Beijer Ref AB (publ)

over here sitting with Ulf and also Ewell Davidson who will be taking over as default going forward. So we're all three here in the room in Malmö. So then we'll get started. First slide is Bayref at a glance. As you can see our rolling club continues to increase. I think more interesting here is that we We joined a new market here in South Korea as an acquisition during the quarter, so now in 45 countries around the world. And of course, we'll come back to also we made another add-on acquisition in the quarter in the U.S. as we have been discussing that earlier. Moving over to the next slide, a little bit highlights of the quarter. Sales of almost $8.5 billion at stake. Continue our strong growth, plus 42%. Of course, the majority in this quarter supported by our acquisition in the US, but also other acquisitions that we've done during the year. So continue to have a good growth path in total. Organic sales was minus 4% in the quarter. We'll come back a little bit what that relates to. I would say the majority is in HVAC and one day less. And then the acquisition, I would say, performed very well. And we continue to have a good tailwind on the currency. The EBITDA continues to be very strong, with margins of 11.3%. So it continues to be good development in our business, driving by a continued strong gross margin. So we grow EBITDA at 54%. And then also, as we have been fairly clear about, The cash flow is now turning in a good way, record cash flow for Bayref in a quarter in Q3 as we are reducing our inventories, flashing accounts receivable, but also we'll come back to quite a negative effect that we're not buying anything or very low from our suppliers and we expect cash flow to continue to be strong here in Q4. The result, an increase of 32% in EPS that continues to grow by 8%. So I would say good quarter, good margins, and a strong cash flow in Q3. Moving on to the next slide. If you look at our different product groups as we split up our business, on the organic side, commercial industrial refrigerants continues to be in a stable level and good activity, plus 3% in the quarter. OEM continues to grow, a little bit of a mixed picture, but very positive in Europe, where our main company, TSM Freedom Energy, continues to have a very good development, double-digit growth, and some more challenges in APEC driven by China. We expect China to improve as we move into Q4. So I would say very happy with the OEM development in Europe, stable on the commercial industrial refrigeration, Then we have HVAC minus 11% and I think it's important just to have a little bit of reference point. We still see good activities in the HVAC segment on the underlying business but having some respect from last year in Q4 and Q1 we had 25 to 30% organic growth, a lot driven by a chaotic situation on energy prices, gas and oil and a lot of people moving into these type of products. So underlying feels good, but compared to those type of comps, it will be a challenge for the next couple of quarters until we normalize our business. But in general, I would say good activities in that area as well. So that drives our minus 4%. Inventory, we will come back to a little bit more under Wolf. North America, I will touch upon a little bit later. I think on the acquisition side, I have to denounce moving into South Korea, buying one of the market leaders there in refrigeration and see a good growth path by introducing our natural refrigerant products and expanding the business with new products. I'm very happy about that entry. I also think it's important to mention Amsoil supplied strategic add-on from us and we expect more acquisition as we continue to grow in the US. A fairly active quarter also on the acquisition, and we'll come back to, I would believe that the acquisition were financed by our cash flow we generated in the quarter. That's why net debt hasn't changed, but a very good addition to the company. Next slide. Looking at EMEA, I would say it continues to operate at a very good level on the margin side. Of course, also flushing out a lot of inventory. I would say gross margin continues to be strong in this segment and we expect this to continue. We also expect the inventory to continue to move down here in Q4. So we're getting a good traction on the cash flow. I would say in AMEA, good growth on the OEM side. Refrigeration and then HVAC a little bit more challenged Most of this growth in HVAC came in Europe the last year Q3, Q4 and Q1 related to the energy situation while APAC was more stable and of course the US driven by other areas and we'll come back to that. We also acquired the company Condex here and they're sort of consolidating into the strong HVAC interview as well. I would say, in general, good development on REMP and OEM in Europe. And then high comps on the HVAC side, that's affecting us. But in general, I would say still good activity. Moving on to APAC. APAC is now moving into summer season. Mid-October is usually where we start seeing it in Australia and New Zealand, which are our biggest markets. So I would say a good start to the season there, while of course, the U.S. are moving more into the off-season. So continue to be an active market for us. We mentioned South Korea stable on the market side, but as volume now starts to increase in Q4 and Q1, of course, we'll get a pickup there on the volume side and start promising this region. We look forward to follow this here for the high speeds for the business. Next slide. Then North America. Happy to see that we're growing at a higher sales in Q3 versus Q2. So I would say a stable market for us in our regions. A little bit warmer in Q3 versus Q2 compared to last year. That's driving some of the math also. towards the end of the quarter we started seeing better product supply from our key HVAC supplier that helped us drive sales. So we're now in Q4 getting more and more into a stable supply chain situation. So we believe that of course will help in 2024 as well from gaps in 2023. So all in general, positive. Still up in the US, stable side of the margins. More equipment sales in Q3 versus Q2, where there's more repair. But in general, a good and stable development in the U.S. And of course, during the quarter, we added Amstel that we're already starting to work together with. It's aligning our existing territory as the same strategic supplier. Good possibilities for us to put on an expanded platform. And then also just towards the end of the quarter, we started to launch private label things here. So we're very interested to follow this moving forward. So in general, very happy with the U.S. performance and the outlook going forward. And we'll come back a little bit on how regulation is accelerating in the U.S. as well, but I think it will have a good impact for us on the long term. So moving on to the next slide. 42% overall growth, organic 4%. We'll come back a little bit more on that one. Good EV day growth and then positive EPS growth as well. So next slide. Similar here on the sales side, more broken when you see the currency continues to be a tailwind for us in the euro and the dollars continue to be strong versus the six. And then M&A plus 39%, so I would say we've continued good development on the M&A side and their growth as well, which gives us 8.5 billion in sales. Here you can see, of course, the historical sales that we continue to perform very, very well, plus 42% compared to plus 38% Q3 last year. You can see the difference here is, of course, the organic growth coming into very strong comps. driven mainly on the HVAC side, as we said in Q3, Q4 and Q1 last year. But we'll continue to have a good acquisition growth and we'll come back to what we see on the HVAC side. But in general, I would say still good activity in most of our regions in the world. Moving on to the next slide. I guess a new slide explaining on the HVAC to clarify a little bit what we see. Now if you look at our extract business the last five to ten years it's more an organic kegar of eight to ten percent of the year which I believe is very good organic kegar but then you saw in Q3, Q4 and Q1 you had extremely high growth levels a lot related to the situation on of people buying air-to-air heat pumps to manage electricity, gas, oil, and other solutions in a lot of countries. And now we see a more normal pattern. But we still see long-term very good possibilities in the heat pump side, the electrification of the world, also the banning of gas. So long-term, the trend still looks very strong. But of course, the short-term are fairly strong targets. And that's also saying the underlying activity is still fairly good in the markets. Okay, moving on to the next slide. EBITDA growth, we went over that. 54% driven by, of course, higher sales with our acquisition, but also continue very good margin development, 11.3% EBITDA margin in the quarter. Moving on to the next slide. Next slide, here you see a longer trend on the margin development as you can see here now Q2, Q3 which Q2 and Q3 will be our highest quarter on the market because it's two highest sales quarters and then the US follows a more similar trend like Europe on having Q2 and Q3 as high seats when it's of course really hot and then now as we move into Q4 and Q1 it's more replacement with maintenance and service, but you're also moving more to heat pump. The U.S. does have a large heat pump sales now in Q4 and Q1, and as you know, in Europe, we're moving more and more into the heat pump segment as well. And then APAC is moving into summer season, so of course that's a strong cooling segment of our business. So moving on to the next slide. And here's the EBTA growth. So we can see 2023, 2022 plus 70% and 54% above that this year. So we are pretty satisfied our margin of business are developing in Bay Rep.

Okay. Okay. Then we have the next slide which is the P&L statement. And if you look then at the amount, Gustaf went through the EBITDA. So if you go further down, you see the financial net is minus 158 million. which is then impacted negatively by an exchange deviation of $40 million. So the underlying financial net is then down to $120 million. And then the tax in quarter, that is a normal 25%, versus last year, 24%. But the 25% is then what we have been having for the last quarters. And then I move over to the next slide, and we also talked about earnings per share, so there's an 8% increase. And then the next slide then, operating cash flow. So I have three slides on cash flow, just to explain the delta. So this first slide here is then the movement from Q3 2022 to Q3 2023. As you can see then, we have increased EBITDA, also have a very positive movement in working capital with 481 million. slightly higher capex, 55 million, and leasing, 27 million, and then others, 13 million. And as Christoffel said, the nice thing in the quarter three that was actually the operating cash flow, 1.1 billion, financed the M&A activity in the quarter over close to one billion, so the net debt is the same during the quarter as we entered it. The next slide is then explaining the movement in the quarter. So in the quarter we had EBITDA of 1.1 billion, and then we had a working capital movement of 167 million, the capex minus 90 and leasing 125, leaving them to 1.1 billion. But just to explain the 167 million, the working capital movement, we have a next slide showing the specification of that. So we have then a release of inventory of 525 million, We also released on accounts receivable of $770 million. And then the negative side on the inventory reduction is that we are buying less and then we're also getting less accounts payable. So we have a negative delta or negative movement on accounts payable with $848 million. And then we have other working capital items, which is basically accruals related to salaries like vacations, et cetera. So that had a negative impact in the quarter. So that leaves us with plus 167 million in the quarter. The next slide is then showing the quarterly development of cash flow and as Christopher said earlier, this is the best quarter we have had in cash flow. So 1.1 billion and hopefully we will see a good development also in Q4 2023. And then my final slide is then the net debt, which we have then the leverage of net debt EBITDA of 230 reported. But if I then exclude the leasing, which is mainly our rental contracts on our branches, and then the pension, we have a leverage of 194 versus last year of 231. So that's also improving. Then I hand over to Christoffer on the last slide here.

Yeah, so a little bit, a lot of summary points, but you heard most of it. The way we summarized the quarter with good profitability, strong cash flow, stays growth, growth here continues to be high, driven by the acquisition agenda we have. EVDA continue to follow that growth and of course continue to have improving margins that's driving that even further. Cash flow of almost 1.1 billion, and I think we'll be very, bullish on that and we continue to be that in Q4. This is of course something that we are working actively with. We also have in the US supply chain is improving, stable market here in Q3, good activities in most of the segments in the US and we continue to have good margins and good activities also on the integration from private label a lot of activities on refrigeration that will grow in the future and branches investing in. And then of course, first add-on acquisition in the US, Emsco Supply, happy to welcome them to our US platform and more to come in that area. And then also entering a new market in South Korea, one of the market leaders in refrigeration where we think there's a lot of value creation we can do over the years and also continue to grow in new markets. Summary Q3, I think we're good performance in general, good activities on the acquisition side, improving balance sheet at a good level, good cash flow going forward. If you look at a couple of things that I think is fairly relevant, that has been under the quarter, is the West's decision under the update of the gas regulation in EU. so we further accelerate the phase out which means that they will take down the quotas even further until 2030 and a couple of things that will happen long term with this acceleration is that of course it will be tighter to get access to the refrigerants and we expect that long term prices will get positive in this journey but I think even more important of course is that you will have to accelerate your phase out of all your equipment running on old F gases because we can already now see a tightening of the supply which means that you have a risk of not getting hold of enough quotas to supply the demand out there. So I think very positive for the OEM business for us long term to drive the acceleration of phasing out all the old system. Of course very good for the environment. We believe it's a positive thing. Of course, you get more regulation on how you're going to move into natural refrigerants on your HVAC system, your heat pumps, and that will also, when that comes in a couple of years' time, have, of course, a different type of price picture with these type of products. So, good long-term trends accelerating on the FCAT in the EU. Then also in the US, relevant to mention, is that by 2025 HVAC regulation is moving into natural refrigerants. There was a lot of talk before regulation that was manufacturing date, now they're moving it to installation date, so it's also accelerating and it's also going to have, of course, a long-term positive effect on our platform in the U.S. as we expected. So, continuously good trends in the the changes and the phase out of the product that's beneficial for Bayer F. We talked about the US getting better on the supply chain, which we expect in 2024 to get a little bit of a pick-up so we can have a better product. Portfolio notes, of course, our main supplier is already prepared for the natural reframing in 2025, so it feels good to have a very good partner in the US. We also launched the Sinclair at the end of the quarter. It's going to have a more effect on 2024, and it also allows us to be a little bit more aggressive in segments that are not active today with the platform, so positive. And for that, the refrigeration continues to grow very nicely for our stuff from a small base as we disclosed before. We do have respect for the next couple of quarters on the comps, especially on the HVAC side. As I said, we're going 25-30%, 26% in Q3, 29% in Q4, and 17% in Q1. So we'll continue to be a headwind on the comps, on the organic side, on the HVAC, until we get back to more normal comparables, especially in Europe. This is mainly in Europe, while back in the U.S., of course, it's in a different situation. It looks like cash flows will continue to... do well and we expect to be stronger in Q4 than Q3 and of course that gives us opportunity on that position side versus working on our balance sheet and debt. So I think we're in a very good position on the balance sheet and we can choose a little bit as we continue to generate the cash flow. Because we do continue to have a good pipeline on high positions and working with companies we have both in the US but also in Europe and APEC so we expect to continue to drive that strategic growth there in the future as well. So that is the last comment, so we can open up for questions. Thank you for listening.