Credito Emiliano S.p.A. (CE) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning. This is the Chorus Call operator. Welcome to Credem's conference call presenting full year 2024 results. [Operator Instructions] Let me now turn the conference over to Mr. Angelo Campani, General Manager of Credem. Mr. Campani, you have the floor.

Good morning to all of you. Thank you very much for logging in to our conference call. I have here Mr. Cassinadri, our CFO; Mr. Cucchi; and our Investor Relations team. Let me give a brief introduction on 2024, a year that was characterized by major economic events, starting from the evolution of monetary policies involving rates. And to withstand inflation, many banks adopted a more prudent approach of trying to strike a balance between growth and rates, and the ability of banks to work as a catalyst for stability and growth will be of paramount importance to go through the uncertainties that characterize our times. Going back to Credem, I would like to stress with pride the role we have played in such a context -- complex backdrop. In 2024, we still stood out, with a strong focus on our clients and real economy. We have increased once again the loans disbursed to families and corporates, playing a role in the domestic growth. That was a one-of-a-kind result for us, not just from a financial standpoint, but also thanks to the trust we have gained in the country. We are at the center of our client interest when it comes to their savings and the protection of their savings, and that against a backdrop where yields are going to decrease, makes our role even more central, even more important to try and meet all of their demand. We've been determined to be a reliable partner, a partner that can give the best possible consultancy for their financial future. And we've strengthened our commitment for digitalization, which is fundamental point in our business model. We've invested in innovative technologies, not just to improve our services, but also to simplify and make the experience our customers have leaner, safer and more efficient. And our North Star is a long-term approach to sustainably generate value and leveraging our Federation of Business, the soundness of our Federation of Business. So we are still ranking among the first one for capital soundness and performance and quality of assets. This is the result of an exceptional teamwork, always focusing on our purpose. So my warmest thanks to all the people in our group, who, in a very simple way, but with a lot of trust and with a lot of determination make the result possible, not just today's result, but also the future results. And now let's now look at the agenda for today's presentation. We'll start with a presentation of yearly results -- full year results, 2024, and then we will focus on some key points such as growth, investments and sustainability, and we'll be closing the presentation with our positioning, looking at the value of our very position. Let's move on to the next slide, Page 3. And as I said, 2024 was an exceptional year, one of a kind year that was closed with profitability levels that were at top level in the industry, with our ROTE and ROE, respectively, of 18.5% and 16.1%, and net profit landed at EUR 620 million, up 10% year-on-year despite the fact that even 2023 was a very, very good year. And the quality -- the asset quality is, again, top of the industry with a gross NPL ratio that is top class, not just in Italy, but all over Europe. We are an NPL 0 with an NPL ratio -- net NPL ratio equal to 0.7%, and our capital soundness is still proved by a CET1 ratio, 15.53%, with a buffer of 752 basis points versus [ SyRB ] that already includes the impact of the new SyRB buffer. And so we have a dividend payout of EUR 0.75 per share. That's the dividend distribution. Let's have a look at our financial highlights. We are on Page 4. And our main focus on our growth strategy is still firm, and we produce overperformance for customer volumes, proving our ability, execution ability, regardless of economic cycles we're going through, but that will be -- we'll come back again later in the presentation. Loans are increasing, 1.8% year-on-year unlike the industry, and direct funding is up 5.6%, almost 2 points -- well, more than 2 points -- percentage points higher than the industry. Production. So net inflows between insurance, direct, indirect inflows is up EUR 4.7 billion. That really proves our potential, our business model that is set to best address the new challenges of the new economic cycles. Our growth strategy enables us to widen our customer base. It's now 1.6 million customers, and it's up 5.5% versus full year 2023. So we reconfirm our ability to attract new customers and make available to them a highly diversified offering of products and services to support their needs and projects, and placing more than 4 products per customer, the famous cross-selling ratio. Now we're on Page 5. Even over the last quarter, we've proven a strong diversification in our business, in our revenues. And we are going through towards a shrinking of NII following or tracking rates, but also relying on our Federation of Business, we can increase our core operating income, thanks to the positive performance of recurring commissions and fees that make up about 40% of our revenue. In 2025, we expect to see growth further -- sorry, rates further being reduced, but I'm sure that -- we assure that commissions will play a role to support the business. And given the major importance they have in our business, they will still present -- represent a competitive edge going forward. Next slide, we are on Page 6. We see the consolidated net profit contribution for macro businesses. Starting from the commercial bank, 2024 was exceptionally good for NII, commissions and for lack of deterioration in our portfolio. So the net result was in excess of EUR 334 million, 54% of our consolidated income. And then extended banking service, despite the low demand, we closed with a net profit in excess of EUR 80 million, contributing to the consolidated net profit, they give it [ 13% ] contribution. Let me also stress the fact that for wealth management and private, including product factories and then Credem Euromobiliare Private Banking, the results confirm our expectations. We have positive expectations for this business area, and they are growing sustainably, with a net contribution of EUR 219 million and accounting for 36% of our total revenues. And we are confident that Credem can play a leading role with these pipelines, thanks also to the improved wealth management capability we have proven over the last year and the previous years. Let's have a look at the income statement -- reclassified income statement. As I was saying before, 2024 was a one-of-a-kind year on -- from many perspectives. We went -- well, 6.5% revenues were up, not just thanks to the NII, but also thanks to the commission, that really played a very strong role, EUR 930 million. So let's have a look at cost -- cost increase for personnel costs, especially over the last quarter of 2024. Of course, there were variable items that were affecting the results. And as to admin expenses, and we have to -- we had ICT spending for new cloud technologies to comply with our road map to cloud. And over the last quarter, we had EUR 7 million of cost item, and we'll see in the following pages how we are committed on the digital and IT side. 2024 overall was a very positive year, and that meant having a higher spending capacity despite the fact that we preserved our margin. So year-on-year, they went -- our net operating profit went up 5.1%. And LSPs were very limited, and cost of credit was 12 basis points. The net profit is a record figure that stood at EUR 620 million. Let's now have a look at the individual items of our net interest income. Despite the rates, our NII was slightly down in the last quarter, but the group was really able to protect customer spread that will reduce -- that declined at a lower pace than the banking industry. So of course, we had an excellent result on the NII side, but rates are down. So it will be of paramount importance to stay focused on growing volumes and relying on our Federation of Business to support our business and, of course, support the reduction in NII. Let's have a look at our securities portfolio on next slide. Over the last part of 2024, we've somehow rebuilt our platform -- portfolio with Italian govies to support our yields, and we try to reduce the overall portfolio duration, which is slightly -- the average maturity is 4.2. It's highly diversified. It's mainly Italian govies, and most of them accounted for as HTC, held -- hold-to-collect. And 59% of the portfolio is HTC, which -- with a gross fiscal effect of about EUR 9 million. Let's now have a look at commissions, the noninterest margin, and we're on Page 10. So NIM, noninterest margin, went up to EUR 250 million, up almost 27% versus the previous year, and that happened thanks to performance fees that in Q4 alone were in excess of EUR 30 million. What I would like to stress, however, is how recurring commissions performed, almost EUR 209 million, and they enable us to be exceptionally positioned for the coming months, where we expect rates being further cut. So our networks really managed to increase inflows. And in the recurring component, it's EUR 124 million, and they are growing versus the previous quarters. Excellent results for the insurance income as well, still giving a very meaningful contribution, EUR 124 million. There was no specific gains on the securities portfolio, but you can see from the table that these are the aggregate figures that make me very confident also for the current year for 2025. Let's now go to Page 11 in the presentation. As I said before in the previous page, we have increased over the last quarter of 2024, we increased the number of projects we are rolling out, and we kept a focus also in the most difficult times. So even more so, we thought it was sustainable and looking forward for -- to improve our spending on personnel costs and ICT. And personnel costs, of course, went up, thanks to the results also achieved -- to produce the achieved results. And we have to take into account the labor contract increase that coincided with the fourth -- increase that coincided with the fourth quarter. And the group is really committed to new projects for technology innovation, and then admin costs also went up for ICT development to provide digital services and the many projects we are rolling out that comply with our multiyear road map to cloud. In Q4, specifically, we had EUR 7 million for the transformation of our IT systems to get ready for new systems, more efficient, more resilient and to withstand possible external attacks. In the following pages, we'll see further element. We will keep on investing on this front. And over the next few years, we expect to grow less, but with overall cost in a low single-digit area. We're now on Page 12, loans to customers. Again, we reconfirm our ability to grow our market share through organic growth. You see the positive performance of our loans to customer year-on-year. This is a very meaningful result also going forward to support our NII, and it was achieved, thanks to strong synergies we have in our business model and also thanks to the exceptionally good work our people did and sales network did. And so my congratulations go to them for the excellent work they performed, even more precious and valuable, if we consider the general economic trend we're witnessing. And then -- so residential mortgages, consumer finance performed really well despite seasonality, and then also loans to corporates are back growing. And it's definitely a challenging scenario, but we are confident that volumes will grow next year too in -- well, consistently with our growth strategy. Let's now have a look at Page 13. So net inflows, as I said at the beginning, it's a sizable result. So net inflows are EUR 4.7 billion, and that will enable us in the coming quarters to rely on net commissions. So assets under management were EUR 1.3 billion and exceeded our expectations under custody. Again, inflows are EUR 1.3 billion and direct deposit are in excess of EUR 1 billion. Direct funding, direct inflows are a -- is a very important driver to increase our customer base and to really explore the full potential of our Federation of Business approach and then direct and deposits and assets under custody will improve, will enable us to improve the number of customers. And then let's have a look at, again, inflows. All aggregate figures are growing. The direct customer deposits are up 5.6%, thanks to the inflows of last year. And also, assets under management are growing and -- sorry, assets under custody. Assets under management churn reserve stood at EUR 44 billion. And the overall the aggregate figure, thanks to the 2 items I mentioned, is up 10.4%. We're talking asset under management and insurer reserves. Now we move on to Page 15. This -- our NPL portfolio is constantly declining. Based on some disposals we performed over the year, the total is very limited, EUR 669 million with an NPL ratio, which is lower than the Italian average and the EU as well average. Cost of risk is at its all-time lows, 0.46% and 12 basis points of cost of credit -- cost of risk. And if we compare ourselves again, EU diversified lenders, we come out on top, even with those lenders who have different business models. To anticipate some of your question, we expect a slight worsening in 2025, even though we are not yet seeing the signs so far, should be not meaningful, this decline. And next year, we should stay below the threshold of 20 bps as far as cost of risk is concerned. Let's move to Page 16. NPL coverage. We are still very cautious to really address the volatility brought about by the new scenarios. Accounting coverage stood at 60% for NPL's. And we have also additional coverage for Shortfall and calendar provisioning. And these values really prove that we are very sound, not just compared to Italy, but also compared to other EU diversified lenders. And our positioning will enable us to look ahead to the future, aware that we have a strong competitive edge versus our peers. Let's now move on to Page 17, bond issuances and maturities over the last quarter. In 2024, we exercised the call option on the outstanding senior nonpreferred notes. In 2025, as you see, we have no issues with the natural maturity. But in 2025, provided we get the regulator's clearance, we have the EUR 200 million of Tier 2, and that will enable us to be very, very flexible. And therefore, picked the best moment in time, the best time window for refinancing and to further strengthen our managerial buffer on the MREL requirement that is still very, very sound, as you can see, 95 and 150. Next slide, Page 18, our liquidity level, NSFR, stable funding ratio and LCR are very high. LCR, 168%. And as you know, with no use of TLTRO, that is very meaningful and which will enable us to be very resilient in looking at strategies for funding. Let's now move on to Page 19, capital ratios. We confirm an excellent generation of capital to support our growth strategy. You see that we are still developing RWA as a result of our increasing of loans. So CET1 15.5, with a buffer of 752 basis point on the minimum requirement, also after discounting the first level of buffers. So we are growing and we're keeping our prudential perimeter. The positions we have will enable us for 2025 to take up the Basel IV regulatory requirement and enabling the group to remain at the top of the system and further pursue our growth strategy. Let me wrap up as far as results were concerned, and we move to Page -- to the second section, so growth investments and sustainability. We would like to talk about our growth strategy, what we are doing, our projects, et cetera, and give you an outlook on our sustainability. Let's now move to Page 21. And as you can see on Page 21, we have a 3-year time frame 2021, 2024. We increased our revenue in excess of 52%, and we really unfolded the maximum potential for NII growth. And we reached the growth level at the top of the banking industry on NII growth. And we've heard the results -- the first results presentation or disclosure of the bank results. You see that the growth of our NII went to -- from 100 to 226. And the other peer with the highest performance we've seen so far is 20 basis points below our results. Just to remind you how our actions really have any impact on how we perform our NII. And then the N-I-M, core NIM is a very, very important factor too because despite the important NII, as assumed over the last time frame, NIM grew from 100 to 108. So we've gone through markets and customers that were mainly driven by the yields of govies and time for frames of deposits. So that means that our business model is very resilient in any economic scenario, and we can perform -- and we are very confident on how our recurring fees will also grow moving forward. If we look at the next slide on Page 22, you see an outlook with a similar time window. But here, we talk volumes. And because, of course, our revenues can only grow if you have a growth of total business to match it. So we have seen growth in all of those items despite a very challenging market scenario. You see and -- you see that we have -- loans are growing 10% versus 2001, and we have direct and indirect funding growing. Indirect is growing 18%, and total business lands at EUR 142 billion from -- up from EUR 123 billion in full year 2021. And we therefore recorded a group total business growth of approximately 15%. And that really tells you how we act in the banking world, how we play a role in the banking world. Let's -- return on equity, again, a historical projection of data. And if you read these results plotted against time, we have a profitability that is always higher than the system average, not just system average for Italy, but also European system average. That tells you how we are very strong in reinforcing capital and reinforcing profitability and paying dividends sustainably over time without resorting to capital increases. So we are safe, sound, growth going through the different economic cycles, providing high profitability over time. And let's now move on to the next -- and talk about technology. We managed to achieve the results we've just -- have just shown on the previous page. Despite the investments we have to make for IT and ICT, we've increased the number of projects because we've always invested in projects, but with investors almost 10 years of our total revenues were invested over EUR 600 million. We involved dedicated teams. Overall, over 600 people were involved to achieve these results. And these are the costs that will be required to further increase our digitalization pathway and our IT platforms to ensure our business pipeline and our business model will be duly supported. Let's now move on to 25 and have a look at some detail. These expenses over the last 12 months, we had an overall expense of EUR 187 million between OpEx and CapEx for ICT items. And let me break it down for you to show you our focus on the different policies. A very important part is for the IT platform to really support the group's architecture -- IT architecture, and seize all opportunities that can be driven from data governance and artificial intelligence, and also to support the road map. So it's 44% of the total ICT spending. And then we are constantly evolving our service model, our networks, from analog to digital. And we have targeted projects to make the omnichannel experience more and more thorough, more and more complete. And these are already very meaningful results. And the contribution of digital sales was 18% and in -- for the acquisition of new customers at 29,000 in that year alone. And then we constantly invest in product factories as well with the objective to increase efficiency, reduce operating risk and of course, support the business and increase the current product range. And then last but not least, we very much strengthen on governance and regulation because we want to constantly improve our internal processes in line with regulators' requirements. And we will focus on the group position because we are sure that these investments will enable us to fully leverage on our integrated model, human and digital. And then we move on to Page 26. We reconfirm our ESG commitment with a strong focus on climate. Of course, we want to look at climate change from a thorough perspective, emissions, short-term, long-term, medium-term targets to reduce environmental impacts connected with the group activities, and then the monitoring of outstanding issues, ESG issues, and it will be consolidated into our balance sheet. We have targets that we have defined with a short-term horizon, 2025, but also medium, long-term horizon. We confirm our commitment in the social arena. We want to retain the certifications we've already achieved -- for gender quality as well, and we are the only Italian bank who have both certification. As to ESG short-term targets, we see -- you see the targets we have for loans, inflows and investment. We're not going to go into details. We want to support with funding and leasing to, of course, encourage corporate for electric vehicles, to issue loans on residential mortgages with -- to private customers that have high energy classes A and B. And also, we want to focus on sustainable assets under management. Let's now move to Page 27. Again, this is a medium, long-term horizon we're talking about. We have made it official already at the beginning of last year that we comply with the net zero banking alliance. We were even early in delivering on some targets in decarbonizing our loan portfolio. We focused on oil and gas and power generation industries, that are the most meaningful ones when it comes to emissions. And so we have defined a target to reduce the emission intensity of our portfolio counterparties of 25% when it comes to oil and gas, and 76% for power generation. Targets were embedded in our business plan with both short- and long-term horizons, and this reconfirms the group's commitment to sustainability, which is a very important step in our development pathway. Let's now move on to the conclusion, Page 29. Let me summarize our positioning. We -- as I said, Page 29. You see 4 boxes to mention some factors that we think are very important going forward. First of all, we're first in Europe for the lowest additional capital requirement, Pillar 2, P2R, Pillar 2 requirement to retain a better asset quality for our customers. You see -- and we believe that this combination of soundness and excellent asset quality enables us to really provide the best standing -- industry standing going forward. And then the last 2 boxes on the right, Federation of Business, that can take advantage of contribution from all pipelines. And we expect a nice growth in revenue diversification from wealth and private. And commissions are going to play a role definitely on total revenues, and the role will be much higher than the peer group average. That's the last box on the right. We want to keep on being top of the industry not just based on our financial highlights, but also for the quality of our people, for our ability to execute. And I hope I gave you an idea of, now and also in the past, of how we can seize opportunities and rapidly adapt and adapt in the best possible way to scenario changes. That's it for me. And of course, now we open the Q&A session.

This is the Chorus Call operator. [Operator Instructions] First question comes from the line of Luigi De Bellis from Equita.

First question is on the NII. What are your targets when it comes to growing loans and deposits in 2025? What do we expect in terms of customer spread in the light of the current spread curve? What are -- what's your expectations for NII in 2025 and 2026? And maybe you can give us an update on sensitivity when it comes to interest margin, when rates move and change. And then capital and dividends, could you give us an update on the regulatory amendment that is going to move the dividend scope. And on dividend that is higher than year-on-year, but the payout is still very cautious, 41%. So below the average of your peers, but capital went up year-on-year. So -- and the excess capital you are building, could it become even more sizable? So does that mean you have other objectives maybe of external growth or? And then assets under management, could you give your targets for 2025 [ x ] performance fees? And how are you performing in -- how have you performed in January this year?

So it's a long list of questions. Thank you very much. We hope we took the -- all the notes to answer your question. Let me say a few things. You talked about NII, if I'm not mistaken. We know that -- we are faced with uncertainties that we -- as far as rates are concerned. We expect, for 2024, the gentlemen said, we expect a shrinking of interest rates with a picking up of that in 2026. And let's talk about revenues, because in the near future, I think there will be a strong recoup recovery of revenues, but with a different product mix. As we are seeing in the blend, in the mix between NII and NIM, that will be more focused on NIM rather than NII. Of course, you were asking how we -- what are our targets when it comes to net interest income. Of course, we, first of all, as I said, want to increase volumes, that is viable and sustainable according to us. Generally speaking, if you allow me, as there are a number of concentration deals in the market. So sometimes, those deals tend to disperse market shares. And then the spread -- customer spread, as you saw in the last quarter of 2024, withstood its ground and declined, but much less than the industry average. I think we can do a good job. And therefore, we expect to be able to defend and protect it quite well. Back to inflows -- that's the other leg of NII, of course. We have potential to recover vis-a-vis the current deposit rate. We have some time deposits that also bear witness to the increasing our customer base and somehow build a layer for a subsequent conversion to assets -- asset management products and provide further cross-selling opportunities. In a nutshell, I think, there will be an increase in the spread, but I'm an optimist because on the loan side, as I said before, in addition to our Federation of Business, we have some pipelines, as you say, the Avvera loans that are increasing, and its fixed rate loans. So they give a good boost in a phase of declining interest rates. As to growth targets versus stock, the stock we have. We have an estimate, a growth estimate in our loans of about 2%, 3%. And we think it's sustainable. It's spread across the different business lines and business pipelines. As to inflows and deposits, we have a growth target. In excess of the results, where we did EUR 4.5 billion worth of inflows. And then we direct inflows or assets under custody or management. But what I would like to stress, it's a challenge we feel we can take up. We could have another EUR 2 billion worth of inflows coming from assets under management, and that could lead to an increase in noninterest margin. As to capital, you were asking about the holding and therefore -- and then maybe I can hand it over to our CFO to answer that. And then I'll get back to you on the dividend policy. Mr. Giuliano Cassinadri.

As to the regulatory paper -- there's a consultation paper for options and discretions of Central Bank. The public hearing was completed, and so we expect within a couple of months, 3 months, to have a paper completed. And then, of course, there will be the implementation phase of CRD in Italy. CRD 4, should be completed by year-end, the implementation. And this type of topic should -- we should -- I think we're probably going to tackle that with the Central Bank starting from 2026.

How about sensitivity? You can answer that, and then I'll talk about the capital strategy.

Luigi, after sensitivity, it's a mathematic call piece of information. But from a mathematical perspective, the current sensitivity is further up 100 bps for the curve and another EUR 84 million of NII. And then the other sensitivity is minus 41.5. So of course, the sensitivity depends on our position on interest rate risk.

Let me talk about capital and dividend. I'm pleased that you said that we have constantly increased our dividends, and that confirms a balance between, of course, rewarding shareholders and, at the same time, retaining a sound capital endowment regardless of the economic cycle. So we want to -- we have midterm target of sustained growth. And then next year, there will be regulatory impact due to Basel IV, that impact -- and that will have an impact on capital ratios. And then having resources available will enable us to meet our target to increase loans, as we said last year as well, but also to look into any opportunities to grow any possible opportunity to grow. If you look at the historical performance of our dividend per share, you see that year after year, we -- we've never gone back without a reconfirmed or moved forward. It's not written in stone, but I think it's a good proxy.

Next question comes from the line of Giovanni Razzoli with Deutsche Bank.

I have a strategy question. It's a question across the board. You made a huge disclosure effort. You've looked -- you've told us about the contribution product factories are giving, insurance is giving you. Those are major drivers and how you build your profit and from the different business units because very often, we mainly associate Credem with NII and not with product factors. But within the Board, other members were -- would be open to maybe enabled you to come up with a business plan disclosure with a 2-, 3-year time span ahead to look into the business lines and how they can grow over time and how the Credem Group can grow over time?

Thank you very much, Giovanni, for your question. You are indeed a very knowledgeable observer when it comes to our group. And we've made an effort to open our group, to make us more readable, if you wish, and share with you the analysis work, the strategic review work we do on our business to measure value creation. So we've made this effort, we are making this effort to provide not just consolidated results, but results also going forward. And every time we close the accounts at year-end -- let me reconfirm the fact that every business line, every pipeline can produce value. And in addition to the sum of the parts, it's very important to look at how the different parts can be blended and embedded with one another. And I think that is very important, both going forward and to really stress how we are positioned. We see our clients, be it corporate or private customers, are being faced with such an extended and thorough proposition or offering, enables us to really seize all opportunities and to be also life cycle partners for our customers. We talked a lot about digital implementations and -- but also the perfect blend between being able to access your bank 24/7, consultancy, competence, ability to serve and understand customer needs across the board today and tomorrow will be a decisive factor. And what you were saying is important when it comes to medium-term planning. In our tradition, we do -- we never present multiyear business plan. But indeed, I will take note of your suggestion, maybe to give you more visibility about our pipelines and enable you to better understand and appreciate them in a great -- with a greater level of detail. Indeed, there are individual products and parts, but it's very important to see all those parts as a whole, how they interact with one another.

The next question comes from the line of Noemi Peruch with Mediobanca.

I have 3 questions. The first one, have you ever thought of paying out an interim dividend? Fast growth of dividend per share. Do you view EUR 0.75 as a starting point for 2025? On asset under management, you've seen -- we've seen a lot of switches between assets under custody to assets under management. How do you think that trend will support your fee performance in 2025 and '26 going forward -- by 2025? And could you share the criteria you're using to stay in the current scenario? And how you see yourself projected in this scenario going forward?

Thank you, Noemi. I -- that reminds me that I didn't answer a question asked by Luigi on assets under custody. And so I'll go back to it. Or as to dividends, you know very well that we talk about dividends in the second half of the year. For the current year, I think I was very clear when I told you about the historical performance of our dividend. It's not random, but it also -- instead it represents the Board perspective. So I cannot tell you that EUR 0.75 is going to be the guaranteed minimum for 2025. And so it's something we can maybe talk about going forward. As to the fees from assets under management, we are very positive going forward. Also as far as the guidance that we can give you is concerned, we assume recurring fees, of course. For assets under management, a 5% increase, not including performance fees, that are difficult to estimate, as you well know. And as I was telling Luigi, 2025, the first approach -- well, the first part, we've witnessed so far of 2025, has been good. That's why somehow I said we can achieve a major result for assets under management for the full year. But we'll keep you in the loop. We'll keep you updated as we move over the year and for the different quarterly reports. As to M&A, considering the latest events we have. Our announcement we've witnessed in the market. Let me say, by way of introduction, that, first of all, we are focused mainly on what depends on us -- organic growth, but also I said we are open to assess external opportunities. It could be traditional sales opportunities or vertically for business units, business pipelines, guideline or guidance that you were asking for. It must be accretive deals -- value-accretive deals, not impairing our asset quality in any way or capital soundness in any way. So we are aware that growth can be a major factor and also growth through M&A can be an accelerator. But -- and we know that, and we are monitoring the market to see if there are opportunities. As we were saying in our comments for our capital transactions, we think we have enough resources should an opportunity come along. From another perspective, above and beyond growth through M&A, we've witnessed a concentration, a consolidation phase in the group, and that will open up more opportunities for us to grow internally because during consolidation processes, there's dispersion of market shares that we hope we can pick up.

[Operator Instructions] Mr. Campani, there are no more questions in the queue for the time being.

Very well. Thank you very much for joining us today. My best regards on behalf of all of my colleagues, and talk to you soon. Have a good day. [Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]