Samhällsbyggnadsbolaget i Norden AB (publ)

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to today's call. My name is Helena Lindahl, and I'm the Treasury Director at SBB. Today we will walk you through the financial results for the third quarter of 2024. And joining me this morning presenting our results is our CEO, Mr. Leif Synnes, and our Finance Director, Daniel Zellberg. Leif, we'll start with the key financials and the strategic highlights. for the third quarter and an overview of our business units. Daniel will then provide a detailed review of our financial statements, and I'll provide an update on our financing in the end. We will, as always, finish with a summary and Q&A. With that said, I would like to hand over to you, Leif. The floor is yours.

Thank you, Helena. If we start with the most important thing is the development of the core business in SBB. We see that the rental income in the like for like portfolio develops quite well, close to 6% up. We see also that the net operating income develops well with 7.4%. So we are very happy that the properties continue to perform well. And we also work towards better and better financial stability and high equity. And one goal for us is to reduce debt. And we have reduced the debt with 43 billion SEK during the last two years. And we're happy with that. And we'll continue to reduce the debt going forward. We have had some heavy wind when it comes to property valuations. I think the wind is leveling off and then this quarter we had the value decrease of 0.8%. We believe that we will get some tailwind starting from next year. and we get some help with property valuations and help us in our goal to stabilize the SPB group. We have a court case coming up and we're happy to see an end of the discussion about the financial governance. So we will start in January and hopefully we will get a positive result in March and we highly expect that. We strongly believe that the best argument is in our favor. We continue to deliver on the strategy and creating strong subsidiaries and associated companies. And we're very happy with the development in the Corb portfolio. If you look on more details about the achievements on the strategy front, we did some bond exchange which we had a closing in July. And that resulted in 1.6 billion in equity for the shareholders in S&P. And then later we listed SEA Fastheter and we collected 3 billion SEK from the stock market. And that fund will help us to repay the maturing bonds during 2025. They also get long-term financing from Nordic banks and additional credit lines, which will have them to continue performing well from the property side. Nordicus, an associated company of SBB, has been able to borrow 10 to 15 year money in the US bond market with an investment grade rating. They also receive additional trade facilities and also are being able to give dividends to the shareholders in Q4. And they will continue to give dividend in the upcoming years. So we're very positive on the development in Nordicus and also Sveapasteten. And we also have a large ownership in PPI, a Norwegian company. And that company received a triple B minus rating from Fitch with positive outlook. And they have started to acquire properties. And we're very pleased with the performance of that company too. We have a strong project development team in SBB and we are happy to, we have been able to announce a couple of transactions lately and where we have divested properties or will divest properties for around 1 billion SEK and that is elder care and property with the criminal warden as a tenant. We're happy with the strategy execution. We believe that we should, and we want to create a situation with strong companies in the SBB group. We want to create a transparent group structure, and we are gradually achieving that. As I mentioned, we have Nordicus and BPI, two strong companies, and we also have . So we will achieve transparency and also funding options for the group, which is very helpful going forward for SBB. If you look on the community segment, we in total have 45 billion SEK as on property exposure. And some of it is control to 100% via STB and some of it is controlled via strong associated companies. I think the property performance is very good with mostly index-linked revenues and we see a strong development in the like-for-like key figures like rental income and net corporate income. So very stable business. Residential is the part of the company that I think will perform the best in the upcoming year. Due to that, the rent development has been a little bit lower than the inflation in recent years. And over a long period of time, the rents in Sweden for residential grow faster than inflation. So we expect that for the upcoming year, the residential business will beat the revenue growth compared to other segments in the Nordic property market. So we expect a strong development on rental income and strong development of net operating income, and that is very helpful when it comes to property valuations. Education part of the SPB is dominated by the associate company Nordica. And as I said earlier, they have a very strong portfolio from a property point of view. And now they have also a strong position when it comes to funding. with investment-grade funding possibilities and infrastructure rating, and they can borrow for 10 to 15 years. It's quite a strong signal that we combine very strong assets with very long-term funding. It can't be more stable than that, I think. As I mentioned earlier, we had some headwind when it comes to property valuations and things go up and down when it comes to valuations of real estate. If we continue to work hard with improving the rental income and also the net operating income and the EBITDA from the properties, I think at some point of time we will get some tailwind. And I believe that the development in the capital market will help us towards higher property values going forward. We see more or less stable property violations during the last quarter when it comes to yield. The occupancy rate is decreasing slightly, and that is due to projects. We have emptied some properties for us to start new development projects, and we have also just recently finished development of some residential properties, which we are currently leasing out. So most of the drop in occupancy is due to projects, and we will think that the occupancy rate will recover in the upcoming quarters.

Thank you, Leif. Let's go more into detail on the financial statements. On a light for light basis, rental income for the period increased by 5.9%, while net operating income increased by 7.4% compared to the same period last year. In general, both revenues and costs are rising, but revenues are rising more than costs, giving a positive development of net operating income. This is driven by the fact that we have managed to maintain maintenance costs at a low. This achievement is the result of continued dedicated work to deliver on a strategic plan despite the challenging market conditions. which we believe are gradually improving. Together, the income basis provides stability and reduced risk by balancing income streams across the different segments. During the quarter, net operating income continued to grow and improve life for life. At the same time, admin and restructuring expenses are down compared to the same quarter last year. During the period they remained high due to reorganization and legal processes which we did not have in the last year. We have an ambition to reduce those costs by 50% by the end of 2025 and we believe that we're in the right way. There was a decrease in property values, but we are now seeing signs that the decline is leveling off. The decreases of nearly 5.4 billion is due to both realized and unrealized changes. Of these 5.4 billion, 3.2 billion is unrealized, of which only 0.5 billion is in Q3. The value of our property has decreased with 0.8% during the quarter. Rent development and lower capital costs are expected to lead to positive value changes in the long run. Now briefly looking at the balance sheet and the asset side. The large change in property portfolio for the PRD is attributed to transaction with joint ventures and associated company. The acquisitions are entirely attributed to the solution of Coopan and Innovo in the preparation of the IPO of Svea Fattigheter. The changes in other sales is due to structural measures rather than sale of assets. By that, I would now like to hand over to Helena for the financing.

Thank you, Daniel. SBB's primary focus is, of course, to continue to reduce the debt levels and also to reduce the reliance on individual sources of financing. And the long-term ambition is, of course, to regain the investment grade rating we had last year. And we believe that our decentralized group structures will aid us in this effort. And our work to strengthen the company's financial position continues unrentalously. And we have also implemented several initiatives which Leif already talked about to accelerate this. Our launch value stood at 62% this quarter, a number which we're not happy with. And we will work very hard going forward to bring this figure down. And this work is ongoing. The main reasons for the higher number is the dividend payment and also, of course, the property value changes. On our side, we think that we still have long-term funding, which is very, very attractive by any measurement. We have a three-year average interest rate maturity, and our average interest rate cost stands at 2.33% during this past quarter, which is very low compared to the market. On the death maturities, our average death maturity is 3.3 years. And we'd like to point out that still 67% of the death matures later and beyond 2026. And that runs with a rate of 2.37. So I would like to reiterate again that our top priorities is to increase the liquidity and also to continue to reduce the debt level. Through active management of our debt portfolio, we have achieved a substantial decrease in our debt on a like-for-like basis. And even if we've had the hefty headwind, We've made good progress and our aim is to reduce the debt level further through operating cash flow, strategic divestments and partnership with equity partners. Leif, now move on to summarize the presentation.

Thank you, Helena. The key focus for us is delivery on the core business. And we have a strong development in rental income and the net operating income, which we're very happy about. We also have strong performance when it comes to property development. We are able to divest the finished projects in a very good fashion. So we're happy with that. And then we have, of course, continued a need for improving the financial figures for the group, meaning we need to lower the loan to value and improve the liquidity. So we will continue hard to continue to improve those areas. I think we will be helped going forward. With the tailwind, the situation now in the capital market is quite much better than it was one or two years ago. And within some quarters ahead, I think we will see some recovery of the proper prices. And that will give us some help with improving some key figures and also much easier for us to divest assets at a good price in order to decrease the leverage and improve the equity level of the group. Thank you.

And with that, we move to the Q&A.

If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key 5 on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key 6 on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Mary Pollack from Credit Sites. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. In the liquidity section of your filing, you mention a new credit facility that you signed after quarter end. Can you provide more detail on that? Should we think about that's just like a straightforward RCF? Is there anything that you need to provide to the Scandinavian bank that is Do you have full access to that for your liquidity needs? And the maturity in terms would also be great if you can provide it.

Thank you very much for that question. I can confirm that the facility is in place and is ready to be utilized whenever we will need it.

And can you provide any more detail in terms of maturity or terms?

Not at this point in time. Thank you.

Thank you. And then you also mentioned that section, more disposals are likely, sort of pointing to the past deals you've done or structures, some are more JV focused, some more unique, some are straightforward. I guess, what do you think is the most likely path right now? as you already think about your pipeline for the 2026 bond maturity? Another big deal like we saw with the IPO or a series of smaller transactions that started the year?

In SPB, we have one big maturity in early 2025. And we are taking the time during 2024 to master the liquidity needed to manage that maturity. And the next maturity on scale is, I think, late in late in 2026. We have plenty of time to consider how we will meet that maturity. At the moment, we see that the prices in the transaction market is improving and we continue to believe that that pace will continue. So at the moment, we think it's better to do small in the investment of assets rather than selling shares or establishing new joint ventures.

Thanks. And you've noticed in the occupancy decline that had some somewhat different by public tenant departures. Can you provide more detail there? Which types of your tenants are departing? Do we need to worry about that? Is that indicative of a work from home trend for some of your public tenants? I was surprised to see that.

Yeah, we are a company that focuses on residential and long-term leases to publicly financed tenants. So if you compare us with Peers, we have a very strong income stream. It is less sensitive to movement in the market when it comes to lease activities. Of course, we do have some agreements that can be vacant, but it shouldn't be seen as a large concern. But even we expect that we will face some more difficulties to lease out mainly public offices. But it is a small part of our business. And I think when it comes to rental growth in life for life, it will still be quite positive next year due to the dominance of good development on the residential side. and also indexation on the leases that we have on long-term. So even if we get some slight improvement, a decrease in occupancy rate, we will still be able to show good numbers when it comes to like-for-like rental growth and like-for-like net operating income growth.

Thanks. That's really helpful. And on that indexation piece, what extent do you think indexation will slow in 2025 because inflation has come down?

We have a goal to beat the inflation when it comes to rental growth, and that is mainly due to small projects that we do together with the tenants. We can construct new areas or improvements in the properties, which enable us to re-increase the rents above the indexation. That is ongoing work. And we believe that also in the upcoming year, we will be able to show higher growth in like-for-like rental growth. And that's what the indexation give us.

You'll be higher than your indexation, but you can't provide any color on what that indexation might be. Like, is it going to be 2% or 5% or flat?

I don't have the number in my head what the indexation was for this year.

I think the number is around 2%.

For this year?

Yeah.

As in 2024? Okay, wonderful.

Thank you so much for your question. It is measured as the October CPI number, which came in a tad over 2%.

Okay. Thank you.

The next question comes from Eduardo Gili from Green Street. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone. A quick one from me. Assuming the court case is settled early 25, how will that impact your access to financing, both from banks rolling their exposure, but also equity partners joining you in joint ventures and different partnerships? How will that work in 25 if the court case is settled?

I think the court case has given us some headache when it comes to raising new debt in the market. So when we win that court case, it will be much easier for us to raise new money. And we can go to traditional lenders to a higher degree and lower the cost of capital for the group. And that will be helpful for the current bondholders, but also from the equity partners. And it will also improve the ability for us to cooperate with other investors in order to raise the equity of the SBB Group. Thank you.

The next question comes from Osman El-Iraqi from Fidelity International. Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning and thank you for the presentation. Just two questions for me. The first one on the bond exchange that you did in the summer, do you think you could do something similar going forward? That's my first question and my My second question is on the ICR. It stands at 1.7 today, which is slightly below your kind of own policy at 1.8. How do you think about the development of this metric going forward as your weighted average interest rate is still quite low at 2.3, I think? How do you think about this metric going forward?

Thank you. Yes, the first one, the bond exchange, that was done in order to create a good financial structure for Svea Fast Theater ahead of the IPO. So that transaction was, I would say, a one-off. We understand, of course, that we need to reduce the level of debt in the SVB group and we need to divest some assets or take in equity partners and that will create liquidity and we will use the liquidity to buy back bonds or to repay maturing bonds. So if we have some excess money at some point of time in the future, it can be so that we have a bond exchange or we ask to repay some bonds ahead of the maturity. And that we decided when we actually have some money to spend on that.

Okay. But it's unlikely that you use other kind of part of the business to do the same kind of contractions, pushing debt at the subsidiary level.

Yeah, we need to, in F2B Group, we need to use the possibilities we have in order to create stability for us and also for the subsidiaries. We have the need to to increase the debt level in Sveafasteter to not the high level, but to an appropriate level ahead of the IPO. So we did a bond exchange where we moved down bonds into Sveafasteter and then listed Sveafasteter. And that was done in order to create a financial setup in Sveafasteter. So we were able to do a listing of the shares later. So just that transaction was, I think, a one-off. But we have, of course, the ability to create new entities in the future. We see just that transaction with creating a large residential unit as a one-off transaction.

And on the ICR question, you had I think we have reiterated many, many times that our aim is to reduce the level of debt and also the interest rate cost. And we are very much focused on that number, of course.

And also when it comes to IECR, The debt with the highest interest are the short-term funding. And the long-term bonds that we have in SBB have a low coupon. So when we gradually will repay the maturing bonds, the average cost of funds will decrease. And also when we divest the properties or take an equity partner, or we get an equity through the sale of CFS data, we will use this procedure to reduce also the amount of death. And those two trends will help the ICR going forward.

Okay, that's very clear. Thank you very much.

The next question comes from Michael Stigjohan Levin from Ericsson. Please go ahead.

Hi, thanks for taking my question. It's related to unrealized changes in property values, which amounted to negative 0.5 billion SEK during Q3 and negative 1.5 billion SEK during Q2, although the yield requirement has been unchanged. Can you please explain how you end up with the negative value changes, although the yield requirement is unchanged, and considering that you also write that other factors such as rent development, renegotiations, and newly signed leases have contributed positively to property values. Thanks.

With refers to realized value changes this is mostly related to technical accounting reasons in relation to the creation of the joint venture with Castle Lake. In relation to the unrealized value changes as we said during the quarter we have a negative changes in value of 0.8%.

Yes, and during Q2 it was a bit bigger. Can you please explain how that has arisen since yield requirement is unchanged and you're right that other factors have contributed positively?

I think to some degree we see a little bit more vacancy in some properties which have affected the evaluation of the proper portfolio. isolated cases on properties which have affected us during the quarter, where the tenants have sent us that they will not review the contract. So that has affected the proper valuations I think, as I pointed out earlier, those kinds of properties are not in the majority for the group. The majority of the properties we have have long leases or are residential properties. So I don't expect this trend to continue.

Okay, thanks.

There are no more phone questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.

Thank you all for listening in and raising good questions in this call. Thank you very much.