LIXIL Corporation (5938) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

[Interpreted] It is time for us to start the briefing for the First Half Results for the Fiscal Year Ending March 31st, 2025. This briefing is streamed live on the Internet. Thank you for being here. Let me introduce to you the presenters. Director, Representative Executive Officer and President and CEO, Kinya Seto; Executive Vice President in charge of Finance, Treasury, M&A and IR; as well as CFO, Mariko Fujita; Head of IR Office, Aya Kawai. I will be serving as the MC from IR office. My name is [ Yo Takeuchi ]. The materials are posted on our IR page. I would like to explain to you about how we proceed. First, President Seto will be briefing you on the overview of our financial results. Question-and-answer session will follow. [Operator Instructions] We expect to conclude at 6:00. Now, I would like to hand over to Mr. Seto to talk about the first half results for the fiscal year-ending March 31, 2025.

[Interpreted] Hello, everyone. I would like to brief you on the first half results for the fiscal year-ending March 31st, 2025. So what we have felt after the first half, especially the recent 3 months, was that the objective environment was very bad. However, we were able to improve our business. I think that is very encouraging globally, excluding India, as well as Middle East, there was interest rate hike, and the real estate business was sluggish. And domestic -- in the domestic market, the new housing starts had declined more than expected in the -- there was a 7% to 9% drop each month year-on-year in the detached housing, as well as the owner-occupied houses. So the fact that we were able to improve, I think that it was good. In LWT, domestic market, we launched various new products, biggest number of new products. Also, the renovation business did well. Compared to the competitors, we tended to depend more on the new houses business. However, we were able to overcome that, and we were able to overachieve the plan that we had in place. As for LHT, window and sash door businesses depended on new housings because of that, it was impacted drastically by the decline in the new housing starts decline. However, because of the window renovation subsidy, we were able to do better there. As for the international business, as I have said earlier, Europe, U.S. had been in a very difficult environment market wise. However, demand is going up. For the U.S. in the past few years, there has been pent-up demand for -- from the immigrants as well as the lower income people. And also in Europe, there is pent-up demand being accumulated as well. If there is some kind of subsidy initiative from the government, I think that the pent-up demand will be realized. U.S. and Europe were the biggest struggle markets, but we were able to grow with the new products in Europe, but -- and also in the U.S. a bit lagging behind the U.S., we are working on the structural reform. Right now, we are working on the structural reform matched with the bad economy. So we are struggling, but we will do better. There was reversal of the deferred tax assets, and the tax expenses had gone up and the first quarter had seen losses. However, in the second quarter, we were able to go back to the profit. We would like to boldly conduct a structural reform at this point in time. I believe the U.S. market -- in the U.S. market, we will be able to do better next fiscal year. And we want to have fruitful results from the structural reform. The recovery in Europe will be a bit behind the U.S. As for the operating cash flow, it had significantly improved. Free cash flow was JPY 65.2 billion better than last year. I think this was a huge step forward. For EBITDA, we are seeing improvement. And as for the dividend for the full year, there will be no change. We have made a resolution on that item today. The domestic market, as I have said, in LWT, including INAX, ERA, we were able to launch the biggest number of new products. We knew that if we don't differentiate, we would not be able to get large profit, and we were able to differentiate. For the second quarter, I think that we were able to have a good flow. We are seeing improvement in the number of visitors to our showrooms from June. 3 months for renovation and 6 months for the new housing is the period after the visit to the showroom -- the showroom that the actual demand starts to come in. And we are seeing the increase from renovation from June. So we believe that new housing will do better. And as for the LHT, when there is decline in the housing starts, this business is negatively impacted. However, we are seeing increase in the window renovation due to the subsidy. So we were able to offset the negatives with that to a certain extent. Last year, there was a last-minute demand from the consumers. when they thought that the subsidy will be concluded. In August to October, we were seeing the impact from the subsidy. But we are seeing increase year-on-year in the renovation demand in the past 6 months. So in LHT, the window reform has supported its growth. In regards to the international business, the objective environment is very tough, except for India and the Middle East. But despite that difficult objective environment, we feel that we have been able to bottom out and exit the bottom. And I say so because -- in Europe, we have implemented structural reform, which has enabled us to reduce costs quite significantly, and we have been able to launch quite a large number of new products. And now that we are able to constantly launch new products, and particularly in a shower-related product with a higher margin, the fact that we have been able to launch these new products, we have been able to start recovery in Europe to an extent. The profit earner for us is Europe. And so, the fact that Europe has picked up in that regard is very good for us overall. But U.S. continues to be quite weak. And I don't want to use that as an excuse, but we are working on structural reform quite aggressively in U.S. And let me explain the situation on a per country basis. And for U.S., as I have just explained, centered around retail, particularly the renovation, the demand has been quite weak compared to the past. And interest rate may have come down, but the mortgage long-term rates has stayed at high level still. And also, in the case of U.S., people tend to use fixed rates more. And so, just a slight decrease will not really change the situation immediately. And so, the overall cost has been increasing for the housing materials and so forth and the loan cost has come up. And so, despite the fact that there is a quite a high demand, but it has not translated to increase in supply and the demand has just continued to be potential demand and hasn't eventuated into actual the orders. But many people are saying that the improvement will come next year, particularly due to the pent-up demand. So we expect the market to improve next year in U.S. And in that regard, I think we have been making quite a significant effort in advancing our structural reform. And given the fact that the market is quite large, a pickup there will be quite large in terms of performance. And the loss due to the structural reform in U.S. has increased our tax cost. And so, once the pickup occurs, that would have quite a significant improvement on our profitability. So we have high expectation for U.S. in that regard. For Europe, the recovery is probably slower than U.S. particularly for Germany and France, if we look at these countries, and our competitors are probably saying the same thing and the construction or housing related industry. So our partner like [indiscernible] in Germany, when we speak with them, the sales level is expected to drop by 20% to 30% this year. And so, they are saying the situation is quite weak. But despite that, when it comes to Europe, and the market is quite weak, but we have been able to increase our sales a little bit, and that is because of new product we have been able to launch like in the shower product and also because we have been able to reduce cost. And so, Europe did actually make a contribution. So in terms of recovery, recovery is likely to come earlier in U.S. for the market itself, but for us, the recovery came earlier in Europe. But having said that, the sales pickup was not all that significant, but still the same. Europe is where we have quite a large business and is a source of profitability for us. And the fact that we have been able to make improvement there is why we feel that we have kind of bottomed down. Middle East, Saudi Arabia and UAE continues to perform very strongly, and we still have high expectations for the future. The Saudi Arabia is a country with a young population, and there is strong the housing demand for the younger generation, and there is a national project to increase the housing stock there, which is quite significant. And there is that geopolitical concerns that you may be concerned with, but Saudi Arabia and UAE has not been affected by that at this point in time. In regards to Asia Pacific, Vietnam and Thailand is weak, India great. As for Vietnam, we've seen a sudden break put on. And as you know, the reason for this is that in Vietnam, there is quite a significant effort to deal with the corruption and so the high-ranking officials have been the core and so forth. So the permits have not been issued. Even with permit issuance, styrene, there is a bribe issue and so forth at the government level. And this is a country with a communist party. And so -- but the demand itself isn't that weak. In regards to Thailand, maybe it's structurally weak at this point in time, whereas for India, more than Middle East or Middle and Near East, we are seeing quite a strong situation continue in India. And U.S. and Europe included, when we look at the total situation, U.S., Europe, Asia, the Middle and Near East, and when we think -- rather than the retail business, where we have high expectations in relation to projects. And projects are something for the future, but we have been able to capture these businesses for the future, and that is also a sign of bright spot for us. But in regards to China, we expect the market to continue to remain weak for quite some time, and we are quite prepared for that. But Chinese customers, they tend to try new products quite quickly. So they are important in that regard. We have GROHE PureFoam. This is what we refer to as Kinuami in Japan. It's a foam shower. Now we have changed the design of this product, and we intend to launch this product in November. And as exemplified by this type of product, a new product or new way of selling is something that we'll continue to try in China going forward. With that said, I would like to summarize. For revenue, it was not a significant increase. For core earnings, especially LWT domestic and [ LI ] had done well. So the past 3 months was very good. As for EBITDA, it was JPY 52.3 billion, up JPY 3.8 billion year-on-year. As for the profit for the first half, there was a red ink from the structural reform in the U.S. as well as tax expenses because of that, we struggled in the first quarter. But in the second quarter, we turned back to the profit. So after the structural reform is completed, we see a bright future for the U.S. So in the -- between core earnings and the profit, I don't think that there would be much of a gap. That's what we expect for the coming year. This is a recap of what I have talked about. What you notice is that the gross profit in the second quarter was 33.5%. On a year-on-year basis, there was a 1.7% improvement. One of them is because of the bigger ratio from the new products. The old products tend to be -- to see decline in the gross profit because we were able to launch new products, we were able to improve the gross profit. Also, for SG&A, there was not a significant increase there. Compared to last year, there was a 0.5% increase. We are conducting various restructuring within the group. and we have been able to bring down SG&A. Labor cost, the distribution cost, these are increasing in the recent years. We have been able to suppress the increase of SG&A in the face of that. So we have been working on structural reform quickly than the others, especially in the international market, and we are seeing bearing of the fruit there. As for the profit, we have seen the side effects of the structural reform, and there was improvement in the cash flow, as well as EBITDA. So I think that we would be able to improve it going forward. This is a comparison of LWT and LHT. In the past 6 months for LWT, we had been doing better than expected. As for LHT, it has been impacted by the decline in the new housing starts declining more than had been expected. But if you look at the negative figures, we are seeing smaller negatives in the recent months. So we are doing better. Here, in regards to our financial position, impact from FX is quite large. And so, if we consider that, not a significant change overall with equity ratio at 33.7%. Next, the cash flow. Now we've made a lot of improvement here. And from our perspective, we have been making a lot of efforts and JPY 65.2 billion of an improvement year-on-year is quite a significant improvement in our view. Yes. Well, I have explained the overall picture. And so, I would like to spend the rest of the time to respond to your questions. Thank you for listening.

[Interpreted] Thank you very much. We would like to go to the Q&A session now. [Operator Instructions] We would like to go to the first question from Goldman Sachs Securities, Okada-san. We have received 2 questions. So I would like to go with the first question. You are saying that the U.S. market will be improving due to the impact from the structural reform. But depending on what happens with the presidential elections, there may be some negative impact to the housing market because of the interest rate, as well as inflation. What is the risk scenario that you have for this?

[Interpreted] I don't foresee situation getting worse than we are seeing now. This year, we have seen very bad situation. In the past 2 years to 3 years, there was less new housing starts. But -- and recently, we are seeing the increase in the buying of the houses by wealthier people. And also, we are seeing increasing the people who rent their residences. Younger generation and the millennials are -- have high demand for housing. Also, immigrants demand is high, but the supply is in shortage. So at one point in time, the houses must be built. I think that whichever becomes the President, they need to work on the supply of housing. I don't think that the market will be worse than it is now. It's hard for me to comment on the presidential elections, but Vice President Harris has been saying that there is a necessity to build 3 million homes, and she would be providing the subsidies for that. And also, former President Trump is also saying that there needs to be support provided to buying homes. So and either of the President may be conservative and the conservatism may drive inflation and prices may be higher. But in the housing market, there is a huge gap between supply and demand. It needs to be solved. So I don't think that the market will be deteriorated significantly. It's hard to expect from a historical view. On the other hand, that's the overall environment. But if we look at LIXIL itself, what we have been struggling is unprofitable business units and profitable units existed together, and we were not able to make structural reform to our organization. However, we have taken bold measures to change the structure. We are focusing more on the faucets, as well as the higher-end toilets. And by steering towards that direction, we are seeing better results. So if we are able to improve the focus on the -- if we are able to focus on the businesses, where we are better at, I think that the business will turn around. It is very difficult to make assumptions about the economy. But for the mainstream, I think that the view is that the housing market issue has bottomed out.

[Interpreted] Now moving on to the second question. Is it okay to understand that the structural reform for the European LWT business have been completed. The first half core earnings ratio for GROHE was 8%. And is it possible to maintain the double-digit core earnings ratio from next fiscal year on?

[Interpreted] I don't believe that the structural reform has been completed. As for Europe, the situation is very bad. Under that circumstances, there are still things that we need to work on. For Europe and Middle and Near East, the growth is 10%, but -- but it's combined and Middle East is better, and Europe is only growing 3% to 4%. If Europe improves, then the situation will be significantly better. As for the U.S., in terms of the structural reform, if the demand goes up, then the business profit will go up. So considering that Europe, we would be able to do the structural reform quicker than the U.S. But for Europe, in terms of the economy, the speed of recovery would be somewhat slower than the U.S. That's my impression.

[Interpreted] Next question is from Nakagawa-san from Mizuho Securities. Two questions. The first question, on Page 21 of the earnings result presentation, you showed the waterfall chart for the profit, and it is indicated that the mix and pricing for LWT in Japan is plus JPY 3.6 billion, and a pickup from JPY 1.5 billion in the first quarter. What are the reasons?

[Interpreted] I'll ask Kawai-san.

[Interpreted] This is Kawai speaking. For the LHT, the mix and pricing, the pricing benefit from September from last year is continuing. And for the second quarter, in the building related, we saw improvement in mix. And as a consequence, LHT, the sash and door different mix and improvement was down as well. So it's a slight pickup. In regards to the building business, LHT overall, we have seen the new housing starts come down, but for buildings, we are still seeing demand increasing. So when it comes to buildings, demand is continuing to grow, but it's the supply for the industry, as a whole, they have not been able to keep up. And so, we now have been able to resolve the excessive pricing competition from the past. Now building business within LHT was a business with the lowest margin. But now within LHT, building is stably generating high profitability.

[Interpreted] Next question. You've indicated that there was a benefit from a new product launch in Europe. Do you expect that benefit to continue in the second half of the year as well? And if you look at the business environment in Europe, particularly for Germany, what is the trend in regards to inventory in distribution? Please give us a comment on that.

[Interpreted] For new product for shower and color, so colored products, there is a quite a strong demand, and we are receiving quite strong orders for that as well. So for the colored products, we need to adjust our production capacity quite quickly, and that's how high the demand is. But Europe, overall is quite weak. And the stock or the inventory and distribution is quite poor. Now for us, there is quite a high level of inventory for heat pumps. And themselves when thinking about financing for distribution, then they are struggling, I think and it's quite a fact. And Germany that you have indicated in your question is quite poor. But one good sign that I can refer to is that for about 1.5 years, the housing prices have continued to come down. But from August, we have started to see the housing prices pick up. And so, in Europe, the demand fell sharply, but we are starting to see some pickup, and which is a change in the environment. But generally speaking, Germany, France, Holland, they are not that good right now. But as indicated in the presentation material, in the case of Europe, many countries tend to use variable mortgage rate. And so, the interest rate coming down will have benefits there. And also, in comparison to U.S., there are lesser reasons for inflation. And so, the speed at which the interest rate coming down is probably faster in comparison to the real long-term interest rate as well. But it does have a relationship with what the economy will do as well. But my view is that we will -- probably we will see recovery come first in U.S. followed by Europe.

[Interpreted] Next question. It is from Kawashima-san from SMBC Nikko Securities. We have 2 questions. The first question. The second quarter result for GROHE was improvement of EUR 3 million versus the first quarter and EUR 19 million bigger in profit. I think that it has been positively impacted by the structural reform, but what were the reasons behind this increase? Do you think the similar kind of impact can be expected in the second half?

[Interpreted] This can be said to the Japanese market as well, but our products in this industry is when you launch a new product, that product will be sold for several years. The margin will be declining gradually as the time goes by. So it depends on at what speed we would be able to launch the new product will be the key and also whether we would be able to manufacture that on the platform for mass production purposes. That's one of the reasons why we conducted the structural reform. We were able to launch new products, and we were successful in that. So in that sense, I think that we were able to derive good results from the structural reform, and I think that we can continue to launch new products. The products with colors, PVD is the final finish that we need to have on those products, and we were not able to catch up with that because there was a huge increase suddenly in those types of products. So we need to solve each of these bottlenecks. And from next year on, if we are able to solve that, we would be able to do better.

[Interpreted] The second question. In order to achieve the full year plan, you need to improve the revenue by 10.6% year-on-year and also 71% increase in core earnings. The sales environment is not good. Are you thinking about additional price optimization or suppressing of the expenses?

[Interpreted] If we look at the current environment, for example, in October, we are seeing our performance being in line with the plan, but we don't know what will happen in the future. The price revision requires preparation period. So we would not be able to do it all of a sudden. In October, we have conducted some price revisions in Japan, and we are seeing some increase in the copper cost. So we need to respond to that in the international market. Suppression of the cost is what we need to work on in the structural reform. So we would not be conducting arbitrary cost cuts like not going on business trips. Fujita-san, anything to add?

[Interpreted] I would like to make supplementary comments to this. As Seto-san explained, the structural reform was the major portion of suppressing the cost. On a daily basis, we will be investing, where the cost is needed, and we will be suppressing the usage of the cost, where it's not necessary. This is how we would like to respond to the situation. That is all.

[Interpreted] Next question is from Fukushima-san from Nomura Securities. Two questions. The first question. The structural reform in Europe and U.S. to what extent have they progressed against the plan? Is there -- I think you have indicated that the structural reform will continue into the next fiscal year as well. Am I right? Is that true? And the cost reduction effect from the structural reform, how much will be in the results for March 2025?

[Interpreted] For U.S., the progress is earlier than that is planned and Europe, more or less in line with the plan. We started first in Europe. And so, there was a benefit in improving the profitability in Europe due to the earlier start of the structural reform. Of course, there are things that we need to continue to do every year. And so, there is even a possibility of U.S. becoming even worse in terms of condition. But basically, we want to complete much of the structural reform before the end of this fiscal year. If we are unable to complete, we need to certainly do some more next fiscal year as well. So there is that possibility. But the cost reduction benefit from structural reform is one thing. But because of the cost structural reform, we are seeing some cost increase right now because we need to treat assets and things like that, and it's somewhat sensitive. It's difficult to say. But for March 2025, there is quite a large amount booked in the first half of the year, but the poor performance in comparison to core earnings is as a result of that. And the second half of the year, we expect the situation to improve somewhat. But for the first half of the year, rather than cost reduction benefit, there is an increase in cost, as a result of the structural reform that we have been implementing.

[Interpreted] Yes. As explained by Mr. Seto, we are having to book expenditures right now. That's without a question. But we are implementing structural reform that is necessary for the future. So once we go through with these actions, then we will create a company structure with a lower cost base. And so, these are well thought out expenditures. And to respond to Fukushima-san's question -- and the structural reform is not just to reduce cost, but in the case of U.S., we are trying to restructure business as well. As I've been saying, we want to focus on higher probability business and reduce resource for lower probability business. And so, because of the structural reform, not just the benefit in terms of cost, but we should be able to see greater contribution to profit next fiscal year. We should be able to share things next year. There are things that I can't share with you right now because it's sensitive, but we are now at a stage of being able to see outcome coming up.

[Interpreted] The second question I understand that new product was launched in LWT Japan and also in Europe. But against the sales, what was the contribution from new product? Can you share the contribution ratio?

[Interpreted] Well, unfortunately, we cannot disclose these numbers. And LWT Japan, even from the INAX days, we have been able to launch the highest number of new product in history. The new product in Europe is mostly related to shower and some colored faucets. But in practice, rather than sales, they tend to have a greater benefit in terms of profit margin. That's the impression that we got.

[Interpreted] Next questions are from Mochizuki-san from CLSA Securities. The first question, GROHE's core earnings ratio for the second quarter was 10%. There was a significant improvement from 5% in the first quarter. Would this margin of 10% be sustained from the second half on?

[Interpreted] I think this overlaps with what Kawashima-san asked. In our business, our sales is the highest in the third quarter. As for GROHE, the fourth quarter revenue is the highest. So there would be an increase gradually from the first quarter and the highest in the fourth quarter. In March, we need -- we are seeing the business tradition of buying more in the fourth quarter for the purpose of the calculation of rebate. So I think for GROHE, in the fourth quarter, it will be -- it will see good revenue. But in the first quarter, we are not able to foresee how it would drop. But if the third quarter and fourth quarter, if it were to deteriorate, it would be in relation to the cost perspective. But I think that we would be able to maintain certain margins for the third and fourth quarters at this point in time.

[Interpreted] The second question. The sales volume for the second quarter for ASP, as well as the trend for price is what I would like to know. In the second quarter, I think that you had booked losses for the business. And when do you foresee turning into the black?

[Interpreted] This business has seen the biggest negative impact from the structural reform. We are now working on the replacement of the resources, and there are many sensitive matters that I would not be able to disclose here. The cost for the structural reform, I think, has peaked out or in the process of peaking out. I believe that next fiscal year, we would be able to turn into the black. But at what timing we would be able to go into profit, I would not be able to say because of the sensitivity to this matter. But where we need to focus is the faucets, as well as the high-end toilets for trade purposes, and we are seeing increase there. For other products, there are areas, where we are intentionally decreasing. Businesses like DPI have been discontinued and we had booked losses for that. So the current situation is the bottom. Maybe the first quarter is the bottom.

[Interpreted] Next question is from Daiwa Securities, Teraoka-san. Two questions were sent in. The first question. On Page 17, the housing starts for the second quarter came down by 5.4% in terms of revenue. But the window renovation, did that increase in the second quarter? The budget consumption is quite slow. What do you expect for the subsidy next fiscal year?

[Interpreted] When it comes to renovation, the windows for renovation, it is increasing, but the increase has not been to the extent that we had expected. So the second quarter was more or less in line with the number last year. And let me explain in some detail here. Basically, JPY 100 billion of subsidy increased JPY 135 billion of subsidies. Our budget was to increase by 35%, but we were not able to achieve that. But in comparison to last year, we have been able to grow. And maybe I shouldn't be comparing against competitors, but competitors have not been able to make that improvement, but we have been able to make that pickup. And the reason why we did not see a pickup in the second quarter, there was a special reason. Last year, when the subsidy was announced, then industry thought that the subsidy was going to be fully used up. And so, there was a rush order in April and May, quite a large volume. So whether it be ourselves, or our competitors, we were unable to fully accommodate those orders. So most of the shipments were in August, September and October. But last year, there was a decrease from November onwards. And so, in that regard, the August and September, the -- what we are comparing against was very high. And so, our increase in the second quarter was low. It was more or less in line. But the third quarter onwards, when we compare against the basis because everyone knows that there is not going to be completely consumed, so it should be a pickup. And 3 reasons, I think, why the budget has not been fully consumed. The first is that last year, at the start, people who wanted to renovate their windows, and those people, who had that intent made orders immediately. But once that settled down, there is a significant demand, but the fact that the windows can be renovated, but many people didn't know, maybe our education or the promotion activities were not all that significant. So the increase was not as expected -- not as high as expected, but we should be able to make a gradual increase. That's the first thing. And the second thing is that, as I said before, last year, August, September and October were when we saw concentration of shipment numbers. And so, how we looked at the situation, we are making comparison against the high base, and so it may look to be somewhat slow, and that's the second reason. And the third reason is that quite frankly speaking, window renovation tends to occur mostly in October, November and December. That's when the temperature starts to drop. But October for us was not all that cold, and that was somewhat unfortunate because when it comes to window renovation, temperature and the energy costs tend to be significant factors. And energy cost has not really picked up at this time of the year as well. And so -- and there has been a subsidy provided to gasoline. And so, in that regard, maybe not as good as what we had initially expected, but still the same. The increase has been quite steady. And as for the subsidy next year, the budget request has been made for JPY 130 billion. Of course, there is still a possibility of the government changing that could potentially have impact. But in our view, the subsidy program is expected to continue.

[Interpreted] The second question, we do hear of price competition against Chinese local manufacturers or there is a shift in demand for low-priced product. Are you impacted? Are you doing anything to address this?

[Interpreted] In the case of LIXIL, GROHE is one of the pillar of our product and GROHE is considered to be relatively high end. And so, we have not really seen pricing competition with the local manufacturers. But the shower toilet or toilet product, there is a demand shift for real. And in the case of China, the market was expanding in the past and China made and overseas made, the market was kind of separated. But when the market itself is shrinking, so the local manufacturers are coming up in terms of the quality of products. So the competition is becoming more tougher. But frankly speaking, for China, we have decided to use the market to first trial a product that has been fully differentiated, whether it be product or how we sell, we will trial the product first in China. So that is what we intend to do in terms of how we will use China. So in that regard, we will increase our resources to China from those perspectives. And the shift of demand towards a lower-priced product, well, for certain product, the China-made product is better. So for [indiscernible] product, good or interesting products are being launched in China by local manufacturers. So we need to learn from them as well. So inclusive of development. So whether it be development or research, we intend to increase resources in China going forward. And so, when you ask me whether we have any countermeasures, well, frankly speaking, the countermeasures against the demand shifting to lower-priced product, we are not really thinking of doing much there and the market probably will deteriorate, but China is a unique market. We want to use China as an experimental market, and we want to use China as a place for research and learning. So we want to kind of learn from China in that regard.

[Interpreted] Next is from [indiscernible] Securities Institute of Economy from Suzuki-san. You talked about the increase in the visitors to the showrooms at the time of the financial results briefing for the first quarter, and you said that the effect will appear from 3 months after the visit of the showrooms for renovations. So how would it impact to your products? What is the current situation?

[Interpreted] In the showroom, people's demands are related to water-related products, the plumbing products and the kitchen [ reshell ], the higher-end products are what the customers would like to see. And we are seeing the effect of that kicking in. We are seeing the increase of the visitors for those who want to build new homes. And for -- and we are seeing the increase in the orders for the new housing and the renovation 6 months on, and we are seeing the increase in the demand from September for the renovation, but we are not seeing that for the new housing. So we need to wait and see. There are some companies, who are saying that the situation will be improving from December to January period, and there are companies, which are not saying that. So there are discrepancies.

[Interpreted] The next question is from Takegawa-san from Mitsui Sumitomo Trust Asset Management. Four questions have been sent in, but we will share 2 questions to begin with. On Page 20 of the presentation material, could you explain the difference against the plan in terms of domestic sales, as well as the reason for that and the expectation for the future?

[Interpreted] In terms of the performance against plan, there is a gap. And as Seto-san has explained, when it comes to LHT and renovation materials, we had quite a strong plan, 1.3x increase was what we planned for. And so, for LHT against the initial -- the forecast, we have been somewhat lower. LWT against the planned numbers, we are likely to end up slightly lower. But as was the case with renovation performing well in terms of sales, and there is also a seasonality benefit to come, and so, from third quarter onwards, we expect improvements to come. That's all.

[Interpreted] Next question is to Fujita-san, becoming -- it's been a while since you became the CFO of LIXIL. Where do you think are the challenges? And what are the instructions that you have given to make improvements?

[Interpreted] Thank you very much for your question. So I have assumed the position in April. So I've been in this position for around 6 months. And as I have explained on numerous occasions here, we tend to have quite a heavy asset. And so, we are trying to reduce the asset to become more asset-light. And that is a challenge, and this is also something that we need to work on. And from the finance perspective, we are providing support for such an initiative. And that is probably the most pressing action, and that is the action that I have given to my team. I hope that you have high hopes for the future in that regard.

[Interpreted] From Morgan Stanley MUFG Securities, Yagi-san sent in 2 questions -- 1 question. GROHE's second half, the margin level, will it improve from the EUR 59 million, which is the cumulative of the first half? Or because there is the concern for demand, it would be about the same level as the first half.

[Interpreted] Basically, we believe that it would improve. I think it was Fukushima-san's question that I have responded to this. Traditionally, GROHE's business, there will be an improvement from the first quarter, second, third and the fourth quarter would be the best. So I believe that basically, there would be an improvement. But there is still concern for demand, especially in retail, as I have said, the heat pump inventory is piling up and also German economy is not doing well at all. So we need to be conservative. Usually, in this industry, we accumulate the inventory at this period of the year, but we may not do that this time.

[Interpreted] Next is from Takegawa-san from the Mitsui Sumitomo Trust Asset Management. And I would like to continue with the questions he has asked, which is the third question now, the mix and pricing and also the continuance of the price increase benefit. Competitors like Panasonic has been reducing the price of toilet. Are we starting -- are we thinking of reducing pricing? It seems that competitors are also reducing their pricing.

[Interpreted] Well, I don't want to speak about others. But toilet industry in total, ourselves and Panasonic, we are essentially the players. And whether it be renovation or for those with the network, that is quite strong to the various customers or the contractors. The total is quite strong. We have come in later and Panasonic came in after us. That was how we have entered into the market. The latecomers in that regard -- in regards to such a network, we are at somewhat of a disadvantage. And so, we tend to sell to those who will buy in large volume for new builds. And so, when we focus on those, who buy at a volume for new housing, we often have to reduce pricing. And so, pricing sensitivity tend to be quite high for latecomers in regards to the business. As to whether there's going to be an increase or not in terms of the price reduction going forward, we can't really predict for what others may do. But for those where we would be depend on the new houses, various factors may come into play, say, structural reform done on plan. And if we don't do structural reform on the factories, there is possibility of what you have indicated happening. But now in the current era, those in the logistics or the vendors, those manufacturing the raw materials, we can't actually lower pricing. And so, to do so, we'll strangle ourselves. So probably we will not do so. And if we think about the past, in Europe, things like that didn't really happen in the past. Europe, because of the increase in immigration and the opening up to Eastern Europe and the market has been expanding. But in the past, there was a period when market continued to shrink. And so, they have been able to improve our profit margin. So when the industry starts to mature, can the industry change its mindset or thinking. So that's the kind of the juncture that we are at. So irrespective of what the individual companies are doing, when the overall pie is shrinking, we shouldn't do things that will really strangle ourselves.

[Interpreted] And the fourth question, in regards to the structural reform cost, cumulative for the first half of the year, the full year plan and the forecast for next year, could you give some explanation on that?

[Interpreted] The definition of the structural reform, we tended to have a broad definition. So it's hard to disclose because there are some sensitive matters, we would not be able to talk about. So for the first half, we used about JPY 1 billion. Aside from that, the DPI costs, which are not included in the structural reform cost, for example, getting rid of the inventory or for equipment and facility of the plants, we had sold that and that has not been categorized, as the structural reform. So it's very difficult to talk about this, but the biggest structural reform came from the U.S. this time. I believe that we would be able to reduce that amount gradually for next fiscal year. We -- there was a question asked from Fukushima-san that will this continue? And there are areas, where we need to continue to work on restructuring, but I don't think that it would be significantly increasing. The market itself is very close to the bottom. So I don't foresee the market further deteriorating.

[Interpreted] That will be all for the questions. And we would like to conclude the Q&A session here. We would like to conclude the financial briefing for the first half of fiscal year-ending March 31st, 2025. Thank you for your continued support for LIXIL. [Portions of this transcript that are marked [Interpreted] were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]