Inchcape plc

Good morning all and welcome to Inchcape's Q3 2022 Trading Update Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session through the phone lines. If you would like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star 1 on your telephone keypad to be added to the Q&A queue to be had later in the call. I will now hand over to the Group Chief Executive of Inchcape, Duncan Tate, to open the presentation.

Duncan, please go ahead. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us.

As usual, I am joined on the call by our CFO, Heisbert de Zoeten, and our Head of Investor Relations, Raghav Gupta. I'll begin by commenting on the group's performance before handing over to Heisbert, who will give more detail. We'll then be happy to take your questions. As mentioned in this morning's announcement, the group continued to perform strongly in Q3. In the quarter, we delivered organic revenue growth of 16% versus the same period last year, with double-digit growth in both distribution and retail and growth across all our regions. On top of this, our recent distribution acquisitions contributed nicely with 4% of additional growth. Having launched the Accelerate strategy a year ago, I am delighted with the substantial progress the group has made so far. We've extended our global leadership in automotive distribution, leveraging our digital and data investments, and continue to move forward with our ambition to capture more of a vehicle's lifetime value with Bravo Auto, our digital-first, multi-brand used car platform. During the quarter, we have further expanded our OEM footprint with exciting electric vehicle brands, adding Great Walls Aura in Hong Kong and Macau, and BYD in Belgium and Luxembourg. This expansion is a great example of our accelerate strategy and action delivering on the group's growth ambitions. As regards our proposed acquisition of Durco, the process is progressing well, and we expect the transaction will complete at the end of 2022 or in Q1 2023, subject to necessary shareholder approvals and merger control clearance. Let me now hand over to Heisbert, who will run through the regions.