and capability to continue executing into 2026.
About SS&C Technologies (NASDAQ:SSNC)
SS&C Technologies is a global provider of software and services for the financial services industry, offering technology and outsourcing solutions that support investment managers, asset servicing firms, insurance companies, private equity and real estate managers, hedge funds, wealth managers and other financial institutions. The company’s offerings span front-, middle- and back-office functionality, enabling clients to automate trading, portfolio accounting, reconciliation, performance measurement, risk and compliance, and client reporting.
SS&C delivers its capabilities through a mix of licensed software, cloud-based SaaS platforms and managed services.
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