Aryzta AG

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to 17 Months Results to December 2023. The call will be hosted by Leo Sigorti, Chairman and CEO, and Martin Huber, the CFO. There'll be a presentation followed by Q&A. This call is being recorded. Now I'd like to hand over the call to Paul Mead, Head of Investor Relations, to open the call. Please go ahead, sir. Thank you.

Thank you. Good morning, everybody, and welcome. I'd just like to point out that today's discussions are governed by the forward-looking statement in terms of all the risks associated with reporting. And I'd now like to hand over to Urs Jordi to present.

Good morning, all. Let me welcome you to this year's result presentation. We will start on page four of the presentation. with the strategy and the delivering of the goals. The performance arrives the way we have planned. Take-off business remains attractive and is creating sustainable value. Arvista is on track to deliver its mid-term targets 2025. On the page number five, You can see the key highlights for the 17-month period to December 2023. Revenue of 3 billion and 46 million was achieved. An organic growth of 17.3% is there. An EBITDA of 400.8 million. An EBITDA margin of 13.2%. and free cash flow of €139.6 million was achieved. Profit for the period amounted to €160.5 million. On the next page then, page number 6, the key highlights for the 12-month period to December 23. The revenue amounted to 2,192,000,000. The organic growth stands with 14.7%. An EBITDA of 304.5 million was achieved, which is a margin of 13.9%. A free cash flow of 132.4 million was achieved, profit for the period 125.7 million. These are the key highlights for the 12-month period. On page 7, then, the organic growth strategy, which is working in our core categories. Innovations are impacting revenue heavily. This impact almost doubled over the year. With this, we gain market share. Core channels remain the same, quick serve restaurant, other food service and retail. There are significant improvements in customer feedback ratings, which we are doing on a yearly basis. Customers seem to appreciate our activities. Both core regions performed well. Several growth initiatives are underway. You may have read the investment in Perth into a burger bun line. We invest in capacities in Switzerland, in Germany, and in Poland. On page 8, then, the operational improvements on all levels. We are still in a challenging environment. There is still significant labor inflation in place. There are supply chain disruptions appearing from time to time. Commodity largely remain stable but still on an elevated level. There is an increasing regulatory complexity and with these costs in the system, pricing effects are becoming flattish but not deflating. On page number nine concerning governance, The board composition proposal will be listed in the AGM invitation. A new permanent group CEO will take over the business January 2025 onwards. There will be a smooth and orderly transition granted from this dual role. there will be a strong oversight and support from Chairman and the Board to this new CEO. The guidance for 2024, there will be further improvements in all QE metrics expected in the current year. The organic growth will normalize into the low to mid single digit range driven mainly by volume and mix The EBITDA margin expansion will normalize, supported by growth, efficiency, and cost discipline. Further improvement in free cash flow and total net debt leverage we will see. Sequential improvement in ROIC we will target. On page number 11, you know this page with the targets 2025. they will remain the same. ARISTA is on track to achieve all these targets. There is an ESG strategy in place based on three pillars supported by 13 goals. There is an environmental efficiency pillar, I apologize, an innovation pillar, and people and community pillar, All of these supported again by 13 goals, greenhouse gas and water footprint improvements, enhanced sustainable sourcing about people and communities, health and nutrition. The key targets on this ESG initiative you find on page 13. In the environmental part, a greenhouse gas reduction, a food waste reduction, and a water reduction. In the innovation part, a share of regenerative wheat on a mass balance basis, reduction of virgin plastic usage, and an achievement of 40% share of new products aligned with Arista, better for you. means healthier products. People and communities, we work on work-related incidences to take care for our employees. And on supply chain diligence, each of our sites are reporting through ZX and will achieve a score of at least 3.5 out of 5. On page number 14 you can see the improvement in energy mix, greenhouse gas emissions and food waste. On the left side the renewable and non-renewable energy usage. Then in the middle the greenhouse gas emissions and on the right side the food waste reduction in our business. I would now hand over to Martin Huber for the financial review.

Thank you Urs. Let's move now to page 16. Good morning all. Firstly I would like to briefly remind you of our flight path so far. The Eritze aircraft took off more than three years ago in very stormy conditions with many skeptics critical of the disclosed flight path. Despite this we quickly gained altitude However, it was anything but quiet in the air. COVID disrupted supply chain and spiraling inflation as a result of the outbreak of war in Europe all challenged the crew and cockpit. We successfully managed these turbulences, continuing our flight path, and we remain on track to progress towards our cruising altitude and reach our midterm destination as laid out in our original flight path. And now, moving to today's strong performance. In the last 17 months, we have consolidated our turnaround plan. Our strong set of figures, both for the extended year as well as for our calendar year 2023, are a clear testimony to this. Double-digit revenue growth supported by innovation and market share gains paired with disciplined cost management and some active portfolio management have expanded our margins, significantly accelerated our cash flow, and increased the run the return on invested capital of our mid-term target levels. With these milestones achieved, going back one more and last time to the aircraft analogy, this means going forward we will be normalizing our speed and steering continuously and sustainably towards our communicated mid-term targets. Page 17. We have exceeded expectation in all our key performance metrics for the extended financial year 2023. We've increased our revenue to 3 billion 46 million. The resulting organic growth reached 17.3% compared to 21.6% for the 12 months communicated in October. This organic growth rate reduction is almost entirely driven by pricing, which decreased from 18.2% for the 12-month period to 14% for the 17-month period. This is a pure mathematical effect. as we have been running against strong previous year price comparables in the period August to December. In this five-month period, we have achieved high single-digit organic growth with broad-based support from European businesses and QSR in the rest of the world. We have expanded our EBITDA margin to 13.2% in the 17-month period supported by double-digit revenue growth, further acceleration of innovation to circa 14% of revenue, contribution from our cost discipline measures, as well as active portfolio management, particularly in our Ireland UK business. Free cash flow improved to €139.6 million, confirming our cash generation capability. We increased the ROIC to 12.3% by improving the operating business performance, combined with discipline cap expense and strong capital improvements. This KPI is now significantly ahead of our mid-term targets. Page 18. For the rest of the results presentation, we will focus on the calendar year, which will be our new financial reporting period. For this purpose, we compare our calendar year 2023 results with calendar year 2022 based on unaudited performance statements. Calendar year 2023, we have delivered strong results for all our key performance metrics, which consolidate Our turnaround plans initiated three years ago. Double-digit organic revenue growth reaching 14.7% supported by pricing of 12.2% to compensate commodity headwinds. EBITDA margin improved by 190 basis points to 13.9%. Revenue growth as well as cost discipline measures and innovation contributed to this. Free cash flow more than doubled to 132.4 million euros driven by operating performance improvements more than compensating higher financing costs and tax charges. As mentioned on the previous slide, ROIC increased to 12.3%. This is a significant acceleration compared to the 7.5% in the previous year. With these results, we have achieved a new performance level from which we now move in more normalized steps towards our mid-term targets. Page 19. Over the last two calendar years, we delivered double-digit organic growth. This growth was supported by relevant but necessary pricing to offset the massive commodity headwinds. Pricing peaked at the end of 2022, beginning of 2023. In 2022, volume growth was 9%, with additional support from COVID recovery throughout 2023, volume growth has moderated. Key call-outs for our 14.7% organic growth in 2023 are pricing for the full year was 12.2%, supporting the recovery of higher input costs. Quarter by quarter, we saw this pricing normalize. The normalization of pricing throughout 2023 is primarily driven by the mathematical effect of strong previous year price comparables. Volume growth declined compared to previous year, but remained positive. The launch of new products contributed, but was partially compensated by active portfolio management, mainly in our Ireland UK business. Although volumes were impacted by active portfolio management, our actions were EBTA margin accretive. With post-COVID recovery no longer a factor and reducing price effects, full year 2024 growth is expected to normalize. Our growth will be supported by volume and mix and less so by pricing. We expect 2024 quarterly growth trends to vary, as was the case in 2023. In light of Q1 2024 organic growth trending at lower run rate, reflecting temporary softness, especially in QSR, we expect organic growth to be in the low to mid single digit range for the full year. Page 20. Europe contributed substantially to the overall performance in calendar year 2023 with an organic growth of 15.2% and an EBTA margin of 13%. All businesses, with the exception of Ireland and UK, deliver double-digit organic growth. Strongest contribution came from Poland, France, QSR, and Germany. In the retail channel, Arista continued to grow market share, outperforming the channel in our key European businesses. New product launches supported by our innovation process almost doubled the share of innovation and revenue. EBTA margin expanded by 200 basis points to 13%. This is a result of growth and the launch of margin-accretive products, as well as efficiency initiatives. This led to broad-based margin progression across our businesses in Europe. The portfolio optimization actions, primarily focused on our European businesses, have also contributed. Page 21. The rest of the world delivered an organic growth of 11.2% and an EBTA margin of 20.6%. We drove organic growth for the region by correct pricing to support cost recovery and the contribution from innovation and new product launches, primarily the best burger rollout. Our QSR business delivered double-digit organic growth supported by innovation, new restaurant openings, and promotional offers. Food service contributed with resilient organic growth, strong double-digit revenue growth in our core channel with partially compensated by active portfolio management, supporting margin expansion, and some temporary lower revenue in other food service channels. The group accreted EBITDA margin of rest of world increased by 150 basis points to 20.6%. The key contributor to this result was our food service business, which benefited from efficiency and cost discipline measures, as well as margin recovery through pricing. In QSR, margin consolidated at slightly higher levels compared to previous year. Important innovation and contribution from fixed cost management were the basis for this evolution. Page 22. At group level, we increased EBTA margin by 190 basis points to 13.9%, progressing toward our midterm target of at least 14.5% by 2025. Key contributors to these results are the gross margin, which improved 210 basis points. We achieved this result by strict cost management in our factory, allowing factory fixed costs to grow by less than 30% of organic growth, the launch of margin-enhancing innovation, and active portfolio management. Distribution added 70 basis points to the margin expansion. We optimized these costs through several measures, such as outsourcing of some distribution services or streamlining of some of our outside storage setups. Our cost control and procurement risk management also helped to manage distribution costs. SG&A increased by 30 basis points compared to the previous period. Upfront cost for our end-to-end optimization project. such as the setting up of the shared service center and the acceleration of our IT standardization program are causing this impact. In addition, one-time costs related to the change of the financial year also added to this. Excluding these effects, SG&A costs would also have contributed positively to the EBDA margin. Slide 23. Our gross margins have recovered and are back at pre-COVID levels at the end of calendar year 2023, while input costs are still at an index of 130 versus pre-COVID. Beginning of calendar year 2020, our gross margin was at 32.8%. With the support of correct pricing, disciplined cost management, launch of margin accretive innovation, and some portfolio optimization, we have been able to compensate the headwinds caused by the pandemic and the war in Europe. Slide 24. Our efficiency and cost discipline program contributed strongly to our operating performance improvement. In manufacturing, we are on track with our annual 2-3% efficiency improvement. The basis for this result is the rollout of the performance control system to all our factories. This was concluded in the first half of 2023. Supposed by this performance control system initiative, we have improved conversion costs as a percentage of revenue to an index of 90 versus the start of the mid-term plan. With strong focus and action on the reduction of waste, we brought down waste as a percentage of used raw and packaging materials to an index of 79% versus the start of the mid-term plan. At the end of December, we managed circa 70% of our procurement spend with our global procurement organization and have concluded 10 simplex projects. The result? cost optimization of over 18 million for the calendar year 2023. With this progress, we are on track to deliver the targeted 26 to 36 million for the mid-term plan. Fixed-cost growth, excluding the one-offs of the financial year change, the front-loaded costs of our end-to-end programs, and some other one-off elements, are slightly above the upper range of our indicative target. However, fixed costs have contributed significantly to the overall results acceleration. Slide 25. We have more than doubled our free cash flow to €132.4 million in calendar year 23. We achieved this by operating business performance that increased absolute EBITDA by circa €74 million. The improvement of working capital efficiency, net of securitization, delivering almost 25 million of incremental cash flow, and prudent capex management. It's worth mentioning that we expect to be in line with our midterm capex guidance of 3.5% to 4% over the years 2023 to 2024 due to important growth capex taking place in 2024. Strong operating performance. has more than compensated the higher financing costs and tax charges compared to 2022. With this result, a register demonstrates that the business is able to generate a healthy cash flow, which supports the continued optimization of the balance sheet. Slide 26. Over the last two years, we have reduced total net debt from 1,135,000,000 to just slightly over a billion at reported currency or 924 million at 2021 constant currency. This was possible through the hybrid buyback program, reducing the principal of these bonds by circa 376 million through a mix of free cash flow and bank financing. In December 2023, we have also repaid circa 18 million of the remaining two short-share notes. At the same time, supported by the contribution from our turnaround plan, we have decreased the leverage ratio from 5.6 times to 3.3 times. This progress, we are on track to deliver a below three-time leverage by 2025. Slide 27. Driven by the significant change of the interest rate environment, our financing costs have increased by 9.7 million to 73.4 million euros. Although financing costs were higher, In 23 versus 22, we significantly limited the increase through the hybrid buyback program, which offset 13.2 million of the gross increase. In addition, our interest rate hedging, covering over 40% of the bank debt interest exposure, ensures visibility of our finance costs up to the maturity of these instruments in September 26. The full benefit of our hybrid buyback will materialize in calendar year 2024, and our total financing costs, including lease interest, are expected to be in the range of 67 to 71 million euros for the year 2024. Slide 28. We further improved the value creation of our business by increasing the ROIC to 12.3%. With this, we have exceeded ahead of schedule our mid-term target levels and are delivering solid levels of economic profit. The cornerstone of this improvement are strong growth and margin progression, paired with increased working capital efficiency and prudent capex management. Slide 29. The consolidation of our turnaround plan is equally visible in the over 140% EPS improvement achieved in 2023 to 8.2 euro cents per share. Strong operating improvement was partially offset by higher financing costs as explained in the previous chart. In addition, our income tax charge significantly increased in the current year, mainly due to normalized recognition of tax credit versus previous year and higher taxes due to improved profit levels. Slide 30. In summary, Our financial results for calendar year 23 confirm that we are operating in an attractive market and that Arista can deliver solid and sustainable returns to our shareholders. Our strategy is delivering and we are on track to achieve the committed mid-term targets by 2025. Thank you. I hand now back to Urs.

Thank you, Martin. start the Q&A session. Paul.

Good morning. Operator, if you can now go to the Q&A and take the first questions, please.

Sure, thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, your question and answer session will now begin. If you wish to ask a question from the conference call, please press TAR1 on your phone. If you change your mind and decide to withdraw your question, simply press TAR2. You will now be advised when your line is open to ask questions. We will take the first question from line June Eifert from UBS. The line is open now. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Thank you. Thanks for taking my questions and good morning all. I would take them one by one, if I may. The first one would be, please, on pricing. Do you have relatively good visibility on pricing for 2024 already, i.e., have the contractors, retailers are now, again, set for 12 months rather than for three to six months? This would be the first question, please.

Thank you, Jörg, for this question. question. We have a good control and good view on pricing. There are negotiations due over the whole year, but as we told, pricing is becoming rather flattish but not deflating. We have input costs which are still growing. Salary is one component. So, as we have laid out, we believe that pricing will become rather flattish but not deflating with a good view from our side towards these negotiations coming up.

Thank you. And the second question, please, on the quarterly sales volatility you are mentioning. I mean, I think in Q4 23, top of my head, you had close to 8% organic sales. How shall we think about the ranges? I mean, is Q1 then low single-digit and Q2 can be again high single-digit? Or what is roughly the range for the sales volatility you're expecting? And why is the QSR weakening for you as I think you're also invested in growth capex recently?

Good morning, Jörn. Thank you for that question. For Q1, we have put the growth rate into context and we have indicated that Q1 is soft. One reason for that is the softness we're seeing in the QSR segment. I'd like to remind you on the result publication of some of our food peers and as well as the listed QSR companies. You have certainly seen their similar messages, so it's not It's not a message that's uncommon to Arista. And that's why we expect our full year organic growth to be in the range of low to mid single digit. Quarterly growth will vary as we have indicated and as it did also in the year 23.

And thanks, Martin, for this. And the ranges, I mean, can it be in some quarter minus 2%, minus 3% organic sales and in other quarters plus 7%, plus 8%? Or is it more between 0% to 5% organic sales where you can think about the volatility?

Yeah, and I think it's rather somewhere between plus minus 0% and a low to mid-single-digit upwards. This is a bit the range. It's difficult to see now. January was a bit soft. February already a bit better. March remains to be seen. So it's difficult now to give an outlook quote by quote. But I think it will land somewhere there, what I told.

That's helpful. Thanks a lot. I'll go back into queue.

Thank you. We will take the next question from line Pascal from Stifel. The line is open now. Please go ahead.

Yes. Good morning, everyone. My first question would be on your Q4 results. What drove the peak volume growth in Europe? I mean, it was quite of a sequential improvement in Europe versus the last two quarters before. That would be my first question. And then my second one on rest of the world. you point out in your presentation that the margin was actually stronger for the financial year ending or for the 12 months ending in July than for the month or for the period ending in December. So I guess the margin was then lower for the last five months when we look back. So what grows that lower margin? Thank you.

I will answer the question now about Europe and Q4 and Martin then the margin in rest of the world. In Europe we had a very strong year end. This was driven by good promotions, good mood in the market, good day constellation and good basically December business. This was very strong and then driving these numbers up. Margins in rest of the world, Martin,

Pascal, I think obviously we are moving now to a calendar year. When you look at the calendar year comparison, also 23 showed a strong improvement versus previous year, 150 basis points improvement. Rest of world is margin accretive and has consolidated now at at nice levels over 20%. So I would not read too much into the evolution over the five months. I think the right way to look at this is to compare how we have again improved our profitability in 23 versus 22. Clearly here the food service business was the strong driver of this. which has allowed us to achieve that. QSR, on the other side, as I said, they have consolidated at high level their margins and have slightly improved, supported by innovation and also strong and disciplined fixed cost management.

Maybe one question more, if I may. I mean, you also outlined in your outlook that you will have some or share some more thoughts on new financial targets 26 to 28. Now with a new CEO coming in, can we expect that this will be aligned so that the new CEO will also be able to share his view on new financial targets or will the board pretty much decide about new financial targets and then the new CEO needs to execute on them? Thank you.

It's basically a cascade in the process. Before we go after financial targets, we will do a strategic review. This will take place this year, and towards the end of the year, then the financial target. This is obviously mainly driven by the actual board and the actual management.

Thank you. Thank you. Your next question is from Andres Von Ark from Bubba. The line is open up.

Good morning. I would like to start on page 45. That's your free cash flow generation of $132.4 million for last year. If we were to make an average towards $25 million, I mean, there's three elements I would like to have your view on. Last year, you have quite favorable networking capital effect. Is that achievable in the years to come, or would that be more flattish? Then the second point would be how you think about the CAPEX spending, which I think is in line with, let's say, your mid-term indications. but maybe a bit on the low end in in the sector if you were to have higher growth so is that a sustainable figure at four to five percent or would that have to go up if you would deliver more on the top line and the third point would be on the taxes that you pay is this a normalized level in terms of, you know, cash tax as a percent of profitability, or would this increase clearly in the mid-term? Then I would have additional questions.

Andreas, I guess that's a question for me. As we have indicated already in previous discussions and presentations, we have strong working capital improvement initiatives in place and we are confident that we can continue delivering incremental improvement in the working capital movement part. So I'm not referring to the test of securitization program, I'm referring to the management of inventories, payables and receivers. We have concluded the analysis of a couple of businesses already, and this has confirmed our targeted improvement level that we see in the working capital movement. So we are clearly confident that this will help us to further support. When we look at CapEx, you're right, 23 was probably a bit at the lower end. You can expect capex to be within the guidance that we have indicated between 3.5% to 4% for the midterm target. Should the growth come higher, improved EBTA margin, you will also get incremental contribution obviously from EBTA. Taxes will normalize over the longer period. But you can expect to see there a slight uptick. But on the other side, we have another element that we are working on and we continue to work on, that is optimizing our balance sheet structure. And with that, optimizing obviously also our interest and financing costs. So therefore, we are confident that we can deliver these levels of healthy cash flow.

Okay, just on the guidance, I was a bit late on the call. Normalizing of margins for next year, so that excludes a lower margin or normalizing something around this margin or is it, you know, I would have thought it's just a modest increase, is that what you're saying?

That's how we should read this. We have now, as I said, we have now reached a new level of performance. We are committed to our mid-term targets of at least 14.5%. We are now at 13.9%. So you can expect a further increase in margin, but at a more moderate pace. That's how that should be interpreted.

Sorry to push a bit on that first quarter theme that you pointed to. It's just like the messages I got from food peers was that there might be a trading day left. Easter timing might be something. It was especially mentioned that the U.S. consumer was down trading and weakening, but that's not relevant for you. And, you know, I think growth rates in Asia are maybe a bit more modest, but not significantly. So I'm not really sure, you know, given your low cost per calorie category, why you should be here, you know, significantly impacted at things that I think at peers seems to be a bit more elsewhere. Maybe if you could elaborate a bit on that to better understand it.

Good morning, Andreas. Andreas, it's mainly the QSR sector which is weak. There are some geopolitical impacts on this, and this is the main driver for us. You are correct. Bakery calorie is a very efficient calorie from an economical and from an environmental point of view. This remains. The softening in Q1 is mainly coming from the QSR sector. and you have read there the news about this, this is the source.

But do you think that people basically trading up again in that environment? I mean, that would typically, you know, could also happen given in, you know, at some other companies in Europe, numbers, the volume seems to have improved rather.

I think there is a temporary impact based on several factors. QSR, the organized world in this business, will continue to win. They did enormous gains after COVID, post-COVID. These gains are becoming normalized and again the last some months they were a bit flattish. Up-trading and down-trading for this type of businesses are not really important because these who are up-trading can up-trade into QSR or up-trading out of QSR. So this is basically an equal game. QSR world is investing a lot of efforts in activities, promotions, innovations, build-up of restaurants. this phase will go away and is already improving. Just in Q1 around December, beginning of January, this was a bit softer.

Thank you very much, and I give it back to the Q. Thank you.

We will take the next question from line Patrick Svendeman from ZKB. The line is open now. Please go ahead.

Yeah, Patrick Svendeman, ZKB. Hi, Urs. Hi, Martin. Hi, Paul. Congrats for this very nice further improvement. So my first question is regarding net debt currently at 1 billion euro. What's your best guess here for the end of 24 in terms of net debt? And also a question related to that one, you're still sticking to the target for a net debt to EBITDA level of below three times. shouldn't be that significantly below three times, as you're already at 3.3 times now, or is there a risk why we should be here more prudent? Then second question, could you give us a little bit more flavor what you expect for the different channels for the current year in terms of organic growth, but also in terms of the competitive environment? And last question, again, on the EBIT margin, so a slight improvement means then something like 20 to 30 basis points. Is that correct? And would you also expect that one as a best guess for H1? Thank you.

Morning, Patrick. Thank you for your questions. On the first one, in terms of net debt, this continues to be our focus to drive our operating performance, deliver increased margins, profit for the period, and strong cash flow to further optimize our balance sheet structure. This will continue and we are confident to reach the below three times leverage by 2025. We will progress towards that and this is through the focus of improving operating performance, as we have done so over the last three years. In terms of Channel organic growth, we have said, we have indicated that there will be softness, particularly driven, and Urs has reiterated that, particularly driven by the QSR segment. We have also indicated that organic growth quarterly will vary as it did in 2023. we can only reiterate our 24 guidance of low to mid single digit. In terms of EVTA margin progression, I think that is a fair assumption what you're indicating. As we are now at the new performance levels, as I indicated and said before in my answer, the improvement will continue in a sustainable way. but it will continue at a more moderate pace. And I think what you have indicated, you can use as a reference point.

Okay, perfect. Many thanks, Martin. And regarding the channels, just in terms of the competitive environment, the QSR retail channel and food service channel?

On QSR, I've already mentioned, Urs has elaborated on it. On the retail part, As I indicated in Europe, where we measure that through market data, we have in the trailing 12 months of 23, we have outperformed in the key markets the retail channels in terms of value. So we continue to perform. We have increased. our innovation strongly. And these products are obviously being spot on with the consumers and customers. That is helping us to deliver this performance in terms of channel performance.

Many thanks. And regarding the other food service, so restaurants and hotels?

I said we have been growing in 23 in Europe strongly in organic growth. All businesses except Ireland, UK, where we have done active portfolio management, have not delivered double-digit organic growth. And the standouts of this growth, as I've also said, one of them is France. And France, as you know, is our biggest food service channel. And they have continued to execute, gain new customer, improve their footprint, drive value in the channel. So this is a channel that is in need of solutions to optimize their back of the house. And we are able to help them support their challenges they have with labor, with space, with rent, with energy. as you well know.

All right. Thanks a lot, Martin.

Thank you. We will take the next question from line John Cook from Kepler Shores. The line is open now. Please go ahead.

Yeah. Good morning, guys. A couple of questions from my side. Just on the free cash flow and your guidance, maybe your capex is going to be a bit higher this year. Should we assume that potentially free cash flow will be lower than 2023, i.e. your EBITDA conversion is a little bit lower? That was the first question. Second one, just to come back to this sort of QSR weakness, and you seem to be saying it was soft around the turn of the year and it has improved. Just wondering if you've seen any signs or any indication or any thoughts you have on GLP-1s and impact on QSR. There's obviously been a lot of focus on that in the U.S. And just on QSR generally, I know this has been your sort of focus in terms of, you know, because it's growing faster and that's what you really want to concentrate on. I guess that would still be part of the new medium-term plan. And as far as I remember, QSR tends to be your better better in terms of mix profitability. And I guess that's still the case, even with that weakness we're seeing in QSR. Thank you.

QSR, as I mentioned, is a growing, organized QSR, is a growing part of our business. We don't see any impact from these new methods and technologies to lose weight. It's clearly an impact from Most probably interest rates down fast from geopolitical questions try to be answered via this way. But again, QSR is normally very well organized, is very reactive on impacts like this. So we see already a recovery, and the recovery will continue. For free cash flow, Martin,

Thank you for the question. In terms of free cash flow, clearly you can use the 2023 result as a starting point. We have indicated that CapEx will be a tad higher than what we had in 2023, given that some important growth projects will be coming online or will be executed during the year 2024. We have some other elements. We have, as I said before, to yearn. We have a strong working capital improvement project ongoing where we are identifying important additional cash opportunities. We continue to work on our financing cost in order to to improve not only the balance sheet, but also the overall financing cost of the year. That's why I would say take calendar year 23 as a reference with these balancing elements.

Thank you.

Thank you. We will take the next question from . The line is open now. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning. Thank you for taking my question. I just wanted to ask if you have any concrete actions planned for a hybrid bond, and what is the timeline here? I mean, by when do you want to have it redeemed entirely? Thank you.

Take that question. The politicians didn't get your name.

Flavio Schuster from Lombardi Asset Management.

Hi, Flavio. Hi. As we have indicated, we are clearly focused on improving our battery structure, and that is supported by the improved operating performance of the business, driving growth, improving margin, delivering an improved profit for the period, This will help us to feed our equity on one side, and on the other side will allow us to deliver and continue to deliver solid cash flows. With the free cash flow, we can then take action to further optimize our balance sheet. As I've indicated in the past, we clearly understand that hybrids are not part of food and beverage balance sheet structure. We will be working on this. Certainly, we're not giving here a timing on by when we will do that. It depends on the financial market. It depends on, obviously, the continued delivery of results. But we clearly understand that optimizing the balance sheet Proving the financing cost is a strong way to deliver shareholder value.

Okay, understood. Thank you very much.

Thank you. There are no more questions in the queue. Now I'll hand it back over to closing for the conference. Please go ahead.

Thank you very much for joining this call. I wish you a good day and you soon. Bye-bye.

Thank you.

Thank you. This concludes the session for today. Paris Station can now disconnect.