Scandinavian Tobacco Group

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Scandinavian Tobacco Group Q2 Results 2026 conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To answer your question, please press star 1 and 1 again. Alternatively, you may submit your question via the webcast. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Torben Sand. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning to everyone on the call and thank you for joining us today. My name is Seth Torben Sand and I am Director of Investor Relations and External Communications. and I am today joined by our CEO Niels Frederiksen and our CFO Marianne Rørslev Bock. Before we start, I ask that you pay special attention to our disclaimer on forward-looking statements which can be found on the next slide in this deck. Please turn to slide number three. Let's have a brief look at our agenda. Niels will start with the key developments of the first half year including an update to our strategy focus 2030 and Marianne will then take you through the half year financial results for the group and our three commercial divisions. I will then hand it back to Niels who will provide some additional insights to our expectations for the full year. Following the presentations we will host a Q&A session where we will be pleased to take any questions that you might have. Now, let's begin. Please turn to slide number five and I will leave the work for Niels.

Thank you, Torben, and welcome to the call. Today, we are reporting on the results for the first half of the year, and while we're still in the initial phase of our Focus 2030 strategy, we will talk about the progress made in this area. I'll start by spending a moment sharing my reflections on the progress we have made with the strategy, and then Marianne will talk to the financial highlights. Our main priorities embedded in Focus 2030 are unchanged. They are to stabilize earnings in our machine-rolled cigar and smoking tobacco business, to inject new energy and growth into our strong handmade cigar business, and to continue to accelerate our promising nicotine pouch business. The activities that we have activated to support the strategy is progressing well, and we are more or less following the plans we outlined at the Capital Markets Day last November. We are taking small steps in the right direction, and I am confident that we are creating the foundation needed for delivering on our long-term ambitions for the Group. Let me give you a few examples. For the first six months of 2026, our combined tobacco categories – handmade cigars, machine-rolled cigars, and smoking tobacco – show signs of stabilization. Organic net sales are flat compared with last year, while the gross margin before special items has improved. Stabilizing our machine-rolled cigars and smoking tobacco business is essential to deliver well on the two other priorities, growing our handmade cigars and growing our nicotine pouch business. We are executing our nicotine pouch strategy by expanding our product portfolio into the mint and menthol segment and by expanding to new markets. Our market share in Sweden continues to perform well. And in July, we agreed to divest two of our fine-cut brands and Moro to Japan Tobacco in a transaction which at completion will strengthen our strategic and financial flexibility. Based on the financial performance in the first six months and the early part of the third quarter, we remain on track to deliver on our full year 2026 expectations. Now please turn to slide number six where Marianne will talk about the financial highlights of the quarter.