Koninklijke Vopak Uns/Adr

Hello and welcome to the Royal Volpac Fully Year 2024 update. Throughout the call, all participants will be in a listen-only mode, and afterwards, there will be a Q&A session. This call is being recorded. I am pleased to present Tatiana Topsyu, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead with your meeting.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our full year 2024 results analyst call. My name is Fabiola Tocciu, Head of IR. Today, our CEO, Zsuzsanna Grishel, and CFO, Mihail Hilsin, will guide you through our latest results. We will refer to full year 2024 analyst presentation, which you can follow on screen and download from our website. After the presentation, we will have the opportunity for the Q&A. A replay of the webcast will be made available on our website as well. Before we start, I would like to refer to the disclaimer content of the forward-looking statements, which you are familiar with. I would like to remind you that we may make forward-looking statements during the presentation, which involve certain risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, this is applicable to the entire call, including the answers provided to the questions during the Q&A. And with that, I would like to hand over the call to Dick.

Thank you very much, Fatrona, and good morning to all of you joining us in the call today. Let's move to the key highlights for the year 2024, starting on the left side with improve. In 2024, the need for our services remained strong across the portfolio. I'm very happy that that resulted in a proportional occupancy of 93%. And we did that by also continuing to serve our customers well. We reported improved financial performance, growing our proportional EBITDA. Adjusting for divestments and negative currency effect, our proportional EBITDA increased by 9% year-on-year to 1.17 billion euro, the highest result on record. Also, our operating cash return improved year-on-year to 15.1%, driven by strong performance of the business and contributions from growth projects, as well as lower capital employed due to the divestments done in 2023. Let's take a look at growth. growing our footprint in gas and industrial terminals. We made significant investments in Canada, India, and the Netherlands this year. And in all these countries, construction is ongoing to support energy security, energy affordability, and allowing the switch to more sustainable energy. We're also expanding our industrial terminals in China and Saudi Arabia. More than €500 million have been committed in gas and industrial investments in 2024, reaching a total of more than €1.2 billion on a proportional basis since we announced our strategic direction in 2022. Looking ahead, we see solid opportunities to further grow with, for example, an open season for the storage of LNG, after 2027 at AIMS energy terminal in the Netherlands, and positive developments in South Africa related to a potential energy import terminal. Let's move to accelerate towards new energies and sustainable feedstocks. We are focused on repurposing existing capacity for low-carbon fuels and feedstocks, as we did in Singapore, the US, Brazil, and the Netherlands during 2024. We're excited about the first steps of a second battery energy storage project here in the Netherlands. Our commitment remains unchanged to support our customers in the ongoing energy transition and invest when opportunity arise at the right returns. Move on to some of the dynamics of the key markets in which we operate and how they impact the demand for our infrastructure services. To start with the gas markets. We saw continued high utilization of our LNG infrastructure, and LPG demand is growing around the world, driven by petrochemical and residential demand in, for example, India. During 2024, our SPEC LNG terminal in Colombia had a strong performance, and that was driven by an increase of LNG imports as a result of energy imbalances in the country. The market for low-carbon fuels like SAF and renewable diesel remains in oversupply, anticipating increasing mandates. The demand for infrastructure of these fuels and feedstocks continues to be robust, supporting the longer-term prospects. New supply chains for new energy projects, such as ammonia as a hydrogen carrier and CO2, are developing at a somewhat slower pace than anticipated. As the direction of the energy transition remains unchanged, We continue to be well positioned to capture growth opportunities when they arise. Fundamentals in the energy markets remain healthy. Our oil hub terminals in Singapore Straits, Fujairah, and Rotterdam continued to have a strong demand. The need for local imports are driving a stable performance in oil distribution terminals. And lastly, chemical markets continue to be oversupplied, however, the impact on our chemical distribution terminals remains limited. Our industrial terminals connected to manufacturing clusters showed solid throughput levels driven by new capacity that was commissioned. Continuing on to the next slide and looking further into the financial performance of our portfolio across the different product markets. The divestment impact compared to 2023 was fully offset by growth contributions. gas and oil markets showed firm demand for our infrastructure, especially in the oil hubs. Even though chemical market performance is mixed with the strength in the U.S., contrasting the weakness in Asia and the Middle East, demand for our infrastructure remains healthy. The proportional EBITDA of our existing terminals increased by 96 million 96 million euros, excluding the impact of currency translation and divestment impact. The increase was mainly related to growth projects contribution of 75 million euros. And strong performance of our existing terminal, which was partly offset by increased expenses. Across the network, we were able to record an improved proportional EBITDA margin of 57%, slightly up from last year. Next up, financial performance. we have continuous focus on our sustainability performance. And to start with safety, our personal safety performance remains strong. And we keep an improving trend on our process safety event rate. With regards to emissions, we made further steps to reduce our scope one and two emissions compared to our baseline in 2021. This was mainly driven by investments in electrification and switching to green electricity for our operations. We made progress in increasing diversity in management, where women now represent 22% of our senior management. The next slide shows, this map shows the main developments ongoing around the globe. We're proud to see our industrial terminal in Weizhou in China now fully operational, and the expansion of industrial capacity in Xinzhou in China, and at Chemtank in Saudi Arabia. Major LPG and LNG new construction projects are ongoing in Western Canada and in the Netherlands. Repurposing existing capacity in multiple locations is a proof of our ability to adjust to evolving markets. We positioned ourselves well by acquiring additional land in the Port of Alamoa in Brazil, where we can develop projects like we are doing in Volpac Energy Park in Antwerp, Belgium. Access to land in strategic locations coupled with our capabilities to develop new capacity drives growth in the future. Let's look forward. And looking forward, we see that we are well positioned to further grow the business while creating shareholder value and returns. Market fundamentals continue to be strong, and the demand for infrastructure continues to increase. we see ample opportunity to continue our path to grow in industrial gas and new energy space. A strong balance sheet, driven by good business performance, supports the funding of these opportunities. In India, we are exploring options to fund growth via a potential local listing. As said, we remain committed to generate shareholder returns. This is further evidenced by the proposed dividend increase to €1.60 per share and the initiation of a new share buyback program of up to 100 million euro in 2025, following the program we executed last year of 300 million euro. To summarize, we delivered strong results with a record proportional EBITDA and high occupancy rate. We executed on a strategy to grow business, especially in gas and industrial terminals, and a well-diversified portfolio of terminals delivers healthy cash generation, supporting our growth ambition, and returning value to shareholders. And lastly, we are committed to invest in opportunities that the energy transition provides. With that, I want to hand it over to our CFO, Michiel Vilsing, who will give you more insights on the financial aspects of 2024 and for the last quarter. Michiel.

Thank you, Dick, and also from my side, a good morning to everyone in the call. Let me take you through our recent financial results in a bit more detail. I will start by giving some more insight into our financial performance in Q4 of 2024. I will then cover our strong performance in full year 2024, which is well in line with our latest guidance, as well as our strong cash flow generation capabilities and how we use this to fund attractive growth opportunities and return value to our shareholders. Let's start with the financial performance for the last quarter of the year compared to the third quarter of 2024. We saw solid demand for our storage infrastructure, which is reflected in the proportional occupancy rate of 93%, a 1% point increase compared to last quarter. This increase in rented capacity in combination with higher throughputs positively influenced our revenues, which grew by 3.7% quarter-on-quarter. Looking at the operational expenses, we saw an increase in cost in Q4. However, this increase was mainly driven by one-off costs, which were €20 million in the last quarter. These one-off costs were mainly a result of currency revaluation of some receivables, in addition to costs related to the Ames Energy Terminal in the Netherlands, certain provisions and other items. This also had a negative impact on proportional EBITDA, which decreased by 5.8% quarter-on-quarter. When we adjust for one-offs, the proportional EBITDA slightly increased in the quarter. Moving from the Q4 numbers to a full-year comparison. Proportional EBITDA excluding divestment impact grew by 8%. reflecting a strong business environment and a positive contribution from growth projects. Strong demand for storage infrastructure resulted in a proportional occupancy rate of 93%, a 2% point gain compared to last year. Delivering on our focus on cash flow generation, operating cash return improved further to 15.1%, a 1.1% point increase compared to 2023. These financial results highlight the strength of our well-diversified portfolio in terms of products we store, geographies we are active in, and the role our infrastructure plays. If we take a closer look at the business unit's performance, an ongoing pattern of improvement can be seen across the regions. The negative divestment impact of €75 million was fully offset by contributions from our growth projects, mainly the added AIMS energy terminal in the Netherlands. Strong performance in the Asia and Middle East business unit, the Netherlands and Singapore was driven by good performance of our energy hubs. In addition, in the U.S. and Canada, chemical and industrial terminals showed strong performance. Overall, there is a strong and stable demand for our services, mainly driven by growing energy needs and ongoing adjustments in global trade patterns. Despite market fundamentals on a global level remaining strong, some of our terminals face some challenges based on the local market and regulatory environment. For example, in Colombia, our LNG terminal spec is benefiting from increased imports to support energy imbalances. We expect that in the short to medium term, our terminal will compensate for the gas deficit in this country. These developments have led to an impairment reversal of €30 million. On the other hand, our Vera Cruz terminal sees lower imports of petroleum products into Mexico as a result of a negative market outlook that is driven by the regulatory environment in this country. This led to an impairment charge of 58 million euros. In the Netherlands, we are capturing market opportunities for waste-based feedstocks by repurposing capacity in Vlaardingen. While this is an attractive investment for us, supporting our strong cash flow focus, There is some temporary impact on performance of the terminal due to the capacity being repurposed. And as mentioned before, Ames Energy Terminal is facing some technical challenges while the terminal remains operational. We expect the impact of that to continue in 2025, however, not as material as in Q4 2024. And lastly, our Volpark Ventures Fund with 19 investments will undergo a strategic review going forward, and we will provide a further update on it during our Capital Markets Day in March. Back to our global network. This slide shows more detail on the proportional EBITDA of the different terminal types we operate. Gas terminals showed firm throughput levels, and the growth year-to-date is mainly driven by our added Ames Energy terminal in the Netherlands. Industrial terminals, backed by long-term, often 20-plus year contracts, had solid throughput levels, and we had some contribution from the newly commissioned capacity in China. Chemical distribution terminals showed stable performance. The individual terminals showed a mixed picture, with a strong performance in the U.S. and Canada, offsetting weaker chemical markets in Asia. Oil terminals, both hubs as well as distribution terminals, showed solid performance, driven by growing energy demand and geopolitical uncertainties. All in all, this has led to an increased proportional EBITDA and a solid operating cash return of 15.1% in 2025. Let me move on to the cash flow generation. Our cash flow generation continued to be strong, resulting in €948 million of gross cash flows. generated by the group companies and increased dividend upstreaming from our joint ventures. Compared to last year, gross cash flows increased by 5%. After tax payments, derivatives impact and other cash flow from investing and financing activities, we had €729 million cash flow from our operations. This is the available cash flow that we can allocate towards operating CapEx, which is our license to operate, growth CapEx and shareholder distributions, all in line with our capital allocation policy. The operating CapEx and growth CapEx amounted to €537 million in 2024. Shareholder distributions consisting of dividend paid in 2024 and the share buyback program of 2024 amounted to €527 million and were therefore well supported by cash flow generation. It remains our priority to generate strong cash flows in order to fund operational CAPEX, pursue growth opportunities, and deliver value to our shareholders. The strong focus on cash flow is well reflected on the per share metrics, as can be seen on this slide. Despite an ongoing transition of the portfolio, which involves divestments, we were able to increase earnings per share, excluding exceptional items by more than 40% since 2021. Also, proportional free operating cash flow per share significantly improved to €6.69 per share, a significant improvement over the last years. This increase in free operating cash flow per share has enabled us to increase shareholder distributions in the form of rising dividend payments and the new share buyback program up to €100 million for 2025, as we announced today. The previous buyback program, which we completed in 2024, supported value per share metrics, and the new program will continue to do so going forward. Moving on to the leverage. Total net debt to EBITDA went up to 2.35 times compared to the end of 2023, when it was at 1.99 times. Still below our ambition of 2.5 to 3 times total net debt to EBITDA. The proportional leverage, which reflects the economic share of the joint venture debt, slightly increased to 2.67 times compared to the end of 2023 when it was at 2.4 times. Funding joint venture growth prospects is a focus area for us, and we continuously explore different funding options for our joint ventures, like we do with our AVTL joint venture in India, considering an IPO. As indicated, returning value to shareholders is an important part of VOPAC's capital allocation framework. We have a proven track record of delivering consistent and growing dividends while maintaining a healthy payout of around 50%. For 2024, we propose a dividend of €1.60 per share compared to €1.50 per share over 2023. That brings me to the full year outlook of 2025. Our financial outlook is cautiously optimistic for 2025, with a proportional EBITDA range of $1,150 million to $1,200 million, subject to market uncertainty and currency exchange movements. Additionally, we account for some capacity being repurposed and the technical challenges at our AIMS energy terminal in the Netherlands. We expect proportional operating capex of around $300 million for 2025. And then last but not least, before I want to close off, I want to highlight our upcoming Capital Markets Day on the 13th of March. We will provide an update on the company's strategy, financial targets and overall business development. Please reach out to the Investor Relations Team for further details and registration when you would like to attend. The webcast will be made available as well and happy to meet you there. Bringing it all together in this slide, we delivered on our financial performance, and despite divestments, proportional EBITDA grew year on year. Operating cash return increased to 15.1% at the end of 2024, which is well above our long-term target of 12%. To support our growth ambitions, in India, we reached an agreement for primary equity issue and are in process of a potential local IPO. With our well-diversified portfolio in terms of the products we store and the different geographies we operate in, we are able to create connections. We are committed to capture new opportunities to grow in industrial and gas terminals and accelerate towards new energies and sustainable feedstocks. These factors combined with a strong capital allocation framework create value to our shareholders. And this concludes my remarks in the presentation. And I would like to hand it back to Dick for the Q&A.

Thank you, Michel. And with that, I would like to ask the operator to please open the line for questions and answers.

Thank you. If you would like to ask a question or make a contribution on today's call, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind and want to withdraw your question, please press star 2. Please ensure your lines are unmuted locally. as you'll be prompted when to ask your question. The first question comes from a line of Jeremy Kincaid from Van Lamshof Kenpen. Please go ahead. Jeremy Kincaid, please go ahead. Hi. Jeremy has just dropped. The next question comes from from ABN AMRO. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning, gentlemen. The market is not reacting too well on your report. One of the reasons, obviously, let's say the 20 million one-offs not being on the front page labeled as one-offs. The other thing is probably the 2025 guidance, which probably is perceived as lower than what the market has expected. Can you maybe further quantify your, let's say, the buildup of your 2025 guidance? 70% of your contracts are inflation linked, inflation roughly 4%. dollar stronger, your occupancy rate higher than before. So why, explain why the guidance for 2025 is so cautious. Has it maybe to do with starter goals for new projects, whatever.

Well, in general, I think, yeah, indeed, what will continue a bit in 2025 is the Mexico impact. So that is one of the elements. So Mexico was performing still quite well in 23, over 24 as well, but now we have some empty capacity there that has an impact. We have some repurposing impact as well because we repurposed some capacity in Vlaardingen and also in Rotterdam and Europort. So that is basically one of the main factors. We will still have some slight impact of the Ames Energy Terminal. Obviously, there is still some currency volatility. And we will offset that by some growth projects, which will be delivered over the year, but that's not a significant amount, I would say. And then the other factor is, if you look at our growth portfolio, we also need to spend quite a bit of money on business development. So we have quite a sizable growth portfolio and opportunities. We will update the market more on that in capital markets day, but obviously that also involves quite some investments which cannot be capitalized so far and have to run through the P&L. So those are the factors. Overall, we expect effectively in the oil market that the oil market will still remain strong, and that's what we also see in the first month of the year, so there's no significant change in that market other than the Mexico impact I just mentioned. On the gas markets, well, definitely there is demand for our infrastructure to be seen what's going to happen in Europe with refilling the capacity, but with the take or pay type of contracts, most likely the impact is not going to be material for us in a positive manner. Industrial terminal is still a solid part of our portfolio. And then the chemical side, I would say U.S. should still be strong for the year. Singapore and Europe are still a bit weak compared to where they were historically. But it also seems that that market might bottom out a bit, especially in Europe. So too early to tell. It's still a a market with some weak elements, but that's where the market is today. So that's altogether has given us a, well, I think a realistic outlook from 1150 to 1200. Obviously, if you look at the financials in the longer term, if we have quite some major construction projects ongoing at the gate expansion here in Rotterdam, and then we have also the West of Canada, and we have some sizable projects also in India. But most of these projects are going to deliver either by the end of 26 or beginning of 2027. So it takes quite a bit of time before such investments are going to contribute to the financial results of the company.

Yeah. Clear. Then I had a question on your leverage. Your leverage is still below target. That's why you maybe can afford the 100 million additional buyback. But in your other slides, you're indicating proportional leverage is 267 times. And you're saying providing ample headroom to fund attractive growth. What is your leverage target range on a proportional basis? Do you have that?

Yeah, well, this is something we will also discuss on the Capital Markets Day. So our preference is, well, we have indeed two leverage numbers, but from a portfolio point of view, to move towards proportional leverage makes a bit more sense in terms of value creation. We still need to manage our consolidated leverage also from a banking point of view. But we feel that we still have opportunities even within the proportional leverage. So we will most likely get more guidance on the capital markets related to this topic.

Okay. Thanks for now.

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Jeremy Kincaid from Van Lashot Campaign is back in the queue. Please go ahead with your question.

Hello. Good morning, everyone. Can you hear me this time?

Yes. Yes, we can.

Excellent. Apologies if I ask a repeat question. Feel free to let me know and I can ask a different one if I do so. But firstly, I was just wondering if you could provide a comment on tariffs in the U.S. and if you're expecting any impacts to your business from tariffs.

Good morning, Jeremy. I think if you look at what is happening currently in the US, it's still early to comment on if and what the impact could be. I think if you look at it, let's put it a bit in perspective of our global portfolio of 76 terminals, eight are currently positioned and located in the US. From that U.S. location, there's multiple products that are being exported to other parts of our portfolio, like, for instance, LNG, and like much more other products, like the products that are leaving from the Park Terminal at the Houston Ship Channel. So it's early days to assess if what the potential impact could be. I think the way we would look at it, It's much more from a long-term perspective, and the investments that we've done are long-term investments. The flows that are moving to and from our network are long-term flows, generally speaking, and if we talk to our customers and we stay close to them, to serving them in all the different parts of the world, We don't get any alarming news from their side on how they want to deal with some of the potential terrorists that will impact them. So I think it's way too early to mention, and if so, there's probably going to be a few positives and maybe a few negatives that generally speaking will balance out in the global network.

Sure. And then on the Mexican terminal, you've obviously taken an impairment alongside a customer leaving that terminal. Does that imply that it's unlikely to see that terminal being refilled with another customer anytime soon? And if that's the case, can you give us an idea of what you're thinking to do with that asset?

So the situation in the Mexico terminals is one of the terminals that we own in Mexico. It's the one in Veracruz. I'll take you back actually to the situation before we went into fuel distribution. It's a terminal that is being owned, generally speaking, for imports of chemical products, of bioproducts and feedstocks and vegetable. oil products. On top of that, we've invested, because of the opening in the past of the fuel distribution markets for foreign importers, we've partly converted and partly added capacity to support the fuel distribution market in Mexico. What has happened over the past period, and what we've updated you on in the last 12 months is that the government is putting quite a bit of pressure and is making it hardly attractive for foreign importers into Mexico to sell imported fuel products into the country. So it makes their case pretty complicated to actually be successful in Mexico. Those are the type of customers that rent the capacity at the Veracruz terminal. The reason that we are now impairing the facility is because of that part of the business, so the fuel distribution part of our business, showing limited prospects of turning back relatively soon. Never say never, but at least that's not what we are betting on at the moment. So what we are doing is repurposing the capacity back into what it was used for before, which is the chemical products, which is vegetable oil products, And that's the market that we expect to serve as we did prior to the fuel distribution. And the correction in the impairment was made accordingly. And as Michiel already indicated, that will also have some impact on the results as is outlined in the outlook for 2025.

John? And then final question from me on the VOPEC Ventures portfolio. You're obviously conducting a strategic review there. Could you give us an indication of how much that portfolio contributes to the group's EBITDA?

Yeah, I can. Well, it doesn't contribute anything to the EBITDA. At the moment, if you look at the portfolio, we have approximately 50 million invested in Volpac Ventures. The strategic review is really triggered by what we think could be the return of this portfolio versus where our ambitions were. Our ambitions were definitely higher than what we foresee at the moment. That's why we also impaired quite a significant part of this portfolio, especially related to our investment in Hydrogenius, which had a positive creation of the valuation many years ago, but this impairment doesn't hit the P&L, so it goes via the equity. So the results contributed by ventures is low. It's always based on how attractive can we make an exit on a VOPAC venture investment. at the moment under strategic review and we will give more guidance to the market at the right moment in time, but that's going to happen definitely in the first half of 2025.

Thank you. There's no questions.

Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Corinne Mulder from ING. Please go ahead. We're in from ING. Please go ahead with your question. The next question comes from a line of from ABN AMRO. Please go ahead.

Yeah. The rest of the market is silent, it seems. So follow-up question. In slide 15, you're showing an EBITDA bridge where you mentioned other including ventures minus 9 million. Is the minus 9 million largely the ventures? Second question is on your new terminal. LNG terminal in South Africa. What kind of investment requirements should we expect for this terminal from a VOPEC perspective?

Yeah, first of all, on the slide 15, it's mainly corporate entities, so hardly anything is related to venture type of entities of the 9 million. So for example, a corporate entity is a captive we have in Singapore, but there's other corporate entities we have as well, but the venture impact is relatively limited. In South Africa, we effectively own 52% of that venture we have together with Transnet and our partner Realtile. The latest outlook for the investment in South Africa is, well, it's still under consideration, but an indicative number for phase one is around 400 million. And ultimately, if you include phase two, it will be around 700 million. But these are ballpark figures at the moment because we haven't done a serious feed process yet. So these are, I would say, well, indicative numbers.

Okay, clear. Can you maybe give an update on what kind of impact you see from Dutch politics, nitrogen legislation, whatever, on your plans for a CO2 terminal in Rotterdam? Maybe, you know, what is it, the CO2 energy storage? potential project in Rotterdam, et cetera?

Well, maybe to take that one, we're still committed on the project, so that's the CO2 Next project. That's for the import or the reception of liquid CO2. Location is available. Overall, still a strong desire from the different partners and end users of the facility to continue with the project. It's harder, given I think maybe more uncertainty, but the timeline, the exact timeline is always a bit hard to predict. But if I talk to the potential users, the way they would phrase it is, Generally speaking, a CCS project that is the one that we are participating in, like this one in Rotterdam, is a relatively competitive CCS project. Simply because the industry is next door, there is an offshore solution that is available, so the volumes would definitely justify an investment, and therefore we are optimistic that this project will continue to develop positively and not too pessimistic, I would say, on, let's say, current temperature in the political landscape. I don't think that will have a bigger impact on the viability of this project medium to long term.

And the energy dome?

The energy dome? I want to know about the energy dome.

Yeah.

That's one of the ventures that we've invested in.

Yeah, correct. And they're expanding, I think, into the US, but I thought there also initially was a plan to have an energy dome also based in Rotterdam. Is that delayed or postponed?

No, I don't. Maybe there have been discussions about it, but it seems highly unlikely given the simple size of a land surface that you need for it. So in the U.S., some of their projects are potentially attractive because you need a massive amount of land available to put the actual dome there. So in some of the deserts in Utah and some of these places there, it has become a potential option. But in Rotterdam, I don't think that that is a very realistic, well, I think it's a very unrealistic option that that will happen. We follow everything in Energy Dome through our ventures investment. So we're not developing any projects together with them. And if finally the market decides that they are a potential provider of a solution, then it's good for our ventures state. But it's not that we are co-developing projects with them.

Okay. Clear.

Yeah. Thanks.

You're welcome.

As a final reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your keypad, and please ensure your lines are unmuted locally when prompted to ask your question. So the next question comes from Ryan of Querying Molder from ING. Please go ahead. We're in Moldova. You're live to ask your question.

Can you hear me now?

Yeah, we can hear you.

Okay, perfect, perfect. Now the decisions were not ideal today. Okay, fine. A couple of questions. First of all, about Mexico. So how long will you think it will take to, let me say, to have the repurpose there ready? Is that 2036 already?

That will take, I think, it will be 27, Kiai.

Okay, 27. That's my first question. And then about, let me say, the market in general. So you have given an outlook, guidance. Can you give me some flavor on the chemicals and oil markets, how you see them developing in 2025? Is that different from 2024, for example?

I think there's still... If you first take a look at the oil markets, hub locations, Singapore, Fujairah, Rotterdam, and greater Singapore region, I still think or I still think I know healthy demand, healthy occupancy rates. If the total portfolio is 93, in those particular locations, it's above 95%. So still, I don't see any weakening of those markets for 2025. I think if you look at fuel distribution and exclude Mexico for a second, also there positive and healthy demand, so no big change expected. And I'm talking about South Africa, about Australia, about Indonesia, some parts of Brazil operation, Los Angeles. I think all healthy developments. So by and large, I think oil continues to be strong for the year. I think chemicals, yeah, maybe not so much about what is happening on the macro picture on chemicals, because we've been repeating the main headlines there for a number of quarters now. But what you see is basically the balance. The U.S. is doing actually quite well. and is up and was doing better in 24 than it was in 23. So you see that especially Deer Park is super high occupancy and opportunity also to still have a solid rate development. We see some weaknesses on the other hand in Asia. China low and low occupancy but not expected to go much deeper I would say. And then some of the locations in Asia itself some of the tanks in Singapore are in the pressure So we see that occupancy has dropped during the year 24 Yeah, that will remain to be seen how that develops in 25, but I don't expect that that will go down much much further And then I think the balancing element is Europe But we're very happy that we're not exposed to the European petrochemical market, especially in Rotterdam so I think Belgium is doing quite okay and and pretty healthy. I also don't expect the big changes there in 25 compared to 24. So by and large, I think chemicals with the pluses and the minuses across the portfolio, it's stable, and I think the, as I said, on the oil side, pretty healthy. So overall, and that is, I think, what Michiel also indicated in the first question that came from Thijs on the outlook, It's really, it's solid demand in our portfolio, 93% of occupancy across the portfolio is solid demand, but there's a couple of pockets that are now determining, I think, the outcome of the result in 2025. That's Mexico, that's Ames, that's maybe a couple of FH developments and movements, maybe some cost developments on the BD side. Those are kind of like indications that may move the total result up with 10 or minus 10. But fundamentally, demand for the services, it's still fairly healthy from where I sit.

No, fine. And then on your cost, because in my view, in 2024, you benefited from lower utility prices. So how is the outlook for 2025 then, if that is stabilizing and you still are confronted with higher wages, et cetera? Anything to add to that?

Yeah, energy prices are definitely higher. A lot can be passed on to our customers because we, in 2022, when the prices were really high, we put a lot of effort in making sure that we have the right pass-through principles with our customers. But definitely there is some upward pressure in a negative sense on energy and utilities, Quirijn, at the moment.

Okay, and then my final question is about the LNG project, so ambitions. Last year you mentioned Australia, as I remember. It looks like you're shifting somewhat to South Africa, so we have, let me say, different shifting parts, shifting projects, it looks like. Can you maybe elaborate on that?

I think the latest news was on South Africa because we moved into the agreement with the authorities of the long-term concession that we were awarded. So that was why South Africa maybe made it a bit more in the headlines. Australia, and that's the project in Melbourne for energy imports, is still on the list. We're working on that as well. We're on target and in the process of preparing ourselves for the permit application over there, and that is moving positively. So I think the two big bets on LNG, with still both of them a development process that is never an easy development process for specific reasons, but we're both very optimistic at least about the opportunities that we have in those locations. So both South Africa and Australia at the moment are high on our development list from an LNG perspective.

My final question is about AVQL. How is the planning looks like at this moment for the, let me say, the second quarter probably,

I guess you mean on the IPOC, we have filed the draft prospectus with the Indian authorities, SEBI. We're waiting for the final response, so we have answered many questions. But overall, it seems we're in good shape in terms of prospectus. Then we need to file the updated draft prospectus, and then we have another sort of, three weeks to go to an IPO. So, well, the planning is that it should happen somewhere in the first half of 2025, if everything goes smoothly.

Okay, thank you, Vito. Thank you, Dick.

Thanks. Thanks, Guillaume. The last question, which is a follow-up question from Tish Beckender from ABN AMRO. Please go ahead.

Yeah, thank you again. Next follow-up questions. You're showing a slide with your operational free cash flow per share development over the last couple of years, constantly on the rise. So showing your fresh free cash flow yield is quite high right now. Can you maybe give some guidance on what to expect from dividend from JVs and associates in 25 versus 24? Is there any reason to expect a certain drop in the dividend or not? A second question is on Reef, your Canadian LPG export project, reading Alta Gas. They give the impression that phase one is close to 100% contracted. Could that mean that phase two is nearby already? And further, also made clear that they aim to have the projects levered up while in your accounts, I think you're still fully booking the on your balance sheet.

Maybe let me start on the dividends from joint ventures. So 2024, we had quite some healthy upstreaming of dividends from our joint ventures. Our target is a minimum of 90% of the net profits we generate. There is no indication that for 2025, we will not achieve it. So in general, we still expect very healthy dividend upstreaming. of our joint ventures. So I think that's the answer to your question in my mind.

If you look at maybe a brief size, so far the development of the project construction is moving on. The difficult part of the in-water works during the white season is underway, and that's, I think, a very important element in terms of meeting the timelines. The first phase, as we announced already when we started it, is fully contracted out. There's always a bit of, in the final result, there's a bit of dependency on the actual volume that will be put through in the first phase. So the variability, I think, when we go live with the terminal will depend a bit on ancillary revenues for the terminal with a good base because it's just one customer that will occupy the facility. I'm happy, and that's what we hear also from AlteGas, they're positive, continue to be very positive on the role of the facility and the ability to actually increase that going further. If you look at geopolitically what's happening between Canada and the U.S., you can only imagine that it becomes an an even more attractive outlet for the country to have. So as you are, so are we also speculating and hoping that there is an opportunity for a second phase. I think the important thing over there to realize is the jetty that is currently being built will only utilize, will only be utilized for a minor percentage in phase one. And so there's ample opportunity to expand and to use the jetty for much more volume and the same hot stool for the land. So if you recall, the investment was done at the time, and it is fully based on the full investment that we do in the JETI and all the land preparation covered by phase one. But then phase two and anything that comes after that is actually benefiting from land availability and JETI availability. And maybe, Michel, anything on the leverage of that project because we take it on the balance sheet?

Yeah, we take it on the balance sheet.

So that's adding to our consolidated net debt to EBITDA. Obviously, if we look at the proportional leverage, if we would have had a leverage in the joint venture, it would have also added to the proportional leverage. But it's – yeah, that's – where we are. I think it's fully equity-funded, effectively, the project, but we take it on the balance sheet, so we effectively take in the debt here to fund the equity in the Canadian project.

Yeah. And related to proportional versus consolidated, you now shifted to only giving an outlook based on proportional EBITDA. Are you expecting or do you want to see the cell site moving to pure proportional forecasting? More or less?

Is that the plan? My preference would be to move everything to proportional. Obviously, we need for IFRS purposes, we need to report consolidated numbers, but the value creation really sits with proportional numbers. I think we made quite some steps over the last two years to move towards proportional, and also during capital market, we will continue that journey. with the ultimate aim to at least give all the guidance on a proportional basis. So that is important for us, and I think it's also important for the market to fully understand our company because we have so many joint ventures, and the number of joint ventures is not going to go down. It's actually increasing, so it's very relevant to move to proportional numbers. So it would be very helpful if the sell side also moves to proportional numbers, and most people do already sell.

Yeah. Okay. Clear. Thanks.

There are no further questions, so I hand back over to you, Host, for closing remarks.

Well, thank you very much. Thank you all for joining us this morning, for your questions. If there's any follow-up comments or items that you would like to raise, then you know where to find Farjona and the team on IR and hope to connect and meet you in person at the Capital Markets Day. and to anyone else also virtually. So thank you very much and have a great day. Bye-bye.

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