Avolta AG (AVOL) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Dufry Full Year 2021 Trading Update Conference Call and Live Webcast. I am Paul, the Chorus Call operator. [Operator Instructions] And the conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Mr. Julián Díaz, CEO of Dufry. You will now be joined into the conference room.

Hello. Good afternoon, good morning, depending on where you are. Thank you for participating, and welcome to Dufry's full year 2021 results presentation. It's a very great pleasure to see physically all of you here. I think the last time was in 2020 at the beginning of the pandemic with the mask and with not very happy faces. I hope that today the situation is a bit different. But it's very important that we start physical meetings step by step, and we feel the people again, and we obviously consider this as a reopening phase. Today, we are -- part of the presentation is Mr. Juan Carlos-Torres, Chairman of the Board of Directors; as always, Yves Gerster, CFO. He's also a good friend since a long time ago; Xavier Rossinyol, Dufry's designated CEO; and myself, trying to obviously present what happened in 2021. We are going to start with our introductory remarks done by our Chairman, Juan Carlos-Torres, please.

Hello. Thank you, and welcome to everyone. As we disclosed recently, we have announced the succession plan for our current CEO, Julián that is here with us. The designated CEO is Xavier Rossinyol that will take -- he will take over the role of CEO in June 1 of this year. Xavier was with -- Dufry's CFO from 2004 to 2012, and the COO of our Asian Eastern operations from 2012 to 2015, when he left our company to become the CEO of gategroup, one of the leading companies -- worldwide leading company of the airline catering. Xavier tenure as a CEO of gategroup was extremely successful, growing the company from revenues of 2.9 billion to [ 6-point billion ] in 2019. And while it was public, the share price went from CHF 30 in early 2015 to CHF 53 in late 2016. We're extremely happy that he has agreed to return to us with a wealth of additional experience in the industry and public markets, plus the 11 years that he spent with us in Dufry. I also would like to express to Julián our internal gratitude -- eternal, not internal, eternal gratitude from both the Dufry Board and myself for the outstanding job that he has done for our company. Under his leadership, and people forget this, Dufry went from being a company, a small company in Basel of about, some of you remember that, from CHF 600 million in revenues to CHF 9 billion in 2019 and has risen from being the #7 among the duty-free companies to be recognized and the #1 Dufry company in the world and one of the leaders in the industry. He is culminating accomplishment is Dufry's '21 results that you will see now. Julián has transformed Dufry into a more competitive, efficient and profitably -- profitable company during the worst possible historical period for this industry. His departure is a very hard thing for me personally since I've been working with Julián since 1992 in different duty-free ventures and in different continents. Julián will be in -- [ effectively ] on leave from -- after he steps down as a CEO for 9 months, and he will be available to collaborate with Xavi as needed. So from all of us, Julián, from all the Dufry stakeholders, thank you.

Okay. After this, obviously, kind words and nice work. Thank you very much, Juan Carlos, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to, obviously, all the members of the Board and the management team over the years for this close collaboration that we have worked all together and all aligned with the same objective. Let's continue with the presentation, and we are going to use, as in previous times, the document that we disclosed this morning in our website. Let's move to Page #3, and let's comment on the agenda. The agenda, as in previous times, we'll try to recover ideas about 2021, mainly group highlights. Then we will go through the business performance. We will move from the business performance to the financial performance, and we will try to provide, obviously within the limitations of the situation, an outlook for the year 2022. If we move now to Page #5, group highlights. We are going to start with the financial highlights. Financial highlights speak for themselves. I think this year, we have been able, altogether, all the stakeholders in the business to align the company and to move the company to a set of financial statements and information that will be shared with all of you that really shows what is the value of this company, where the resilience of this company is. We have modified operationally the company. We have strengthened the financial structure of the company. And finally, what is the outcome is a company that with CHF 5 billion less sales in 2021 compared with 2019 has been able to reach a breakeven equity free cash flow level and a positive adjusted operating profit of CHF 374 million. The -- I think the most important headlines are already reflected in this slide. Organic growth increased by 53.2% compared with 2020, providing confidence in the overall recovery. I think this is the critical point. What happened in '21 is something that is very important for the future, is every time that restrictions and limitations to traveling, especially quarantines and release, the situation improves very quickly. Last year, the main drivers or the main regions that drove the building -- the business were especially regions in America, U.S., Central America, Caribbean and South America and EMEA. And along the year, also, we have seen reopenings and impact -- positive impact from South America. Probably, what is still an ongoing problem is Asia. Asia Pacific has been quite stable in the negative side because most of the countries are obviously subject to restrictions and limitations, especially quarantines when you need to travel. I think in terms of the operating results, as I just mentioned, we have reached adjusted operating profit margin of 9.6%. Adjusted operating profit in value of CHF 374 million. It's a very good sign that from the operational point of view, the company has been able and navigate through the most important crisis with good results and positive results in the operational level. Dufry continued, and that's the reason what obviously happened, that the company continued with a very strict cost control and cash management control. In terms of expenses, and we will comment on that later on, we have reached CHF 1.78 billion of minimum annual guarantees reliefs and negotiations reliefs with landlords in general. And personnel expenses, CHF 607 million and operational expenses, CHF 234 million, significantly ahead of the first disclosure information that we did last year in March 2021 when we started the year. Positive equity free cash flow during the second part of the year. We have reached with this level of sales, CHF 242 million. That is very similar, CHF 243 million was in 2019 compared with the record year in equity free cash flow generation. Three obviously aspects that are giving me the impression that the company is better prepared and stronger than before for the reopening phase. Underpinning this Dufry's cash flow conversion, I think, is the opportunity and the flexible cost structure of the company. This company has shown opposite to, obviously, previous probably understandings that the cost structure is very flexible and can be adapted to the reality of the business very fast. In 2020, it was in 6 months. In 2021, I think it was along the year. If we move to Page 6, Slide 6 and comment on the business highlights. At the end of 2021, we are very close to being fully opening again. In December, we had opened around 88% of the total sales capacity. And by March this year, in a few days, we will reach 93% of the capacity already reopened in terms of self-possibilities. The opening strategy proved to be good and resilient, and we are going to continue with that in terms of openings and closings. We are reopening based on shop-by-shop case, based on the performance of each of the locations and basically taking into consideration of the number of passengers going through the different airports and locations where we are operating. The last 24 months has demonstrated the importance of the strong relationship that we have with the trusted partners. Dufry is well recognized, and I am going to mention different aspects of what happened in 2021 by landlords, suppliers, share and bond shareholders, lending banks and other business partners. Thank you to all of them because this happened because the support of all the stakeholders in the business. The number one is resilient gross profit margin. I think it's very important to comment on that. Obviously, depending on the reported gross profit margin impacted temporarily due to the mix of the income we had last year, especially the wholesale activities that are in Hainan. We have increased the retail gross profit margin 120 basis points compared with 2019. Good support by suppliers. Minimum annual guarantees already commented many times, but let me comment one thing. In 2020 and in 2021, we have renegotiated, as we commented on in the past, because many questions raised in the past were regarding what happened is the minimum annual guarantees are obviously beating the company. We told at that time, and we are confirming today, that the partnership with the landlords exists. And today, we have accumulated CHF 1.6 billion renegotiated minimum annual guarantees in 2 years, 2020 and 2021. In terms of assets to financial facilities, we have reached close to CHF 3 billion equity and debt funds, renewed covenant waivers 2x. The last time has been announced 1 or 2 weeks ago, and reducing the net debt to CHF 3.079 billion, same level of net debt even before the crisis. Also in my opinion, relevant in terms of business highlights, we have renewals and renewed contract in 2021, included the U.K., Teesside and Cardiff, Martinique, French Guiana, Jamaica, Porto Alegre, Brazil, Dominican Republic, et cetera, with a total of 9,800 square meters of commercial space. In order to really provide a bit of light regarding what happened in the company, we have put on the right side of this slide two things. It's the level that's obviously of the business basically in commercial and in operations. In commercial, it's very relevant to say that we have learned a lot along the process of pandemic. We have invested in new assortments. In fact, most of these assortments are already ongoing or already displayed in the shops. Shops that are displaying today more sustainable products, more local products and well-being products. Also we have developed the new -- what we identified as the new store of the future. And finally, and I think this is, in my opinion, even more relevant, we have developed a global marketing digitalization aspect that starting with Alibaba and the mini application that we have opened in one of their platforms will continue in the future, obviously, providing opportunities to our customers worldwide and specifically Asian customers. In terms of operations, I think there are 2 aspects. We have started 17 initiatives, initiatives focused in improving the efficiency of all the shops that covers all the steps in the operation in one shop every day. And the second one is we have started also a program. So far, 50 airports are collaborating and will be for all the landlords, not only for airports, where we have created a regular base relationship with these airports for exchanging information and projecting, if there are things that we need to correct what initiatives we should implement. Let's move to Page #7. We have provided two [ normalized ] scenarios since the beginning of the year and related cost and cash flow sensitivities in 2020 as well as in 2021. I obviously would like to comment again. The uncertainty still is very high. Providing specific information at this stage of the development of some aspects that we are going to comment later on is very difficult, but it was also very difficult in 2020 and 2021. Through 2021, we were able to upgrade our initial estimates based on the agreements we achieved with the landlords. At the beginning of the year, we were commenting on CHF 300 million -- around CHF 300 million. We have finished the year in full year in CHF 1.078 billion. It's not by chance. It's current and completely ongoing process of negotiating with the airports. In terms of personnel expenses and operational expenses, it is something similar. We started with around CHF 600 million, and we have finished around CHF 900 million, CHF 842 million. On the right side of this slide, probably it is good to comment that the consequence of this negotiation processes and these reorganizations were the improve of the projected equity free cash flow at the beginning of the year, CHF 450 million -- around CHF 450 million to the minus CHF 33 million that we finished 2021. In Page #9 -- I think in Page #8, sorry, I think we not only progressed with the financial KPIs, but also we have progressed a lot with the nonfinancial KPIs. I would like to emphasize the four focus that we communicated to the market: focus in customers; focus in trusted partner; focus in employees' experience; and focus in environmental. In the first one, regarding customer focus, we have also launched our new sustainable product identification initiative. I commented on that 1 minute ago, across 128 airports with 171 shops globally, helping our customers to shop this type of products easily. In regard to the objective as a trusted partner, a comprehensive review of Dufry's remuneration framework was conducted with the outcome in regard to increased transparency and overall setup displayed in our remuneration report. Regarding the employee experience, we have evolved our diversity and inclusion engagement by setting dedicated responsibilities in the Group Executive Committee. And finally, on protecting environment, if we move to the next page, Page #9, on the environmental side, we have defined the science-based targets to achieve by 2025 neutrality in terms of climate impact. In terms of the Scope #3, we have 2 targets. One is cover 50% of the product procurement through a science-based target, committing with suppliers by 2027 and reduce carbon footprint of our upstream logics by 2030 and reaching 28%. If we move to Page 11, let's comment on organic growth and evolution of sales and turnover in 2021. Organic growth for full year, as I commented on, stood at plus 53.2% versus 2020. Important is also the acceleration in Q4. In Q4, the average growth in organic compared with 2020 was 179%. The turnover progress is clearly visible, and we are progressing towards achieving 2019 levels, especially in November 2021. For Q4 2021, Dufry reached already 67% of 2019 sales level. Full year performance and obviously supported by specific regions in the second part of the year, Americas, especially U.S. Central America, Caribbean, South America during the last part of the year and EMEA during the summer and the extended summer. South America is a very interesting case because around September, October last year, they started to accelerate. I think that it is still happening today. Step-by-step and gradually, they are reopening and increasing sales. Asia Pacific was still largely impacted by the respective governments with zero COVID case. This is something that has not changed, and we are in the level, obviously, of the pandemic -- during the pandemic level of sales. If we move -- yes, if we move now to Page -- or Slide 12 and comment on turnover and organic growth by region. Looking at the regional performance, best performing were Americas, especially the U.S., Central America and Caribbean. The region reached 73% of 2019 turnover levels in Q4 2021. In traditional travel from the U.S. to Central America as well as the opening of the transatlantic roads on November were supportive. South America started to trend upwards, especially in Argentina, Colombia and Ecuador, in line with the vaccination progress and the reopening of the countries in the region. EMEA saw a significant step-up in July and gradual improvement ever since. Best performing at the Mediterranean, including Turkey, Greece, Eastern Europe, Russia, Middle East and Africa from -- especially benefiting from leisure travelers, mainly with obviously flexible offers because, finally, what we have seen is the airlines and tour operators require very flexible offers in terms of traveling. Also were good performance, France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland. The U.K. saw a gradual reopening after the most important restrictions were lifted. Departure destination with inbound travel to the U.K. benefited from new regulations related to Brexit. As you all know, and we commented on this specific point, all the countries with destination in the European Union with destinations U.K. now are able to sell in duty-free the whole assortment of products. In terms of Asia Pacific, still largely impacted by the respective government zero-case approach. I am not going to comment on that any longer because it's the same every time. Let's move to Page 13, net sales by region and sector. Very interesting what happened here. A split of the net sales by region, similar than in 2020 as recovery pattern has continued exactly the same. Performance was driven by domestic and interregional travel, with the manned convenience stores, food and beverage and other duty pay settings leading of this recovery. Asia Pacific is still impacted, but it's especially important to comment that there are 3 locations with significant step-by-step recovery. One is Macau, the other one is domestic in China, and the third one is the reopening of Australia. Distribution centers were temporarily impacted in a positive way because we moved all the wholesale activity to Hainan to the distribution centers. In 2022, the situation will be different because we have allocated the responsibility of buying the merchandise for Hainan in our subsidiary in Hainan with Alibaba. If we move now to Page 14, and we comment on performance by channel. Airports continued to be prevalent channel, 84% of share, another proof point that the resuming of travel is happening very fast. Dufry benefit also from the other channels. Other channels is the wholesale activity. That obviously is mentioned it in the chart on the left part. Whereas ferries returned strongly in U.K. to Europe and North of Europe, the situation with the cruise lines still is very, very small. We have reopened 4 cruise lines, but the occupancy has been still very low. The cruise lines companies are expecting to resume throughout 2022 more probably. If we continue with explanation, performance by category in Page 15. Food and beverage and confectionery continued to obviously drive the share versus 2019. And in 2020, it happened the same thing because we reopened first the convenient part and the duty paid part. Expected -- especially during the first part of 2022, expected trend is confirmed. Luxury with obviously lowering -- lower share compared with 2019, but increased step by step and increased gradually, depending on the reopening because still, there are several shops within this 10% of the business that is still closed down that are operating this type of products. If we move to page -- to the next page, Page 18, let's comment on the square meter space development and square meter development. Total number of square meters by the end of the year, commercial square meters, 470,000. We opened 9,800 new ones, gross, and we have refurbished around 19,250. In regard to opportunities, I think I commented on several before, we won in many jurisdictions and many countries and highlights among refurbishments are new openings and renovations in Rio Galeão, Shopping megastore in Brazil, the extensive ready sign at Milan Linate International Airport and the completely renewed Brookstone concept in the U.S. With the opening of our first full seated restaurant in the U.S. with a name Plum Market, we are really moving forward, as we have commented on many times, in the food and beverage market in the U.S. I think we have explained in the past about the equity story with Hudson, and we are continuing to move forward in order to deliver more growth in the U.S. Also relevant to comment, Hudson nonstop fully digitalized concept with Amazon. These stores were pioneered in the U.S., in line with Dufry's digitalization efforts and strategy. We have also, and is very relevant for the future, pipeline total square meters of 38,700, in line with other opportunities that we commented on this number that has been moving from 35,000 to 45,000. One comment regarding Mova Mall. Mova Mall in Hainan has been a tremendous success. The information is public. I think in Hainan, the government disclosure everything is the second most important operation after the -- obviously, the historical one in terms of sales per square meter. And in terms of sales, it's improving this year around 50% on sales. I remind everybody that we don't consolidate because we cannot invest in Hainan yet as a foreign international operator, but we have a different agreement that I explained during past calls. Let's move now, and I will hand to Yves for commenting on the financial summary.

Thank you, Julián, and welcome to everyone in the room and also on the line from my side as well. It's really great to be back and have the physical full year presentation back again with an in-person meeting. Also I have met most of you already during the physical road show we have had in the second half of the year 2021. Normalization and strong recovery, we have also seen in our financial performance during 2021. Starting with our income statement with the key KPIs at the bottom of the Page 18, our operating results and our net results have substantially improved compared to the year 2020. Adjusted operating profit stood at CHF 374.9 million, an improvement of close to CHF 2 billion versus the previous year. Also our net results with adjusted net profit and adjusted net earnings per share already generated positive results again. The strong results reflect the successful cost control executed throughout the year, including the management of personnel expenses, other expenses and concession fees. Julián already commented on personnel expenses and other expenses, so let me give some additional details on the accounting treatment of the waivers of minimum annual guarantee, or short MAG, we have achieved throughout 2021. Dufry reflected CHF 1,077.8 billion of MAG relief in 2021. Of the total amount, an amount of CHF 847.1 million were accounted as MAG relief under the P&L line lease expenses. Thereof, CHF 27.3 million have already been accounted and considered as MAG waivers and communicated to the market in 2020. The remaining part refers to lease modifications in accordance with requirements of IFRS. Those leads to a lower depreciation of right of use of CHF 92.7 million to lower lease interest of CHF 47.9 million and lower variable concessions of CHF 33.7 million in 2021. An amount of CHF 85.1 million will benefit in future years. Turning to depreciation and amortization as the next line impacted accounting-wise. There are 4 effects impacting our 2021 D&A line. The first one is impairments done in the year before, in 2020, which have a lower D&A already in 2021. The second effect is a partial reversal of the 2020 impairments done to MAG relief achieved in 2021. The third effect, it's almost mechanically required to generate additional impairments in 2021, which will lower D&A from 2022 onwards. And lastly, the derecognition from IFRS 16 of some of the contracts related to change in the agreement. I do not want to linger on this topic as we are mostly talking about the timing shift of switch between lease expenses, depreciation and amortization, of right of use and lease interest here. The overall impact on our rent results over time, i.e., over several years, will be 0. So again, it's a timing shift rather than anything else. Our financial expenses benefited from significant lower lease interest, partially offset by some transaction-related costs. Please recall that we have executed a comprehensive refinancing of around CHF 1.6 billion early in 2021. Income taxes and minorities increased due to higher profit before taxes and net profit, respectively, which we achieved during 2021. The overall net result as adjusted net profit attributable to equity holders turned positive and meaningfully improved CHF 23.4 million for the full year 2021. Turning now to Slide 18 and a closer look to the gross profit margin. Gross profit margin stood at 56.5% for the full year 2021. This is an increase of 270 basis points compared to 2020 and in line with our expectations. As communicated, we expect gross profit to recover in line with the business recovery. Most notably, our retail margin already provided to be very resilient in 2021. The main -- the retail margin saw an increase of 120 basis points compared to 2019. This was due to a strong demand of returning travelers, and it was further supported by the higher share of duty free for inbound customers in the U.K. The negative margin impact during 2021 was mainly related to the temporary supply of our Hainan collaboration in China through our Hong Kong-based distribution center. This effect will subside in 2022. Moving to Slide 19. Slide 19 visualizes the tight cash control and cost control we have executed throughout 2020 and also 2021. Total cost savings amounted to CHF 1,919.7 billion. At the beginning of 2021, we have provided sensitivity for concessions, personnel expenses and other expenses to the market based on the visibility we had at that moment in time. We upgraded our estimates throughout the year, and we have progressed on the agreements with our landlords and continued to manage the reopenings in a considerable way. On concession waivers, please remember, this is reflecting relief signs and achieved during 2021, but partially also related to previous year and accounted for partially in future years, as commented before. On personal expenses, our location by location reopening approach proved successful. This also includes weekly profitability driven assessments on opening times and staff requirements. On top of that, we managed a broad rollout of self-checkout systems, particularly in the U.S. We also saw some direct and indirect government support throughout the year, which has come to an end now. The reopening approach and also benefiting other expenses on top of the centralization of those accounts. Turning to the -- from P&L to the cash flow on Slide 21. For me, this is one of the highlights of the year. For the year '21, we report an equity free cash flow of minus CHF 33.4 million only. As you can see on the left side of the chart, turnover increased by about CHF 1.3 billion compared to the previous year. On the far right of the chart, you can see the corresponding increase of equity free cash flow by close to CHF 1 billion. This reflects a 73.4% conversion rate on incremental turnover. This solid result is primarily based on the efficient cost and cash flow management as well as working capital movements in line with the recovery trajectory, but also some phasing effects I will touch on, on the next slide. Moving on to Slide 23. With -- as already mentioned, equity free cash flow for the full year '21 stood at minus CHF 33.4 million. However, an outflow was largely related to the first quarter of 2021. From May to October, Dufry generated positive monthly cash flows. Equity free cash flow for the second half of '21 amounted to CHF 241.7 million, the same level as precrisis in the second half of 2019. Even in a normal cash negative fourth quarter, we have seen only limited outflows. Our 2021 quarterly equity free cash flow evolution provided a clear picture in regard to the normal seasonality of our business and working capital movements throughout the year. We discussed this already many, many times. Quarter 1 and 4 are typically impacted by the lower passenger numbers and demand. In addition, and as expressed now several times, we sourced the merchandise for the high season, i.e., quarter 3 and 4 at the beginning of the year, whereas concession fees payments for the higher summer season are typically paid with a delay of a couple of months. During the fourth quarter '21, we had some phasing effects with CapEx and tax-related cash-outs of around CHF 50 million moving from '21 to '22. The phasing effect will be reflected in our cash flow assumption for the current year. For '22, you can expect a similar cash flow pattern as in 2021, with negative equity free cash flow in quarter 1 and 4, particularly negative in quarter 1, in line with normal pattern. This will be followed by improvement throughout the year, depending on turnover. Moving on to the next slide. As in 2020 and also in 2021, we are not in a position to provide guidance for the current year. We see continued improvements and an encouraging trend in general, but the visibility on the short-term trajectory is still very low. On the one hand, I'm referring here to government responses and international alignment regarding the COVID-related health crisis. On the other hand, we are also monitoring very carefully the developments around the war in Ukraine. While our hopes are with our Ukrainian people and especially our colleagues in Odessa and their families, we do not have visibility regarding the few other developments in that regard. To increase transparency and support the market to assess potential developments, we are continuing to provide equity free cash flow sensitivities for potential turnover scenarios. As highlighted on Slide 23, in a minus 35% turnover scenario versus 2019, monthly average cash consumption would be around CHF 10 million. Assuming a minus 40% top line compared to 2019, monthly average cash consumption would be around CHF 20 million. In other words, equity free cash flow for 2022 is expected to be in the area of minus CHF 120 million to minus CHF 240 million for the full year 2022. Please recall that 2021 equity cash flow performance was influenced by around CHF 50 million shifting in CapEx and income tax. Additionally, 2021 contained PAX government support schemes in the area of around CHF 100 million, which are considered to be 0 going forward. As mentioned on the previous slide, cash flow will not follow an even pattern. In line with normal businesses operations, please expect a negative outflow for Q1, which will be followed by improvements during the rest of the year, especially during Q2 and Q3. Moving on to Slide 24 with the net debt evolution. We have significantly decreased our net debt position during the year to be explicit by CHF 264 million versus 2020. With a net debt position of CHF 3.080 billion as of December 2021, we are now below precrisis level as of December 2019. During the first half 2021, we have successfully executed a comprehensive refinancing of overall CHF 1.6 billion. This allows us to balance our net debt profile in regard to maturities and interest rates. Relevant maturities are only coming up in 2024. Our interest rates are fixed for about 80% of our drawn debt facilities. Important to mention, the EUR 1.3 billion RCF continues to be fully undrawn. We also reached a very solid liquidity position at year-end of CHF 2.243 billion. Moving on to Slide 25. To continue, we have some flexibility throughout the short-term recovery. We agreed with our group of lending banks to extend the covenant holiday for an additional 4 quarter until and including June '23. The next testing will now take place in September 2023 with an increased threshold of 5x on the leverage covenant. For March 2024 and onwards, the testing will be again at the threshold of 4.5x. Our substantially improved results and solid financial position as of December 2021 make me confident for the year ahead. I am professionally and also personally looking forward to participating and shaping the short-term recovery and the midterm growth opportunities. With that said, I'm handing over back to Julián for the closing remarks.

Thank you, Yves. I suggest that we move now to Slide 27. I'm commenting on the outlook and also obviously these 2 slides that are here. Significant progress started in June 2021 when we consider the evolution of sales. With obviously broader reopening and vaccination campaigns, we saw more countries and, more often, people traveling. In our recovery since, we prolonged it especially summer season. As you all know, the reopening in most of the countries in Europe started late, around July, when the season normally starts at the beginning of May, but the summer season was longer, and the termination was delayed. I would like to remark again that, especially driven by the reopening of transatlantic routes, we had a significant improvement and good results in the U.S. and then gradually in South America. The peak in terms of recovery sales compared with 2019 was, in November 2021, driven by the vaccination campaigns and the reopening of countries. Best performing areas where Central America and Caribbean, including Dominican Republic, Mexico, Jamaica, Aruba, Bahamas, Bonaire, all performing very close to even above -- or even above 2019. In December, Central America and Caribbean reached already levels of around 92% of 2019. North America stood at 83%, with the holidays and opening of the transatlantic routes benefited through December. With especially Europe, Middle East and Africa, Mediterranean region performed best and stand at 87% of 2019 sales, and seeing high demand elasticity. The emergence of Omicron variant had an impact in January and first half of February, but sales were trending upwards again already, especially during the last 2 weeks of February, reaching levels similar to November 2021. In January, restricted traveling measures temporarily, as I said, impacted Americas and Europe, Middle East and Africa, with Asia Pacific unchanged in low levels due to the -- obviously, the COVID zero policy that I mentioned many times. But I think it's important to obviously comment on February. February started with the same trend. But during the last 2 weeks of February, the situation improved in Americas and EMEA, reaching levels similar to the highest achieved during the pandemic in November 2021. For now, it's too early to assess the full impact. The current political turmoil is in Ukraine, but the impact has been very limited so far. And during the last 2 weeks, the situation has not been significantly different than before. If we move to Page 28. The current range in relation with passenger numbers in 2022 is between 69% and 83% of 2019 levels. Put it in a different way, minus 17%, minus 31% versus 2019 number of passengers. Recovery expected depending on the source in 2024 or 2023, depending on the institution. As in the past 2 years, we are not providing, as we would hear from Yves', guidance in the current volatile environment, now made even more difficult to project anything, especially with this war ongoing in Ukraine. We see a strong demand for the resuming of traveling and travel retail as integral part of the travel retail business will benefit from that. But I think, obviously, the Easter -- the next Easter period of holidays is one, obviously, the test. The elasticity of demand has proven to be high during the last months, and we are taking confidence especially in the middle long term. If we move to Page 29, and we'll comment about the reopening. I already commented on that, but by the end of 2021, we reopened 88% of the total sales capacity. By the end of March, it is around 93% of the total sales capacity. Most of these closed down sales capacity is located in Asia Pacific. If we move to Page #30, it is an update of one of the slides that we have projected during previous conference calls and so is the evolution of customer behavior and motivations for going to travel retail shopping. We have resumed with our in-person interview in around 9,300 interviewers and believed that still gifting and attractive value proposition are main drivers for purchasing in travel retail, around 30% and 29%, both increasing versus 2019. And we are accounting for with the offering, for example, increasing range of local as increasing sustainable products, as I mentioned before. Passengers currently traveling tend to be younger. More sole travelers and more leisure and visiting family and friends oriented. However, we already see significant progress in intra-regional and intercontinental travel as well as in the resuming of the business traveler. With our high flexible commercial offer, I think we can provide the best alternative to current demand and drive recovery accordingly. Let's move to the Page #31 is a brief conclusion. I think in terms of what happened in 2021, we have commented with a lot of detail. But in steps, number one is organic growth increased by 53% compared with 2020. I think the strong trend that we have seen in the summer has been maintained until December. And with the new variant of Omicron, we had more or less 30 days between middle of December to middle of January with an impact, not huge impact, but an impact in the recovery of the sales. But we have seen during the last week, 2 weeks of February, a significant recovery. Substantial, I think, with what happened last year in terms of cost control and generation of cash is we reached CHF 374 million of adjusted operating profit. And the tight cost control, the CHF 1.9 billion, repeated during the presentation several times is really a huge increase compared what we were expecting at the beginning of the year, and we thank all the stakeholders that -- in the business that supported us to achieve this impressive figure. In terms of equity free cash flow, the numbers are already there. We reached in the second part of the year similar than in 2019 same period. And the full year, minus CHF 33 million, was the total equity free cash flow for the year 2021. I think from my side is -- everything is here, but I would like to give the opportunity to Xavier Rossinyol that is with us here and provide some insight about what he's thinking about and what you are doing now. Xavier?

Thank you, Julián. Can you hear me? Well, I'm extremely happy to be back at Dufry. I thank the Board of Directors for the appointment and the trust on me. Thank you, Julián, for the transition we already started. I know it's going to be very smooth. And I can assure you, I feel a strong responsibility to follow on your amazing legacy. We will work on the new phase always based on that. I'm looking forward to work with the entire Dufry team, not only the Board and the senior management, but every single team member. I truly believe the people in Dufry is the true strength of the company. I'm looking forward to engage, in some cases reengage, with the investor's community and the analyst community. And just a few flashes. Everything we're going to do going forward, we're going to do it together as a team. We are going to hopefully define a new cycle of success. Success defined as: one, value creation for shareholders; two, value creation for customers; and three, value creation for the communities where we are in. We will work for the long term. Of course, any modern company needs to focus on the short term to have a long term, but our focus will be at least on a cycle of 5 years. We will build on the strengths the company has, but we will not be shy to change what needs to be changed to address the challenges we have as a company as in the industry. Thank you very much, and I'm really looking forward to work with everybody. Thank you.

Thank you, Xavier. And now as is obviously the next step, the Q&A. We can obviously welcome questions we have in the room. And obviously, we then will continue with the audience through the conference call.

We have one question here in the room.

Yes. Simon from Stifel. Two questions, please. First, looking at the recent geopolitical events, any potential impact? I guess, the way I would ask the question is what was your top line scenario for 2022 before the start of the conflict. And secondly, still looking to '22, if you could share with us any details on the moving parts between the top line and free cash flow, so gross profit margin, OpEx and also working capital.

In respect to the first question, so we have taken the geopolitical situation, which we currently see around Ukraine and conflict into consideration for 2022. So this is reflected there. Obviously, we have to slightly adjust our expectations in that regard compared to what we have considered 1 or 2 weeks ago. I think that's normal. However, the impacts we are considering is not overly huge. In respect to the second question around the scenarios, did I understood correctly? You're referring to the scenarios we have shown and the bridge between the top line assumptions and the cash flow. Was that the question?

Yes.

So look there in respect to the different scenarios. In respect to personnel expenses, you can assume something similar than what we have seen before, between 17% and 18%. In respect to the OpEx, depending on the 2 scenarios, it's around 8% to 8.5%. In respect to the cash flow statement, there, you can assume that the situation is more or less unchanged in respect to interest paid. And in respect to CapEx, you can assume that our normal guidance of around 3% all through also for the 2 scenarios we have provided. In respect to concession fees, in the minus 35% scenarios, you can assume around 32% and in the minus 40%, a little bit higher than that.

On working capital, any...

So on working capital, it's the same thing as we have discussed before. So as we go along with the recovery, we assume that we can again recover the net working capital as a result of the increase of the receivables mainly. And then on top of that, what you have seen is also the shift from the procurement in Hainan, obviously, also has a certain effect there.

Questions in the room? Yes, yes.

Andrea Martel from NZZ. I was wondering, can you tell us a bit more about what's happening with Dufry in the Ukraine? How many people do you have there? And what will you do with your people?

In Ukraine, we have a small operation in Odessa. It's 2 shops. One is a duty free shop, 450 square meters. The other one is a duty paid shop, 40 square meters. There are -- or the total number of employees we have in Ukraine is 34, 35 -- I think it's 35. We have provided them with resources before the attack. And now we are in the process, because it's very complex today to support them from the financial point of view. And if there is somebody interested to leave the country, that is not everybody, because we have a list of people with the intention they have, we will try to facilitate they leave the country. So far, it is what is happening.

Look, if I can potentially also add on that. I just had a discussion with one of my colleagues on the way coming here. We know exactly from every single colleague we have in Ukraine what their intention is, if they want to leave the country or not, where they are and what their preference is, and the key needs they have at this moment in time.

Any other questions here in the room? I think we...

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Edouard Aubin from Morgan Stanley.

So three questions for me. The first one is on nationalities. So if we go pre-COVID 2019, I think Russians and, if I remember correctly, Chinese nationals were amongst the highest spend per capita. And what I have in mind, but just wanted to confirm by you with your stories that Chinese nationals were about 6% of your sales and Russia about 4%, so if you could confirm that. And also were they shopping more maybe higher gross margin categories for you guys? So that's question number one. Question number two on the cost-cutting program, which I think is CHF 400 million by 2023, sorry, if I remember correctly. If you could just give us a quick update, if you're on track, sorry, and what about the cost inflation offset to these benefits. And then lastly, if you were kind enough in the previous conference call to update us on 2023, just a sensitivity estimate for your equity free cash flow versus what sales could be. And I think you had talked about in the scenario where your sales will be 5% in '23 versus 2019, 5% below you would be close in terms of equity free cash flow, which was around CHF 320 million. Do you confirm that? I know it's -- there are a lot of moving parts these days, but if you can give us an update on the sensitivity for next year as well.

Thank you for your questions. As always, regarding the spend per passenger, the most important nationality is confirmed were Chinese. The second most important were the Russians. The total impact of Russian sales in 2019 was 2%. And the total impact of Russian destinations, including Russians, is 3.5%. Actually, it's a bit higher than 3%, but lower than 3.5%. In terms of gross profit margin, it's basically not impacted at all because these customers were very similar in terms of behavior than the standard mix of passenger we had, if we take into consideration the gross profit margin.

So in respect to the cost cutting initiative, what we have communicated before in half year and Q3; there is nothing new to be added to that. So whatever we said at that moment in time still holds true in respect to amounts drop through to cash flow and also in respect to the caveats, in respect to inflation, et cetera. You have to take into account income tax, et cetera. So nothing new to be reported in that regard. In respect to 2023, that's a difficult one. So look, it's obviously relatively difficult with the current geopolitical environment and situation we are in to comment on that again. But it's basically what we mentioned before. So it depends on a lot of variables, net working capital, et cetera. But more or less, you can still take the same assumption. But look, it's difficult to say from today's perspective.

And Julián, best of luck, by the way.

Thank you very much.

The next question comes from the line of Jörn Iffert from UBS.

First of all, Julián, all the best to you, but I'm sure we remain in discussions and conversations. And then a couple of questions, if I may. Number one, Yves, to follow up here, what you just mentioned, with the CHF 400 million cost savings and the related cash conversion, I think you pointed out in last conference call, it will be around CHF 200 million. Since then, we have seen harsh inflation on the wages in the U.S. and also on some input costs. So just to be sure, the CHF 200 million cash conversion out of the CHF 400 million cost saving is still something we should look for. And the second question would be, please, incrementally on the equity free cash flow in 2021, this was supported by MAG savings of how much in the cash statement? And also for 2022 in your equity free cash flow scenarios, what is the incremental MAG savings you're assuming here? And the last question, if I may, on Spain. The tender is coming up end of the year. May I ask a bit how you think about this? I mean, do you -- would you prolong at the current terms or not? Just to have a little bit of an idea where you're heading to.

So I go with the first one -- yes. So in respect to the cost savings and the drop-through to cash flow, sort of what you stated, Jörn, is correct. So that's what we said, and that's what still hold through. In respect to the inflation, I also repeat what I said before. It depends on how much of the inflation we will see on the cost side, we will translate or transfer to our customers. And on one hand side, in our business, historically, that is relatively easy to do, and we have discussed that in length, and there are a couple of reasons for that. But then on the other hand, it also depends on how much we want to transfer to our customers. So look at something we are assessing and see as we go along. And depending on what results, then in the best and optimal outcome from a cash flow perspective is most probably what we are going to do. In respect to question number two and three, on the MAG savings from a cash flow perspective, if I understood correctly, the answer to the second one is CHF 800 million, so that's what you see in 2021. And it's CHF 200 million for the next year.

And in respect to Spain, Jörn, in Spain, I think it's clear and has been disclosed by AENA, they are preparing a possible tender for all the commercial activities, including the duty free. We are interested to participate. The answer is depending on the conditions that will be written down in the tender and depending how the tender is going to be implemented. In principle, we have -- or we are the incumbents in Spain, and I think we have a lot of experience and a significant competitive advantage for participating and preparing one of the best offers, for sure. What is the intention of AENA? I think you need to ask AENA. I don't have a clue. I think what I know is what I hear and read in the newspapers.

The next question comes from the line of Dhar, Manjari from RBC.

I just had two. Firstly, what are you seeing in terms of spend per passenger trends capturing conversion rates? Have they started to normalize at all? And secondly, could you update us on anything you're trialing in terms of data usage or loyalty schemes? And any plans for rolling out any of those out in 2022?

Sorry, I couldn't understand the second part of the question. Can you repeat it?

Could you give us an update on anything, any trials that you're putting in place in terms of digitalization and data usage or potential loyalty schemes?

Okay. Thank you very much. Regarding the spend per passenger, what we have seen since the pandemic started, and even a short time before, is an increase on spend per passenger when you compare like-for-like in the sense that you compare duty-free with duty-free and with the same blended. What is the -- what is important here is that the trend, since the moment the pandemic started, the spend per passenger is growing. And in 2021, it was exactly the same time -- the same case. Regarding the digitalization, I think probably the most relevant, I already mentioned it, is a mini application that we have developed together with Alibaba, and this application is today in Alipay. We are obviously very confident that the development of our loyalty program, the name today is RED, basically connected with the development with Alibaba will be a significant opportunity for Dufry. But still, obviously, there are not Asian passengers traveling. The situation with Alipay and the opportunities to test are subject to this type of travelers. And I prefer that we delay the answer until we know exactly what and how much is the efficiency of this agreement with Alibaba and what we have done.

Next question comes from the line of Mestari, Jaafar from BNP Paribas Exane.

I just had one on trying to understand your framework for the full year '22 scenarios. So back in January, consensus had 2022 revenue approximately 25% below '19. And I think at the time, you said this looked consistent with industry forecast. So if I start with that minus 25%, your comments just now on 2%, plus 3.5% exposure to Russia and to Russian travelers, let's say, maybe until we know better, this should just be assumed 0. So the discussion starts at minus 30%. And then from that minus 30%, you seem to be working with another 5 points or another 10 points of extra deterioration from the current geopolitical situation. What does that include, the potential commodity price hikes, volume disruptions, potential inflation hitting customers, potential inflation hitting your own operating costs? Just wanted to know more about the framework here. I know this is not formal guidance, but curious how you picked this scenario range, please.

Sure. Thank you very much for the question. So look, as you have just pointed out, it's not a guidance, and I think we are very clear on that. It's different scenarios. We want to show the sensitivity on the cash flow, depending on the turnover we generate. And you have also rightly pointed out that our exposure to Russian is around 4 -- 3.5% to 4%. But having said that, for us, with the current visibility we have, it's unclear on what the impact of that crisis will be, and we are -- it's also unclear for us what the recovery pattern due to the health crisis will be exactly and how fast that will happen. So from that perspective, we thought it's cautious to show those 2 scenarios to give you the sensitivity on how the P&L and the cash flow could like in a scenario where we generate either CHF 5 billion to CHF 5.5 billion turnover or the minus 35% and the minus 40% correspondingly to the 2019 turnover.

I mean, I appreciate not everything is super detailed at this stage. But for example, if we just read the newspapers and some of the worst case scenarios that are being mentioned, oil at $150 materialize, would you say, yes, absolutely, that's minus 40%? Or would some of those worst case scenarios require a much wider range?

Sorry. Can you repeat the first part of the question again? I didn't understand it entirely.

Just wanted to understand if you had baked in that range some of the really worst case scenarios that can come up. If we listen to the media, for example, very, very significant rises in oil prices to $150. Would that be something that you would say, yes, absolutely, this is within our range of 35% to 40%? Or would you say, well, actually no doubt would be worse?

Look, as I have mentioned before, we have taken into account some assumptions with respect to the current crisis around Ukraine as well as the current health crisis. So it's -- I wouldn't call it a worst case scenario or anything like that. Again, it's 2 different scenarios, which we are providing to the market. To get the sensitivity around costs and ultimately cash flow, we would expect to generate in those specific 2 scenarios, but it's not a boundary or a guidance or a worst or best case scenario in any regard.

The next question comes from the line of Volker Bosse from Baader Bank.

One question is left from my side. It's regarding Asia Pacific that you're still down there. So could you please provide us a bit more detail? You mentioned corona as a risen -- a reason. If corona comes to an end, hopefully, so what is your projection for '22 in the APAC regions or how things are evolving in perhaps also general sales or an improvement trend? Or what's your expectation for APAC?

Okay. What I comment regarding Asia Pacific is that restrictions are still in place in many countries, are avoiding obviously most of the people traveling internationally. As you know, our main activity in Asia Pacific is international travelers. What we are expecting is obviously, today, very -- is based on uncertainty, and I am going to comment on this basis, is we believe that in 2022 it is not going to be a significant recovery in the Asian market, especially because the question mark regarding the reopening in China. For the rest, other countries are already moving ahead, for example, Australia that I commented on during the presentation. We have activity today in Cambodia also gradually improving. We have activity also in Macau, significant -- reaching significant level of sales 2019. But still, during 2022, I think we should not really base the recovery in Asia, especially until the end of the year.

The next question comes from Marco Werro, Gian from ZKB.

Gian-Marco Werro, ZKB. Three questions from my side, please. First one on Hainan. We read also and hear from you that, there, the business is really booming. So can you give us maybe an intention or also a range about your expectations as a share of results from associates for 2022 just as a part based on this JV with Alibaba? That will be very helpful. And then the second question is in relation to your U.S. business. There, can you give us an update in relation to your food offering that you want to expand? Also your partnership or your set-up with Plum Market, for example, where do you stand there? And then third question, besides the whole oil topic we already heard, how about the wage inflation in the U.S.? Do you see some meaningful momentum there? And how can you counterbalance that?

Okay. Regarding Hainan, I commented on in the past. Due to the restrictions from the legal point of view, Dufry is not able and cannot invest in travel retail duty-free activities. This is the first starting point. The second, we have a joint venture company, 51% owned by Alibaba, 49% by Dufry. We have been, at the beginning of this relationship, supporting AVH. The license holder is a Chinese local company in Hainan, owned by the government in the province to supply, obviously, the merchandise needed for the opening phase. We have also advised and participate in the design of the shop, and we also advise and participate in the first step of training and establishing the company as a retail company. In the near future, and I would say during the next 2 years, we should not expect any income from Hainan in the P&L because, finally, what we are with the current legislation able to do is a supply agreement with obviously the limitations that most of the supplies will be moved during 2022 to the joint venture company in Hainan, with Alibaba and then management fees intercompanies, these dividends that will come from the joint venture company. And these management fees coming also from this joint venture company will be relevant probably, in my opinion, in 2 years because this is the way, obviously, of starting the business there. From the sales point of view, the operation is really blooming. This year is -- official information already disclosure in January increased the market in Hainan by 53% or something similar compared with previous year. What is the impact in Dufry? Dufry is a huge opportunity because, obviously, first of all, we need to be sure that we participate in the channel, travel retail duty free channel by the year 2025. As you know, there is a possibility that by the year 2025, international companies will invest in this business in Hainan because it is expected during this new policy started by the government 2 years ago, what they call the bonded zone or the bonded area. And I think Dufry should be there from the strategic point of view. In terms of the U.S. and the food and beverage, this is something that we commented in the past at the time that we went with Hudson listed and is still valid. The best way to grow in the U.S. is to really invest in food and beverage for Dufry. We are the leaders in travel retail, duty paid and duty free. And the assumption is for accelerating growth, we need to invest in 2 different businesses. One is food and beverage. The other one is management of concessions. The second one is a longer-term strategy. The food and beverage is something that we can increase and improve daily because there are tenders and RFPs and proposals that we can participate. In fact, we have won two of these, and I mentioned one that happened over the past weeks. The opportunity is based in one, obviously, flat in 2020 -- in 2019, before the pandemic. 65% of the business in U.S. is food and beverage. Within the remaining part, 35%, most important part, almost 2/3 is duty paid, and we are the leaders in duty paid. And the remaining part is the smallest part is duty free. And we are the leaders in duty free, too. The idea here is how to continue the growth in the U.S. That is a very profitable market for us, is stepping forward in the food and beverage business. And the third one, I don't remember that question.

Inflation, wage inflation.

Okay. In the U.S., what we have seen is obviously depending on the states and depending on the locations. But we have seen, especially 4 or 5 months ago, a significant inflection in salaries per hour. As you know, we are very flexible there with salaries per hour, and that can go from 10% to 20% per hour. The impact in the P&L so far is not yet relevant because we have been also efficient in terms of cost savings, and the impact in the P&L is not remarkable in the sense to say something today. But the question mark is how this is going to impact when the full set of operations will be reopened. Today, I think it's a trend that the salaries or, let's say, personnel expenses or labor expenses will increase in the U.S. is true.

All the best to you, Julián, and I wish you many joyful also leisure flights going forward.

Thank you very much. I hope that we can celebrate it together. Any other questions from the participants via conference call?

The next question comes from the line of Prateek Phatak from BlackRock.

So I just wanted to confirm on what you said earlier regarding the exposure to Russia. So it's like 2% to the national and 3% to the region as a whole, so total 5% exposure to Russia, Ukraine?

Let me repeat it. I think probably, it's better to repeat it. The exposure in 2019, the mix of the share -- sorry, the share of the impact of Russian nationalities sales were around 2%. The impact of Russian destinations that could be with other people, and I think this information is also interesting, it's very -- it's between 3% and 3.5%, less around it, 3.5% of the total sales.

The next question comes from Rebecca McClellan from Santander.

Yes. Can you hear me?

Yes, Rebecca, loud and clear.

And Julián, all the very best to you. And Xavier, welcome. I look forward to working with you in the future. And just 3 small questions. Firstly, if you back out the wholesale or the Hainan drag, what would you expect more or less the 2022 gross margin to come out? And secondly, if you were to take a revenue scenario of down 30% or even down 25% on 2019, what would your equity free cash flow on a monthly basis be? So just trying to understand where the leverage in that might be. And thirdly, more generally, what is the environment for tenders at the moment? How competitive is it versus pre-COVID?

Yves, you go first.

So for the first one, the margin -- or gross profit margin impact by Hainan, so in 2021, is around 3.3% of the group's gross profit margin. And going forward, as you know, we have changed the supply chain approach there, so that effect will not be there anymore in 2022 and going forward, maybe a little bit in '22 at the beginning of the year because there's some phasing out in that regard. Then the second one, the revenue, did I understood correctly that you mentioned an additional 20% to 30% reduction or 20% or 30% reduction compared to 2019?

The latter, i.e. down 20%.

20% or 30% compared to 2019.

Yes.

So yes, absolutely. Look, in that regard, what you can assume, give or take, is that in the minus 30% scenario, we will probably be around breakeven. And in the minus 20% scenario, probably around higher double-digit amount million Swiss francs positive.

Does that mean 10s of double digit?

Sorry. Say it again, Rebecca.

Does that mean 10s of double-digit, i.e., 60, 70 or 80, it is?

Yes. Yes, exactly.

And the gross margin, you say 3.3% to the 2021 number. So we're looking at 59% in a bit?

Yes. So what I said is that in 2021, the impact was 3.3%. That will not be there anymore going forward. But maybe in Q1 2022, there is still some rest, which needs to fade out. But yes, this is exactly what I mean.

And Rebecca, regarding the tender environment and competition in the new environment, I think it's difficult to say what is the final conclusion of -- and the outcome of the pandemic, but there are 2 aspects that probably are relevant. We have been able, more than any other competitor, to expand the business. We have expanded in 2021 around 2% of the total commercial space through mainly direct negotiations. I think the second part of the answer is there are initiatives by landlords in general, not only in airports, asking a strong company from the financial point of view to really start discussions for new spaces. Is more often now that the negotiation process one-on-one happening? The answer is yes. We have started, and we have 30,000 square meters of commercial space, where most of the square meters that we are today are under negotiation. But what is going to happen after all this period of time, it's difficult to confirm. But those are facts that probably will help you to understand what the situation is.

The next question comes from the line of [ Alex Apostolidis ] from Barings.

Two questions for me. So you discussed the 10% to 20% increase in salaries per hour in North America. I just wanted to get a sense of what you're seeing in other regions, specifically Europe. And just a second question just in terms of your cost of goods sold. What sort of inflation are you seeing there currently? If you can give a specific guidance on that, that would be very helpful.

Okay. In terms of labor costs, I think, obviously, we have seen increases in several countries, but the reality is also that the translation effect is mitigating in some of them due to the currency that we are reporting a significant part. In general, what -- if repeated, I think probably is the best prospect is depending on the scenario, around 16%, 16.5%. The personnel expenses will be recurring especially during 2022. To tell that globally, this is going to change, it's very difficult to tell specifics, but I think it has been very clear about that. In terms of cost of goods sold, there is obviously a trend where we have been asked by suppliers and other partners of cost increases. Most of these costs due to the circumstances and analyzing also the pricing strategy compare market by market has been assimilated, and the gross profit margin is not really impacted due to the cost increases. And we don't expect this in 2022.

The next question comes from the line of Paul Brennan from GoldenTree.

My question is just in relation to the cash flow scenarios. You noted in the footnote that the scenarios are based on MAG relief agreed on as of February 2022. So I'm just wondering, is there upside to these scenarios if you agree further MAG relief in the remaining part of the year? And kind of how should I think about that compared to what happened in 2021? And I think you said you started off the year with CHF 300 million of MAG relief and then ended up with closer to CHF 1 billion.

Thank you very much for the question. So look, as always, there is a certain potential for additional relief, but I would not model too much in there. So look, we have obviously already negotiated a lot. And as you can see in the scenarios, we expect a certain recovery. And therefore, I wouldn't go significantly beyond what we have considered already there.

Got it. And I guess, just putting that into context. If I think about your -- I think you said around 32% of revenue for concessions in '22. And I think it was more like 30% in '21. Correct me if I'm wrong there, but your concession costs are going up, even though your revenue is recovering. So is it -- I guess, is it harder to get the MAG reliefs? Or is there maybe something else impacting those figures that I might be missing?

Look, again, as we have stated and as we have done it last year and also the year before, what we are considering for our scenarios is only what has been achieved so far. And what has been achieved as MAG relief, as you can also see in the last part of the deck, is around CHF 380 million to CHF 400 million, and that is what is considered and that is reflected in the concession fee assumption of 32% for the minus 35% scenario.

The last question comes from the line of Matthew Garland from Deutsche Bank.

I just had two quick questions. Firstly, in terms of the partnership that you have with Starbucks, what is your expectation around the impact, I guess, of that in FY '22? And what are the opportunities that you see over the next few years from that? And then in terms of the retail gross margin, obviously, you've seen quite a significant increase there from 2019 levels. How should we think about it sort of on a normalized 2023 basis given probably more normal discounting and things like that? And what's the sort of upside do you see from that kind of 60% level?

Can you please repeat the first question? I couldn't understand it.

So in terms of my first question, it was around, I believe, that you and Hudson has entered into kind of an agreement with Starbucks for a number of locations. So I guess it...

Yes, yes.

What you kind of see as the impact of that in FY '22 and going forward there, I guess.

First of all, there is not an agreement between Hudson and Starbucks. What there is an agreement is for two specific locations. We don't have a nationwide agreement with Starbucks. And the situation depending on the number of units, that will be available or tenders where we can present offer together, there is not -- today, there is not a significant impact or will not be a significant impact in Hudson or in Dufry due to this agreement.

And look, in respect to the gross profit margin, your second question, so there are two effects. As mentioned previously, on one hand side, we see a high demand and above spending because we believe that what we see currently during the recovery phase, our customers which have an above spending power. So this effect may obviously vaporize as we go along with the recovery, and we see a more kind of like a normalized pattern again. In respect to the second effect, which leads to additional gross profit margin that's coming from Brexit and the Brexit impact with additional margin of people arriving in the U.K., so that's most likely to stay. So in respect to the gross profit margin, the way you probably should think about it is what we have mentioned also in the past is that there will be a recovery. Back to the gross profit margin, we have seen immediately before the crisis and then some optimization here and there, a little tiny bit depending on negotiations we have, as we have communicated before the crisis. But more or less, a normalization to the levels we have seen before the crisis.

Any other questions from the audience or from the participants in the call?

There are no further questions from the phone.

Okay. I think we -- in this case, we'll start finishing here. Thank you very much for obviously participating in both physical and conference call. Great pleasure to meet physically all the people in the room again. And I guess that my last participation in the call will be in the first quarter -- third quarter report, and I will obviously meet all of you there. Thank you very much.

Ladies and gentlemen, the conference is now over. Thank you for choosing Chorus Call, and thank you for participating in the conference. You may now disconnect your lines. Goodbye.