Arcelormittal SA

Good afternoon and good morning, everybody. This is Daniel Faircloth from the Basler Missile Investor Relations team. Thank you very much for joining today's call, which is being hosted by Mr. Mittal, our Executive President, Aditya Mittal, our CEO, and also Giannino Cristino, the Group CFO. The focus of today's call is to discuss strategic progress we're making at Basler Mittal. This is covered in depth and detailed presentation published alongside our results on the website today. So as usual, the format of this call will be some opening remarks from Mr. Mittal and Aditya, followed directly by a Q&A session. As such, we should be able to complete this call in about 45 minutes. Before we begin, some housekeeping items. Firstly, if you would like to ask a question, please do press star one to join the queue. Secondly, I'd like to remind you of the disclaimers on the first slide of our presentation deck. And finally, I'd like to inform you that this poll is being recorded. So with that, over to you, Mr. Mittal.

Thank you. Good day, everyone. Thank you for joining today's call. I hope you are all keeping safe and well. Today, we have reported a very strong set of results for 2021, including a record level of net income. As a company, we have achieved significant progress on many strategic fronts over the past 12 months. Cost improvements, advancing our decarbonization plans, and progressing with our investments to grow EBITDA. At the same time, we have been able to return significant amounts of capital to shareholders. The progress is gratifying, and it's down to the hard work commitment and dedication of all our people. I expect 2022 to be another strong year for company and all our stakeholders. Adit.

Great. Thank you and welcome, everyone. Good morning. Good afternoon. 2021 has indeed been a very progressive year for Arswar Mittal. However, I must acknowledge the one area where we did not make the progress we wanted. and that is safety. Our leadership is fully focused on improvement, taking decisions on where we need to strengthen and intensify our very important efforts to achieve zero incidents. We will continue to double down until we reach our goals. In terms of financial performance, full-year EBITDA was $19.4 billion and net income a record $15 billion. We delivered $6.4 billion of free cash flow for the year, with 3 billion being generated in the fourth quarter alone. These are very strong numbers, and I believe that we can post strong results in 2022 as well. At the start of the year, we set out four strategic priorities. I'm pleased to say that we are delivering progress on all of these areas. First, we're leading the industry on decarbonization. Second, we're further improving our cost position Third, we're investing for long-term strategic growth. And finally, we're consistently returning capital to our shareholders. These are the strategic pillars on which we can grow per share value. Our capital allocation and return policies are delivering. In 2021, we reduced the share count by almost 20%. The buybacks enhance the impacts of our growth projects, supported by the growing contributions from JV and Associates and the structurally lower net cost, net interest cost. These factors combined will drive higher earnings and create sustainable value for shareholders. Looking ahead, I see good prospects for 2022. Demand continues to improve. We have the support of higher annual contracts, and we have our value plan, which should offset some of the impacts of cost inflation. I fully expect 2022 to be another strong year of EBITDA and free cash flow generation and look forward to making further progress against our strategic priorities. Thank you. We're now happy to take questions.