Multitude AG ($0R4W)

Q1 2026 Earnings Call. My name is Adam Hansson-Tönning. I'm the Head of IR and Treasury of Multitude, and I'll be your host today. Today's presenters will be our CEO, Antti Kumpulainen; and CFO, Bernd Egger, who will walk you through our Q1 2026 results. Following the presentation, we will open the line for a Q&A session. I'll now hand over to Antti to get us started. Antti, please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, and thank you for joining us. My name is Antti Kumpulainen. I'm the CEO of Multitude Group. During today's call, our CFO, Bernd Egger, and I will walk you through Multitude's Q1 2026 results. The first quarter reflects disciplined execution of our long-term strategy, while profitability development is expected to be weighted toward the later part of the year, we continue to make strong progress on the strategic priorities that we have communicated to the market. Today, there are five key takeaways we would like to highlight. First, group fee and commission income increased significantly by EUR 2.5 million year-on-year to EUR 4.9 million. This demonstrates our ability to generate recurring and resilient revenue streams. Second, our share of results from associates increased strongly to EUR 1.1 million, reflecting the continued good performance of our strategic investments. Third, asset quality continued to improve. Impairment losses decreased by 18.8% year-on-year to EUR 18 million. This is a continuation of the positive development we have seen for several years already. And fourth, during the quarter, we successfully issued EUR 70 million of perpetual notes, strengthening the IFRS equity position of the group and supporting future growth. And fifth, we confirm our EUR 30 million net profit guidance for 2026, together with the outlook of 20% annual net profit growth, both in 2027 and 2028. Let me briefly recap who we are and where we are heading. Multitude is a pan-European FinTech operating with one single EU-wide banking license across 17 European countries. We operate three business units on one shared growth platform, serving consumer, SME and institutional customers. The company was founded in Finland in 2005 and has been listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in Prime Standard since year 2015. In 2025, we generated EUR 257 million in revenue and EUR 26.6 million in net profit. And today, we employ around 700 people. We continue to maintain our dividend ambition of distributing between 25% to 50% of annual net profit. For financial year 2025, we have distributed a dividend of $0.55 per share to our investors, corresponding to a payout ratio of 44.2% of net profit. So this is a business with 2 decades of operating history, an established regulated footprint and what we see as a long runway still ahead. Turning to the group highlights from the first quarter of '26. Revenue for the quarter was EUR 61.6 million. The development reflects changes in our product offering and portfolio composition, partly offset by the very strong growth in fee income. Fee and commission income increased by more than 105% year-on-year to EUR 4.9 million, driven mainly by the Consumer segment. At the same time, impairment losses improved significantly, decreasing by 18.8% or EUR 4.2 million year-on-year. Net loans and investments grew in total by 23.5%, demonstrating strong demand on the market. Net profit for the quarter was EUR 4.4 million. This performance is fully in line with the expected phasing of profitability development during 2026 where we expect stronger contribution during the later quarters of the year. Going forward, we continue to focus on profitable and scalable growth through organic execution, partnerships and selected M&A opportunities while maintaining high asset quality. Moving to our largest and oldest business unit, Consumer Banking. The first quarter reflects continued portfolio optimization together with strong progress in asset quality improvement. Interest income and profitability were impacted by changes in portfolio composition and product offering, which were implemented intentionally as part of our asset quality strategy. At the same time, fee income increased significantly to EUR 4.3 million compared to EUR 1.9 million in Q1 last year. Asset quality strengthened further with impairments decreasing by over 21% year-on-year, supporting profitability. The portfolio continued to grow by 7.6% year-on-year. Going forward, our focus remains on disciplined growth, increasing recurring income streams, partnerships, selective M&A opportunities and continued automation-driven scalability improvements. In SME banking, the key focus remains execution, efficiency and automation on our path towards sustainable profitability. Net loans and investments increased by 19% year-on-year, with secured lending now representing 31% of the total portfolio. Portfolio growth accelerated beyond full year '25 levels in the first quarter, while the revenue contribution from new business is expected to materialize progressively over time. Profitability development in the quarter reflects continued investments in growth and portfolio expansion together with higher provisioning levels. Importantly, impairment ratios remained stable despite the rapid growth of the portfolio. Our focus for 2026 remains very clear, transitioning CapitalBox into sustainable profitability while continuing to improve scalability through automization, data, AI and risk innovations. Wholesale Banking, our new business unit, continued its very strong growth trajectory during the first quarter. Net loans and investment increased significantly to EUR 258 million, supported by strong execution across the secured debt pipeline. Profitability development continued to outperform revenue growth with EBT growth exceeding 400% year-on-year. That's amazing. At the same time, Payment Services continue to benefit from scalable infrastructure and increasing customer onboarding activity. The focus going forward remains on growing the secured portfolio and expanding the Payment Solutions customer base across the EEA region. Our ambition for Wholesale Banking remains very clear, and we continue to see substantial term -- long-term growth potential in this business unit as well. Let me also briefly touch upon the acquisition of a majority stake in Sortter Oy, which we announced yesterday and why we see this as a very attractive strategic investment for Multitude. Sortter is a fast-growing Finnish FinTech company focused on consumer and SME financing comparison services. And today, it's already one of the leading players in Finland within its segment. In 2025, Sortter generated EUR 17.2 million in revenue and EUR 1.6 million in net profit, making this not only a strategic investment, but also an attractive financial investment for the group. For us, the strategic fit is very strong. We have already been a shareholder in Sortter since 2023. And over that period, we have seen firsthand the quality of the management team, the scalability of the platform and the strong market positioning the company has built. Importantly, Sortter will continue to operate independently under its existing brand, platform model and management team. We believe this entrepreneurial setup has been one of the key success factors behind the company's strong development. At the same time, Multitude brings significant expertise in digital consumer and SME finance, together with extensive operational experience across 17 European markets. We believe this creates a strong foundation to support Sortter in evaluating and potentially executing international expansion opportunities over time. The transaction also supports our long-term strategy of diversifying group revenues through recurring fee income streams. We see significant long-term potential in the business and believe the combination creates value both strategically and financially for Multitude. With that, I will now hand over to our CFO, Bernd Egger, who will guide you more closely through the Q1 financially and the underlying dynamics behind them. All yours, Bernd.

Many thanks, Antti. Welcome also from my side. Good morning from Helsinki, and I'm actually super happy that I can start with a positive message. I like this sort of story a lot, and we will certainly have the opportunity to talk about that. And going forward, we will also apparently include Sortter in our presentation. Now let's talk about P&L in a little bit more detail. As always, I would like to focus on key messages. Key message number one, when it comes to revenue, when it comes to growth dynamics, revenue reflects the deliberate changes in the portfolio composition and product offering. This is especially true for the consumer business. It's not a new message. We have been explaining that over the last quarter as well. We are repositioning our offering in a number of markets. We have sold some businesses in order to focus on recurring businesses. So this is absolutely intentional that we accept a short-term drop in revenue. Message number two, asset quality continued to improve significantly. Message number three, profitability is in line with the expected phasing of the year. In fact, budgeting is an internal number, but nevertheless, I would like to also share that we are slightly above budgeted levels. Let's go into the details of our financial KPIs. Revenue, EUR 61.6 million compared to EUR 66.8 million Q1 last year. But in comparison to Q4, we again see an increase quarter-on-quarter in terms of revenue. Interest income, EUR 56.7 million. That compares to EUR 64.4 million in 2025, decreased EUR 7.7 million, and that is essentially driven by the factors that I just explained. Fee and commission income developed very strongly. We are super proud of that, increased to EUR 4.9 million compared to EUR 2.4 million in Q1 '25, an increase by EUR 2.5 million or 106%. Also on a very positive note, net fee and commission income increased even more from EUR 1.9 million to EUR 4.6 million last year to this year, up 140%. Fair value and foreign exchange gains and losses contributed positive EUR 0.3 million in Q1 compared to negative EUR 0.7 million in Q1 '25. This includes also positive effects related to earn-out valuation from sold businesses. And finally, the [ Pata ] profit share from investments in associates, Lea and Sortter increased to EUR 1.1 million, more than doubled from EUR 0.5 million in Q1 2025. This results in net operating income of EUR 51.2 million, slightly below last year's level. Credit losses, Q1 '26 came in at EUR 18 million compared to EUR 22 million in Q1 '25, improvement EUR 4.2 million or 18.8%. Outstanding remarkable, we will look into that in more detail to understand -- so to help you understand the drivers behind that. Personnel and G&A expenses increasing a little bit by some EUR 1.9 million, reflecting continued investments in growth in operational capabilities and scalability. Finally, all of that translates into profit before tax, EUR 5.1 million in Q1. Net profit EUR 4.4 million. So this is somewhat below the EUR 7.2 million, which we had in Q1 2025, which was an outstanding and extraordinary performance in Q1 2025. So from that perspective, we are somewhat below last year's level. However, we are on track to EUR 30 million net profit guidance for the full year. Let's very briefly talk about assets, super simple message when it comes to the main drivers behind the EUR 200 million increase in our total banking assets. One is portfolio growth, EUR 30 million, EUR 32 million portfolio from end of year. But -- and this is also very important when it comes to managing growth expectations. The portfolios, total portfolios increased by more than EUR 180 million compared to Q1 2025. All of our three businesses increased their portfolios quite significantly. Second driver behind increase in assets is EUR 175 million additional cash. And for that, in turn, two drivers. One is deposit increase in order to support the business for the remainder of the year. And number two, the successful issuing process of the perpetual bonds that we completed in Q1. That, in turn, is reflected in equity and liability. Apparently, deposits up to EUR 1.2 billion and equity ratio increased significantly. We now hold almost EUR 250 million in equity on the balance sheet. And that in turn means that as a result, the balance sheet at the end of Q1 is characterized by significantly stronger liquidity position than in the past and stronger equity. And that, in the end, in addition, of course, to the human resources and technology is everything we need to grow the business going forward. Let's briefly talk about the segment performance. Consumer Banking Ferratum revenue EUR 45.3 million, -- that is somewhat lower than last year. But again, I would like to reiterate, adjusting for businesses sold, adjusting for the temporary effect of reduction in revenue in some of those markets, which is an investment into future growth, we are actually back to growth mode. So that is in combination with the fact that also portfolio already increased by almost EUR 40 million compared to last year, very positive note. And again, super important for our monetization strategy on top of the Sortter business that we just briefly touched upon fee income. Fee income in the consumer business increased very strongly to EUR 4.3 million, up almost 130%. Credit losses, just a very quick look as we will go into this topic in a little bit more detail a little later. Nonetheless, I need to highlight that EUR 15 million. You will recall that we had levels of EUR 20 million, EUR 22 million, EUR 23 million over the last couple of years. Portfolio is increasing. Credit losses are decreasing very significantly, supported also by a couple of hundred thousand from macroeconomic effects. So really, really top performance when it comes to credit loss management, underwriting portfolio management. So really outstanding performance. Profit before tax, EUR 5.2 million. And again, EBT is lower than last year, but still the growth dynamic that we have from a portfolio perspective supports future growth, and we have a more diversified revenue mix and business is expected to benefit from both this improved revenue mix and top asset quality. Let's move on to SME. CapitalBox Revenue going up slightly to EUR 8.8 million compared to EUR 8.6 million last year, increased 2.8% portfolio increasing quite significantly to almost EUR 172 million. Credit losses on the same level as last year, EUR 2.7 million. So that is important since a couple of years ago, we had issues with asset quality very well under control now. So both growth dynamics are there, need to be accelerated. Asset quality is good. Operating expenses up by a little bit more than EUR 1 million. But again, that is something that we look at as an investment in future growth in automation and data and risk innovation. Profit before tax, minus EUR 1.7 million. I don't want to repeat what Antti just said. The message is very clear. Our expectation and CapitalBox management expectation is to fully focus on turning portfolio growth into profitability. Finally, Wholesale Banking, the success story continues. Wholesale delivered a quite strong or actually a very strong quarter performance. Revenue increased to EUR 7.5 million compared to EUR 4.5 million last year, Q1, up almost 70%. Portfolio increased 86%. So there is a lot of traction in this business. Net interest income more than doubled to EUR 3.8 million. Credit losses remain on a low level, EUR 0.4 million. And all of that in combination with a slightly higher investment in operating expenses results into a profit before tax of EUR 1.5 million compared to EUR 2.3 million last year. So I fully echo Antti's words here. This is an amazing development in Q1. Asset quality. This slide, I will not spend too much time on that. It's not really the exact number that is of relevance here, but it's the trend. And the trend is very clear. Most of you might be familiar with this slide. Trend downward sloping means that credit losses over asset or portfolio size is dropping significantly. Asset quality is increasing significantly with an extraordinary low level of below 2% on a quarterly level. So this is really, in the end, the continuation of an excellent trend over the last couple of quarters. Similar picture when it comes to credit loss development on the level of the three businesses. Consumer Banking down to EUR 15 million in terms of -- in relation to the portfolio size, all-time low, reflects enhanced underwriting and this strategy. So you need to see those two factors in connection. These are two sides of one on the same coin, accepting a drop in revenue in order to build up a portfolio that is more sticky that generates recurring revenues and that is also reflected by lower credit losses and higher asset quality. So those two messages need to be read in conjunction. SME Banking, finally, EUR 2.7 million, slightly above last year, but again, adjusting for volume on an excellent level. Wholesale Banking, all exposures in Wholesale Banking are underpinned by collateral, and this is represented in very low credit loss levels. In short, key message is asset quality continues to strengthen further. Funding structure, not too much to explain here. You're all familiar with our ambition to maintain a balanced funding mix. This still holds true. Focus number one is deposits. That helped us to reduce weighted average cost of funding quite significantly over the last couple of quarters down to 3.4%. That is important. Second key message that is important is the successful placement of the EUR 70 million perpetual bond. This is IFRS equity, and that supports our ambition to grow throughout '26 and then also, of course, '27. And as additional information or an indication rather than former information, but nonetheless important, we believe in future growth, and this is why we are preparing the issuance of an additional Tier 1 instrument on the level of the bank during the second half of this year. And what does it actually mean in terms of where we want to be and where we are heading for '26? Naturally, we confirm our net profit. We are on track. We absolutely believe that in terms of net profit with the factors that we have outlined, the portfolio growth, but also increased contribution from earn-out is not fully reflected in P&L, we are in a position to close the gap and get to EUR 30 million. And also naturally, then as a consequence of that, the ambitions and plans and guidance metrics for '27 and beyond remain valid. With that, Adam, I hand back over to you.

Thank you, Bernd. Thank you, Antti. We will now open the line for questions. But we will start with questions and then continue to written questions. I believe our first question comes from Roni from Inderes.

Maybe first about the cost level, especially in SME banking. So does this represent a new higher recurring cost level? Or was there some one-off costs? And maybe how confident are you that the growth investments will materialize in the top line soon enough in order to reach profitability in '26?

If I start first on that. So yes, the operating expenses were slightly higher, but we are not seeing that, that trend would continue vice versa that we are now making lots of investments into turning around CapitalBox business, even further automization, use of AI, making sure that the cost will go down. That is one of the priorities. But it's not only about cost saving here or being more effective on the cost side, we also need to grow the top line as well. But we cannot grow it widely. We have to make it really smartly so that we don't have the impairment losses following. So it's fine line where we have to operate. But we have a clear plan with management of CapitalBox how to get this forward to the right pace. And we are on the right pace, but we will see the results later on this year.

Then about Consumer Banking as the interest income was partly burdened by regulatory interest rate caps. So can you comment on the outlook of possible other interest rate caps going forward in other countries?

At the moment, we do not see that there would be any significant interest rate caps imposed in any of our countries that would materially change our profile.

Then about Sortter. So have there been some business opportunities with Sortter that you haven't been able to pursue when you were a minority owner? Or is it continuing fully independently? And maybe what type of synergies are there on top of just equity sharing?

Thank you. First of all, like I said, we see that Sortter is an excellent financial investment and an excellent strategic investment. But it's extremely important to highlight that Sortter will continue with its own brand platform and own management. We do not want to start affecting that. What we can bring on the table is more support from the group side from a financial perspective. We have a lot of international experience naturally. But the day-to-day work and strategic outlook is from Sortter management and Sortter is staying independent within Multitude Group.

Are you able to comment on the valuation of the deal, for example, in terms of revenue multiples?

Bernd, do you want to...

Compared to...

Ring valuation and pricing. Now in the end, it's a little bit of a moving target. We closed the transaction yesterday, but when it comes to finalizing, some remaining variable components that need to flow into the final calculation, purchase price allocation, all that will be done over the next couple of weeks. So this will be disclosed in H1. We think apparently that the valuation is quite attractive for us. Otherwise, we would not have done it. And I would also like to put it a little bit into perspective about growth driving and why we think that this is a value creator. We have disclosed a number of, I think, EUR 17.2 million revenue. But again, if you put that into the historic perspective, you're coming from -- they are coming from now. We are coming from EUR 8 million, EUR 10 million, EUR 17 million. So this is an absolute fantastic growth case and it's 1% in line with our fee generation strategy. So from that perspective, we think that the valuation, and again, we will disclose details is absolutely attractive.

How does the outlook of Sortter look in '26 in terms of revenue and profit?

Well, I mean, Sortter is not part of -- or has not been part of the organization when we issued our guidance. So I'm a little bit -- or we are reluctant on behalf -- speaking on behalf of Antti as well to give -- make forward-looking statements. What I can say, though, is that there is a lot of growth momentum. So I think we are also seeing -- if you take a closer look at the Wholesale Banking associate contribution from profit, you will also be able to calculate the profitability level is going up quite significantly. So we are very optimistic about future contribution, both in terms of top line and profit contribution.

Then one more question about the guidance. So did I understand correctly that you should have -- should be able to make the guidance totally organically. So it didn't include M&A, for example, like? And maybe what are the main factors that properly is weighted on H2?

Maybe to put the whole thing into perspective, we are at EUR 4.5 million now. We need to get to EUR 30 million. I think a key driver #1 is portfolio. This is why we wanted to really make sure that everybody understands that portfolio has increased very significantly, so EUR 180 million compared to last year. So this is driver number one. Driver number two, cost, we have spoken a lot about efficiency gains that is not going to change. Then there are a couple of technical aspects. For instance, from sold businesses, this is super relevant for the consumer performance. We've incurred EUR 3 million earn-out and IFRS logic dictates that only a fraction of that EUR 0.9 million was reflected in the P&L in Q1. Not promising anything, but should this earn-out level on a monthly basis remain constant, and this is going to be an upside -- when it comes to M&A, the logic was that we aim at achieving EUR 30 million without M&A. Should M&A transaction help us or accelerating the path to getting there, then we naturally like such transactions. But we're not going to change the guidance at this stage.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Julius Neittamo from NuWays.

Congratulations on the Q1 results. So my first question is about the fee and commission income. So I understand that the share of the fee and commission income comes from divested entities for now your clients. So I would like to understand how sticky is this relationship with these entities? How concentrated is the risk? And then secondly, how is the fee and commission income developing with completely new customers?

The fee income, yes, you're right that from divested companies, what you see on the consumer side, yes, partly from that is coming from there, but we also have partnerships bringing in -- especially in Poland, significant fee income. Also, when you look on the Wholesale Banking perspective, payment solutions are bringing in the fee income part fully from that side. Stickiness, I mean, they are sticky as long as we can serve them with the quality we have, and we are really aiming to do that. It's in any other business, it's recurring from that perspective that the customers are happy with us and that we get in the fee income from that perspective. Perhaps you can comment on the divested entities a bit.

Yes, absolutely. I mean the logic here is that we provide services, I don't necessarily want to use big terms such as Banking as a Service, Software as a Service. But in the end, it's a recurring fee income, a couple of hundred thousand each month. Cooperation is going very well. We do not rather think in terms of stickiness, but rather how we can expand that to other clients as well. We have no reason to believe that this is not going to continue beyond the remainder of the year.

All right. No, understood. Then on Wholesale Banking. So if I saw correctly, the performance this quarter was very strong. It was somewhat weaker than in Q4. So can you maybe tell me again what were the drivers behind the strong performance? And should we expect kind of volatility in the top line growth throughout the year, like big jumps like we saw between -- from Q4 to Q1?

Well, the performance, like you said, was really good and comparing year-on-year, so extremely great growth. When it comes to volatility, so the dynamics are slightly different between Wholesale Banking and consumer, for instance. First of all, the number of customers is completely different. And once there are bigger cases, the portfolio there might be a month that we don't have too many bigger cases coming in. And then next month onwards, we might have three or four big cases in. So from that perspective, for instance, the net receivables perspective, the volatility can actually be upwards quite high when it comes to net loans and investments. Of course, at that point, once we underwrite and ship out the money, then we always make the provisioning. So it's also impacting immediately on the P&L line. When it comes to Payment Solutions, which is an important part of Wholesale Banking as well, that is not as volatile as you will be describing since we have institutional customers operating their payment businesses, which we are then supporting them on. So the volumes are quite stable and these customers are not either there but changing their providers that often or redirecting the traffic differently. So from that side, there was no volatility.

Maybe one addition, if I may. With regards to the specific question, Q4, Q1 Wholesale Banking. And I somehow sense that you have your financial model in the back of your head when you raised this question. We had EUR 1.2 million fee income in Q4, EUR 600,000 in Q1 with around about EUR 600,000 onetime effect in Q4. So when you think in terms of your financial model, then I would maybe disregard this EUR 600,000 onetime effect from Q4.

Thank you for clarifying that.

Yes. Thank you Bernd. Then maybe again on the cost-income ratio, and apologies, I think Roni might have asked this, but I missed the answer. So maybe the cost-income ratio jumped quite a bit. So could you provide the granularity what were the drivers behind this? Is this kind of the ramping up of the fee income business or wholesale banking ramp-up that is driving also a bit these costs? Or...

There are from cost-to-income ratio. Obviously, there are not only onetime, but like I said, we have been investing a lot of now to new technologies and also certain business units such as Wholesale Banking, as you're rightfully so saying, is something we are still ramping up, which comes with the cost. But the long-term and mid- to long-term view for us is really clear that we are going to get the cost-to-income ratio down. Of course, then when you have a different restructuring, et cetera, the cost will come down.

And you see the scalability in the more mature businesses. So for instance, in consumer, there is no cost increase. I mean it's operating on a stable cost base. In the other two, we have between EUR 1 million, EUR 1.5 million, EUR 2 million cost increases, and that is what is needed in order to accelerate growth, we want to make sure that we have the resources in place to work on the deal pipeline in Wholesale Banking to establish the processes, the systems. So this is to be seen as an investment.

Thank you. We will then continue to take questions. Starting with 2 questions from Andreas Pläsier at Warburg. On CapitalBox, we have already talked a bit about it. But our guidance calls for a single-digit EBT for the full year. Can we provide some more color on the operational measures that we have for this turnaround? We have already mentioned the portfolio growth, but what else is in our toolbox?

Yes. So that's a really good question. So our portfolio has to obviously grow in order to get interest income. But how to get there is an excellent question. And it comes from -- first thing is speed. We have to be even faster than we are today serving our customers so that we can also choose the best quality customers on the market. This is important also the previous question was a bit about the cost-to-income ratio, and that we have to also get in a better shape. And it comes with more automated processes, more use of AI, more speed and quality. That's how we see. And we have a clear plan with the management how to drive that forward.

Indeed. And how should we think about -- how should investors think about the impairments when progression when the loan book is growing?

Yes, whether we like it or not, growth is to be seen again in conjunction with credit losses. For instance, CapitalBox, as we are specifically talking about CapitalBox, increasing from EUR 2.5 million to EUR 2.7 million comparing the respective 2 first quarters of the year, '25 and '26. Is that a bad thing? No, it's not because portfolio increased quite significantly during that period of time. So this is something that we think is just to be accepted. Naturally, mid to long term, I think this whole trajectory of reducing credit losses over portfolio size, improving asset quality, I think that is one of the three main drivers of profit that we also presented at Capital Markets Day over the last couple of earnings calls. So the expectation is that we will, in absolute numbers, see a slight increase, but aggressive when it comes to volume development.

Another question from Warberg on Wholesale Banking. So Wholesale Banking has now delivered exceptional EBT growth in Q1 and is emerging as a key profit driver. With the business unit CEO departing in April, can you walk us through how management is ensuring continuity of client relationships, deal pipeline momentum? And how sensitive is the 50% EBT CAGR target setting that we announced on the Capital Markets Day?

Yes. Obviously, Alain did a great job in ramping up the Wholesale Banking. How we see it at the moment? Of course, we are looking to have a successor there. And at the moment, we are working -- I'm really involved at the moment in Wholesale Banking, secure debt and payments business myself. That was the unit that was helping us to set up a couple of years ago as well. So I know the business really well. And nothing is in the company pending on one person. So we have a really great team in Wholesale Banking secure debt. The customer relationships are handled by the team. And I think we have a really bright future ahead of us like we have had right path already with the Wholesale Banking. I'm not worried.

Thank you. While we are on Wholesale Banking, we have another question from a private investor. Could you walk us through a bit the nature of the fee and commission income in the wholesale banking? What drives it? And how is it structured?

Yes. So mainly comes from payment business. So this is quite simple. We are processing payments on behalf of payment service providers, electronic money institutions. And we take a fee per transaction and then there are certain tiers as many transactions you are doing. There are minimum minimum fees and, of course, tiered transactions. So the more transactions we are processing, the more fees we are getting on a monthly basis. And this is distributed by multiple customers, a couple of big ones and then smaller ones. And it's important to understand that once you onboard an electronic money institution or a payment service provider, you onboard, you start with a pretty, how would I say, slow in a sense, ramping up period that both parties are comfortable how we are working before we really ramp up. This is how the business works.

Thank you, then we have two similar questions on earnings progression. We have covered it a bit already that we have confirmed our full year guidance, but how should investors think about earnings progression through the year?

Full speed, And then we have EUR 4.4 billion. The mathematics linear extrapolation will not be enough to do the trick that's clear. But I think I've touched -- briefly touched upon three factors. One is portfolio growth. Here, we see quite significant momentum. Secondly is revenue growth. I've mentioned that Q1 revenue performance is already above the level of Q4 last year. Number three, this phasing of profitability. So what we are seeing here is exactly in line with the plan of the ramp-up of the portfolios that we have reorganized where the offering has been changed in a couple of markets in the consumer business. Number four, earn-out, I've mentioned that EUR 3 million connected cash from earn-out only EUR 0.9 million reflected in P&L. So this is an upside potential. And number five, the expectation that we remain as successful when it comes to credit loss management as expected. Maybe just to put it in perspective, it's, of course, fair to compare the EUR 4.4 million to the EUR 7.2 million that we had last year. But 1 year before that, we had EUR 2.5 million net profit in Q1 and achieved EUR 20.5 million net profit. So this means that roughly 12% to 13% of the full year net profit was achieved in Q1. Now we're talking about 15%, so relatively speaking, better. And with these drivers, it's obviously not guaranteed and a lot of actions need to work out well, but it's absolutely realistic. We have just completed the 2 days leadership team workshop here in Helsinki and confirmed internally and join forces behind this target, and we're optimistic.

Thank You, Then we have another question on the cash level that we have roughly EUR 480 million end of Q1. The question is why so much cash? I believe we have had this question before, but it's worth repeating the message.

Yes, there are two factors. One is the regulatory requirements that come with operating a bank. This is one. Nonetheless, we hold quite some, I would say, around about EUR 100 million, even a little bit more cash that is ready to be distributed to businesses. So I'm -- we are counting on our CEOs on the level of the three businesses to distribute and bring those -- bring the cash to revenue generating assets. And then we have a temporary effect that has to do with the replacement of the perpetual bond, and that will, in the end, result in outflow, double-digit outflow in beginning of July this year, so that then we will see a cash outflow.

Yes. That was the next question, what is the plan with the 2021 perpetual bond? But as you said, it will be called on the update.

Yes, yes, exactly.

We'll announce very soon. I think that marks the end of the questions that we have received. So with that, we would like to thank you for your interest in Multitude today. And please tune in for our H1 earnings call on the 13th of August. Thank you, and goodbye.

Thank you.