Overview

In certain jurisdictions, we collect funds for payment of payroll and taxes; temporarily hold such funds until payment is due; remit the funds to the customers’ employees and appropriate taxing authorities; file federal, state, and local tax returns; and handle related regulatory correspondence and amendments. The customer assets are held in segregated accounts intended for the specific purpose of satisfying customer funding obligations and therefore are not freely available for our general business use. In the U.S. and Canada, these customer funds are held in trusts.

Our customer funds are held and invested with the primary objectives being to protect the principal balance and to ensure adequate liquidity to meet cash flow requirements. Accordingly, we maintain on average approximately 45% to 55% of customer funds in liquidity portfolios with maturities ranging from one to 120 days, consisting of high-quality bank deposits, money market mutual funds, commercial paper, or collateralized short-term investments; and we maintain on average approximately 45% to 55% of customer funds in fixed income portfolios with maturities ranging from 120 days to 10 years, consisting of U.S. Treasury and agency securities, Canada government and provincial securities, as well as highly rated asset-backed, mortgage-backed, municipal, corporate, and bank securities. To maintain sufficient liquidity to meet payment obligations, we also have financing arrangements and may pledge fixed income securities for short-term financing.

Financial Statement Presentation

Investment income from invested customer funds, also referred to as float revenue or float, is a component of our compensation for providing services under agreements with our customers. Investment income from invested customer funds included in recurring revenue was $55.3 million and $60.7 million for the three months ended March 31, 2025, and 2024, respectively. Investment income includes interest income, realized gains and losses from sales of customer funds’ investments, and unrealized credit losses determined to be unrecoverable.

The amortized cost of customer funds as of March 31, 2025, and December 31, 2024, is the original cost of assets acquired. The amortized cost and fair values of investments of customer funds available for sale were as follows:

Management does not believe that any individual unrealized loss was unrecoverable as of March 31, 2025. The unrealized losses are primarily attributable to changes in interest rates and not to credit deterioration. We currently do not intend to sell or expect to be required to sell the securities before the time required to recover the amortized cost.