Lagardere Sa

Thank you. Good evening, everyone. This conference call will be hosted by Jean-Christophe Thierry, chairman and CEO of Louis Hachette Group, Grégoire Castin, deputy CEO of Louis Hachette Group and deputy CEO in charge of finance for Lagardère. And joining us for this presentation, we have Pauline Auel, our group leader, Secretary General, Mr. Doug Rasmussen, Chairman and CEO of Lagardère Travel Retail, Frédéric Chevalier, CEO of Lagardère Travel Retail. All these participants will share their insights and key highlights. This presentation will be followed by a Q&A session. I now leave the floor to Jean-Christophe Thierry.

Thank you, Emmanuel. Good evening, everyone. I am delighted to present the results of Louis Hachette Group. Driven by the strength and complementarity of all our businesses, our international footprint, and the commitment of our teams, we delivered a revenue of 9.6 billion euros, and a record adjusted EBIT of 551 million euros. This strong momentum also allowed us to continue reducing our debt at a rapid pace. Grégoire will tell you more about the figures in a moment. Lagardère Publishing delivered strong performances in 2025 both in France and in English-speaking markets. A few highlights include, in the United States, Hachette Book Group became the number three publisher in the market. Along with a strong release schedule, our efforts to enhance the value of our catalog paid off with the successful re-release of Twilight, for example. In Europe, the new Asterix adventure was a tremendous success across several markets. In 2026, we will celebrate the 200th anniversary of Hachette, the world's third largest publisher. The bicentennial is an opportunity to reaffirm our mission. making reading and culture accessible to as many people as possible. To mark the occasion, we will host a free literary festival in Paris next month. Lagardère Travel Retail also had a very strong year in 2025, driven by profitable growth as air traffic normalized. A key milestone was the seamless takeover of one of the largest travel retail contracts in history as Schiphol Amsterdam Airport. Within Lagardère Live, 2025 saw the best audience performance in six years for Europe 1, now reaching 2.9 million daily listeners and record attendance at our Arkea Arena in Bordeaux. Finally, for Prisma Media, 2026 will be a year focused on strengthening our core activities in a rapidly evolving market. In summary, one year after the creation of our new company, we have demonstrated the solidity of our strategy as a diversified leader in publishing, travel retail and media. We are confident in our future and our development prospects. Thank you very much all. I will now hand over to Grégoire.

Thank you Jean-Christophe and good evening everyone. I'm also very pleased to share with you this strong Results delivered by Louis Hachette Group this year, the first full year as a listed company. Let me start with the key figures on the slide 4. And as you can see, Louis Hachette Group's revenues reached 9.6 billion euros compared to 9.2 billion euros last year. This confirms the continuation of a solid growth trend in a rather challenging economic environment with an increase of 4% on a reported basis and 3% on a like-for-like basis. Our operating performance was equally robust. Adjusted EBIT rose 8% to more than 550 million euros. This reflects the quality of our businesses and the disciplined execution of our operational strategy. Flash flow generation was also very strong. You know that this was our priority for this year, and we come back to this point later, but you can already see its positive impact on the balance sheet. In 2025, we significantly reduced our net debt by 236 million euros, and this brings the net debt just below 1.6 billion euros with a leverage ratio now under two times, a level that the group has not reached in a long time. Let us now take a closer look at the performance of our different businesses. Starting with the slide 7, with the Lagardère publishing activity, which delivered another year of very solid results. Despite the market environment that has generally been trending downward this year, Lagardère Publishing continues to deliver solid growth, supported by its diversified portfolio of activities and geographies. Revenue was up 3% like-for-like basis this year and crossed the €3 billion threshold. The division delivered solid growth across all markets, as you can see, more specifically in France, Revenue was up 2% in a market down by 1.5%. The illustrated segment benefited from continued demand for coloring books as well as from the strong performance of the new Asterix album, Asterix in Lusitania, which sold over 2 million copies as of today. In general literature, sales were driven by strong new releases, including Dan Bones' The Secret of Secrets at Lattès, the third part of Pierre Lemaitre's saga Un avenir à Dieu at Calman Levy, the Adélaïde de Clermont-Tonnerre's novel Winner of the Renaudo Prize, published by Grasset, and the President Sarkozy's Journal d'un prisonnier at Fayard. The education segment also benefited from the reform of the sixth grade curriculum, as well as the primary level titles. And regarding the US, we are seeing revenue up 3% in a market that was actually down by close to 0.5%. The business benefited from a very strong slate of new releases. Among the top sellers in 25, we had Kelly, Art, Quicksilver, Brimestone. Gone Before Goodbye by Riz Winterspoon and Harlan Coben, as well as the anniversary reissues of Twilight. In the UK, gross reached a solid 3% in a slightly declining market, supported by the strong performance of several fiction titles, including Onyx Term by Rebecca Yaros, The Hallmarked Man by Robert Calbraith, and Circle of the Days by Ken Follett, as well as the continued momentum from Frida McFadden's The Housemaid series. The business also benefited from the new distribution partnership with Bloomsbury, initiated in 2024. In Spain and Mexico, revenue was down 6%, mainly due to the curriculum reform in Spain that has started in 22 and that ends at the end of 24. Revenue in part works was up 6%, a remarkable performance given the trend of this market. This was driven in particular by the successful launches of Warhammer Combat Patrol and Disney novels. Finally, board games continue to support Our other revenue segment and our diversification with a strong 10% growth on a like-for-like basis, supported by the carryover sales of Skyjo, with 2 million units sold in 25, along with the successful launch of the new game Flip 7. Now let's have a look to the operating margin of the publishing branch. On slide 22. EBITDA reached 308 million euros compared to 289 million euros in 2024, maintaining predictions operating margin at a very high level. The high level of margin was driven by the top-line growth, of course, and by the favorable sales mix and improvements for the SG&E cost. EBITDA also included the contribution from equity-accounted companies, which came to 6 million in 2025 compared to 1 million in 2024. These favorable effects were partially offset by the restructuring costs of 14 million euros, mainly in the U.S. and in Mexico. Next slide on cash flow. Our strong operating performance translates into steady cash What we show here is the CFFO, the cash generated from the operation including capex before interest and taxes. CFFO came in at a very high level of 361 million euros compared to 330 million euros at the end of 24, a solid increase of 9% considering that 24 was already a record year for the cash generation at publishing level. This year, this amount included 44 million euros related to the proceeds from the sale of the real estate asset in Paris through Dassas and the sale of a domain name moon.com in the U.S. Let's now move on to travel retail on the slide 11. Twenty-five marks another record-breaking year for Lagardère travel retail, first revenue-rich year. 6.1 billion euros. On a like-for-like basis, revenue increased by 4.4%, driven by a significant number of openings and concession wins across Europe, Africa, and the Pacific region. In France, revenue grew 3%, supported by higher air traffic, new concession, and strong commercial initiatives in duty-free businesses. In the EMEA, excluding France, revenue was up 7% with solid growth in the UK, Spain, Poland, Italy, and Albania, driven by traffic growth and network expansion. Africa posted strong momentum as well, up 25% thanks to recent opening in Benin, Cameroon, or Rwanda. In the Americas, revenue was up 3%. In North America, activity was supported by network expansion and strong commercial performance in travel, essential, and dining. despite stable air traffic. South America delivered a strong growth of 28%, driven by the rebound in tourism and the opening of the new Lima airport in Peru. Last but not least, in Asia Pacific, revenue declined by 12%, mainly due to North America, which turnaround, by the way, is well on track. This turnaround impacted the group revenue by close to 2% of growth, so long story short, excluding North Asia, travel retail revenue grew by 6.5% on a like-for-like basis. Let's now turn to profitability on the next slide. We are also pleased to share this record EBITDA of 312 million euros in 2025 of 17% year-on-year. As a result, our opening margin reached 5.1% of revenues compared to 4.6% in 2024. Travel retail achieved this strong performance supported by the top-line growth in Americas and EMEA and also with the China restructuring benefits and, of course, a strict discipline regarding the costs. EBITDA in 2025 also includes 23 million in restructuring charges and 18 million in asset impairments, mainly in Asia and Iceland, related to closure operations in order to preserve the profitability going forward. Going to the cash flow generation on the next slide, the CFFO of our travel retail business stood at 224 million Again, a record level. In this amount, we had an unfavorable impact on working capital from the numerous new duty-free concession openings in Amsterdam, Auckland, and Cambodia this year, and from an increase in inventories in France linked to the opening of a new warehouse. It's also worth noting that capex were slightly lower in 2025, 35 million euros lower this year compared to last year. This is not because we intended to slow down our investments, quite the opposite actually. It's rather linked to the very high level reached in 2024 and derives from the project phasing of the new concessions. Let's now move on to Lagardère Live on slide 15. As you know, this branch brings together our radio channels, news magazines, health licenses, live venues, and artists' production business. In 2025, La Garda Live generated €219 million in revenue. Excluding the impact of Paris Match disposal in November 2024, revenues continue to grow, up 1% year-on-year. The news and radio segment delivered a slight increase, 0.3% compared to last year. The continued expansion of European audience helped offset software trends in music radio and regarding the advertising market. The press business also performed well, supported by the launch of Le Gide News and by strong contributions from Hell's international licensing and by the ongoing momentum of our diversification strategy. Our live entertainment activities had a particularly strong year, posting 6% growth, driven by successful concertos organized by Hell Productions, and a record year at the Arkea Arena in Bordeaux. Going to slide 16, Lagardère Live, as you can see, strongly halts its operating losses in 2025, delivering a 37 million year-on-year improvement, supported, of course, by significant cost-saving measures. The year 25 was still impacted by around 10 million in restructuring costs. These costs relate to reduction of staffing costs as well as efforts to streamline the real estate portfolio inherited from a time when Lagardère-Médias perimeter was significantly larger than it is today. So as you can see, we are fully committed to continuously reducing operating costs within this new division. And excluding these restructuring charges, EBITDA would therefore be closer to a loss of around 10 million. We are not here break-even, but as you can see, we are getting closer. The cash flow also improved sharply with cash burn reduced threshold. CFFO came in at minus 11 million euros compared to minus 43 million the previous year. And before wrapping up our review of the group performance, let me share a few comments on Prisma Media. For the full year 2025, Prisma Media delivered revenue of €266 million, down 9% on the reported basis. This reflects both the ongoing contraction of the print press market, the consumption patterns, and the shift in digital advertising markets. To respond and adapt to these challenging market conditions, we launched two restructuring plans, one in June and another one in December 25, covering around 300 employees, more than one-third of the total workforce. is to, of course, safeguard profitability. PRISMA is still profitable. I will come back to this later in 2025, besides the restructuring cost. These certain changes in governments were also put in place, and the new leadership team initiated several other strategic actions. First, we strengthened Our People Magazine portfolio with the acquisition of EC Paris and France Dimanche in December 2005, two magazines which are profitable today and less impacted by the market changes that I just mentioned. Second, we decided to refocus on our core businesses and flagship brands with the planned investment of our luxury magazines. And third, at the same time, Vivendi is expected to take 14% minority stake with a cash consideration. These last two transactions are currently under review by the staff representative bodies and are expected to be finalized by the end of this semester. Let's now move to the next slide with a focus on Prisma Media profitability. As you can see, Prisma's EBITDA stood at minus 43 million in 2025, a decrease mainly reflected in the decline in the top line and the impact of the restructuring cost of 49 million euros. Let me point out again that excluding this cost, this restructuring cost, EBITDA remained positive at 6 million for 2025. And of course, our aim is definitely to keep Prisma EBITDA in this positive territory. Now that we covered the group, the performance for each division, let me walk you through the financials at group level, starting with revenues on slide 11. The total group revenue reached, again, 9.6 million in 2025. As you can see, reported revenue growth was 4%. As I already mentioned, it represented almost 400 million additional revenue in absolute terms. This year, again, organic growth remains the main driver. contributing 310 million euros across all our businesses. The main scope effect came from the start of the duty-free operation at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in May 25, as well as the acquisition of Sterling Publishing at the end of 24, and 999 Games at the beginning of 25, offsetting the sale of Paris Match in November 24. Regarding Amsterdam Duty Free, the tender we won in December 24 led to the acquisition of a 70% stake in a new joint venture with Amsterdam Airport, retaining the remaining 30%. So to be clear, this new concession has been accounted for as an acquisition and therefore is not included in our like-for-like growth. On the negative side, foreign exchange had an adverse impact this year, quite a strong impact, with the US dollar being the main currency affecting our revenue, reflecting our strong presence in the US, both for travel retail and publishing. Despite this adverse impact, as you can see, the growth is still very strong. Let's move on to EBITDA on the next slide, slide 22. As shown on this slide, we had a solid and steady improvement in 2024 and 2025. EBITDA rose from 490 million in 2023 to 551 million in 2025, representing more than 60 million euro increase. We are particularly pleased to see that this high level of EBITDA continues to be almost evenly supported by our two core activities. with again 312 million contributed by travel retail and 308 million by publishing. Overall, this reflects a strong and balanced performance across the group's key businesses. Let's have a look now at the rest of the P&L. Below EBITDA, after deducting amortization of intangible assets related to M&A and the positive adjustment linked to the IFRS 16, profit before interest and tax reached 429 million euros, representing a seventh increase year-on-year. Below this line, the finance costs improved by 21 million euros in 2025, driven by a reduction of the gross debt and a lower average cost of debt. Interest expense on lease liability increased by 8%, reflecting new, renewed, and amended lease contracts, particularly in the United States, Oakland, Warsaw, or Prague. Income tax decreased to 73 million euros compared to 93 million in 24, mainly due to exceptional items recorded last year. And as a result, net profit rose to 112 million euros, an improvement of 50 million euros supported by lower finance costs and reduced tax burden. The level of minority interest is explained by the increase of Lagardère earnings, of which, as you know, Louis Hachette captures only 66%, also impacted by the decrease of the losses in Asia that are shared with minorities, and the fact that Prisma's losses significant this year due to restructuring are fully borne by Louis Hachette Group. Despite that, as you can see, net results group share significantly increased from 13 to 22 million euros. On the next slide, you can see the improvements again in terms of cash flow generation, our CFO increased from 357 million in 2023 to 558 million in 2025, a sharp uplift of 155 million euros in two years. This reflects again the solid operational momentum across the group. This section on cash flow naturally leads us to the balance sheet and more specifically to the evolution of our net debt on the slide 25. On this slide, you can see our usual net debt bridge over the last 12 months. And beyond the CFFO that I mentioned, our outflows include 100 million of tax paid and 96 million euros in financial interests. Altogether, our CFAET, that is the cash flow after tax and interest, amounted to 363 million euros. On the M&A front, the group remains active, but reasonable this year, in line with our strategy, with the acquisition, as I already mentioned, of 999 Games, Sterling Union Square Publishing, Le Routard, in France, by Lila Garder Publishing, The first installment payment for the acquisition of the 70% stake in the GenVenture operating the Schiphol travel retail concession that I already mentioned and also the acquisition of ICI Paris and France Dimanche for Prisma. In the opposite direction, we received also around 40 million euros from the repayment of a vendor loan granted to Sport5 following the disposal of Lagardère Sport in 2020. In May, we also paid a 6 cents dividend per share representing a total of 59 million euros. We also distributed 85 million to minority shareholders including 32 million to minority shareholders of Lagardère itself and 53 million euros to minorities at publishing and travel retail level. All in all, these movements bring net debt just below 1.6 billion euros at the end of this year. At this point, I would like to make a brief remark for those monitoring net debt at Lagardère level. Just like Louis Hachette Group, Lagardère's net debt also improved, ending this year at exactly 1.6 billion, which represents a 255 million reduction year on year. As a result, Lagarde's net debt ratio fell also below 2 times, 1.96 times, to be accurate, at the end of 2025, compared to 2.4 times a year earlier. We are currently on track and even a little bit in advance with our leveraging strategy, but of course we remain fully focused on continuing this effort. And to continue on this topic, let's move on to the next slide. As you know, in 2025, the Lagardère Group successfully issued A 500 million euro five-year bond, the transaction was more than three times oversubscribed by the market, demonstrating investors' confidence in the group's solid performance. Lagardère also raised 300 million euros through a private placement structure in euro with a mix of maturity up to five years and fixed and floating rates. After these two refinancing operations for 800 million euros, our net debt, as you can see, is now well diversified and well balanced between bank loans, private holders, and bonds. And the maturities are also well spread until 2030, as you can see on this slide, and the weight average maturity is 2.9 years. Let's now move to the conclusion and to sum up the key message for 26. So first, I would tend to say that we will continue to consolidate our leading position by staying fully focused on the solid execution of our strategy across all the businesses. This includes promising release schedule for Lagarde Air Publishing. Lagarde Air Travel Retail will also capitalize on major openings completed in 2025 and growing air traffic which will support growth momentum going forward. Our aim is still to deliver growth to increase margin with a strict cost discipline. And second, we also want to continue to deliver the group, but we will invest to fuel the future growth. And we will remain attentive to Bolton acquisition opportunities when they could make strategic trends. Third, regarding the dividend fiscal year 25, we will propose an ordinary dividend of $0.06 per share to be submitted To the AGM in May, the ex-dividend date will be May 7, with this payment starting on May 11. So 26 priorities reflect again a balanced approach, reinforcing our strategic position, continuing to reduce debt. and maintaining a disciplined and predictable shareholder return supported by strong operational momentum in both publishing and travel retail. Thanks a lot for your attention, and we are now available to answer the questions that you may have.

Thank you. This is the operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and 1. on their touch-tone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star N2.

We will pause for a moment as participants are joining the queue.

First question is from Eric Ravary, CIC Market Solution.

Yes, good evening. Thank you for taking my questions. First question, could we have a comment on the outlook for full year 26 for both book publishing and travel retail, especially at the margin levels? Do you consider especially for travel retail that there is still room for margin improvement following the research in China? And also, a brief comment on the operating trends for the two businesses since the beginning of the year. Second question on Prisma, do you expect further restructuring costs in 2026? And do you expect that Prisma could post positive EBIT excluding restructuring in 2026? following the staff reduction. And last question is on the debt structure. So you delivered your company in 2025. Is it a priority for you to continue to reduce leverage in 2026? And could you give us an indication of the kind of leverage that you could target at the end of 2026?

Thank you, Eric.

I think I will hand over the answers to first Jean-Christophe.

Okay, for Hachette. So as Grégoire explained, we had a very strong year in 2025 for Hachette. And for 26, we expect stable revenue despite Forex potential headwinds with a weak US dollar. Concerning France, we will not benefit from an asterisk release in an even year. And we will face a risk of erosion in coloring sales after outstanding sales in 2025. But on the other hand, we have a very promising publishing program, including new novels by Pierre Lemaitre and Guillaume Musso. For Guillaume Musso, including a new novel, Le Crème du Paradis, and the trade paperback release of his previous title. We will have to the second year of middle school reform with math, French, LV1, LV2. In the UK and in the US, activity should remain relatively high after a record year in 2025, driven by a strong publishing program, among which a new title by Callie Hart in the US and in the UK, or Lisa Minnelli's memoir in both countries. We will have a Herbstopper No. 6 by Alice Oseman in the UK, a release by John Grisham in the UK, a new novel by Abbie Jimenez in the US. In the US, the results should also benefit from the full impact of the synergies realized by Union Square acquired at the end of 2024. We, concerning the EBITDA, we hope to be able to deliver EBITDA roughly in line with 2025 and to maintain a high level of margin ratio.

Good evening.

Regarding Lagrada Travel Retail, We believe the year 2026, we hope the year 2026 will be material in the continuity of the last quarter of last year. What we see is a continuous slight increase on the traffic side and we hope and we believe it will remain like that for the next 10 months. We will continue to benefit of a positive effect in comparison to last year of the Amsterdam integration that Grégoire highlighted started in May 1st last year. This will help us, counterpart of that we continue the restructuring of China that should continue at the same speed along the year and most of the restructuring should be done by the end of 2026, by the end of this year. This is in the context of a very challenging macroeconomic environment and in particular ethics environment. the evolution of the dollar and the dollar peg the currencies is something we take we look at very very carefully but for the time being we're in the range of let's say mid single digit sales evolution and regarding margin EBIT we expect an absolute value should grow rather substantially and in terms of percentage we believe there's still a little bit of room for slight improvement in the rate, marginal one, a result of slowing reduction of the losses in China, as I related in the question, but also all the efficiency efforts we're going throughout the world, we're delivering throughout the world to improve the overall profitability.

Maybe I can take the question regarding the live branch and PRISMA for the Q4 and Q1 trend. Regarding the Q4 supported by the European strong audience performance, like other news Advertising revenues held up well in a challenging advertising environment, as you know, declining only by 6%. For Prisma, the decline in digital advertising revenue for this last quarter is broadly in line with the market trends, close to 10% in Q4. Regarding the beginning of this year, for January, quite soon to say, but January trends are correct at this stage for radio, still driven by the European audience. However, the trend for Prisma is unfortunately aligned with what we saw in Q4-25. Then you had a question regarding the restructuring at Prisma. I can also take this question. As I already mentioned, our target is to keep Prisma EBITDA in the positive territory. It's the case about the restructuring cost in 2025. This is clearly a challenge for 2025. but this is our target. The restructuring initiated at the end of 2025 will of course generate savings as early as 2026 on personal costs as well as in support and marketing functions. for a global amount estimated at this stage between 15 and 20 million euros, full year effect, but let's be cautious with that number because it has to be very accurate for 26 impacts since, again, it's still under the review of the staff representative and we are not completely sure about the timing. This Two restructuring plans are already very large, as I mentioned it, more than one-third of the workforce. At this stage, we don't contemplate other strong restructuring costs for 2026, but we could have other costs in a lower magnitude. But again, today we are focusing on the last restructuring launch in December. So this is for Prisma. And then you had a question about the debt and the potential target regarding the leverage. As you know, since 24, we have been executing a very disciplined leveraging strategy. You saw the results. Our leverage ratio improved very strongly from three times at the end of 2023 to less than two times at the end of 2025. And again, in 2026, the leveraging will remain a key strategic priority for the group. We'll continue to apply the same discipline financial approach with a strong focus on ABDA, working cap control, prioritize investment that supports future growth, And in the same time, we also want to continue our policy of investment of discipline, Bolton M&A, and a reasonable level of dividends. So long story short, too soon to give you a precise target for 2026. But again, we want to consider the cash generation as a key priority for the group for the next year.

Thank you very much.

Next question is from Jerome Boutin, OdoBHF.

Yes, good evening. A few questions on my side. The first one is on China restructuring for Lagardère Travel Retail. Where are you exactly from the starting point? Is it one-third, two-thirds, half of the effort? And when do you plan to be break-even for this business? If you plan to be break-even, that's my first question. My second one is on the Vivendi deal regarding Prisma. So if I have understood well, you are selling some title to Vivendi, does that mean a cash in for you? And then Vivendi is buying a stake in Prisma. So if you could detail a bit the cash impact and what's the valuation of Prisma that has been used. And last question on free cash flow. So the capex are down this year. Should we consider this level based on the revenues as the new normal? And also second question, so based on the 90 million of restructuring in 25, what has been included in the free cash flow for 25, especially for the Prisma? Thank you.

I'll take the Chinese one.

First, maybe one point to highlight or to remember to all of you. The situation in China is a very atypical situation because what we operate in China is mostly fashion, predominantly. 90% of the business is fashion in domestic airports. So it's a very somehow atypical market in which we operate. Despite all the efforts we did in the recent past, we do not see a clear turnaround of market trends. So we are in the process of restructuring. Depending on the way you measure it, I would say if you count in terms of number of stores closing, we are more than halfway. If you count in terms of reduction of the losses, it's higher than the number of stores shrinking or declining. As I said earlier, most of the restructuring should be achieved by the end of this year. We're still in the red this year, but next year we can consider we are in the range of zero, zero of everything, including bottom line.

Thank you, Frederick.

Coming back to the Vivendi deal regarding Prisma, again, this is under the review of all the bodies. So, in a nutshell, in December 25, Prisma finalized, as you know, the acquisition of the magazine ICI Paris and France Dimanche, and then we launched the two restructuring. The restructuring... This transaction will again enable Prisma to refocus on its core businesses in a more challenging economic environment. The impact are not very strong regarding the business of Prisma since the luxury branch represents close to 20 million in terms of revenue and is close to breakeven in 2025. Regarding the cash consideration and the cash impact, the consideration is regarding the sale of the luxury division around 10 million euros in cash. And regarding the other part of the transaction, since concurrently with the transaction regarding Branch Vivendi will acquire a minority stake of around 14% in Prisma Group's share capital. The transaction will contribute to around 30 million euros in cash for LHG coming from Vivendi. So this is for Prisma Divendi deal. You also had a question regarding the CAPEX for 26 and is the 25 level the new normal? Actually, hard to say. Again, the capex in 2025 was a little bit lower than expected, so I would tend to say that the target is between 2024 and 2025. I think it's better to consider the level of capex compared to the turnover and particularly regarding travel retail. I think that we should have a level between let's say 3.5 and 4% of the total revenue. I think this is roughly in the long term what we should target. And then you had a question about the cash impact, which was exactly the question, the impact for the restructuring regarding Prisma. And during the year 25, we had roughly 7 million euros already cashed out for the restricting plan launch for Prisma, mainly the one launch at the beginning of the year. So the main part of the restructuring costs in terms of cash will impact year 26 and maybe a little bit year 27, depending again on the timing linked to the review which is under process.

Thank you very much.

Next question is from Julien Barclays.

Yes, good evening. Thank you for taking my questions. The first one is, can you give us some colors on Q1 trends by division? That's number one. Number two, is there any assets in the live division that you consider non-core? I know, for instance, the last thing is profitable, but maybe you could get a good price and deliver some more. Or the venues, so anything in there that potentially could be non-core. And then last question is, can you give us some indication on cash flow, either cash flow conversion from EBITDA or, yeah, some indication, whatever you can say, on cash flow generation in 2026?

Merci.

We start again, I think, a little bit to summarize what's the trend for publishing with Jean-Christophe.

Thank you, Emmanuel. The Q1 of 26 should be roughly in line with 2025, despite the unfavorable comparison base effect with the first quarter of 2025, which had benefited from the huge success of ONIC Storm in the U.K., We will have a very solid publishing program for the first quarter of 2026. Additionally, we will publish Judge Stone in the US in March, which is a collaboration between James Patterson and the actress Viola Davis. And the activity for the first quarter in France will be driven by the success of Pierre Lemaitre, Les Belles Promesses, which is the fourth title in the series. He began in 2022. And we will have the return of Guillaume Musso, who will publish a new novel, Le Crime du Paradis, I mentioned earlier at the beginning of March. along with the simultaneous release of Quelqu'un D'Autre in trade paperback.

I guess this is my turn.

For La Gala Travail Retail, the month of January, was somehow in the continuity of the last quarter of last year, that we find a pretty good result, especially in the context of very adverse weather conditions in northern Europe. I have in mind Brussels and Amsterdam airport in particular that were badly impacted by the snow wave. And also in North America, it was an extreme weather event. that affected traffic and therefore our sales. I think that despite this very adverse effect, we maintain a good momentum in the continuity of last quarter, so mid-single-digit sales growth. We continue to be supported by the Amsterdam effect because I said earlier, until the end of April, this will be helping our growth. And this is despite a quite painful in January, painful FX effect. And that's why I said earlier for the full year, it's something we're going to monitor. But all in all, we're on track with what we were expecting mid single digit in Jan. Well, that being said, be careful. Extrapolating January is the lowest, smallest month of the year. we believe the first quarter should be equal or slightly better than the month of January.

And I think that I already answered regarding the Prisma and live trend for the beginning of this year. Coming back to the question that you had, Julien, regarding the assets that you named non-core assets for the LifeBranch, as you know, these assets are definitely not for sale. It's not our plan. We clearly love these assets. It's a very strong portfolio of brands. They are all profitable apart from the news activities, and as I mentioned, we are targeting to be close to zero for this news branch in DC. Clearly, the priority for us, I prefer, essentially, to focus on generation cash through operational improvement instead of planning any sale for good assets of the groups. Regarding the cash flow conversion for 2026, Of course we will try to increase again the cash flow generation for 26 for the next year. I think of course the main driver will be the profit and the EBITDA generated next year and the increase of the EBITDA. But just keep in mind that for 2025, as I mentioned it, we have a few exceptional items that positively impacted the CFFO. The first one is the sale, again, of our real estate asset, Ruda SaaS. and the sale of the moon.com domain name. Both represent together close to 40 million euros. And we also have, as I mentioned, the credit loan for reimbursement for Lagardère Sport from Sport5. for also 40 million euros. So all in all we had close to 80 million euros exceptional impact this year. It was not so easy to deliver these exceptional items to again sell particularly the Rue d'Assas at this level. But this is down, and I'm not sure that we will have so big exceptional items in 26. So the main driver, again, for the cash generation should be the operating result for 26.

Thank you.

Next question is from Christophe Chablanc, Bernstein.

Yes, good evening. I had three questions. The first one was on minority interest. I think in the release you mentioned that the improvement is coming from the lower level of losses in Asia. So it seems to be essentially due to lower losses in Asia. Is that the right way to look at it? If that is the case, 20 million, 19 million increase suggests a very, very strong improvement of the net contribution of travel retail Asia. Is that a fair assumption? The second question is just a confirmation. I had in mind that the share of operating profit generated in dollar was about 40%. Just wanted to have an update on that. on that order of magnitude. And finally, on live, I think, Grégoire, you just said that you were targeting for news to be at zero. Is that an assumption we can take for all of 26, for the whole of the division live, live plus news? Thank you.

Regarding the minority interest, I just mentioned that this has a positive impact regarding the minority interest at the group level since we share the loss with minorities and since the losses are lower this year, we have, let's say, lower negative impact for the minority shareholders in the results. As you know, it's always quite difficult to explain in details all the impact for the earning group per share, particularly if you are at the Louis Hachette level but if you have a detailed question about this do not hesitate to outside this call have a discussion with the AR they have all the the sheets and the and the figures that help you to go from the net results from Lagardère to the net results from LAG with the clear split between the group level and the minority level. Then you also I have a question regarding the results coming from the US and with the assumption of 40%. I think it's quite a good assumption for this year. Again, the US is clearly today our first market. So beside your question, the question is could we be also impacted by any FX change? Of course we could. We already mentioned it. But keep in mind also that we have a part of our debt which is in dollar. So if we could have negative impact regarding the FX for the revenue and the operating results, we could also have a positive impact balancing this for the net debt. And then you mentioned the target regarding live. As I mentioned, we are close to breakeven, not yet there. I think it's feasible to be breakeven in 2026. It of course depends a lot on the market and the advertising market, so I again prefer to be cautious, but I already mentioned this target one year ago and we really want to achieve this level. I hope this is feasible in 2026, but if it's not the case, this will be for 2027. We want to reduce the cost and the loss at this level. We are completely focused on this target.

Yes, it was at Lagardère level where you got that 19 million increase. you have 23% share of minorities. So if you do the math, that's a massive improvement of the net profit of Asia. So I do know that last year you had reorganization.

If you just have a look to the net result at Lagardère level, you have a very significant improvement regarding the net result group share at Lagardère level. Then we have just to walk you through the net results from Lagardère to Louis Hachette. And again, this is something that we can do outside this call, no problem, to give you all the details. Okay, thank you. But you're right, the net result at Lagardère level improved a lot in 2005.

Thank you.

There are no more questions registered at this time.

Thank you. Thank you all.

And we conclude this conference call. And we hope to hear from you for the Q1 2026 in April. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Thank you.