Banijay Group N V

Thank you. Good evening and welcome to Banijay Group's Q1 2026 results webcast. This is Louise Racine, Head of Investor Relations. Before we start, let me draw your attention to the disclaimer on slide two. I also want to remind you that this presentation is now available on the company's website, and a recording of this call will be accessible in the coming days. Your speakers today are François Réailly, our CEO, and Sophie Turing-Fleclerc, our CFO. First, François will present our key financial and business highlights for the quarter. Sophie will then cover the results in more detail before François provides some concluding remarks. We will then open the call for questions. Over to you, François.

Thank you, Louise, and good evening, everyone. Our Q1 results represent a very solid start to the year with 9% revenue growth and adjusted EBITDA growth of 5.4%. This performance is perfectly in line with our guidance and once again demonstrates the strength and diversification of our business model. Our sports betting and gaming business delivered 20% growth in unique active players and 17% revenue growth despite adverse sports results. And there's more to come thanks to an exciting summer of sports ahead. In entertainment and live, we saw mid-single digit revenue growth overall. This figure reflects very strong activity growth in live activities, some lumpy revenues in distribution, and seasonality in content production. With this solid start to the year and an exciting pipeline of major sporting events, content deliveries, and live developments ahead in 2026, we are very confident in achieving our full year guidance. We enjoy also good momentum in executing across our M&A activity. Our acquisition of Tipico Group was completed at the end of April, and our combination with all three media is well on track with closing expecting during summer. A brief look at key figures for the quarter. Revenue reached over 1.1 billion euros, up 9% at constant currencies and current scope. This translated into adjusted EBITDA of just under 200 million, up 5.4%. Restated from the vetting tax increase following the new French regulation implemented in July 2025 adjusted EBITDA growth would have been over 11% above top line growth showing continuous cost optimization. Adjusted net income increased by just over 18% year-on-year while adjusted free cash flow generation stood at 161 million euros, resulting in a high level of cash conversion of 82% in line with guidance. Our leverage stood at 2.7 times stable compared to the end of 2025. Let's move to business highlights now, starting with sports betting and gaming. Once again, The key highlight this quarter was our continued strong business momentum with an impressive 20% growth in unique active players, the most important KPI when it comes to the commercial development of sports betting. This player growth came from all activities and results from our successful developments across geographies. Our new initiatives, such as a poker platform in France and the launch of an online casino in Côte d'Ivoire are paying off, showing our capabilities to expand our activities and seize all opportunities offered by regulation across our markets. In its fourth book, the double-digit UAP growth was driven by strong player interest during national and international competitions, including, of course, the Champions League multiplex at the end of January. Despite adverse sports results this quarter, impacted by FIFA World Cup qualifiers and unfavorable outcomes during the Champions League, this UAP growth translated into a strong revenue performance over the quarter. Looking ahead, the 2026 FIFA World Cup represents a major catalyst for the business, with an expanded format featuring more teams, more games, and a longer competition expected to drive significant player acquisition and engagement. It is widely expected to be the biggest sports betting event in history, and we are extremely well positioned to take advantage of this, thanks to our leading positions in six markets and our unrivaled technology platform. Having now closed the typical transaction at the end of April, integration and consolidation are well underway, and I look forward to updating you on progress. Let's move now to entertainment, where we continue to leverage our scale and strong creative capabilities. We are developing in all the key strategy growth areas we set out at our Capital Markets Day last year and in the strategic update in March. The first is further developing our English language footprint to capture opportunities in a fast-growing market driven by global streamers. To give you some examples, The highly successful reboot of the Fear Factor franchise, House of Fear, illustrates how we continue to create fresh content based on existing IP. On the scripted side, Season 3 of NCIS Sydney had a stellar launch in the U.S., while Healthman, a new scripted show from the author of Baby Reindeer, premiered successfully on BBC One and HBO Max, where it ranked in the top 10 TV shows in 48 countries. Our combination with all free media will only enhance, of course, our growth in this area going forward. The second growth pillar is the continued expansion of our digital footprint as we capture growth and monetization opportunities across social channels where viewers are increasingly demanding longer form and quality content. From 2027, we will launch a new season of the hit food and travel format Somebody Fit Phil on YouTube, following its move from Netflix. We also acquired Global Format Rides to Stop the Train, the high-concept adventure game created by French YouTuber Squeezie. We will help scale it globally for multiplatform audiences, illustrating our ability to attract digital talent and leverage our reach and visibility. And finally, in the growing sportainment segment, Q1 saw new launches around fresh IP. Scripted drama Motor Valley had a strong debut on Netflix with over 2.2 million viewers. That's in Italy. Football is Island, a new concept commissioned by RTL, began streaming in March and had a strong start in the Netherlands. We also launched Showdown TV in Germany, a new streaming and digital media platform combining live sportainment, creator-led formats, and multiplatform distribution. As you can see, a lot is happening everywhere on our footprint, on all our strategic directions, which is very promising. This quarter, the revenues from production are down, but they are not reflective of what we expect for the full year, with strong deliveries coming at the end of the year. Finally, live experiences, which had an exceptional start to the year. We delivered one of the highlights of the quarter, the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics opening ceremony, which I'm sure many of you watched. And simultaneously across four separate venues, it received a massive 2.5 billion viewers worldwide and was widely recognized as the most memorable winter opening ceremony ever. It was a clear showcase of the creative ambition and capabilities of our live business, which will once again demonstrate its creativity during the summer with the World Cup. The Black Mirror Experience, which will launch in Montreal at the end of May, before opening in Madrid in June, is a key milestone in our live strategy. This is unlocking synergies and monetization opportunities across our unmatched IP catalog. Luminescence also continues to perform exceptionally. The show is now live in eight countries across Europe and America, following rapid growth last year and sold well over half a million tickets in this quarter alone. These achievements demonstrate the strong execution of our strategy and are quite satisfactory when you think that we launched this new activity only three years ago In just a few years, we are establishing ourselves quarter after quarter as an important player in the live entertainment business, which in this quarter accounted for almost 20% of our entertainment and live revenues. That's all from me for now. I'll be back at the end with some closing remarks before we open the line for questions. Over to you, Sophie.

Thank you, François. So let's start with group revenues up 9% at constant exchange rates and current scope. fueled by both business. This breaks down to over 17% for sports betting and gaming, and 4.5% for biology, entertainment, and life. Group adjusted EBDA increased by 5.4% at constant exchange rates and current scope, despite the betting tax increase in France. Excluding this impact, adjusted EBDA would have grown 11.3%. External and personal expense increased by 5.2%, restated for the change in betting tax regulation in France of 11 million euros. Therefore, in line with the revenue trend. Excluding this headwind, the rise in earnings translated into an expansion of the adjusted EBITDA margin to 18.1% from 17.6% in Q1 2025 demonstrating our constant focus on cost optimization. Moving to adjusted net income next, which was at 18.1% in reported figures. This was a very good result, mainly fueled by adjusted EBITDA growth and the positive impact of the implementation of the IP box tax regime in sports betting and gaming. Excluding an exceptional charge in Q1 2026 of 25 million euros, large part of this being non-cash, LTIP declined as anticipated and in line with our soft guidance. As highlighted in the strategic update in March, we are expecting a decline in LTIP charges in the mid-term to reach, on average, 4% of adjusted EBDA over the 26-29 period, excluding an exceptional charge of around €100 million in 2026 related to the evolution of Banerjee Gaming's top management LTIP. Moving to results by business, starting with sports betting and gaming. This quarter, we saw strong revenue growth of 17.3% at constant exchange rates and current scope despite adverse sports results. Sportsbook revenues were up 14.4%, supported by strong double-digit growth in unique active players. Casino, poker, and turf revenues were up over 27%, reflecting the success of recent business developments. These include the continued strong performance of the proprietary online poker platform launched at the end of 2024 in France and the ramp-up of the online casino in Côte d'Ivoire since its launch in early 2025. Looking at earnings now. Sport betting and gaming adjusted EBITDA was down 5.4% on a reported basis, impacted by the expected headwind related to the betting tax increase in France. Excluding this effect and at constant scope, the growth would stand at positive 7.1%. The adjusted EBITDA margin reflects the increase in betting tax in France and adverse sports results, which had an amplified effect in Portugal and Poland, where taxes are computed on turnover. Adjusted free cash flow conversion remains very high, at over 90%. The change in working capital is mainly explained by betting tax cut-off effects, while the reduction in income tax paid is due to the positive impact of the IP Box tax regime. Moving now to entertainment and life. Revenues were solid, up 4.5% at constant exchange rates and current scope. Looking at revenue by activity, the decline in content production reflects phasing effects with a strong volume of deliveries expected towards the end of the year. Distribution revenues were up 20% year-on-year, thanks to a format sale. The standout performance this quarter was, of course, life, with revenues almost doubling year-on-year. As highlighted by François, this was driven by the strong performance of Balic, many thanks to the Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics opening ceremony, but there was also a strong contribution from Loci, with reminiscence now live in eight countries and continuing to grow. Looking at earnings and cash flow now for the business line. Adjusted EBITDA was 15.6% at constant exchange rates and current scope with margin improving 140 basis points to 14.2%. This improvement reflects a positive contribution from the distribution segment, as well as a continuous cost optimization. Lower CapEx reflects a high comparison basis with Q1 2025, where there were some significant IP investments and distribution advances. This leads to an adjusted free cash flow conversion at almost 75%. The change in working capital reflects cut-off effects, including phasing in payments at Balich Wander Studio. This temporarily impacted the adjusted operating free cash flow, which is expected to normalize throughout the year. From a cash flow perspective, Group adjusted free cash flow reached €161 million, resulting in a cash conversion rate after capex and mispayments of 82%, fully in line with our full year guidance. The change in working capital requirements of negative 103 million euros in Q1, 2026 came mostly from cut-off effects notably and as explained in life business. This led to an adjusted operating free cash flow of 52 million euros. The Group's net debt stands at 2.59 billion euros, representing a leverage of 2.7 times, which is stable compared to year-end 2025. We continue to have a strong liquidity position with a positive cash balance of 424 million euros and 290 million euros of unruly secured credit lines. That's all from me. I will now hand back to François for some concluding remarks.