Pluxee N V

Good morning. Thank you for standing by and welcome to the PUCSI first half fiscal 2026 results presentation. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions by pressing star and one at any time. I advise you that this conference is being recorded today on Thursday, April 16th, 2026. At this time, I would like to hand the conference over to Ms. Pauline Biro, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, Madam.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today for our fiscal 2026 H1 results. So I'm Pauline. I'm head of investor relations for Pepsi, and I'm joined by Aurélien Saunet, our CEO, and Stéphane Lopiteau, our CFO. Let me get you through today's presentation agenda in the next slide. So Aurélien will start with the key highlights and figures for H1, followed by a focus on our commercial performance, and then Stéphane will take you through our financial results. Finally, Aurélien, we then conclude with our output, including an update on the regulatory situation in Brazil before we open the floor for the Q&A. And with that, I will hand over to Aurélien.

Thank you, Pauline, and good morning, everyone. I'm pleased to be back with you today to present our first half-fiscal 2026 result, starting with our key highlights. We are pleased to share that we delivered overall solid H1, which puts us well on track to meet our full year objectives. First, commercial momentum remains strong and resulted in sustained revenue growth, driven by our core employee benefits activity. Second, profitability delivered ahead of time. Recurring EBITDA margin extended strongly, supported by the operating leverage embedded in our business model, and the strong execution of our efficiency initiatives. Lastly, it translated into strong earnings growth and cap generation, reinforcing further our net financial cap position. Overall, H1 performance strengthens our confidence for the full year and allows us to enter H2 from a position of strength amid a more uncertain macro and geopolitical environments. Let's now focus on the key figures for the semester on slide five. Despite the increasingly challenging environment, we continue to deliver sustained top-line growth, with total revenues reaching 655 million euros, up 5.6% organically. This was supported by the continuous strength of our core business, with employee benefits operating revenue reaching €500 million, up plus 9.4% organically. And I'll come back on this in the coming time. At the same time, profitability delivered strongly, recurring EBITDA reached €242 million, up plus 12.9% organically, and recurring EBITDA margin expanded to 37%, up plus 229 basis points organically. And finally, recurring ticket flow reached 210 million euros, corresponding to an 86% cash conversion rate. In a word, we delivered a strong and well-balanced performance across calls, profitability, and cash generation. And this is exactly what the next slide highlights all the time. Beyond quality of execution, the performance delivered in S1 also reflects how our business model structurally converts top-line growth into margin expansion and cash generation. At its core, Plugsy benefits from a resilient growth engine anchored in employee benefits. Combined with the operating leverage embedded in our platform and the continued efficiency gains, this translates into higher profitability with the BTA growing at twice the pace of top angle. In turn, this profitability translates into strong cash generation, confirming the robust cash conversion capacity of our model. Let me now focus on our core growth engine, employee benefits, in the next slide. At the heart of our growth engine is employee benefits. This core business represents the vast majority of our revenues and continues to deliver high single-digit organic growth across regions in F1. In Latin America, employee benefits grew by plus 11.5% organically, driven by particularly strong commercial dynamics across products, and further supported by favorable face value trends, underpinned by local inflation rates. In continental Europe, growth reached plus 5.1% organically. In the current geopolitical and macroeconomic environment, this represents a solid performance and illustrates the resilience of our core offering across European markets. Finally, in the rest of the world, growth was particularly strong at plus 16.8% organically, in which regimes the favorable dynamics that we observe in terms of market penetration in those companies. Overall, employee benefits once again demonstrated this semester the relevance of our pure play positioning. I will now turn to other products and services in the next slide. Even if other products and services is facing temporary pressure in two specific activities, the long-term value creation story remains unchanged. Looking first at public benefits in continental Europe, current performance mainly reflects the effects related to the contract cycle and order fading, which are inherent to this business. At the same time, by leveraging our merchant network and payment capabilities, These large-scale programs structurally enhance group scalability. On top of that, a highly selective approach and close monitoring of contract performance ensures that public benefits remain sustainably accurate to growth and profitability overall beyond short-term trading impact. As base effects unwind, performance is expected to progressively regain momentum from H2. Switching to the UK and the US, where we are strategically refocusing our activity toward employee engagement, a structurally growing segment in both countries. We now operate fully digital, scalable platforms and are progressively exiting non-core, lower return activities. Together, these countries account for less than 5% of gross revenues. And while they are expected to continue weighing on gross revenue growth in H2 2026, they should return to a positive contribution from fiscal 2027. More broadly, we continue to actively manage the portfolio and allocate capital and resources selectively toward activities and markets offering the most attractive long-term returns. Let's now look at the key drivers of the group substantial margin expansion in the next slide. H1 marked another strong EBDA margin increase, with operating EBDA margin expansion accelerating at plus 268 basis points compared to plus 235 basis points last year. It comes first from the operating leverage embedded in our model. Our one-platform architecture allows us to absorb incremental volumes with limited additional costs, generating structural scale effects and synergies across the group. This sharp expansion also reflects the structural cost efficiency that we've been progressively delivering since the spin-off. It mainly comes from The streamlining of our product range and processes across countries. The accelerated automation, notably through the increasing use of AI as a key optimization enabler alongside technology and data. And a clear prioritization of projects and initiatives based on rigorous value creation monitoring. Plus discipline has become an increasingly important margin driver for Pluxy. complementing volume growth and reinforcing our ability to sustainably improve profitability. Let's switch now to the commercial traction delivered in H1 on slide 11. Our commercial trajectory remains solid in H1 and positions us well on track to deliver on our full-year business target. First, we achieved a record level of new clients with generating €0.9 billion of new annualized PDI across all client sizes and geographies. Second, net retention proved resilient despite a more challenging macro environment impacting end-user portfolios in some markets. Sales value remained a structural growth driver of business volumes. Since fiscal 24, we have generated 2.9 billion euros of cumulative incremental BVI from increases in sales value, bringing us very close to our three-year target of more than 3 billion euros. Let me now detail each of these levels, starting with new client development. new client development was particularly strong in S1. We generated a record 0.9 billion euros of annualized PPI from new client acquisition with positive momentum across all three regions. This reflects our strong commercial execution tailored to the specific dynamics of each local market. Just as importantly, performance remained well balanced across plant sizes, with STBs making a substantial contribution and accounting for more than 30% of new development over the semester. In addition, recent M&A contributed significantly, notably in Latin America, where the Santander partnership continued to perform at full speed. The acquisition of Beneficio Facile has also been a step change for employee mobility business in Brazil, driving more than 50% volume growth year on year. This momentum is to be reinforced by the ongoing integration of Kifur in Belgium and in France. With a strong, diversified and actionable pipeline, we are confident in our ability to deliver ahead of our full-year development targets. supported by disciplined execution in the second half. Now, beyond new client acquisition, let's now look at net retention, another key driver of our commercial performance. Over the semester, client loyalty remains consistently at high level, underlining the strengths of our value proposition to our clients. This provides a solid foundation to actively manage our revenue compliance through two key levels. First, increase in sales values, which remain a key contributor, driven by inflation trends in Latin America and the rest of the world, as well as the progressive implementation of recent legal cap increases across Europe. The dynamic is expected to accelerate and continue to support BDI growth in H2 and beyond. Second, the cross-selling, which gained momentum, reflecting our strategy to stand up as a multi-benefit partner for our clients. It is treated as an example by the accelerated deployment of our own employee mobility solutions, as highlighted on the previous slide. At the same time, end-user portfolios remain under pressure in some markets. A more challenging macroeconomic environment continues to weigh on labor market dynamics in some countries, leading to a temporary contraction in the covert employee base. As a result, net retention stood at 99% in H1, excluding the temporarily delayed large employee benefit program in Romania. He demonstrated solid resilience in the current environment, confirming the stickiness of our solutions and the effectiveness of our commercial and portfolio management strategy. And with that, I will now hand over to Stéphane to take you through our financial performance in more detail.