Jost Werke Se

Good morning and a warm welcome to our Q1 2026 earnings conference. Myself and Oliver will guide you through what we think was a very strong start into this year with the Q1 performance. So let's look at the Q1 highlights from our side. The EVA integration is on track and the synergies are ramping up. And with that benefit, we could return into our profitability corridor, our strategic corridor between 10 and 12%, a little earlier than we initially expected. We have inaugurated a new hydraulics plant in Brazil, and that strengthens our regional footprint in that important region and expands our capacity for the future growth that we have planned for the Americas region in general. We've also increased our share capital by 10% in Q1, 2026. We've issued 1.49 million shares at a price of 62 euros and 13 cents. And with that, we had gross proceeds of approximately 93 million euros. From a market side, EMEA market recovered slightly. The APAC demand was quite positive. export market in the US. And we've leveraged that market environment. And together with our drive and our organic growth pipeline, we were able to ramp up and use the organic growth and new customer gains to have what we think is a strong sales performance in the first quarter. So let's come to the financial numbers and let's start with sales. We have achieved a record sales level of $417 million euros in one quarter. That's the first time in the record level for the US group. That was up 12% compared to previous year. And as you know, with the EVA integration and the divestment of trains, that is a bit complex. So that's why it's also important to look at the organic sales numbers. And that is a growth of 9% versus the first quarter of last year. All regions and all business lines have contributed to this organic growth of plus 9%. Also, adjusted EBIT is up 23% to a record level of 44 million in the first quarter, and the adjusted EBIT margin improved to 10.6% back into our strategic margin corridor a little earlier than we initially expected in the integration planning. Our leverage improved to 1.75 times. That was obviously supported by the 10% capital increase that I've just mentioned, but also from a higher last 12 months adjusted EBITDA of 204 million. So we're now well within the range between one and two, which we consider the strategic or the target range for our leverage. The adjusted net income grew by 17% to 28 million, and the adjusted earnings per share increased 12% to 181 per share, and that is with the additional 10%, so the larger number of shares in circulation. Strong start into the year, so with that strong start, we can confirm our outlook for the fiscal year 2026. I've mentioned that the markets have been... a little um how should i say a week in america's a bit positive in emea and apex so let's look a little bit at the details for europe middle east and africa we had supporting markets in truck and trailers also support in uh tractor in the tractor market and slide support i would say in construction and hydraulics so um our performance in those in that market would was 8.4%, which is slightly above the market average and that supported our organic growth. If we look at AmeriCars, I think that's an impressive performance. Markets were not supportive in North America for truck and trailers, which is an important part of the business. Also not in the tractor industry and the positive 5.2% on an organic basis is the win of new market shares, especially in agriculture, but also some of additional trailer business in North America. But the vast majority of that overperformance comes from agriculture in North America and South America new customers for our plant in Brazil. um asia pacific the markets were supportive truck and trailer in india china also australia with the positive developments tractors also with the positive development same as hydraulics and constructions our performance organic 14.5 growth in that region so i think this is a good We can go to the next slides of how our strategy that we are implementing contributes to the resilience that you see in numbers. Our sales by destination in the first quarter has been 48% in Europe, Middle East and Africa. And then the rest is more or less evenly between the Americas region and the APEC region. If you look at that from an adjusted EBIT, and Oliver can give you a bit more detail in that in his slides, we gained about 35% in our EMEA region, 25% in Americas, and 38% contribution from APEC. So APEC is a very important region for us. If we look at the industries that we serve, we serve to 50% the transport industry, 20% the agriculture industry. And that has been going up. That used to be 18%. So you see the ramp up in agriculture also in those numbers. And the construction and hydraulics industry was 30%. So with that, I would like to hand over to Oliver for more financial details.

Thanks, Joachim, for the quick overview. And as usually now, let's look a little bit deeper into all performance, KPIs and financials, starting with the EMEA region. We have seen a very solid growth momentum and that is going to continue. The order book is quite nicely underway for EMEA, fully in line with the numbers that you are representing for the markets. And profitability has also significantly improved in EMEA through various regions. In detail, we have seen an organic growth in the EMEA region of 8.4%, which is also more or less the reported growth as the M&A impact for more or less levels out. The strongest growth we have seen in the business line agriculture with double digit growth rates in the EMEA region for agriculture, but also transport and hydraulics remain very robust and also forward looking. Quite promising for the moment. On the other side, we still see no significant negative impacts, at least on the order book side, from the Iran-Belize conflicts. However, we used to be a little bit cautious here. All our products are investment goods. We need to see how that means. But again, I'll just confirm it for a moment. Nothing visible here. No major FX impact in the top line. And then we then look for EMEA on the profitability. We have seen an increase in the EBIT margin from 6.1% to 7.7%. And that's partially driven by product mix. As I just mentioned, the growth in the agricultural business line is higher. That comes with higher gross profit margins. prior year first quarter from the cranes divestment as a second big point. And also, we are seeing the ramping up of the synergies. Both companies, Yoast and EVA, so to speak, have their headquarter functions with R&D, IT, HR, et cetera, in their region. And the efforts that we did last year in leveraging those cost bases by realizing synergies are now turning into EBIT here as well. On top, for sure, especially in transport, we see scale effects from the higher capacity utilization in our transport plants and partially also in agriculture. You might remember that last year for a certain couple the headquarter burden. So that's EMEA. For Americas, also a little bit mentioned already by Joachim, we see growth supported by M&A, but especially by market share gains. And that's quite impressive. The organic growth has been 5.2% from 98 million to 104 million in Americas for a single quarter. It's partially driven by But the predominant effect likewise in Europe is here that we have a stronger start into the agricultural business in both sub-regions, North America, and especially in Brazil. So that's quite helpful here. We had on the other side, a relatively strong negative FX effect in the top line of minus 7.1 percent points, which is predominantly to the USD versus the Euro devaluation. And that leads to the situation that the reported growth in organic growth looks more or less here the same. On the adjusted EBIT, we have seen a more or less stable margin. Last year, first quarter, 10.8%, now 10.6%, which is firmly within our margin corridor for that region as well. We have here and there a little bit of a mixed effect. and in general overall in the region we are quite flexible with our cost base so whatever happens in the second half of the year that might be one question what is happening with transport in the second half we are flexible enough to ramping up or ramping down whatever the market will tell us so quite happy also with the America's performance now looking into APAC again another very strong quarter we have seen this especially China and then starting from September onwards also India, starting a recovery and that turned directly into the first quarter numbers. We have seen a reported growth of 26% if you adjust that for the M&A and also a very strong FX impact coming from the Indian Rupiah. It's still almost 15% organic growth underlying our strong positioning in the region. Basically, that's in China. We had a very good start into the transport business in China, again driven by huge export sales numbers from our Chinese customers. But we've also seen a very strong growth of the transport segment, organic growth of the transport segment in India. Oceania was a very solid performance. The only, let's say, a little bit down light is currently the mining business in the APEC region. What we see is that especially the mining segment in Indonesia is struggling a little bit. Still healthy, but that comes normally with a very high EBIT margin, so that's a little bit of a, let's say, yellow light at the moment, but also here it looks stable for the rest of the year. Looking into the adjusted EBIT for the region, that has grown absolutely significantly from 12.8 to 16.6 million euros, driven by that volume increase, but also the margin is slightly up again, now from 14.6 last year to 15.1%, driven by, obviously, by the synergies and also all the very strong business in China in the first quarter. And also here, driven by a higher capacity utilization in our agricultural plant. As you may know, we have a big factory in India producing agricultural parts. This is export business to a certain extent into the US. And as we mentioned, the US agriculture business is slightly picking up. That helps also the production in our Indian plant as well. So very happy with the APAC performance. Again, another super quarter for this region. When we now look then for the total group, some numbers already mentioned by Joachim reported growth by almost 12% to 417 million, record for the group. And even organically, and I think it's more important to look at, is plus 9%. And as was mentioned, all business lines and all regions contributed to that organic growth. A little bit more into details, aquaculture grew by 27% organically, transport business line by organically 6%, and this includes the depressed, still depressed transport business in the US, and also the hydraulic business line contributed at least by 1% on a global level. bit of a supply chain change last year for the hydraulics business and that capacity still needs to up from a demand customer demand hydraulics in europe for certain segments looks quite promising for the second half year as well overall at x impacts of minus 3.7 percent for the top nine From a profitability point of view, very proud to say again, like you already mentioned, we are back in our strategic profitability corridor, which is at least 10% EBIT margin. Now by 10.6%, which is 100 basis points above prior year. For sure, we have to mention the ones that are following us longer. We always have in a, let's say, normal year of where we have normal seasonality patterns. The first quarter is usually one of the strongest quarters because of working days. that's probably throughout April and May, not directly from January onward. So all those things helps normally the first quarter to be a little bit better than the other ones. Nevertheless, 10.6%, that's indeed a little bit earlier into that range that we anticipated. I'm quite happy to show those numbers. We see clearly the ramping up of the synergies. We see clearly scale effects from the high volume and the organic growth, and also the overall higher share of growth Yes, I think that's then for the overall group, 44 million again is the total EBIT number for the first quarter. If we then look into certain other KPIs starting here with the adjusted net income and adjusted EPS, we start with a reported net income 44 million, and that turns then into 28 million adjusted net income or an adjusted EPS of one Euro 81 per share. And that means for both for the adjusted net income growth of 17%, but even more important for an adjusted EPS growth of 12%. despite the higher number of shares circulating after our capital increase beginning of the year, I think a very successful growth also in terms of adjusted net income and adjusted EPS. One last comment regarding the other exceptionals here. There is one exception included of roughly 3 million euro. We disclosed that a little bit more in our quarterly report. We are looking, now that we are progressing with our integration of FIBA quite nicely, and that should be completed by mid of the year we are also now looking in deep in detail in each and every product line going forward from a more strategic long-term strategic point of view and we have seen the one or the other product line that we are questioning a little bit here at the moment whether we want to continue for various reasons right and there's one product line that we detect in 2026. So that's for the adjusted net income bridge. And if we then switch to our balance sheet and capital intense ratios KPI slide, we see a slight increase of our ROCI versus end of 2025, now close to 16%, which is compared to the first quarter last year, 240 basis points up And already approaching our strategic corridor only one year after the acquisition, I think, showing that we are using the capital of our shareholders quite efficiently and are well underway to deliver our strategic numbers. Equity ratio has raised up to 27.4%. one is the capital increase this net proceeds of a little bit more than 90 million directly going into the equity balance but also the 16 million reported net income plus a positive ethics effect of 11 million euro helped to increase the equity in an absolute value of around 120 million euro um so that means also here um from a let's say from cfo point of view we are back in a in a stronger um for our balance sheet figures, giving us financial flexibility for whatever comes going forward. Net debt leverage has decreased significantly, also driven by the operating performance, but the capital increase down to 1.75 times LTE and EBITDA. I mentioned that the LTM EBITDA is now 204 million. That's an absolute record for us. We have for the first time in our history surpassed the 200 million LTM EBITDA mark here. And net debt in absolute amount is almost 360 million. And next page. Free cash flow, if you so will, that's the one and only item where I'm probably not proud in the first quarter, but it's okay. We are showing a conversion rate of more or less zero at the moment and free cash flow of also almost zero at the moment. Why is this the case? to run with a very low November, December, seasonality low. And on top, when the Middle East conflict broke out end of February, we started immediately to look into our supply chain very fast. CapEx is still in line with our discipline corridor, 2.3% in sales, almost 10 million this first quarter, nothing special here at the moment. And also from a working capital point of view with 17.5%, this is fully in line with our strategic corridor and also fully in line with the goals that we have for 2025. And then next page, I think that's then handing over to Joachim.

Thank you, Oliver, for the details. So that was a strong first quarter. So what do we expect for the rest of the year? If you look at it from a market perspective, the expectations for the industry are for Europe, Middle East and Africa that we will have a slight recovery of the demands versus the prior year in trucks and in trailers. Also in tractors we see a slight recovery for this market and the same is true for hydraulics. But it's all on a very low level and of course it all depends on the geopolitical environment. If you look at Americas, we have the effect that the expectation for Class 8 has been going up because there is an emission regulation that kicks in at the end of the year, beginning of next year, and so we expect that there will be a pre-buy effect that will hit the trucks. Therefore, a more positive judgment for the truck development in Americas in general. Brazil is continued to be expected at the low level like last year. For traders, there could be a slight decrease because of the truck investments that the fleets will have to make or will want to make. they may postpone some of the trailer volumes and therefore there's a slight decrease expected on tractors and hydraulics still suffering in america a little bit from the trade situation from the terrorist situation that does not give the necessary stability but overall more or less on the level that we've seen in the previous years looking at asia and pacific truck demands The side growth trailer demand also somewhat stronger growth. We see India more or less on a stable, slightly recovering level, and China exports to the global south are also supporting. The Chinese domestic environment is not growing, is not expected to grow like this. So for traders, a little better, as I mentioned. And for tractors and hydraulics, we also see a slight improvement versus last year for APAC. So let's come to the outlook in numbers. We can confirm the guidance that we have given. So for sales, we expect a single digit growth on the basis of the 1.534 million that we had last year. Adjusted EBIT should grow a little stronger, and you've seen the first quarter very promising on that. But there's also some certain effects that will not translate throughout the year. But we still expect that to be higher than the sales growth, mid to high single digit growth. And the same for the adjusted EBIT margin that will obviously, by dividing the two numbers, increase versus last year. CapEx to be expected around the 2.8% of sales that we also had last year in 2025 and working capital range between the 17.5 to 18.5%. So let's sum it up. We had a strong start into 2026. So we achieved new records for sales and for adjusted EBITs in the first quarter. The Hiva integration is on track and the We have achieved strong organic growth in a very mixed market environment and that is because of our global positioning that we have developed over the years and also the diversification or rather the coverage, the broad coverage that we have across the relevant industries and the regions. Since we're back in our leverage range, we are now more actively working on M&A pipelines and create some attractive offers so that we are now in the range where from a finance point of view we are able to act. The robust order intake continues with the possibility to further recover from the market. We, however, remain a bit cautious because of the macro and geopolitical framework that is more or less changing on a daily or weekly basis. With that, we confirmed And that concludes our presentations and we're looking forward to your questions.