Essity AB (publ) (ESSITYB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and thank you very much for joining this webcast, where our CEO, Magnus Groth; and our CFO, Fredrik Rystedt, will present this morning's announcement and how Essity is in better shape than ever to deliver profitable growth and increase shareholder value. After the presentation, we will open up for questions. If you're watching the webcast -- the replay of the webcast or if you have any additional questions, please reach out to me or my colleague, Viveca Dominguez after this. With that, I say welcome to Magnus to start the presentation.

Thank you, Sandra, and good morning, everyone, and I look forward to presenting Essity's new financial targets. This is our little target baby that's born today, and we will talk about new financial targets and also about the share buyback program. To put things in perspective, maybe as a start, just a reminder that Essity had sales last year of close to SEK 150 billion, with sales in 150 countries, 36,000 employees and 72 production facilities. We are working in attractive and growing business areas that we aim to grow faster and we aim to do it profitably. Starting with Health & Medical, 20% of our sales in 2024 first quarter, it's health and it's where we're active in incontinence health care and in the medical categories. We typically have #1 and #2 positions in inco health care. We are the global leader. And this is the area where we have the highest margin and also high fixed costs. So growing to scale is a very, very value creating strategy here. Moving over to Consumer Goods. The biggest part of our business, 55% of sales. This is where we work with consumer tissue, personal care categories like Feminine Care, inco care and Baby Care and where we aim to grow in the fastest-growing categories, but also the categories with the highest margins, so accelerating high-margin categories. And then finally, Professional Hygiene, 25% of our sales. This is where we made big restructurings last year that we still see some of the numbers. But where we, again, is where we are the global #1, 20% global market share and where we see a big opportunity to expand our global leadership going forward. Before then moving over to the targets and today's announcements, I would just want to put things in perspective also from a time in perspective and the development of Essity. We're a quite young company. We have formed 7 years ago, actually, this weekend, but we've been working, of course, with the hygiene and health parts of SA for many years, well before that. So if we look back 10 years, there's been a continuous ongoing development of the company to create 1 strong culture, 1 strong way of working and a very strong also asset platform, acquisitions and divestments, efficiency gains, restructuring continuously innovations and brands. And that has had a very positive financial development. And as you can see here, a strong decade of financial growth there with sales growing year-over-year-over-year, 82% over a 10-year perspective and EBITA growing faster. We had a dent in the curve during the pandemic, but firmly back on track last year and also as was manifested now this year in the first quarter. And of course, this sets the scene for the targets that we are presenting today. Another perspective is growth in earnings per share. And also from this perspective, it's been a very positive development for Essity since we were born 7 years ago. And as you can see here, our earnings per share growth has overall accumulated been 51%. And on an annualized basis, 7.2%, and this is in line with or better than our competitors. So a very good development historically. Also from a balance sheet perspective, very good progress and especially in the last years, bringing us currently to a net debt to EBITDA of 1.3 approximately in the first quarter. And of course, this is an important reason also why we are announcing new targets. To summarize, Essity in better shape than ever before, more efficient production structure, lower volatility, not least due to the divestment of Vinda. Pricing power, we've shown this again and again, and we will do it also going forward. We are more agile. We trust our brands. We have a very, very strong go-to-market and a very confident sales organization. A more profitable and attractive portfolio. We have lower costs. We have a bigger share of our business in high margin, less capital-intensive categories. So a much more attractive portfolio than we had a few years ago as a consequence of all the changes that we made and a very strong financial position that puts us in a position to announce what we are announcing today. So here are the new financial targets with higher ambitions than our previous targets. Annual organic sales growth above 3%. Vinda used to contribute about 1%. So this is a higher ambition, a higher target. EBITA margin also higher. We have moved from a ROCE target to EBITA margin, and Fredrik will explain why we did this. Basically, this is to make it easier for -- to compare ourselves to our competitors. ROCE, of course, remains incredibly important as a KPI internally, and the target level is to be above 15%. But maybe what's most attractive here is the combination of the 2, based on the high margins we already have and then a gradual increase of the margins and combining that with over 3% growth, creating a lot of shareholder value going forward. Also important to mention that our financial restrictions and policies are unchanged. This means that our capital structure has a policy to maintain a solid investment-grade rating at all times. And this is more than a restriction than a policy since we are now already well beneath that. And the dividend unchanged, stable and rising dividends. So the share buyback program that I'll talk about now in a second, it comes on top of stable and rising dividends. So finally, allocation of our strong operating cash flow, and this is our thinking. We have a strong balance sheet to start with, but the share buyback program is to create an efficient capital structure based on the cash flows that we generate. We will buy back Essity shares to an amount of SEK 3 billion. We start today and we have time until AGM 2025 to do this. We will do it in a way that we are compliant with the safe harbor arrangements. And important, we aim to do this as we have an ambition to use this as a recurring part of Essity's capital allocation. So those are the announcements we're doing today. We'll talk in more detail here, so I would like to invite Fredrik to the scene.

Thank you, Magnus. And I will start by giving a bit of background how the exit of Vinda impacted our previous targets. I will also give you a bit of explanation how we derived our new EBITA target from the previous ROCE target. I'll give you a bit of background also our perspective on market growth and trends. And finally, a bit an overview on how we intend to reach our targets. And I'll start with the Vinda impact. And Magnus, you already mentioned that if we look at the period 2020 to 2023, you can see that, as Magnus said, Vinda had a positive impact of organic sales growth with approximately 1%. But their ROCE was lower than for the rest of Essity. So the negative impact was also roughly about 1%. So mathematically, if you adjust these targets, basically, you would find an adjustment with 1% each. So the target would have been plus 2% or more than 2% for organic sales growth and more than 18% for ROCE. It's important to note that we only own 51% of Vinda. So in real economic terms, of course, the impact was roughly half of that. But as we consolidate Vinda in our numbers, this is the visible impact. Now Magnus said that we, for simplicity, reasons have now chosen to instead of a ROCE target, we are using an EBITA target. And perhaps, I think stating the obvious, ROCE is equal to margin times capital turnover and capital turnover, defined as net sales divided by capital employed. So what you can see on this slide is that more than 18% of ROCE is equal to an EBITA margin of more than 14%, if we use the capital turnover as a benchmark for 2023. So just using that benchmark, the equivalent EBITA margin would have been more than 14%. So maybe to sum up a bit, if we just mathematically translate our previous targets, excluding Vinda, it would have been an organic sales growth with more than 2% and an EBITA margin of more than 14%. But as you said, Magnus, we have chosen to increase our ambitions for both of these targets to more than 3% and more than 15%. So let me give you a little bit of perspective on our market. All our categories are operating in markets and segments with favorable trends. We are selling essentials and necessities for health and hygiene and for well-being, obviously. So clearly, for us, higher living standards and perhaps even more important, higher disposable income is clearly stimulating growth. And that is further emphasized by an increased awareness about the importance of hygiene and health. Aging and growing population is very important. Obviously, when you have a growing population, there is more demand. And as the aging population is growing even faster that, of course, further is positive for what we do. Quite a big portion in -- especially in incontinence and medical is related to this part of the world population. And as the world population is getting older. There is a higher prevalence of chronic conditions, such as incontinence or chronic ulcers as an example. And a big portion of what we do, of course, is related to this area. So basically, favorable market trends. Now if we look at our global market growth, we can see that we estimate in the coming years, a global growth of roughly about 2% to 3%. Now it's important to note here that this is relating primarily to volume and mix. We have assumed in these numbers that pricing will stay largely flat. Now all the numbers you see on this slide relates to the footprint that Essity has, so the categories and geographies that we are in. And just to use an example, just to illustrate what I just said, if you look at the number for Asia there, 3% to 4%, as an example, that relates to the growth of medical in the countries we are present in. And the reason is obviously that this is the only category where we are present in Asia currently. So if you sum this up, we expect Health & Medical to grow by roughly 3% to 4% and Consumer Goods and Professional Hygiene with 2% to 3%, respectively. So how do we intend to reach our target? And let me just start with growth. So much of the recipe lies in what we are already doing so successfully, but we have refocused our organization. So as you know, after a long period of restructuring, [ Curokill ] very aggressive pricing, et cetera. We have reached a level of return where growth is highly value creative. So we have now refocused our organization more towards growth. This does not mean in any sort of way that we are accepting lower returns or lower margin, quite the contrary, but we clearly now are in the position that we can focus more on growth. And we support this with a higher weight of growth in our incentive program. As I showed you on the previous slide, we have a good underlying market growth, and we serve this market with a profit or a product offering that has a superiority level for all our products of more than 60%. And of course, what I mean by that is we are superior in our products to the best competitor. And for the rest of the assortment, we are largely on par with the best competitor. And this has been a main or a key contributor to that very strong gross profit margin and of course, operating -- strong operating margin. We intend to further strengthen superiority as we go forward in the coming years. Finally, we have strong market positions. You've seen that many times. So we have a #1 or 2 market position in 90% of what we do, and we intend to strengthen this further with increased A&P investment as we go forward. And you've actually already seen this in the last couple of quarters where A&P levels or A&P investments have increased. And of course, all the efficiency work that we have done in the last several years has also brought a much better competitive cost position. So when you come to the EBITA margin target and how to accomplish that. Obviously, innovation and mix improvement remains very key to us. We have showed you many times before that our innovation portfolio has a higher gross profit margin than the existing business, and that is the case also going forward. Efficiency improvements and a relentless cost culture will remain as important as it has been going or in the past. But two other factors are equally important. First of all, we now have a much more balanced and optimized product portfolio, and we will continue to over-allocate both CapEx and resources in general to high-yielding parts of our business. And finally, not least important, Magnus, you mentioned the operating leverage or scale. We have roughly about 36% of our cost as fixed. So as we increase the growth level, scale will bring additional margin as we go forward. Thank you, Magnus.

Okay. So a compelling story, Fredrik.

Thank you.

Really interesting, and we have a fantastic starting position, but still a lot of opportunities. So feel very confident about the opportunities going forward here to raise our targets and deliver on them. So to sum things up, the new financial targets, 3% organic sales growth and an EBITA margin over 15%. The financial restrictions and policies are unchanged, and we announced today a share buyback program for Essity for the first time to an amount of SEK 3 billion. And we have an ambition to use this as a recurring tool in order to have an efficient capital allocation going forward. And putting this together, Essity becomes an even more attractive equity story and an even more attractive investment fit for profitable growth to drive increased shareholder value. What we heard, what you presented Fredrik, which you've seen many times, we are a global leading company in attractive and growing hygiene and health markets. We have leading market positions, strong brands, strong innovations, leading to growth and mix improvements. We have a clear focus to increase sales in the fastest-growing and most profitable segments of our business that typically also coincide. So it's a quite easy strategic decision to make. Sustainability remains at the core of what we do, and we have a winning culture, which we've proven over the last couple of years. And of course, as a foundation for today's announcement, a very strong financial position with good stable cash flows, attractive dividend and EPS growth. So thanks for that. Let's see if we have any questions. Sandra, will you join us?

Yes. Operator, please open up for questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Charles Eden from UBS.

I've got two, please. So firstly, on the EBITA margin target of over 15%. I noticed there's no specific year or state if you to reach that target, but I assume you'll have put one in place when discussing the target internally. So how are you thinking about the time line to deliver on this EBITA margin target? And then Carl also just confirm this margin target should be achievable on the current portfolio, and you don't believe there's a need for more planned exits of lower-margin businesses, which obviously may result in the absolute EBITA being lower even if this delivers on a 15% margin? And then on my second question is on the buyback. And I note your statement and your comments around this being part of the ongoing capital allocation policy, which might suggest we get an annual share buyback going forward or even another program later this year. But could you just touch on the rationale for not doing a larger program today given the balance sheet is already in a very good place. By your own admission previously, you see the share is undervalued. And if you're successful in delivering on the new targets you set out today, the shares are unlikely to be this cheap going forward. So to be blunt, why not do a larger share buyback today?

Okay. Thanks, Charles, and I will start with the first question and then hand over to Fredrik to talk about the balance sheet. So thanks for actually making it clear here, the questions, does this require more exits? And the answer is no. The restructuring, the changes we've made to improve our margins is behind us, and we will now improve margins in other ways Fredrik presented, not least operating leverage, but also continuing relentless cost focus, premiumization, mix improvements, innovation and a change in our portfolio in an organic way. We, as part of our modernization of our programs, we have taken away a specific year. I think we learned that the last target we set was 3 months before pandemic. So it's very difficult to set a specific year for achieving targets. Having said that, of course, in the first quarter of this year, we were operating with margins of 14%. So that's the starting point. We do aim to deliver on the old targets for next year as some kind of indicator on our trajectory. And in the medium term, we aim to achieve over 15% EBITA margin. And of course, this is now where we aim to operate them also in the long term above 15%. So that's about the EBITA margin and share buybacks, Fredrik, do you want to talk about that?

Yes. Thanks, Magnus. Charles, we think it's a balanced amount that we have presented here today, Charles. So what we are doing is, of course, obviously, using our operating cash flow. So when you look at the dividend and now you have this share buyback on top, we think that's a balanced amount. And we have nothing against a strong balance sheet. On the contrary, we think that's a healthy thing to have. So we think this is a good amount to start with. And of course, we, as Magnus said, intended for this to be recurring as we go along in coming years.

Your next question comes from the line of Jeremy Fialko from HSBC.

Magnus, I just have really two similar questions to Charles. So first one is, I guess you've got this extra 1% margin from what the previous one -- previous target was when you adjusted for the Vinda disposal. Now I remember you previously said that the old margin or the old ROCE target. I guess you've had a very, very clear roadmap to get there, which was somehow not that contingent on sort of revenue growth or leverage. . Now you've got this extra 1% of EBITA margin. So perhaps you could talk to us a little bit about -- effectively, what is that extra 1%? Is it leverage? Is it cost savings? Is it the fact that you said that you have accretion of the fast-growing great business. So maybe try to like you said like what is, I guess, in totally controlled through costs? And what is going to be contingent on the kind of growth of the -- shape of the growth of the business? And then the second one is just what you thought you would describe as being an efficient balance sheet.

Okay. So maybe we do the same split now, Fredrik, you keep to the balance sheet, and I keep to the top line. And yes, thanks, Jeremy. This is, of course, a combination of everything you mentioned. And we've been studying our own long-term plans, financial plans. We updated them. We have discussed with our executive management team, the business unit presidents, what we can do in the supply chain and so on. And this is the combined result of all those investigations. But what is new and where we are already seeing benefits is operating leverage, which is kind of a lever that we never pulled before because we were so busy with restructuring. So coming out of that and now kind of focusing the business externally and continuing to really benefit from all the things we now put in place over the last couple of years, we see an opportunity to achieve above 15% in the medium term. So I can't really say specifically what has come and what has gone. But this is something that we are very committed to and believe that we can deliver from our starting point in the first quarter of 14%.

Right. Shall I take the balance sheet question. I think you asked about what is an efficient capital structure. And of course, that's obviously differences of opinion there. But we feel that, as I already alluded to on the previous question there that we feel that it's beneficial to have a strong balance sheet and where we are at this point in time. And we believe that is efficient where we are at this point in time. We have a very significant, of course, potential to acquire companies, should we want to do that. We have ample capacity to continue to invest organically. So we think this balance sheet structure that we have now is something very beneficial.

Your next question comes from the line of Karel Zoete from Kepler.

I have a follow-up question in relation to the M&A ambitions. So you've done a couple of add-on deals, somewhat -- some more sizable deals. Balance sheet is strong. So what are the ambitions to allocate capital to acquisitions over the coming years?

Sure. Yes. Again, we've made a major review of our business as part of this exercise. We looked at opportunities, both for growth for margin improvement for our balance sheet and also for M&A. And acquisitions remain an integral part of our strategy. So we are definitely looking at that. But when we look at the opportunities, it's quite clear that the most value-creating opportunities are in smaller, maybe up to midsized acquisitions in the highest margin, lowest capital-intensive parts of our business. And this is something that we are actively looking for. Very difficult to know when the opportunity arises. We are also looking for acquisitions where we can bolt on and find synergies with our existing businesses. And a consequence of this is that of this overview of what we've done is that there are many opportunities, and we will continue to make acquisitions. But then a stronger focus on smaller and midsized bolt-on acquisitions with synergies with our existing businesses.

Okay. And maybe in relation to that, Magnus, what has been the returns or the progress reported with the 2 acquisitions you did in Wound Care over the last years with Hydrofera and ABIGO. Has that generated good returns in general, targets met or difficult to get synergies from that?

Thank you for that question because actually, we are well ahead of our business plans that we made at the time of acquisitions for both these advanced Wound Care acquisitions. So they are doing extremely well. outperforming the market. We have good margins, so very accretive to the value of Essity and we see that. Take example Hydrofera that, of course, has an excellent Advanced Wound Care product, but more importantly, they were registered with many more health care outlets and hospitals and so on than Essity was. So we had a real opportunity there from a market perspective to leverage those registrations immediately. ABIGO, which is company that provides world-leading wound care, advanced wound care products. We have very much been able to grow since the acquisitions, just based on our global footprint that we have in Essity. So both are ahead of the business case and doing really, really well.

Your next question comes from the line of Linus Larsson from SEB.

Now that you're moving from a return on capital employed target to margin side. I wonder what that might mean in terms of organic investments might they increase what are the CapEx restrictions? And also a follow-up, if I may, on the size of the buyback program, what are the possibilities and prospects of you coming back with an additional buyback program before the AGM next spring, please?

So should we do it the other way around now Fredrik, you start? And then I take the second question. It's a change.

Yes, I think, Linus, thanks for the question. Magnus, you mentioned it previously that the reason for changing to EBITA margin, contrary to ROCE is more for simplicity and perhaps comparison reasons. So this doesn't, in no way mean that we have a less focus on capital efficiency. That remains very important, both from a CapEx standpoint and from working capital. So it doesn't really have an impact, you can say, internally on the level of CapEx. So from that perspective, it's basically the same. So we will continue to execute on our journey when it comes to organic investments and everything else in terms of efficiency.

Absolutely. And internally, we have a very strong focus, as you said, on return on capital employed also going forward. And of course, we will also report this externally. And then when it comes to the buybacks, just to reiterate that for the first time, Essity announces a share buyback program. It's SEK 3 billion. We don't mind having a strong balance sheet. And I think this is a very important signal to the market that we have this very, very strong cash flow now that we generate that gives us this possibility.

We currently have no questions in the queue. [Operator Instructions] The next question comes from the line of Mikheil Omanadze from BNP Paribas Exane.

It's a follow-up, really. You mentioned that the above 15% EBITA margin target is for the medium term. And then you said that there is a target to achieve above 14% this year or FY '25. As you said, you continue operating under the old ambition. Did I understand this correctly?

To put it this way, of course, we're not setting any targets for a specific year, but our old target was corrected them to exclude Vinda to achieve a return on capital employed during next year 2025. And just to answer that question, where do you see that going? We're still committed to that return on capital employed target for next year just as before. So that's just an indication. What we're doing right now is with the good margins that we have currently 14% in the first quarter, we're really, really focusing on growth because this is very value creating for shareholders. And when we grow based on this margin. So that's what we're doing now in the short to medium term and then to take another step with operating leverage and with all the other good things we've spoken about cost savings innovation, mix and so on to achieve the above 15%.

Your next question comes from the line of Farhaad Mallu from Jefferies.

Just quick questions I had on the rest of the proceeds from the Vinda sale. So will this be used to deleverage? Also, what's the situation of the bondholder group right now, if you don't mind speaking about that?

Fredrik?

The answer to your first question is yes, we have deleveraged as you can clearly see then for Q1. And when it comes to the second question, we have nothing to share. There is no news in addition to what we have said before.

Next question comes from the line of Victoria Nice from Bernstein.

I just wondered how we should think about the contribution to EBITA target, I guess, from the various divisions or put another way, could you provide more detail on what categories the majority of the step-up will be coming from? And I guess related to that, how should we think about the Consumer Goods adjusted EBITA margin during this medium-term time frame? Is there a possibility to raise EBITA margins in Consumer Tissue? Or is this mainly going to come from Personal Care any contribution?

Yes. Of course, we don't provide detail on EBITA margin for different categories or the 3 business areas. Current performance is strong in all these areas. Then my question or my answer, not answering your question is that when we improve in all these areas that I mentioned and have a good combination of development in all our business areas, that's when we see the type of margins we have today and the improvements going forward. So we see opportunities in all our business areas, in all our categories.

Your next question comes from the line of Tom Sykes from Deutsche Bank.

Firstly, just on the debt that you'll be using to buy back shares or what will be the cost of debt that will offset this obviously previously you've used some quite expensive short-term debt. So I was just wondering if that will be the case. And when you mentioned the incentives at the Board level. Are you going to be changing the incentives to skew towards volume growth at C-suite minus 1, 2 and through the organization, please?

Yes, I can start with the second question, then the incentives that Fredrik mentioned. And of course, this is very important. The last 3 years if I have been out -- we tried to frequently meeting customers with sales representatives and I asked the sales reps so what's your target, what are you aiming to do? He would have said, #1, I want to raise prices, #2 is to raise prices, #3 raise prices because that's what we need to do. And of course, incentives play a role here. And now, of course, we are changing those incentives, not because, of course, prices are not important anymore but because we have achieved really good margins. So it's very value creating now to focus on growth. And by also achieving volume growth, which we haven't had in the last couple of years, we can get operating leverage. So definitely on all levels of the organization, we are changing the incentive, not the systems and the setup, but just a waiting and this we already did for this year 2024. So that's kind of already happened. That's already how the organization is operating to focus more on growth, but of course, protecting the margins that we have today. And we know that this is one out of many important parameters to reach our targets.

Tom, you asked about the cost of funding of the share buyback. And just to kind of perhaps reiterate what we've already said here is that we're mainly -- we're not mainly -- all of it is actually funded through operating cash. So if you look at it, we continue to actually strengthen our balance sheet. So cost of funds from that perspective is not new funding really, but generally speaking, the average -- if you look at the average funding level is between 3% to 4% approximately. If you look at our total funding portfolio.

Your next question comes from the line of Farhaad Mallu from Jefferies.

So just a follow-up question from my previous one. As you mentioned before, you said you're deleveraging. My question was more, would you look to use cash from within Vinda to pay down gross debt? Or would you just keep it on the balance sheet?

If we would -- I'm not sure I got the question, if we would use as -- I mean we have already received the funds from Vinda. We did that already in Q1. It's a very large part of Q1. So it's already in our balance sheet. And of course, over time, that has strengthened our balance sheet, is as simple as that.

Sorry, maybe just to clarify, the question was more, would you use that cash on your balance sheet to pay down gross debt, so to actually pay down debt? Or would you just keep on your balance sheet as cash?

Yes, of course. Yes.

Okay. Perfect.

And we already did. So, absolutely.

We currently have no questions in the queue. [Operator Instructions] We have no further questions in the queue. So I will now hand the call back over to your hosts for any closing remarks.

Well, I just want to thank you all for participating on such short notice and look forward to meeting you again quite soon before summer break on the 18th of July. Sandra, is that correct?

Yes, correct.

Yes, for the Q2 presentation. and thank you for the good questions and good discussion.