Athens International Airport S.A. (AIA) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. I am Gailey, your Chorus Call operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Athens International Airport Conference Call and live webcast to present and discuss the first half 2026 financial results. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. George Eleftheriou, Manager, Investor Relations. Mr. Eleftheriou, you may now proceed.

Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and good morning to those of you listening to us across the globe. Welcome to our conference call of Athens International Airport financial results for the first half of 2026. Please note that the digital playback of the conference will be available from about 1 hour after the conference call ends until September 19. Today on the call, I'm joined by our CEO, Mr. George Kallimasias; and our CFO, Mrs. Nadia Xirogianni. Let me mention that the presentation today is available on our website under the section of quarterly results under the Financial Information page. With that, I would like to pass over to the CEO.

Thank you, George, and hello, everybody, and thank you for attending this earnings call for the first half of the current year. Let's start with the presentation with the first summary slide in Slide #4. The key messages for the period are our solid traffic growth with healthy profitability on target and in line with our regulatory framework as well as a resilient commercial segment despite the headwinds that we are facing in the geopolitics. During the first half of '26, traffic grew by 4.5% and reached 15.8 million passengers, which is a record number for the airport with solid international traffic of 4.2% growth and an even stronger domestic traffic of 5.1%. Our revenue declined slightly by 2.8% to almost EUR 300 million, but this was broadly in line with our projections. The Air Activities revenue was lower by 4.9%, driven by the airport charges adjustments, which we made further to the depletion of the Carry Forward mechanism. While at the same time, our Non-Air Activities revenues remained resilient, growing marginally below the traffic growth levels. Our adjusted EBITDA was EUR 168.5 million, reflecting the planned adjustment of the revenue segment, which was primarily driven by the PTF discount, which ended in April, which means that we expect the adjusted EBITDA performance to strengthen in the second half of the year, but this we will discuss further into -- later into the presentation during the Financial section. Let's move to Slide #5 with the traffic, a few more details on the traffic. As we mentioned, traffic continued to perform strongly in the first half of '26, marking another record for the period within a rather challenging geopolitical environment. On the right-hand side of the slide, you can see the monthly performance which illustrates the resilience of the demand since traffic remained above the 2025 levels throughout the period, including the months that were most affected by the Middle East war. And another thing which I think is important to mention is that August was the first month in the airport's history to exceed the 4 million passenger threshold. And year-to-date traffic, including August, was up by 4.4%. If we move to the next Slide #6, please. I will not go into detail with that because we have -- you are familiar with this slide in the sense that we have demonstrated our strong recovery versus pre-pandemic levels, including the increased connectivity. What I think is important to highlight as new information is what you see in the top left of this slide with Athens Airport continuing to outperform the European market with an average traffic growth of 4.5% in the first half of the year compared with 2.6% for the European airports overall. And this is on top of the 33% traffic growth versus pre-COVID levels that we have experienced between '19 and 2025, which is also much higher than the recovery of our Pier. Let's move to Slide #7. So during '26, we continued to make some good progress across our -- both our aeronautical and commercial activities, Non-Air Activities. On the airline side, our home-based carriers continue to expand their networks, Aegean and Sky Express, they have added 3 new destinations. While in the visiting -- in the sector of the visiting carriers, we welcomed 4 new airlines, IndiGo, TAP, AnimaWings and Air Cairo and also 11 new destinations. I think it's important in this development and destinations, additional destinations to stress the point about our long-haul footprint, which continued to strengthen. So we had new services to New Delhi and Mumbai with IndiGo and to Dallas with American Airlines. And all of this is not affecting 2026. We have announced for next year a new long-haul route for 2027 with Alaska Airlines to Seattle. On the commercial side, we continued to enhance the passenger experience with new concepts, store upgrades and the further development of our Best of Greece strategy, our Best of Greece proposition with 3 out of the 6 new concepts being part of this Best of Greece strategy. And we also benefited from the improved traffic mix coming especially from the high-spending markets. And overall, our efforts were once again recognized by the industry with Athens Airport ranking first at Routes Europe 2026 among airports serving more than 20 million passengers, following a number of distinctions that we also received in 2025. Finally, what you see also the information at the bottom of the slide, I think it's important to note an operational development relating to our change of status from non-coordinated airport to schedules facilitated during summer, allowing for a smoother traffic growth during the nonpeak hours, also addressing ATC constraints. Furthermore, for the upcoming winter season of '26, '27, we will transition to coordinated airport due to the scheduled heavy maintenance works on our runways. Moving to the next Slide #8. Allow me to highlight a couple of important corporate developments. First of all, with regards to the Scrip Dividend program, following the strong shareholder participation in '25, we saw another very high take-up in '26 at almost 88%, generating approximately EUR 83 million of additional Air Activities capital. Combining this with the 2025 contribution from the program, this brings the total capital generated through our Scrip program to approximately EUR 168 million over the next -- over the first 2 years. And just as a reminder, the program continues to support the funding of our long-term investment plan and remains fully aligned with our regulatory framework eligible for the 15% return on equity. The second important development was our successful debut participation in the international debt capital markets. In June, we issued a EUR 500 million senior unsecured bond with a 3.75% coupon. We experienced a very strong demand. Orders exceeded EUR 2.6 billion, which is more than 5x oversubscription. The proceeds of this bond will be used primarily to refinance existing debt and general corporate purposes. I think it's important also to note that AIA was also assigned its inaugural investment-grade ratings by S&P with BBB+ and stable outlook and by Moody's with Baa1, also stable outlook, which is an important recognition. We think this is an important recognition for the company's robust financial profile and our strong traffic performance. Now moving to Slide #8. I would like here to share an important update on our airport expansion program. Following a strategic review, our Board decided to restructure the implementation of the 40MAP expansion plan towards a more phased and modular approach. I think it's important to mention here that the first phase of investments will commence immediately, while in parallel, we will assess strategic opportunities for additional capacity beyond 40MAP. Let me get into a few more details about the rationale of this strategic decision. It's driven by 3 main factors. Firstly, traffic. Traffic continues to grow faster than originally expected and despite the geopolitical tension and the high fuel prices. And this creates an opportunity for the company to evaluate the potential for further capacity development. Secondly, we aim to minimize disruptions, taking into account, first of all, evolving design parameters such as the entry-exit system and the capacity constraints and delays from ATC, together with valuable information we received through the ECI process related to constructability challenges and impact on operations and commercial activities. This together reinforced the case for a more phased approach with lower construction impact on the core and the existing core terminal areas. Finally, as a third factor, the geopolitical developments, although they have not materially affected traffic growth so far, there is continued uncertainty, which further justifies the value of maintaining greater flexibility before committing to large-scale CapEx contracts. So our strategic objectives are quite clear. We deliver near-term capacity required, preserving maximum flexibility and strategic optionality for the airport's longer-term development. This means that we will be accommodating current and future demand, reduce construction risks, protect airport operations and service quality through construction, throughout construction and during the construction period, and we will minimize the adverse impact on commercial activities during construction, the latter being a very important value driver. So we will proceed immediately. We will -- with the following actions, we will discontinue -- we have decided to discontinue the current ECI process and immediately launch an open construction tender for the first phase of the 40MAP program, which comprises the South Terminal Pier, the expansion of the Satellite building and associated works in the surrounding area. This first phase is consistent with the 40MAP implementation plan and ensures that near-term capacity delivery continues without delay. In parallel, we will launch a thorough evaluation of alternative expansion configurations and alternative implementation strategies, including options offering additional capacity beyond 40MAP, taking the opportunity from the higher traffic-growth rate. At the same time, the expansion works which are underway continue as planned. These include the Northwest Apron, the Multi-Storey Car Park and the VIP Terminal. And we will also accelerate targeted investments in certain passenger processing facilities, which include passport control and security screening upgrading and capacity. And finally, we will -- we plan to launch next year in the second half of 2027, a new tender for the initial phase of the North Terminal expansion site to address -- this is going to be sized to address our midterm capacity requirement. Again, this phase is in line with the sequence of investments comprising the 40MAP capacity [indiscernible] expansion plan. So as a key message, we maintain momentum, immediately proceeding with the first phase of the 40MAP expansion plan, which we restructure towards a more phased and modular approach. We lower execution risk, we reduce disruption and we maintain flexibility to capture future capacity opportunities beyond 40MAP. The total CapEx until 2030 for airport expansion projects is estimated at EUR 950 million from '26 until 2030 included. Now let's move to the next slide. This is a picture of the key projects to be implemented over the next years. The key point to remember here again, is that 40MAP remains our reference plan and is subject to improved strategic alternatives that can get us to further capacity development and additional strategic value for the company. So the first phase, which you see in green color includes the South Pier of the main terminal building and the expansion of the Satellite Terminal and also some works, some targeted investments in passenger processing facilities within the terminal, but which will not cause any material disruptions. We expect to launch the tender for the South and the Satellite Terminal building immediately within October 2026. And in parallel, we plan to launch the North Wing expansion tender in the second half of '27. Together, these projects are designed to address our short to midterm capacity needs, delivering approximately 60% additional commercial space by 2030, '31, significantly limiting disruption to airport operations and also significantly reducing disruption to our commercial activities during the construction period. The remaining elements of the 40MAP plan, including this North Oculus and the East Wing expansion remain part of the reference plan, but their implementation will be evaluated in the context of the strategic alternatives we will be evaluating over the upcoming period. I think it's important also to mention here that this approach is in full coordination with our regulator, HCAA, which allowing us to continue investing in capacity now and preserving the flexibility to evaluate and improve strategic configuration if one is identified. And with that, I would like to hand over to Nadia for the next section on the financial performance.

Okay. Thank you, George. So going into more detail on the financial results during the first half of the year in Page 12. Total revenues recorded during the H1, excluding the IFRIC impact, is at EUR 299.6 million. 75% of this revenue comes from the regulated part of the business, the Air Activities and the remaining from the Non-Air Activities. The drop recorded compared to the previous year is 2.8%. It was expected, as the CEO mentioned before, and is mainly attributed to the Air Activities performance and the temporary reduction of our passenger terminal fee until the end of April 2026 and this targeted reduction aims to align the full-year activity performance with the regulatory cap. At the same time, Non-Air Activities increased compared to the previous year, marginally below the traffic increase by 3.5%. First of all, the Commercial -- the Terminal Commercial segment was solid despite the geopolitical headwinds. It was affected by the good strong performance of F&B and specialty retail. At the same time, we had some benefit from initiatives, our initiatives, including improved terms from renewed concession agreements. As regards to another segment of the Non-Air stream, the property and other revenues, this recorded a significant increase, helped by the strong performance of the exhibition center. And at the same time, as expected, the parking -- the car parking revenues recorded a decrease because they are affected by the capacity impact we have due to ongoing works for the construction of the Multi-Storey Car Park that commenced during the summer of 2025. Moving on to the next page, Page 13. Total operating expenses recorded during the first half of the year was at EUR 123.7 million. They demonstrated an increase compared to the previous year, 4.4%. This number includes also the variable portion of the Grant of Rights Fee, the concession fee that the company pays to the Greek state. This was decreased this year compared to the previous year because it is based on lower profitability. Excluding the variable portion of the Grant of Rights Fee, operating expenses were at EUR 101 million, recording an increase of 7.5%, and this mainly reflects the continued investment of the company in our operations to preserve quality of the service. In more detail, this is linked with additional resources we need to have to support traffic volumes and to manage effectively the entry-exit system impact on operations, on inflationary pressures and also on the increases in minimum salaries implemented in Greece in April 2026, and of course, the full-year effect of the increases we had in April 2025. All this additional cost was partly offset by lower utility costs as is the outcome of the implementation of the Net Zero Carbon Emission project that includes energy-saving initiatives. Moving on to the next page, Page 14. We recorded adjusted EBITDA EUR 168.5 million and net profit EUR 81.4 million. Both demonstrated a decrease compared to the previous year. It was expected. As we said for the revenues performance, this is fully linked with the performance of the regulated part of the business. It is important to note here that both the share, the contribution of the Air Activities in the -- on the profitability as the -- also the comparison with the previous year that one can see for the first half of the year does not really reflect the expectation we have for the full year since this temporary reduction of the airport charges ended in April. And we expect to fully realize our potential for maximum profitability as allowed by regulation at full-year level. Now moving to the next page and focusing on the Air Activities and the status of the regulated till following the second-year implementation of the Scrip Dividend program. And after taking into account also inflation in 2026, the inflated equity, the Air Activities capital upon which we are allowed to have up to 15% net profit from the regulated part of the business is at EUR 737.7 million. With the performance of the Air Activity segment during the first half of the year, we left an unrecovered the so-called Carry Forward amount we recovered in the following period of EUR 16 million. So this is the status of the Air Activities till at the end of June. And in line with what we said before, we expect this to be fully depleted by the end of the year. Moving on to Page 16. The net debt of the Company at the end of June was at the level of EUR 690.8 million with low leverage, net debt to adjusted EBITDA at 1.8x. As the CEO mentioned at the beginning, we had also the issuance of a bond in June, and this expanded the company's international investor base and reinforced the financial flexibility. The profitability performance of the company, the healthy profitability is also linked with healthy cash flow generation. Overall, the free cash flow in the first half of the year was EUR 127.5 million and cash conversion close to 76%. The CapEx we spent during the first half of the year was EUR 41 million. As we will continue to invest in expanding the airport, one can expect that the conversion -- cash conversion rates will be lower. But generally, the company's financial stability is fully safeguarded because we have secured debt financing. We have the Scrip Dividend program. We have also the access now we have broadened the company's access to diversified funding sources. And of course, we also have a strong financial position. And with that, I will hand it back to the CEO for the outlook and the final remarks.

Thank you, Nadia. Let's have a look at the -- to the outlook for 2026. First of all, in terms of traffic forecast, we expect passenger traffic to grow in the mid-single digits, which is an upward revision from our previous low single-digit guidance. The underlying demand fundamentals remain supportive, although we continue to monitor the geopolitical situation closely. Now despite the regional uncertainty, traffic performance has indeed remained resilient and our medium- to long-term traffic growth assumption remains in the low single-digit area. On the airport expansion program, we discussed that extensively earlier. We are restructuring the implementation of the 40MAP plan towards a more phased and modular approach, preserving our flexibility to assess capacity opportunities beyond the 40MAP. We discussed immediate actions in detail. We are -- we have discontinued. We have decided -- our Board decided yesterday to discontinue the current ECI tender process, and we will immediately launch the tender for the first phase of expansion of the terminals. We are also launching a comprehensive evaluation of the alternatives beyond 40MAP. At the same time, the ongoing works continue as planned, the Multi-Storey Car Park, the VIP Terminal and the Northwest Apron projects. While in parallel, we are accelerating targeted investments in specific passenger processing facilities. And we plan to launch the tender for the initial phase of the North Terminal expansion in the second half of 2027. The total CapEx through the end of 2030 for capacity expansion is currently expected at approximately EUR 950 million. Looking to the revenues. In Air Activities, we continue to expect broadly stable yield per passenger from airport aeronautical charges in ADF. Our annual Air Activities profitability is expected to be aligned with a 15% return on equity regulatory framework, and this is also supported by the multiyear Scrip Dividend program. In the Non-Air Activities, we expect revenue per passenger to remain broadly flat in 2026. This is an improved projection versus the original. And importantly, this -- the revised expansion approach is expected to materially reduce disruption during the construction phase, and we expect approximately 60% additional commercial space targeted for delivery by 2030, '31. On the EBITDA level, we continue to expect the adjusted EBITDA margin to remain approximately 100 basis points below our long-term 60% target, reflecting the continued investments in operations in order to preserve the service quality as traffic continues to grow and the expansion program progresses. And finally, for net income, we continue to expect approximately EUR 200 million net profit for 2026. And of course, we remain committed to our dividend policy of distributing 100% of profits available for distribution. Moving to the last slide. I would like to -- here to leave you with 7 key messages. First, our traffic remains strong, another year, a record year despite the geopolitical headwinds. Second, our financial performance remains healthy with solid fundamentals broadly in line with our targets and regulatory framework. Third, the airport expansion program continues. The first phase is moving forward immediately, while the projects already underway continue as planned. Fourth, 40MAP remains our reference plan, while we thoroughly evaluate strategic alternatives for further capacity development. Fifth, the more modular approach materially de-risks the investment program, reducing execution risk, better protecting our airport operations and our service levels during construction. Number six, we minimize disruptions during construction of the first phases, avoiding interventions in the core terminal areas and providing material upside in our commercial activities during 2030, '31. And finally, we are preserving long-term strategic flexibility. Any alternative configuration will be pursued if it demonstrates clear strategic and financial benefits and will be meeting all technical, regulatory and approval requirements. So overall, we believe we are entering an exciting phase of AIA's development with strong position and momentum, solid traffic, healthy profitability, continued investment and greater flexibility to support our airports long-term growth. And with that, I would like to thank you for your attention, and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

[Operator Instructions] The first question is from the line of Stamatios Draziotis with Eurobank Equities.

Firstly, on the expansion strategy, you explicitly referred to configurations that could provide capacity beyond 40 million passengers. Should we interpret this as an indication that the 40 million passengers plan may ultimately be replaced by a larger capacity solution? Or is this simply preserving optionality at this stage? And related to that is how should we reconcile the EUR 950 million CapEx envelope with the previous budgets and timing? So is the EUR 950 million a lower cumulative spend because of deferral? Or does it reflect a potentially more efficient design?

Thank you. First of all, the evaluation of additional capacity is something that we're going to start immediately. So we cannot provide currently specific capacity, which we would like to invest in. This is something that we will be able in the upcoming period to evaluate. But as I said earlier, we are -- because of the additional traffic growth, we want to be able to capitalize on this opportunity and build further capacity beyond 40MAP. So we are implementing based on the 40MAP plan, which remains, as I said, the reference plan, we are implementing the first phases. These 2 parts of the 40MAP plan that I showed earlier, the one in the green color are exactly the first phases that were planned to be executed through the ECI process. But of course, we want to retain our flexibility and the modular approach that we mentioned earlier in case we decide eventually to build more capacity than the existing -- than the one reserved in the existing 40MAP plan. The EUR 950 million is, of course, part of the total expansion cost, total part of the 40MAP. So this is the cost that is -- that includes the ongoing works, the MSP, the Northwest Apron, the VIP Terminal plus the cost for this development that you see on the picture here with green color until 2030. I think it's important also to mention that with this restructuring of our plan, we are not causing any further delays. The overall time line is, to a large part, respected. Of course, we are currently at the second half of 2026. Our projection for fully finalizing a 40MAP, I would think it would be reasonable to expect that this can be now realized with, let's say, around the end of 2033. So this is the overall time plan for -- in case we proceed with the full implementation of the 40MAP. I think this sums up the answer to your questions, hopefully.

Just a follow-up. The -- if the eventual capacity solution extends materially beyond EUR 40 million, should we assume that the current Scrip program could be extended? Or would you initially prefer to use the available debt headroom, which admittedly is still very comfortable?

It's very premature to say. I think based on the ADA, on the Concession Agreement, we will obviously try to see whether we can use further Scrip -- proceed from a further Scrip program. But currently, we cannot commit to anything. Currently, we only have this 4-year program that has been approved by the general assembly 2 years ago.

Great. And just a final question on the -- on Non-Air yields, which you flagged they have been quite resilient given the circumstances and you basically say that one of the objectives of the revised plan is to minimize disruption to commercial activities. Can you maybe quantify the yield drag embedded in the previous plan that you actually now hope to avoid? And in essence, how this should lead us to think differently about Non-Air revenue per passenger over the next 3, 4 years compared to the previous situation?

During the previous situation, we had assumed that during the construction, we would lose some commercial space within the terminal. So this would mean that we would have lower revenue per passenger during the year. While what we say now is that we will start investing in the South and the North. We will not intervene in the core terminal. So we will not lose capacity -- commercial capacity, commercial spaces, and we will target to have revenue per passenger stable throughout the years. And of course, following the additional square meters built with the expansion, we expect 60% growth of the commercial square meters, and we guide for an upside and increase after completion of high single-digit growth on spending per passenger and revenue per passenger for 2 consecutive years. This is the guidance.

The next question is from the line of Dario Maglione with BNP Paribas.

Can I clarify on the CapEx? So the EUR 950 million that you talked about, this is not to bring the capacity to 40 million. There needs to be more CapEx to bring the capacity to 40 million or maybe more? So that's the first question, just to clarify. And then in terms of OpEx per passenger, as you mentioned, when you exclude the variable fee, the growth was around 7.5% year-on-year in H1. Shall we expect something similar in H2?

Yes. As regard the second question, for the OpEx per passenger, excluding the variable portion of the Grant of Rights Fee during the first half of the year, we recorded EUR 6.42 per passenger. And this is more or less we expect that this will remain broadly at this level throughout the year also during the second half of the year. Now with regards to the first question, so for the implementation of the 40MAP eventually, we would need more CapEx than EUR 950 million. And as the CEO said, EUR 950 million includes the part of the first plan of the terminal expansion that we mentioned plus the ongoing works for the MSP, Northwest Apron, VIP. Now as regards to the overall cost, the original estimate we had back in 2023, we were seeing EUR 1.3 billion total 40MAP expansion CapEx in 2024 prices. Now based on the construction cost inflation and the feedback and the insight we have during design, ECI process, we expect that the overall cost would be 30% higher than originally estimated. So, in '26, prices is the EUR 950 million. So you can do the -- you can see the remaining part of the CapEx when we will need to complete the 40MAP or if we enter into another route for further capacity increase, there will be another estimate.

Obviously, if we decide that there is a strategic alternative for more capacity that provides better value for the airport and for the company, obviously, once we have that, we'll provide revised guidance.