Anora Group Oyj (ANORA) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hi. Good morning, everyone, and a warm welcome to the presentation of Anora's Q2 results. I am Petra Gräsbeck from Anora's Communications team. In today's call, we have also CEO, Pekka Tennilä; and CFO, Sigmund Toth. Pekka will start shortly the presentation with a business update, which is followed by Sigmund's review of the financials. After the presentation, we will start the Q&A. We look forward to many questions from you, and you can send them to us already during the presentation through the chat. As usual, we kindly ask you to mute your microphones. And please note that we are recording the presentation, and the on-demand version will be published on our website, anora.com. With this, we are ready to start. Pekka, please go ahead.

Thank you, Petra, and welcome on my behalf as well. Here's a recap of our results for the second quarter. Our sales grew by 10% during the second quarter due to acquisition of Globus Wine. Organically, our sales grew slightly by 1.3% in local currencies, with good development in spirits, industrial and in owned wines, but significant negative development in Swedish and Norwegian currencies. And partner losses in Sweden from last year had a negative impact on our sales and drove our organic sales in euro down by 4 -- almost 5%. Comparable EBITDA was EUR 13 million, almost EUR 6 million behind last year. The main driver of the decline in profit was negative currency impact, which we estimate being EUR 5 million for the quarter and EUR 9 million for the first half of the year. Due to significant weakening of currencies and its impact on our profitability and lower-than-expected profit from Globus Wine, we did a new guidance for full-year EBITDA. According to our new guidance, comparable EBITDA will be between EUR 70 million to EUR 78 million at the end of the year. As mentioned in our revised guidance, we are lacking in our profit protection plan with Globus Wine. We do see positive development, but it is [ lower ] than we originally planned. And therefore, we had to adjust Globus Wine full-year profit estimates down for this year. The rest of the savings program for Anora Group is developing as planned, and we do expect a EUR 6 million savings versus previous year in our bottom line. The majority of that impact will be visible in the second half of the year. Then we move on to next page, and we look at the market development. Market numbers are a combination of monopoly sales data and Nielsen off-trade data from [ Denmark ]. As expected, the sales decline has somewhat stabilized and Wine being close to flat development overall in the Nordics. Spirits declined by 4.4%. In your right-hand side, you can see an interesting comparison between 2019, 2022 and this year. This shows that both, Systembolaget and Vinmonopolet, have managed to significantly grow their business compared to 2019, which is the year before COVID. Alko in Finland is below the 2019 level. Next, we look at our segments. We start with Wine. The first half and second quarter as well has been a very unusual and challenging one for Wine, with mixed development across different sectors. In the beginning of the year, we knew that we had a bigger profitable partner losses in Sweden to cover up for, and we knew that our cost of goods are higher than in previous year. The negative surprise has come from the currency exchange development being much more severe than we originally estimated. It has significantly impacted wine sales and profits, especially in partner wine. The impact comes from both translation of currencies and especially from the fact that we buy an absolute majority of our wine in Swedish and Norwegian crowns, and the weakening of these currencies reconcile gross margins. As we are dealing with distributor margins in partner business and operational expenses are quite fixed, the negative development in currencies impact profitability in a very significant way, like we see in this quarter. Secondly, the profit protection program of Globus, like I mentioned, is showing impact but at a slower pace than we originally anticipated. Savings in input costs are coming later or at the lower level than anticipated. Further, our productivity in filling is slower than planned. Therefore, Globus Wine contribution on total EBITDA is basically zero for the second quarter. We do expect them to contribute positively for -- in the second half of the year as our work to restore profits in Globus Wine progresses. For the long term, Globus Wine remains an important part of our Wine growth plan. We are now the market leader in a sizable Danish wine market, and we want to expand on that position. And with Globus Wine brands, innovation and production capabilities, we were able to compete in the very sizable Swedish commercial wine segment. Obviously, our key focus now is to reach the level of profitability of the original business case at the time of the acquisition. Weakening currencies hit our strong development in own wine across all monopolies. In local currencies, our own wine grew by 10% in the quarter, and we gained market share across all monopolies. Sweden was the growth driver with over 20% growth in the quarter. The growth was largely driven by renewed [ Glöet ] brand and multiple successful launches in sustainable packaging formatsglobus Wine also continued to grow both sales and market share in Denmark. Second half of the year is, of course, very big and important to us. We have pricing windows open in September, October, which we will use to improve our gross margins. Secondly, we are closing in on Christmas and our very important [ Blossa ] season. Thirdly, we do expect efficiencies in our overall costs. On the right-hand side, you see some of our new wines launched in Q2. Il Capolavoro from Globus Wine was launched in a bottle in Finland and in bag-in-box in Sweden. In Sweden, we got listed 3 South African wines from Allesverloren, a new partner. The pouch and the can in Norwegian market presents new, more sustainable packages, and the pink bottle is seasonal and low-alcohol product. Rose Sangria from Spain. Inycon Appassimento, 1.5-liter PET, is an organic wine from Sicily, with sustainable certificate. Then we move on to Spirits segment. Spirit sales and profits were also significantly impacted by the currency exchange. Our sales in euro declined by 2%, but in local currencies, it grew by almost 4%. Our development in the monopoly markets were in line with the overall monopoly development, which is slightly negative. As I just told you, in the international markets, we grew by 9%. All international markets performed well, driven by our biggest Spirit brand, Koskenkorva, which grew in double digits. In Norway, we gained market share in Spirits. In Finland, our market share slightly decreased due to high comparison last year with the [ Alavina ] campaign. In Sweden, we lost slightly as well due to other stocks and lost listing in gin. Decline in EBITDA is due to currency exchange impact and high input costs. Our comparable operating expenses decreased compared to second quarter in 2022. As in Wine, we are active in launching new products. In Sweden, we launched Koskenkorva Organic and 7 Botanicals. In Finland, grocery was a big focus, and we grew ourselves in that channel by 50% during the quarter. In Norway, we launched Komiteens Sommeraquavit and Classic Cocktail Raspberry Mojito in 1.5 liter bag-in-box. In Global Travel Retail, we launched Herno Travelers Exclusive Gin. Next, we move on to Industrial segment. Industrial had a solid quarter, and we had both sales and profit improvement. Sales increase was driven by higher sales in industrial services, helped by low comparable numbers from last year. Industrial products sales decreased as the demand for starch is very low at the moment. And this impacts the running speed of our Koskenkorva distillery as well. Vectura has shown clear improvement in both sales and profitability, but that's not fully visible due to weak Norwegian crown. EBITDA increased due to pricing and material price stabilization. And then a few words on sustainability. So the sustainability highlights from Q2 include a human rights assessment. And we also reported on human rights according to Norwegian Transparency Act, which is an important step in preparing to the human rights reporting requirements of the upcoming EU regulation. Health and safety is at the very top of our sustainability agenda, and we have successfully reduced our accidents in our facilities. After a small drop in Q1, the lost time injury frequency improved again in Q2. We have successfully increased the use of recycled materials to be the front runner in the industry, and we are very well prepared for the tightening EU requirements. In Q2, we also introduced other climate smart packages such as lighter glass bottles. With this, I would like to give word over to Sigmund for financials.

Thank you, Pekka. So moving to our first slide. As usual, we present an overview of barley [ trend ] evolution in the barley price development. And as you can see from the graph -- the top graph, prices have come down from the historically high levels that we saw earlier and last year. But as you can also see, the current level is still significantly above even the peaks in the historical prices. So we can say that we are down from the very high levels, but still at a historically high level. And looking forward, obviously, we are in the middle of the harvest. And I think that without fully being able to conclude on that yet, I think that the outlook is one that would support stability around these levels rather than any big changes, but that's still to be seen. Moving then on to the next slide. Here, we see the overview of the evolution in net sales. And what we can see, as Pekka said, is that if you exclude then the impact of Globus Wine, which this was the last quarter that Globus Wine is pure incremental to our numbers, the reported sales were slightly down versus last year, but still then at the level of, for example, Q2 2019. But this small decline then in reported net sales, excluding Globus Wine, is driven, to a large extent, then by the negative FX development. So actually, if you look at it in local currencies, we had a slight increase in the net sales, even when you exclude Globus Wine. If you then look at the evolution by segment, you can see that it indeed is this Wine segment, which is increasing its sales and the slight increase in Industrial external sales behind industrial services. But you can also then see that obviously, the increase coming from Wine is much smaller than the impact of Globus Wine. So there is a big decrease in the Wine sales excluding Globus Wine, and this is then driven both by the currency, but also by some underlying partner losses. If we then move to the next slide, Here, we see the profitability comparable EBITDA, which is down from the previous year and also obviously down versus the very, very high levels achieved during COVID, which were quite exceptional and somewhat below also the, let's call it, [ cleanest ] comparison year, which is 2019. And the drivers of this profitability, we did take quite significant price increases in the previous windows. And they cover our -- the increase in input costs, but they do not cover the impact of the further deterioration in the NOK and the SEK that we saw during the quarter. And that you can very clearly see them primarily in Wine, but also in Spirits. And then in terms of the profitability of Globus Wine, that's not an explanation for the decrease, of course, because there was no Globus Wine in the previous quarter, but it also is not contributing to offset some of the decline seen elsewhere. So if we then move to the next slide. Here, we have some key figures from the balance sheet. And what we can see here is that for the -- at the end of the first half, our net debt levels, they are then still significantly higher than last year and also our target of [ 2.5, ] and that is primarily driven then by the acquisition of Globus Wine, which was debt financed. On the positive side, what we can see is that for the half year, and that's true also for the quarter, is that cash flow from operations, it's obviously impacted then by the low profitability. But on the positive side, net cash flow from operations for first half and also for the second quarter is significantly higher than comparable last year. And this is because we have extended significantly the sales of receivables program, and we have also -- unlike last year, we have not deteriorated our net working capital position. It has improved somewhat. That being said, the inventory levels are still too high, and we are working hard to get those down to the sort of levels that we saw before last year. But the current status is that, that progress is relatively slow, but we expect them more by the end of the year. So that inventory will be going down, and that will be a positive contribution to the cash flow. If we are then moving forward. So the outlook here is this, as Pekka mentioned and as previously communicated, we have updated our guidance for the full year on the 15th of August. Comparable EBITDA is now expected to be between EUR 70 million and EUR 78 million. Previously, it was between EUR 80 million and EUR 90 million, and that is coming behind. We want to improve gross margins, going forward, and we want to improve the profitability of Globus Wine, and we want to continue with the profit protection plan that we have already started, but there are more effects to become in the second half of the year so that we start getting figures that are better than last year rather than weaker. So with that, I think that was the last of my slides, and back to Pekka.

Thank you, Sigmund. So announcement regarding the EMT. So I'm happy to announce Risto Gaggl's appointment as the SVP Industrial as of first of January. Risto will replace current SVP, Hannu Tuominen, who is retiring. Risto will join Anora already in the beginning of October to work and learn alongside Hannu for the rest of the year and then take -- assume the SVP responsibilities. Risto was previously employed by Fiskars as the Head of Supply Chain. With that, I think I'll give word back to Petra.

Thank you, Pekka and Sigmund. We already have some questions in the chat, but please continue to send them. And you can also use the raise-your-hand function if you want to ask questions in person. And at the end of the Q&A, you can unmute yourself and state your name. So let's start from the chat. And the first question comes from [ Raul Juva ]. Globus is doing well in sales, but weak on earnings. Is there a connection? Do you have some less-profitable sales you need to cut to restore profitability?

A big part of the profit restoration in Globus is focused on gross margin improvement. And there are, I think, basically three elements to that. The first is, as you probably rightly said, the product mix. We produce both own brands, and then we have contract filling. And own brands are significantly more profitable. And that has been the growing part of the business. And that will have a positive impact on the net sales per liter and then on the gross margins and gross profit in the future. The second part of the profit improvement plan is lowering the input costs. Obviously, there are some signs of that already, but that improvement has been slower than we anticipated. But we do expect -- also with growing volumes, we expect a lower average costs per liter. So that's something that we work super hard and every day on. The third part of the gross profit improvement plan is about our productivity in filling. That productivity improvement is not at the level we see it should be and could be. And we have good plans to improve on that to then decrease the cost per produced liter. So that will have a significant impact. One big part of part of that is planning, better planning. And -- for example, we are currently implementing [ SAP ] in Globus. So those are some of the drivers and probably some of the key drivers that help us to improve on our gross margins and then obviously, the profitability on the mid- to long term.

Great. The second question comes from Maria Wikstrom. The midpoint of the guidance leaves EUR 57 million for second half of '23 versus EUR 44 million in second half of '22. That is plus 30% year-on-year. Can you walk us to where do you see the biggest profitability improvement to come from?

Yes. I think that the big things are the ones that we have mentioned, it's that we then have feel the effects of one price window, so September and October in the monopolies, with very significant price increases coming, so that's one element. Second element is that as we have mentioned, the profit improvement plan in Globus is continuing. So whereas last year was a year that even though they were in our books for half year, the contribution from Globus in the end was very, very limited. So this half year, second half year, we expect that will be better. And then the third element is the profit protection plan with lower spending on, amongst other things, marketing. So some of that has already come in the first half, but then more to come in the second half. So those would be the, I would say, that three big elements.

Great. Then two questions from Joni Sandvall. First one, you made an insurance claim during Q2 related to Globus' acquisition? How large is the claim, and when you expect to recover funds?

On this one, it's a very good question. It's a very good question, Joni. It's very early days. So that's why we are not, at this time, disclosing anything more than what we put in our quarterly report. It's something that can take some time to actually recover the funds. And in terms of posting any gains from that -- from this contingent asset, the accounting rules are such that you can only post any kind of gain from that once you are virtually certain of the amount. So I mean what I can say is that, obviously, it is a quite substantial claim and that we are working hard to recover those funds from the insurance company and that we will keep you updated as there is more certain information. But for now, the status is that the claim has been submitted, and we don't have anything more to disclose at this time.

And the second question from Joni, gross margin was weak in Q2, given lower barley prices and ease in cost inflation, what should we expect from H2?

I think that on this one, you should expect better gross margins coming mainly actually from the further price -- from the price increases. I mean, lower barley prices, as we said, yes, they are coming down from the very high levels, but still at extremely high levels. And in terms of the cost inflation, what we are seeing is a mixed picture. So definitely on a net -- not an increase in costs versus current levels, but also not a significant decrease. So I would say that for now, input prices will be stable versus current levels and then gross margin improvement should come from the price increases.

Thank you. Then a question from [ Jussi Mikkonen ]. You said that gross margin in Globus Wine is lower than you expected. Could you elaborate the factors leading to this in a bit more detailed level?

Yes, absolutely. I mean in a very, very simple terms, the gross margins in Globus are lower than what we expected because the financials on which the acquisition was made contained, as far as we can tell, significant accounting errors that meant that the inventory value was overstated, and the gross margin was overstated as well. So I mean, obviously, our acquisition was based on the financials that were shared with us prior to the acquisition. And as it has turned out, there were weaknesses in the accounting processes that led to the gross margin that was reported and also the inventory values that were reported to be too high. And that's what we said actually with our Q4 results already earlier this year, is that we took, as you may recall and has been disclosed, a write-down of the inventory values in Globus. And the core area of this is that the gross margins are significantly lower as a starting point. And then we are trying to improve from that level through various actions. Some of them Pekka already mentioned, and they are around efficiency in the factory. They are around lower input prices and getting synergies from Globus being part of Anora , and they are also around the product mix.

Thank you. Another question from Maria Wikstrom. Barley price is expected to remain on current level. How much should that save in euros? And how much is [ it up ] by other fixed cost inflation?

I would say that as I said earlier to Joni's question, I would say that for the balance of the year in terms of cost, I would say that the 2 roughly equal, eat each other up. So the one's the saving is eaten up by some lagging increases in other costs. But of course, as I said, it's still early days with the harvest. So this picture may change. But for now, I would say that the 2 is roughly equal.

Thank you. Then I apologize in advance. George, I'm probably about to mispronounce your surname, but we have a question from George [indiscernible]. You have a year-to-date FX impact on profitability of about EUR 9 million, approximately 3 percentage points. In addition, you are lagging on your price adjustments. How much, in percentage points, would you estimate this to be behind in addition, if any, to the FX impact? Or have you baked this impact into the EUR 9 million impact?

Yes, good, although quite complex question. So when we are talking about impacts here, we are talking about the gross impact. So this is year-on-year, how much the FX is decreasing profits if we do nothing, right? And then on top of that, we have had significant underlying cost inflation due to barley price, due to other inputs, energy that have gone up. And we have tried to compensate for that through pricing and also for the FX through pricing. And the reason that you see net deterioration in our profit is because the pricing is not sufficient to cover the sum of these two effects, the FX and the underlying cost inflation and especially then because, of course, the FX has deteriorated after our prices to the monopolies were fixed. At which point, we cannot change them until the next upcoming pricing window.

Then further questions from Joni. First one, in Sweden, Wine sales were down 80% year-on-year in local currencies. How large part of the lost sales new partner deals are expected to cover?

So on average, we are able to cover the lost partners in, say, 12 months. As these partners were very significant in volume, we've given ourselves 24 months to cover for the net sales, net sales loss. If you look at Sweden development, [ 80%, ] like you said, Joni, more than 100% of that decline comes from those 2 lost partners, which, in other words, means that the rest of the business grew, and that's obviously something that's very, very important. Looking at our strategy, we put the big emphasis on own wine growth, and we are right on track with that, with organic sales growth in Wine, in local currencies, 10%, Sweden being, I think, more than 20% growth. So it comes from two sources, more own wine and then the new partners, let's say, within 24 months of the time of the loss.

Thank you. We continue with Joni's questions. Inventory remained flat quarter-on-quarter. Given current input cost level, what level of inventory is sustainable and when you expect to reach that level?

Very good question. I believe that we've said that we are aiming to get inventory down by around EUR 30 million in value. And we would believe -- I mean, of course, the inventory level, it varies quite significantly, as you know, from -- due to seasonality, so that's quite normal. But on a like-for-like basis, around EUR 30 million down. And I mean, our aim is to reach that by the end of this year. . It is, to be honest, quite a challenging thing, where we have a huge amount of focus on that, but there's still a lot of work ahead of us for the rest of this year. And then as you point out, I mean, one thing is getting it down to a certain level, but then it's to keep it there sustainably without there being any negative side effects such as out of stock. So that balancing act is something that we are working very, very hard on.

Thank you. Then third question from Joni. What was the net impact of FX to net financials?

I don't think I have that number off the top of my head, Joni. So let me get back to you on that one.

Great. Question from Maria. Is the sale of receivables going to be on this level, going forward, as well, so the positive net working capital impact is not expected to diminish coming quarters, so the policy has changed, expanded for good?

Yes. Yes, and yes.

Clear. Then around [indiscernible], can you catch up to negative FX impact with September, October price increases, assuming current FX rates? Or will price increases need to continue in 2024?

I think it's a very complicated question. I think that we should probably not be talking about price increases in 2024 at this stage yet. It's something that we will evaluate once we are closer to when those price windows start and when we have the deadline to submit prices to the monopolies or to other customers looking at the current FX, obviously, also looking at any savings that we've been able to do in input materials at that point in time. But to answer in a more round way, I mean, obviously, our desire was to catch up with a large part of the negative FX impact in the September, October price increases. And then as you can all see from both the NOK and the SEK, it has been quite a bit of variability there, with the SEK especially worsening somewhat after we set prices to the monopoly. And then on the NOK, it's a more balanced picture, although that's been very volatile in the negative direction, I guess, the last couple of weeks after having strengthened significantly a bit earlier.

Question from Paul Handeland. As pricing catches up and given that costs and FX stays here, what do you consider the normalized annual EBITDA to be from EUR 100 million to EUR 110 million and CapEx and leasing should remain at EUR 10 million each?

Well, I mean, I think that on the last question, we can say that that's around that level. Around the normalized annual EBITDA, I mean, I think that maybe we would have to come back on that question. There are many, many moving parts, currently. But the range that you are quoting is maybe not too far off what should be a normalized annual EBITDA. I mean we definitely want to be getting back to the gross margin levels that we've seen earlier. And we are working very hard on a number of profit protection and efficiency plans, some of which take a bit more time, like the center of excellence or as we see the Globus. But yes, I mean, I would say that the number is not too far off where we should be aiming to be.

Further question from Maria. Can we talk about volume declines in Wine and Spirits? Organic sales plus 1%. But given price increases, volumes are down how much?

So if we look at Wine, volumes were down in the second quarter by 12%. And like I said earlier, more than 100% of that decline came from the 2 lost partners, meaning that the rest of the portfolio grew. In Industrial, volumes grew by 10%. In Spirits, in the monopolies or let's say, the monopoly countries, volumes were flat. And the reason for relatively [ good ] performance versus the overall monopoly development, which is down, is the grocery business, which has grown by 50% during the quarter. So that drove volumes up. International, slightly down, 1.5% in volume. There, the main driver is duty-free travel retail, where we have several vessels not operating. So that has driven the whole total market down. So that, Maria, would be an overview on the volumes.

Then question from [ Connor Reynolds ]. Are you planning any more M&A?

Yes. We keep our eyes open, for sure. We stated in our strategy that we want to stay active in M&A, and we definitely want to do that. We definitely have our hands full now with, for example, Globus acquisition. But yes, we're definitely monitoring the market.

Thank you. We are ready with the chat for now, so we can take questions with raise-your-hand option, and I see that Maria has already her hand raised. So please go ahead, unmute your phone and...

Yes, I just thought that I ask the final question like this. So I think the current government in Finland will be discussing of letting the wines in the grocery stores, I think, at the second part of the 4-year tenure. So the question is that, I mean, how do you see this would impact your business if Finland would accept wines in the grocery stores?

We see that as a growth opportunity. And that's because we have that Globus business, which is a grocery retail business. And we believe that once wines come to retail in Finland, we can deploy the same business model, work close together with the retailers, partly with their own brands, partly with our own brands. And we believe that the availability, the better availability of wine would grow the market, and we definitely aim for at least our fair share, if not even more.

Thank you. Any more questions from raise your hand?

If I may, just a follow-up on the previous -- would that impact the food traffic in the monopoly channel in Finland? And how would you see then the impact on the Spirits business?

Yes. So you assume then that the Spirits stay with Alko or with the monopoly, that would definitely impact the traffic in those stores. I mean that would be logical to assume. So the answer is yes.

Thank you. More questions from raise your hand? All right. Then I think we are ready with Teams, and we can take the calls from our telephone lines. So please state your name, if you would like to ask a question. Okay. It looks like we don't have any more questions. So back to Pekka for a summary.

Thank you, Petra, and thank you for the many questions. Here's a very short recap of our second quarter. Our comparable EBITDA was significantly impacted by weakening Swedish and Norwegian crowns. Q2 impact on profit was EUR 5 million. And for the second quarter and for the first half of the year, it was EUR 9 million. Due to currency impact and lower-than-planned Globus Wine profit, we issued a revised guidance. And lastly, Risto Gaggl will follow Hannu Tuominen, SVP Industrial as Hannu is retiring. And then Petra, back to you.

Thank you. Thank you for the speakers and everyone joining us today online. Our next scheduled event is on 9 November, our Q3 interim report. So we will see you then next time. So from all of us, have a great weekend. Bye.