Salzgitter Ag Akt Shs

Ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the content call of the Q1 results 2026 of the Zeiss Gitter AG. At this time, all participants are being placed on a listen-only mode. The floor will be open for questions following the presentation. Let me now turn the floor over to Birgit Potrafki, CFO, and Markus Heidler, Head of Investor Relations. Thank you very much. And a good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome from me here in Salzburg. I'm happy to announce that with 280 million adjusted EBTA, we have made a promising start to 2026. And I can tell you that after two challenging years, that feels really good. As announced on April 21st, Our first quarter performance was boosted by an exceptionally strong contribution from our stake in Arubis. This was driven by the high prices commanded for precious metals. It's important to stress though that all our core business units also contributed to the earnings improvement versus a year earlier. This is obviously very pleasing. Our P28 performance program has been a key contributor to this business-wide turnaround. An additional 43 million euros in efficiency gains were realized already in the first quarter. Our next financial position has also improved considerably since the beginning of the year from minus 954 million euros to minus 679 million euros. mainly on the back of the prompt payment of additionally committed public funding of €253 million on the first quarter. Having said that, we are not getting carried away. The market environment in which we are operating offers some glimmers of hope, but remains challenging overall. We said at the start of the year that we were cautiously optimistic about our prospects for the year, and that remains the case. On the one hand, the new trade defense instrument proposed by the EU Commission in October will be formally adopted in the coming weeks. From July onwards, it will enable the EU to reset duty-free imports back to where they were a decade ago. This will reverse the research in imports and help restore the long-term viability of EU steel production. At the same time, the carbon border adjustment mechanism introduced at the turn of the year is already showing a welcome impact on piping. On the other hand, the high levels of economic uncertainty that have been depressing the European steel market have persisted. In fact, they have increased again due to the hostilities in the Gulf region and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Additionally, they have resulted in surging energy prices and trade rates. While we are well-hatched for 2026 for gas and electricity, those price pressures are pushing down growth projections worldwide. In that context, we have revised our guidance upwards for the year, but not by as much as some of you might have anticipated after such a strong third quarter. And when talking personally to some of you before we adjusted the guidance, I can tell you some of you really challenged me on that. While we expect profit to be higher than projected at the start of the year, our revenue guidance is unchanged. As disclosed on April 23rd, We are now guiding for sales of around €9.5 billion and EBITDA VX of between €625 and €725 million. So to conclude, we have made a promising start to the year and it is pleasing to see all our core business units contributing to our improved performance. EU measures will also bring some relief But ongoing geopolitical and macroeconomic uncertainties mean our growing optimism must be balanced with a healthy dose of caution. Thank you for your attention. I'm now looking forward to your questions. Thank you very much. Dear ladies and gentlemen, if you are dialed in at the conference call, please press star and the pound key to ask a question, or if you joined us via web interface, please click on the dial-in button and then raise your hand to ask a question. I repeat, the combination, if you are dialed in the call, is star, nine, pound key, or please click on the dial-in button on the web interface and raise your hand. The first questions are already incoming. One moment, first question, please.

Always do a question, please.

Can you hear me? Hi. The question is really my questions on the production business. We see that order in tech shows a plus 7% on your growth, so there seems to be a slight recovery. I would be interested in getting your comments on the drivers, what you see behind this recovery and whether you continue to see a change in the customer behavior in Europe. And on the profitability side, it seems like you've been helped by input prices, which shows a 54 euro per ton EBDA in Q1. So how sustainable is that number and is it potential upside going into the rest of the fiscal year?