Hugo Boss Ag S/Adr

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Q3 2026 Results conference call and live webcast. I'm Moritz, the chorus call operator. I would like to remind you that all participants will be in the listen-only mode and the conference is being recorded. The presentation will be followed by a question and answer session. You can register for questions at any time by pressing star and 1 on your telephone. For operator assistance, please press star and 0. The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Lena Biberacher, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to our third quarter 2026 results presentation. Today's call will be hosted by Daniel Grieder, CEO of Hugo Boss, and Ivica Maric, CFO and COO. Before we begin, let me remind you that all revenue-related growth rates are on a currency-adjusted basis unless stated otherwise. As usual, please limit your questions to two during the Q&A. And with that, let me hand over to Daniel.

Thank you, Lena. And good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for joining us today. As you can see, we are hosting today's call in a somewhat new constellation. And I would like to take this opportunity to thank Christian Stohr who has led our investor relations function for almost nine years and recently decided to pursue new professional opportunities outside of Hugo Boss. Christian has been a highly valued counterpart to many of you and has shaped our capital markets communication over the past years. On behalf of the managing board, we wish him all the best for the future. At the same time, I'm pleased to introduce our new head of investor relations, Lena Biberacher. She is already well known to many of you and I'm glad a familiar pair of hands is taking over. Before we now turn to our quarterly performance, I would like to take a moment to address the development of Hugo Boss over the past few months. It has been a period of meaningful change for our company most notably following the increased shareholdings of Fraser's Group and the appointment of Michael Murray as Chairman of the Supervisory Board. Fraser's has been a long-standing and constructive partner of Hugo Boss both as a customer and as our single largest shareholder. We value the relationship we have built over the past years and look forward to continuing the collaboration in the future. I'm personally very pleased that Michael has taken on the role of chairman. He brings strong experience and deep knowledge of our industry and our business. Most importantly, we share a common view on the strategic direction and untapped potential of Hugo Boss. I'm convinced that together with the entire supervisory board, we will further strengthen Hugo Boss and position our company for sustainable long-term success. This brings me to our leadership team. As communicated, Yves Muller has decided to step down from his role as Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer for personal reasons and at the end of September. On behalf of the entire managing board, I would like to thank Yves again for his strong contribution over the past years and we wish him all the very best for the future. At the same time, I'm happy to officially welcome Ivica Maric to our Managing Board as new Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer effective October the 1st. Ivica has been an important part of Hugo Boss for more than two decades, most recently as Deputy CFO and COO. I will leave it to him to introduce himself in just a moment. For my part, let me say that I'm very much looking forward to shape the future of Hugo Boss together. Let me now turn to our strategy and how it is playing out in the current environment. The industry continues to face a challenging macroeconomic and geopolitical context. Consumer sentiment continues to be weak, and traffic remains under pressure in most markets. In such conditions, clear priorities and disciplined execution are crucial. Against this backdrop, We remain fully focused on executing Claim 5 Touchdown and on the things within our control. The third quarter marked another step in the execution of our strategy. We want to strengthen our brands, improve distribution quality, and focus on profitability and disciplined use of capital. In the third quarter, group sales declined by 5%, reflecting our ongoing strategic realignment and the softer demand environment. At the same time, gross margin expanded by 220 basis points to 63.3%, benefiting from our touchdown initiatives. Free cash flow before leases increased to 155 million euros, driven by a reduction in inventories and discipline in working capital. Looking ahead to the final quarter of 2026, We expect that macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty will continue to weight on consumer sentiment. At the same time, protests and social unrest in some key European cities are adding to the broader uncertainty. Overall volatility remains high and visibility continues to be limited. Against this backdrop, we have updated our outlook for 2026 to reflect a more cautious Thank you very much. that once more we are convinced that they will strengthen our business in the long term. And with that, let me hand over to Ivica who will walk you through the key financial developments in Q3 as well as our expectations for the remainder of the year. Ivica, over to you.