Fincantieri S.p.A.

Good afternoon. This is the Corus call conference operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the Fincantieri full year 2024 results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing star and zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Folgero, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director. Please go ahead, sir.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you for joining us and welcome to Fincantieri's Pool Year 2024 Results Conference Call. It is with great satisfaction that we present the results of an highly successful year in which we are seeing the concrete results of our strategy well ahead of our plan and in which we have delivered significant value generation for Fincantieri and its shareholders. Thanks to the tailwinds in all our segments, we have been able to achieve solid top-line growth, which together with the operational efficiency initiatives and relentless financial discipline has driven our margin expansion and enabled us to return to a net profit. The rights issue successfully completed last July to finance the acquisition of VAS, confirmed Sherold's confidence in the group and its development strategy in the underwater domain, aimed at further strengthening our industrial base and supporting a long-term sustainable growth path. None of this would be possible without the hard work and constant dedication of our people around the globe, who I would like to thank one by one. Let's now move to page four for a brief summary of the financial and commercial highlights of 2024. In 2024, it is the first year in which the full potential of our vision and strategy set in our business plan has been unleashed, with results well ahead of our guidance. Revenues increased by 6.2% year-on-year to €8,128,000,000, supported by strong market dynamics in all segments, confirming the growth trend of the first nine months of the year. Thanks to the business path pursued by Fincantieri over the last couple of years, we have been able to deliver a significant increase in profitability. EBITDA recorded an impressive growth of 28%, reaching €509 million, with margin at 6.3%, a material increase compared to 5.2% reported at year-end of 2023, with higher margins in all of our segments. Our net financial position has improved significantly compared to the year-end 2023, with a leverage ratio that is better than the guidance we raised in November. This is also the result of our commercial strategy on cruise, with revenues stabilized at around 4 billion euro per year that allow us to neutralize the working capital absorption. Including also the effects of the right issue and the loan granted to a shipowner reclassified to current in 2024, the net financial position amounts to 1,281,000,000 euro. It is worth noting that we achieved these results without including the proceeds related to the PPA order from Indonesia which became effective in Q1, 2025. Thanks to our financial discipline and the strong business performance in all our segments, we have recorded a net profit of 27 million euro, one year ahead of our business plan targets. Moving on to our commercial performance on page five, we achieved impressive results in 2024. with a record high order intake at 15.4 billion euro, more than twice the orders acquired in 2023, and the book to bill equal to 1.9 times 2024 revenues. As a result, the backlog reached 31 billion euro, up 34.3% compared to fall year 2023. with the total backlog supported by strong commercial acceleration in all business segments reaching an impressive 51.2 billion euro and equal to 6.3 times full year 2024 revenues. Let's now have a look to our expectation for 2025 on page six. Our guidance for 2025 sees Revenues at approximately 9 billion euro. EBITDA margin above 7%. Leverage ratio in line with 2024 with the leveraging well ahead of business plan target.