Fiera Milano S.p.A. (FM) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon, this is the Chorus Call conference operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the Fiera Milano Results as of the 30 of September 2024 Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Mr. Vincenzo Cecere, Head of Investor Relations and Sustainability. Please go ahead, sir.

Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Fiera Milano's 9-month 2024 results conference call. This is Vincenzo Cecere speaking, Head of Investor Relations and Sustainability, and I'm here with Francesco Conci, CEO; and Massimo De Tullio, CFO of Fiera Milano. The presentation of today will be structured in 4 sections. During the first section, Mr. Francesco Conci will give you an overview of the business, an update on the progress of the strategic plan, main financial highlights, and 2024 outcomes. Then, Mr. Massimo De Tullio will go through the divisional results and financial figures in greater detail. On a final note, an update on sustainability will also be provided. At the end of the call, you will be invited for a Q&A session with management available for your questions. At this point, I leave the floor to Francesco Conci for the key messages of the 9-month 2024 results. Please, Francesco, go ahead.

Okay, thank you, Vincenzo. Good evening, everyone, and welcome, and thank you for joining the Fiera Milano first half 2024 results conference call. I am very pleased to present to you a very positive set of results for the first 9 months of the year. With 51 exhibitions, 96 congresses, and almost 1,200,000 square meters sold, the group has delivered a solid growth. Revenue have reached EUR 184.5 million, reflecting an increase of 4%, or a EUR 6.7 million growth, compared to the first 9-month 2023. This result is particularly significant given the less favorable season calendar effect, with the absence in the 9 months, for example, of the biennial Tuttofood or the multi-year ITMA and Plast. The very positive news is that the good performance of the exhibitions and the congresses more than compensated the negative calendar effect. To share with you some numbers, the growth in revenues of EUR 6.7 million resulted from a performance effect of EUR 25 million, reflecting a like-for-like growth of 16%, compared 9-month 2023. This was driven by a 11% increase in sold area and 24% rise in services, along with strong performances in the congresses' business, which grew by 8%. An unfavorable seasonal calendar effect accounted for EUR 19 million, which was completely compensated by the very positive performance effect. EBITDA has saw a notable increase, reaching EUR 62.4 million, marking an improvement of EUR 6.3 million, resulting in 11% growth compared to the 9-month 2023, mainly due to better revenue performance, lower energy costs, decrease in personal costs and a positive contribution from the joint venture with Deutsche MESSE in China. Net income from continuing operations saw excluding the non-recurring capital gain coming from the Tuttofood transaction, stood at EUR 15.6 million, a growth of EUR 8.5 million compared to 9-month 2023. Finally, our net cash availability decreased by EUR 29 million, primarily due to rental installment and typical net working capital dynamics of the period. After an overview of the numbers, let me give you an update on the progress of our 2024-2027 strategic plan and share some positive news regarding our strategic initiatives. As you may recall, as part of our strategic plan for 2024-2027, we committed to launch 3 new exhibitions by 2027. In June, we proudly announced Net Zero Milan, an expo summit dedicated to decarbonization in the industrial sector. In October, we launched PURPLE Sign of the Times, a new B2C event that merges fashion and music, scheduled to take place in 2025 during Milan Fashion Week. Developed in collaboration with M.Seventy, Purple Sign of the Times is for Fiera Milano's strategic move towards diversification and growth, focusing on entertainment as a new business line. On top of this, I am pleased to announce that Gastech, the world's leading event on energy transition, will return in 2025 to Fiera Milano. Hosting such a high-profile event aligns perfectly with our 2024-2027 strategic plan, reinforcing Fiera Milano's position as a premier global venue and further establishing Milan as a strategic hub for world-class event. When it comes to Congress events, after winning the bid to host the European Society of Cardiology Congress, the world's largest cardiology event in 2027, I am pleased to share another important milestone for Allianz MiCo. For the first time in Italy, Allianz MiCo will host the Asian Development Bank's annual meeting in 2025. The annual meeting is a key opportunity for governors to consider on development issues and challenges facing Asia and the Pacific. Several thousand participants, including finance ministers, central bank governors, senior government officials, members of the private sector, representatives of international organizations, civil society, and the media, will join the meeting. Hosting this event reinforces our commitment to positioning Milano and Allianz MiCo as premier destinations on the global stage, where the world's most influential leaders come together to discuss the future of our global economy. We are also pleased to announce the launch of the first employee shareholder plan, PAD Futuro, a program designed to place our people in the heart of Fiera Milano's vision. In alignment with our strategic plan, this initiative is dedicated to developing our human capital, straightening a sense of belonging, and enhancing engagement, empowering employees to play an active role in creating sustainable value for the group. In conclusion, I am pleased to formally announce the most significant update of today's call. We are revising our 2024 guidance upward. Our exhibitions and hosted events have achieved impressive results, with Congresses excellent expectations, strong growth in services, and significant achievement internationally, particularly in Brazil. Additionally, a reduction of energy costs has provided a stable foundation for continued growth. Looking ahead to Q4, we expect results to exceed initial projections, driving flagship events such as CPhI and EICMA, and double-digit revenue growth in our congresses business, with events like IAC and ENLIT. Considering the results achieved in the first 9-month of the year, and our expectations for the final quarter, the exciting and uncertain macroeconomic environment, we believe we can further improve our forecast for the year already raised in the first half. By December 31, 2024, we now anticipate revenue in the range of EUR 255 million-EUR 265 million, up from the previous range of EUR 250 million and EUR 255 million. EBITDA in the range of EUR 75 million-EUR 80 million, compared to the prior range of EUR 70 million-EUR75 million. Net cash position in the range of EUR 65 million-EUR 70 million, exceeding the initial estimate of EUR 60 million-EUR 65 million. At this point, I will leave the floor to Massimo for the business and financial review.

Thank you, Francesco, and good evening, everyone. Well, as Francesco mentioned, during these 9 months, Fira Milano delivered a very positive set of results. So before we get into details of the performance effects and calendar effects at the consolidated level, which will help you to understand the dynamics of these 9 months, let's first take a brief overview of our divisional performances. We will briefly cover the Italian and foreign exhibition business, as well as the congresses providing what we call the divisional legal entity view at Slide number 8. So starting from the Italian exhibition business, we have experienced a revenue growth of 2.7%, moving from EUR 147.7 million to EUR 151.6 million. Despite a negative calendar effect, due mainly to the absence of the multi-year ITMA and Plast and the biennial Tuttofood in the first 9 months. Despite these challenges, our annual event performed very strongly, as the biennial did, as well as most recommended Expocomfort and Transpotec. This growth was driven mainly by the increased volume and a raise in service sales. As well as the revenue, also the divisional EBITDA saw a solid growth 10%, so we moved basically from EUR 43.5 million to EUR 47.9 million. This was clearly driven by the positive revenue trend, but was also further supported by lower energy costs and efficiencies achieved also in the cost incurred in the organization of the events and in the hosted event division. Now, moving to the foreign exhibition business, the foreign exhibition business has shown, as well as the Italian exhibition business, a remarkable progress with a revenue growth of 40%. In terms of absolute value, we moved from EUR 3.1 million to EUR 4.3 million, and this has basically been achieved, thanks to the result of the exhibition organized in Brazil. Specifically, Exposec, which saw a 10% increase in occupied square meters compared to 2023. On top of that, Brazil also benefited of the presence of the new exhibition that was organized with 2 international partners. We are mentioning basically Fruit Attraction and Esquadria, the first one organized with the -- in cooperation with the IFEMA Madrid, and the second one organized with NürnbergMesse. Additionally, also the result of the South Africa exhibition, the Art Fair exhibition, let's say, was helping to achieve this increase in terms of revenue and also in terms of EBITDA. Moving to the third division, so the congresses. Again, we are speaking about positive results. The congresses segment performed very well with a revenue growth of 6.4%, moving from EUR 33.8 million revenues to almost EUR 36 million, and also in terms of EBITDA, we moved from EUR 10.5 million to almost EUR 12 million. This increase is primarily due to higher revenues coming from recurring events, which represent more or less 45% of the total revenue, such as Salone del Risparmio, Salesforce, and the AWS Summit, along with the additional revenue coming from a higher number of non-recurring events. The divisional EBITDA growth of almost 14%, so again, a very impressive result, and is driven basically by the trend in revenues, and on top of that also was also caused by lower cost, lower energy cost, and again, efficiencies achieved in the congress business. Looking at the consolidated level, I think it could be useful to move to Slide number 9 in order to better understand the calendar effects and the like-for-like growth of both the hosted and organized exhibition as well as the service exhibition. So moving from a legal entity view to a business line perspective, we are really pleased to report that at the consolidated level, we reached a solid revenue growth of EUR 6.7 million compared to the 9-month 2023, which represented 3.7% year-over-year increase. But it's even more interesting to highlight that this growth is composed of several key factors, but the first one, the most important one, is that we experienced a performance effect, a like-for-like performance effect of almost EUR 26 million, which really translated to a remarkable 16% increase compared to the 9-month 2023. So if we take out -- in order to have this like-for-like comparison, if we take out the calendar effect, which was negative, this growth was achieved by, thanks to a 22% increase in sold area for the organized exhibition business, a 9% increase in sold area for the hosted exhibition, and a 24% rise in services, including physical and digital services, alongside with a strong performance in our congress business, which grew by 8% in the first 9-month compared to 2023. However, we faced -- so we had this very huge performance effect. We had also this unfavorable seasonal calendar impact, amounting, in terms of revenue, to almost EUR 19 million. I remember that in the first half, it was EUR 10 million, the negative calendar impact. So just in the Q3, the negative calendar impact was accounting for almost EUR 9 million. And this was due to the absence of the multi-year ITMA, which covered 122,000 square meters in 2023, Plast, which covered, in the last year, almost 49,000 square meters, and the biennial Tuttofood, which covered 60,000 square meters. So the absence of this exhibition clearly was creating a huge negative calendar impact, which was partially offset in terms of calendar impact by the presence, in 2024, of the biennials Mostra Convegno Expocomfort, with 86,000 square meters, and Transpotec, with almost 26,000 square meters. But clearly, what was completely offsetting this negative calendar impact was our performance that I mentioned before. So in summary, despite the challenging seasonal factors, our strong performance in sold area services and the congress business has driven a remarkable revenue flow, underscoring our resilience business model. Now I'm going to give you an in-depth overview of our economic and financial performance in presenting Slides from 12 to 15. So looking at the income statement, we have done really well, as well, with EUR 184.5 million revenues. That's an increase of EUR 6.7 million, which is close to a 4% increase in terms of revenue. We already covered what was driven this growth in terms of revenue, so let's move straight to our EBITDA performance. The EBITDA saw a solid increase from EUR 56.2 million to EUR 62.4 million. So a positive change, again, close to EUR 6.3 million, which represented an 11% growth compared to the 9 months 2023. And this growth was mainly driven by a better performance of revenues that we already mentioned and was also complemented by lower energy costs and more efficiencies achieved in the organization of the host event and congress event. In terms of financial management, we saw an improvement of EUR 1.6 million, mainly resulting from higher income related to the use of liquidity. Our net result from the period from continuing operation amounted to EUR 15.6 million, up to EUR 8.4 million compared to the EUR 7.2 million that we achieved in the first 9 months of 2023. The net result for the period from discontinued operation decreased compared to the previous year. That's because in 2023 we accounted for the result of the operation Tuttofood transaction, where we had a gain of almost EUR 16.5 million, which was clearly a one-off and we are not benefiting of this kind of impact in 2024. So our overall net result presented a profit in the first 9 months of EUR 15.6 million compared to the EUR 23.7 million that we achieved in the first 9 months of 2023. Moving to the balance sheet, so Slide 13, I would say that -- I would highlight basically what happened to the net working capital. So clearly our net working capital has moved from EUR 98.2 million at the end of 2023 to EUR 64.7 million. This cash absorption of almost EUR 33.5 million is driven by a typical net working capital dynamic for the period that we face in the even years and is driven by several factors. So first of all, we saw an increase in the trade and other receivables by close to EUR 10.4 million, and this change is mainly related to trade receivables of the parent company. Then we saw an increase in inventory and contracts in progress by EUR 2.8 million, which basically is due to the suspended costs related to the events that will happen after the 30th September 2024. There was a decrease in trade payables by EUR 27.2 million related to the payment of trade payables that were due during a period in which there are fewer liabilities generated from reduced activities. And there was an increase in advance on the other side by almost EUR 14.4 million, which is related to the advances invoiced to the customer for events that will take place in the following periods. On top of that, we faced a decrease in provision for risk and charges of other current liabilities for almost EUR 5.5 million and a decrease in tax liability by EUR 1.9 million. The net financial debt goes from a net cash availability of almost EUR 81 million at the end of 2023 to an availability of close to EUR 52 million -- EUR 51.8 million at the end of September, resulting in a free cash flow decrease of EUR 29 million, which is mainly due to at least 3 or 4, let's say, factors. First of all, an EBITDA generation in the period of EUR 62.4 million, but at the same time compensated by 4 installments for the rent, so there is 1 installment more compared to the 3 quarters. And this is because we moved back to the current contract provision for payment, which requires an advance payment for the rent. And then we had also the impact, clearly, of the dividend paid in the first half of the year. Additionally, it is noteworthy that over these 9 months, EUR 13.9 million in loans were repaid in H1 and EUR 6.3 million in Q3 2024. So, looking at Slide 19, we keep showing an excellent financial stability also in the first 9 months 2024 with all the ratio in a positive range, so all the current assets and current liabilities ratio and the equity and fixed assets ratios are quite positive. And I would finally, let's say, state again that, as Francesco already anticipates, we have improved the estimate for 2024 expected results. Why? This is clearly because of what we achieved in 9 months, but also because of what we see coming in the last quarter of the year. So basically, looking toward the Q4, we expect to exceed our initial projection, and thanks to basically the result achieved by CPhI, EICMA, which delivered a record year in terms of visitors, but also for our financial in terms of revenues, along with double-digit revenue growth that we expect in the congress sector, where we can anticipate more than 15% growth year-on-year at the end of the year compared to 2023. So taking into consideration, and just to give you another highlight, we see again in Q4 services growing by more than 20%, so this happened again for EICMA, and we see the same kind of result in another exhibition that is happening [indiscernible] as a CMA. So all the drivers that basically allowed Fiera Milano to achieve the 9-month result that we are discussing today are basically confirmed also for the Q4. So we again anticipate a change in the main guidelines. Revenues are now expected in the range of EUR 255 million and EUR 265 million. EBITDA is now expected in the range of EUR 75 million, EUR 80 million, and the net cash position is now expected between EUR 65 million and EUR 70 million. On top of that, I would also, let's say, mention that probably if this upgrade in the revenue EBITDA net cash position will probably allow the company to consider a possible improvement in our also dividend guidance that we gave during our strategic plan. I will now leave the floor to Vincenzo for a brief note on sustainability.

Thank you, Massimo. Just very quick notes on sustainability. So we recently got the second ESG rating from Sustainalytics, showing an impressive improvement of plus 37% compared to 2021, and we also achieved our anti-corruption certification that underscores our commitment to preventing, detecting, and addressing corruption risk, reinforcing transparency and integrity in line with our strategic plan. So I believe we have concluded with the presentation, and we can start with the Q&A session. Thank you.

[Operator Instructions] The first question is from Emanuele Gallazzi of Equita.

Yes. I have 3 questions. The first one is on the congress business. You mentioned a very strong performance expected in -- for Q4. Can you just elaborate a little bit more on the driver of this strong performance? The second one is on 2025. Basically, you confirmed the business plan range, but I know that is a little bit early. But anyway, any comment on your view on this 2025 would be really useful at this point. And my last question is on the capital allocation. First of all, if there is any update on the M&A side. And second one is on the dividends. You mentioned that there is some room to increase the minimum dividend set by the business plan, that is EUR 10 million per year. Is it correct I understood correctly?

Okay, thanks, Emanuele, for your question. So about congresses, which -- what is the main driver? The main driver is, in reality there are 2 main drivers, we are increasing both performances on the recurring events, but as we know the recurring events are not accounting for the major part of the congress business, so I was mentioning before the equates more or less 40%, let's say, 40%, 45% of the revenues depending on the period. And we are doing better on these recurring events. How we are doing better? Providing more services and generating more revenues from services. And we are doing really good also in the, let's say, non-recurring events, so the ones that are coming to Milano, to Allianz MiCo every 5, 6 years, so now we are becoming more successful also in getting them back sooner than before. So we are -- we had, just to give you an idea, October 2024 will probably be standalone 1 month, close to EUR 30 million revenues, just in 1 month, just to give you an idea of what we have been able to host in terms of congresses this year and this month, which is really an unexpected and very remarkable result, so there is a strong demand from this sector. And the Allianz MiCo now is representing really a leading venue in Europe and not only in Europe, also at worldwide level, so this is helping us to achieve these impressive performances. Second question was about 2025 expectations. So -- well, at this point we know that in 2025, we will have a favorable calendar impact. Why we will have this? Because we will have host, our biennial organized event, which is one of the most important organized events by Fira Milano, this event will happen in the last quarter. As far as we see now the sales, we see sales going into the direction that we expected so far, so one of the key factors to achieve our revenues and EBITDA guidance for 2025, so the result of host and the sales of host in this moment are giving us confidence that the range that we gave is in our possibility. We have also -- we will also have the Innovation Alliance next year, it's a 3 years and multi-year -- 3 years event and again we see a favorable trend in terms of sales and revenues coming from this exhibition. You know that we have a joint venture with Ucima, so we participate into the governance of the IPACK-IMA company and so this gives us full visibility on which is the trend of this exhibition, so we have very positive confidence in this moment. At the same time we are conscious that there are a lot of challenges in this moment in lots of industries, so there are also the result of the U.S. elections, we have 2 war, at least 2 war happening in the world. We have some sectors which are facing a lot of challenges. We see also the China situation in this moment which is not the positive situation that we were able to see some years ago -- a few years ago. So we know that some exhibitions probably will not, let's say, grow as they were doing before, but this was taken already into account in our strategic plan, so we didn't plan growth in our strategic plan based on the growth of also the exhibition, but we plan our growth basing it on the higher penetration of services and also the capabilities of Fiera Milano launching new events and reinforcing their -- its own organized events. So basically, we will rely on the growth on host for instance in 2024, 2025 as I was saying before, and we will also exploit the potential of exhibition like Sicurezza and all the other ones that we organize. And the third question was about dividends. So the fact that we are planning to achieve results higher than the one that we forecasted in our strategic plan is what is giving us the, let's say, confidence that there is the possibility of thinking about an higher distribution in terms of dividends, because as we remember, we defined in our strategic plan, a minimum guidance in terms of dividend distribution of EUR 10 million per year, and we, let's say, identified also M&A activities as the second part like -- second pillar in terms of capital allocation on top of the recurring CapEx. Now clearly, if we are able to produce additional cash on top of what we already forecast in our strategic plan, this could probably bring us to propose higher dividend distribution to the shareholder meeting, but we will see it when we will have the final result of 2024.

The next question is from Simonetta Chiriotti of Mediobanca.

A couple of questions from me as well. The first, again on capital allocation. If you could update us on M&A, so there are some -- there is a deal that had been anticipated, so where we stand on this negotiation and so an update on this. And second question, how should we think about the possibility of giving a higher dividend? I mean, you have increased the cash guidance by a certain amount, should we expect that the whole increase will be deployed as a dividend or just a part of it? And then again on the cash projection, just to check with you, should we consider the payment of 5 installment of rent this year, is that correct? 4 have been already paid, so should we include another one in the last quarter of the year? And finally on new events and new strategic developments in entertainment, if you could give us some color on these and some KPI on the new events like the one that you have just recently announced.

Okay, thank you Simonetta for your question. So regarding the M&A, we can anticipate that we are at the moment running 2 different due diligence, so we have 2 targets -- possible targets. They are both -- the 2 companies on which we are performing due diligence activities are running the -- into the services sector. One is in the high-end stand fitting sector and the other one is in the logistic and operation sectors and both the targets will be part of the potential strategy of growth of Fiera Milano because on one side they will allow us -- they would in case the operation would be concluded, they would allow us to increase the services in the exhibition and congress business, but at the same time they open for Fiera Milano Group also additional opportunities in the exhibition overall sector also outside our fairground or the congress venue. So I cannot anticipate more on this, but we are fully involved in these 2 due diligence processes. The second question was about the dividends. So again, we cannot now define how much will be the possible upgrade in terms of dividend distribution. Clearly there is a link and there is a connection between the upgrade in terms of guidance we are giving and the possible upgrade in terms of dividends. So I think that could be useful anyway as an answer for you. The third question is about the instalment. Yes, we will have to consider the instalment of the -- the last instalment for the quarter 4, so for all the venues that we are running. So we have to consider another instalment. And the -- in relation to what we are doing on the entertainment new sector, as we already mentioned, as Francesco already mentioned, we just announced the launch of a new exhibition which is close to this sector, which is the PURPLE exhibition that will probably -- that will use 2 pavilions of the venue and as a target of 40,000 visitors with approximately 150, 200 exhibiting companies. On top of that, we are working to close another partnership with an organizer, but we cannot announce it, we cannot say more because the partnership is not yet closed. So I mean, I think in March we will probably announce that we will have a new event in the sports sector which will be part of our portfolio of the entertainment sector with the B2C.

[Operator Instructions] Mr. Cecere, gentlemen, there are no more questions registered at this time.

So thank you everybody for joining the call and should you have any other questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at the Investor Relations email. Thank you and have a good night.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over. You may disconnect your telephones.