S&P Global reported a strong Q1 with 9% organic revenue growth, but management reiterated its full-year guidance despite the escalating Iran conflict, which is impacting its energy division. The call highlighted accelerating AI monetization through new products and data licensing, and the company increased its share repurchase plan to at least $4.5 billion. Total revenue grew 9% organically; ratings grew 13% and indices grew 17%, driven by strength in investment grade and ETF volumes.
S&P Global reported a strong Q1 with 9% organic revenue growth, but management reiterated its full-year guidance despite the escalating Iran conflict, which is impacting its energy division. The call highlighted accelerating AI monetization through new products and data licensing, and the company increased its share repurchase plan to at least $4.5 billion. Total revenue grew 9% organically; ratings grew 13% and indices grew 17%, driven by strength in investment grade and ETF volumes.
Management framed AI as a durable demand accelerant: customers are increasingly accessing S&P Global data through APIs and AI platforms, and AI-enabled customers show outsized retention and growth. Monetization is still early, but clients are paying premiums for AI-ready data…
Management framed AI as a durable demand accelerant: customers are increasingly accessing S&P Global data through APIs and AI platforms, and AI-enabled customers show outsized retention and growth. Monetization is still early, but clients are paying premiums for AI-ready data…
Guidance · revenue to 7%
AI is driving tangible results: customers are paying 35-45% more for AI-ready data, and AI-enabled customers show significantly higher ACV growth.
Management framed AI as a durable demand accelerant: customers are increasingly accessing S&P Global data through APIs and AI platforms, and AI-enabled customers show outsized retention and growth. Monetization is still early, but clients are paying premiums for AI-ready data and S&P is positioning its proprietary data and workflows as essential infrastructure for agentic AI. They expect economics
Private markets revenue grew over 25% in Q1. Management highlighted strong Q1 results and reiterated most guidance, but repeatedly flagged geopolitical/energy risks and trimmed energy growth guidance, indicating cautious confidence.
Management did not disclose S&P Global's own capex; the capital discussion centered on shareholder returns, with buybacks raised to at least 100% of adjusted free cash flow. Customer hyperscaler AI infrastructure spending was cited as a key driver of investment-grade bond issuance.
Management highlighted strong Q1 results and reiterated most guidance, but repeatedly flagged geopolitical/energy risks and trimmed energy growth guidance, indicating cautious confidence.
“as we looked at the amount of hyperscale issuance in q1 we believe that there was some pull forward there relative to our expectations”
“There's certainly a set of AI benefits that we're getting as we think about our our data operations, which is a big part of MI.”
“Some of the energy customers in the Middle East have experienced a direct impact to their facilities, and many are facing supply chain and or distribution disruptions.”
“we're willing to pay in the range of 35% to 45% on the renewal increase to get the AI access.”
“one large strategic customer was so pleased with the new platform that we were able to close a large renewal with a meaningful increase in contract value.”
| Metric | Period | Range | Midpoint | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Op margin | FY2026 | 0.5%–0.75% | 0.625% | MAINTAINED |
| Revenue | FY2026 | 6%–8% | 7% | MAINTAINED |
| RevenueENERGY | FY2026 | 4.5%–6% | 5.25% | LOWERED |
SLB will take over the divested software portfolio and partner with S&P Global on redistribution, implying a close commercial relationship.
“And as part of that decision to divest, we also have a redistribution partnership with SLB that we are quite excited about.”
you know, the strategy in energy where you're selling the workflow businesses and focusing in data, like how would those workflow brands different than the ones you were talking about in MI? And as a quick follow-up, just, yeah, I think that there were like seven or eight different brands. I think you're selling in energy. I was just hoping you could help us size that for our models. Like how much are you getting, uh, selling to SLB?
Hi Matt, thanks for the question. Maybe to start, the size of that is about 25% of upstream revenues. And that software portfolio, as you mentioned, is actually quite varied and quite distinct. And so one of the reasons that really informed our decision there is that we think SLB is a very good partner on that. And as part of that decision to divest, we also have a redistribution partnership with SLB that we are quite excited about. uh as we close that and so what i would focus on maybe is the 75 which is highly differentiated and unique proprietary content maybe just to give you a sense for what is here we cover from basin to reservoir subsurface and geoscience data including seismic surveys wells and logs and spatial data Some of the stuff that is particularly useful for our clients is Vantage asset valuation data that covers over 17,000 global upstream and gas assets. And we also have very, very unique benchmarking performance content that is based on contributory data that allows operators to actually do peer-to-peer performance data and is highly valued. This data actually goes back over 30 years, covering about 80,000 wells globally. Now, there's a lot more to that, and one of the things that we're super excited about is actually creating that we talked about in the prepared remarks that sits on top of all of that data and provides the workflow for our clients to really interact with that data more seamlessly. This is something that our clients have been asking us for for many years and the overwhelmingly positive feedback that we got when we used CERWIC for that soft launch was just really very encouraging and we were able to close one client already just on the demo of the new tool because those clients are very, very aware that our data is the highest quality and most unique out there. And so upstream, more broadly, I would say we look to a broader revenue transformation there. We look to the full hard launch of Ceratitan later this year and are very excited about the progress that we're making there as well. Thanks for the question.
S&P Global sees hyperscaler debt issuance as pulled forward into Q1, with full-year expectations unchanged. — Hyperscaler capex plans are likely being financed earlier than expected, potentially indicating faster AI infrastructure buildout or a shift in financing strategy.
Great. Just a really quick one for me. Just if we go through, I guess, how to think about the balance of transaction and non-transaction growth within the ratings business for the rest of the year. And I guess just, you know, for the first quarter, what drove a pretty notable spike the non-transaction numbers? Yeah, I can answer that.
And Curtis I would maybe just add that we you know you may recall when we gave our guidance back in February that we mentioned we had uh prudent and moderate expectations for hyperscale issuance uh within the um within the uh the year and a good part of that was that we didn't assume that all of the announced capex was going to be debt financed and as we looked at the amount of hyperscale issuance in q1 we believe that there was some pull forward there relative to our expectations uh for hyperscale issuance and this is one of the reasons why we are continuing to maintain our expectations for uh build issuance for the full year thanks for the question thank you our next question comes from manav patnaik with barclays your line is open thank you uh i was hoping just going back to the workflow conversation you could help us just appreciate