Rwe Ag Ord S/Adr

Welcome to the RWE Conference Call. Michael Müller, CFO of RWE AG, will inform you about the developments in the first quarter of fiscal 2023. This meeting is being recorded. I will now hand you over to Thomas Denny.

Thank you, Sergei, and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for joining the RWE Investor Analyst Conference Call today, in particular given that we had pre-released numbers already two weeks ago. Our CFO, Michael Müller, will guide you through our key highlights in financial performance of the first quarter and, of course, the outlook for the current year. Before we kick off, let me also thank all shareholders for your strong support at our AGM last week. Your vote at the AGM confirms the strategic path of our company. And with that, let me hand over to you, Michael.

Yeah, thanks, Thomas, and also good afternoon to all of you, also from my side. The first quarter started was obviously a tremendous start into the new year, with earnings significantly above Q1 last year. We recorded an adjusted EBITDA at the group level of 2.8 billion euros, driven by the operational performance across all segments, but in particular of our flexible generation portfolio and trading business. The development of our installed green capacity underlines the progress on our transition paths. We've added 4.9 gigawatt of capacity to our portfolio, mainly driven by the closing of the acquisition of Con Edison clean energy business with 3.1 gigawatt and the Magnum plant with 1.4 gigawatt. In the first quarter of 2023, we also made the final investment decision for Tor, a one gigawatt offshore project in the Danish North Sea. In total, we currently have 6.8 gigawatt of grain capacity FID'd or under construction. We were also successful in the British Capacity Auction and have secured 6.6 gigawatt of capacity agreements for the delivery years 26 and 27 at attractive terms of 63 pounds per megawatt. And we have issued a 1 billion euro grain bond at attractive rates. Bond divided into two tranches of 500 million euros met strong interest from investors. We saw a final order book volume of close to 4 billion euros. The high interest demonstrates our great access to debt capital markets to finance our green growth investment ambitions. Let's now move on to the details of the earnings in Q1. A very strong operational performance from our flexible generation portfolio and trading business led to an adjusted EBITDA for the core business of 2.3 billion euros, while 2022 figures were marked by a negative one-off. In offshore wind, adjusted EBITDA stood at 473 million euros. Earnings were up on the back of capacity additions of Tritonol with 506 megawatt and Kaskazi with 342 megawatt. Onshore wind and solar recorded an EBITDA of 247 million euros, which was down on previous year. This was mainly driven by lower realized electricity prices, regulatory interventions, and lower wind resources in Europe. However, the consolidation of clean energy businesses and further capacity additions had a positive effect. Adjusted EBITDA of the hydro-biomass gas business was 1,177 million euros. The strong result was driven by short-term asset optimization and hedges conducted at attractive price levels. Our supply and trading business had a good start into the year 2023. The Q1 result is up on the back of a strong performance, and a negative restated one-off effect in previous years due to sanctions on Russian coal deliveries. Overall, the group's adjusted EBITDA stood at 2.8 billion euros, including the coal and nuclear division. Year-on-year, coal and nuclear is up due to higher hedged margins from lignite-based power generation and higher margins on the extended nuclear operations of the Emsland nuclear plant. On the back of the strong operational performance, adjusted net income amounted to 1.7 billion euros. Depreciation increased in line with our growing green strategy and investments. The year-on-year adjusted financial result is stable due to offsetting interest rate effects. For the adjusted tax, we applied a general tax rate of 20% for the RWE group. Finally, Adjusted minority interest reflects lower earnings contributions of assets with minority partners. The adjusted operating cash flow was 2.4 billion euros at the end of Q1 and reflects the impact from operating activities on net debt. Changes in operating working capital were marked by seasonal effects from the purchase of CO2 certificates, compensated by positive effects from the reduction of accruals and of gas in storage. Net debt substantially increased on the back of strong investments into our green growth. In Q1, we closed the €6.3 billion acquisition of Con Edison clean energy businesses. On top, we invested further €1.7 billion net in our green growth program, including the Magnum and the JBM solar acquisitions. Other changes in net financial debt increased by 1.6 billion euros. This includes timing effects from hatching and trading activities. Our net position from variation margins for power generation hatching stood at 1.3 billion euros. This includes net variation margins from the sale of electricity as well as the purchase of the respective fuels and CO2. In line with our green growth strategy, we have added 4.9 GW of capacity to our portfolio in Q1. The acquisition of CEB added 3.1 GW, Magnum 1.4 GW. The growth further includes the German gas plant Biblis with 300 MW and several other wind and solar assets. As we speak, we have a total of 6.8 gigawatt under construction across different technologies. In offshore wind, the project Sophia with 1.4 gigawatt and Tor with 1 gigawatt are well underway. Onshore wind includes our US project Montgomery Range with 200 megawatts and the UK project Anok Hill with 70 megawatts, as well as further small projects. In total, We currently have 2.7 gigawatts of solar capacity FID'd or under construction, mainly driven by the 2.3 gigawatts of U.S. projects with Bright Arrow, 300 megawatts, Pellegrin, 300 megawatts, and Big Star Solar, 200 megawatts, being the biggest. European solar projects amount to 400 megawatts of capacity currently under construction. Battery includes 0.9 gigawatt of projects across the U.S. and Europe. Flexible generation and H2 capacities under construction contain the conversion of the AMA power plants to 100% biomass, as well as further gas and hydrogen projects. For 2023, we confirm our outlook. Adjusted data for the RWE group is expected to be between 5.8 and 6.4 billion euros. Adjusted EBIT is assumed to be between 3.6 and 4.2 billion euros. And the adjusted net income will range from 2.2 to 2.7 billion euros. And the dividend target is one euro per share for this year. And with that, I hand back to Thomas.