One United Properties SA (ONE) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to One United Properties conference call for presenting the financial results for the first half of 2024. My name is Zuzanna Kurek, and I am Investor Relations Manager at One United Properties. I am joined on this call by Victor Capitanu, Executive Board Member and Co-Founder of One United Properties; and Cosmin Samoila, CFO at One United Properties. Before we begin, I would like to mention that this call is being recorded and that the recording of this call will be updated on our website later today. As stated in the call invite you automatically and implicitly consented to being recorded by joining this teleconference. If you do not consent to being recorded, please leave this call. In terms of organizational aspects, let me present to you the setup of this call. Firstly, we will share with you the financial and operational highlights of the first half of 2024, which will be presented by Victor Capitanu, Cosmin Samoila as well as myself. During the presentation, feel free to type any of the questions you have for our management in the chat window, and we'll answer them during the Q&A. After the presentation is over, we will start the Q&A session. [Operator Instructions] I will be moderating this session and therefore, if -- for the sake of those who will be re-watching the replay of this teleconference, I will be reading all the questions out loud before addressing them. Your questions today will be answered by Victor Capitanu, Cosmin Samoila or by myself. Finally, I would like to mention that we may be making forward-looking statements today during this call regarding the future performance of One United Properties, and that actual results may differ materially. We encourage you to review the disclaimer that we have included in the presentation, which you can now see on the screen. This disclaimer applies equally to all the statements made in today's call.

Hello. I'm Victor Capitanu, and I'm the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of One United Properties. Today, I am pleased to share with you the key financial highlights and achievements from the first half of 2024. In the first half of this year, we sold and pre-sold 422 apartments and commercial spaces totaling 43,809 square meters, 624 parking spaces and other types of units. These transactions generated sales and pre-sales of EUR 123.3 million. A truly impressive aspect is the consistency of sales across all our targeted subsegments, premium, high-end and luxury encompassing both completed developments and those still under construction. In a market where supply has decreased compared to the same period last year, our ability to meet high market demand with the highest quality products is what has set us apart, allowing us to continue our growth and maintain our leadership position. At the end of May 2024, we began pre-sales for the second phase of the One Lake District development which will include 867 units. In just 1 month, our sales team sold 165 units, making it the best-selling development in the first half of the year. Therefore, as of June 30, 2024, 66% of the available units under development and delivered were already sold. This success highlights both our strong market position and the ongoing demand for our development allowing us to continue strong sales in the coming quarters. Regarding our rental portfolio, it has also seen significant growth. In the first half of 2024, we successfully leased and pre-leased 8,100 square meters of office space and signed multiple contract extensions for a total of 6,770 square meters. At the same time, our Office division continues to expand, reaching an occupancy rate of 95%. This achievement reflects our expertise in developing the highest-quality office spaces in Bucharest, meeting the needs of the most rigorous local and international tenants. Our office portfolio is the newest in the market, built to the highest sustainability standard and integrate mixed-use commercial functions, benefiting from an average firm contractual period of over 7 years. Profit in the Residential segment increased by 7% to EUR 38.3 million, and profit in the Rental segment increased by 26% compared to the same period last year, reaching EUR 11.6 million. Despite a challenging market environment and historically high interest rates, One United Properties recorded a turnover of EUR 139.9 million in the first half of 2024. Gross profit was EUR 53.2 million, while net profit amounted to EUR 46 million. Regarding these operational figures, the remarkable performance of our sales and rental teams has been the foundation of solid continuous results in line with our revenue recognition policy. Looking ahead, based on the sales and pre-sales achieved as of June 30, 2024, we have an additional EUR 331 million in cash to be collected by 2026 from contracts already signed with our customers. Earlier this month, we obtained building permits for two important developments in our portfolio, the Mondrian Bucharest Hotel and One Technology District permits that allow us to start construction. The Mondrian Bucharest hotel represents the first lifestyle hotel in Romania and is developed in partnership with Ennismore, part of the Accor Group. It will include 103 rooms and suites with a design inspired by Petre Ispirescu's fairytale "Youth Without Age and Life Without Death" to create a unique atmosphere that blends modern aesthetics with local cultural heritage and aims to redefine hospitality in the heart of Bucharest. One Technology District will host the largest research and development center for semiconductor chips in Southeast Europe developed for Infineon Technologies. In conclusion, I would like to mention some information about our planned share capital increase, about which my colleagues Zuzanna will present more details. Today, activity on our construction sites is taking place across 12 developments that include 4,041 residential and commercial units as well as approximately 45,000 square meters of office and commercial spaces. Our vision for the future includes entering the affordable premium housing segment addressed to the middle class, where we see significant growth potential. For this reason, this capital increase represents the next important step in our growth trajectory, and we invite our shareholders to participate in this operation, increasing their investment in One United Properties by approximately 10% of their holdings. This capital infusion will accelerate our ambitious plans, allowing us to double the business in the next 5 years and grow it up to 4x in the next decade while maintaining a prudent level of bank debt. I hand over the floor to Chief Financial Officer. Cosmin Samoila, who will provide a more detailed overview of the main financial results from the first half of 2024.

Hello, and thank you for attending our financial results presentation. In the following minutes, I will present an overview of our financial position and financial performance for the first half of 2024, highlighting the key figures that have shaped our business in this period. In terms of the residential segment, which remains a core component of our business in the first half of 2024, revenues from this segment reached EUR 105.4 million, reflecting a 14% decrease compared to the same period of last year. This decrease is aligned with the final construction phases in which the advance of completion stage is lower compared to the initial stages of construction. However, despite the slight decline in revenue, the profit from residential segment saw an increase of 6%, reaching EUR 38.3 million, again, related to the stage of completion, in which in the final stages of completion, the profitability is higher than initial stages. This positive outcome is primarily due to the revenue recognition from new development where construction began in 2022 and 2023. Additionally, we witnessed a significant improvement in our net margin from residential sales, which grew from 29.5% in the first half of 2023 to 36.3% in the first half of 2024. This increase is largely attributable to the progress in our construction sites. Moving on to our rental segment, we recorded robust growth in the first 6 months of 2024. As for rental income, including revenues from services to tenants, increased with 18% compared to the first half of 2023, reaching EUR 15.1 million. Moreover, the profit from Commercial segment saw an impressive 25% increase compared to the same period of last year because during last year and this year, more and more tenants took over their leased premises. In terms of expenses, administrative costs increased 11% compared to the first half of 2023, totaling EUR 8.5 million. The increase is consistent with the expansion of our operations reflecting our growing scale. The result from our operating activity amounted to EUR 57.9 million, representing a 19% decrease. This decrease is primarily due to a significant reduction in gains from investment property fair value adjustment. However, it is important to note that when we exclude this impact, our results from operating activity actually increased to 6%. This increase was driven by the 6% increase in the net income from residential property and a 25% increase in the net rental income, as previously mentioned. Looking at the balance sheet, as of the end of June 2024, our assets, consolidated value overpassed EUR 1 billion. Currently, we have a total of 4,041 units under construction with a gross development value of EUR 1.3 billion despite significant development activity during the first half of the year, which led to a 20% decline in our cash position. We maintained a solid cash reserve of EUR 67.5 million, more important to mention is that as of the end of the first half of 2024, our loan-to-value ratio stood at 30%, a slight increase of 2 percentage points since the end of 2023. Our net debt is reduced in the amount of EUR 170.5 million. In conclusion, while the first half of 2024 continued to present challenges for the real estate market; at One United Properties, we have successfully strengthened our core business segments, managed our expenses effectively, generated profitability and maintained a healthy financial position. I would like to hand over to our Investor Relations Manager, Zuzanna Kurek, who will present more details about our planned share capital increase, an important step in our growth in the coming years.

Hello, and thank you for joining us today. I would like to present you important updates regarding our ongoing share capital increase and what this means for the future of the company. On August 7, 2024, the Romanian Financial Supervisory Authority approved One United Properties Prospectus for the share capital increase with cash contributions. This marks a significant step forward in One United Properties strategy to raise EUR 70 million, which will be pivotal in fueling the expansion into the affordable premium residential subsegment that Victor briefly mentioned earlier. As a reminder, this strategic move was initially presented during the Capital Markets Day held on April 4, and it reflects the company's commitment to broadening its market reach and addressing the growing demand within Bucharest middle class. The preference rights were successfully loaded into shareholders' accounts on August 7, 2024. Following this, we had a trading window for these preference rights between August 9 and August 13. We are now in stage 1 of the operation where investors can subscribe based on these preference rights. If you have received the preference rights because you held One shares on the date of guaranteed participation, August 2 or because you bought them during the trading window, you can now subscribe the new shares. This subscription period runs from August 19 to September 19. During this stage, the subscription price is set at 0.2 lei per share to subscribe for one new share in this capital increase you will need 2.1879 preference rights with any necessary rounding applied according to the regulations in force, including those outlined by the Central Depository. The results of Stage 1 subscriptions will be published on September 20, 2024, following the closure of Stage 1, any remaining shares may be offered to shareholders in a private placement with the price to be established by a decision of the Board of the Directors. If you have troubles of subscribing in our share capital increase, please contact your Romanian intermediary, who will guide you through the necessary steps. If you have any questions regarding the operation, please do not hesitate to reach out to our Investor Relations team at One United Properties by e-mailing [email protected].

Thank you, Zuzanna, and thank you all for taking the time to watch our financial results presentation for the first half of 2024. In closing, I would like to emphasize the firm commitment that the entire One United Properties management team has towards our development plans. Consequently, together with my co-founder, Andrei Diaconescu; Chairman of the Board, Claudio Cisullo and Board member, Marius Diaconu, we are committed to contributing over 60% of the capital we intend to raise in the current share capital increase operation. Our initial public offering in 2021 was a transformative moment, driving our strategic expansion into the premium residential segment highlighted by the success of the mixed-use real estate development, One Cotroceni Park, with a share capital increase running until September 2024. We are confident that we will continue to expand our presence in the affordable premium residential sector. Thank you once again for your attention today. We look forward to sharing our progress in the third quarter of 2024 and we are excited to continue working diligently to achieve strong results for the coming period.

Thank you for your attention. This concludes the first part of our call. We will now open the floor for questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question is looking at your H1 financials, the income tax amounts to 13.5%. I thought the rate was 16%. What is the explanation for this difference? I'm going to invite Cosmin Samoila, our CFO, to address this question.

Good morning, and thank you for participating to our results presentation call. Related to this question about the income tax, this is -- of course, specific to the fiscal environment in Romania and in the financial statement on Page 24, we have Note 13, which is detailing exactly all the movement in the income tax position. I will mention that aside the earnings before tax, the gross results that are influencing the income tax amount. There are also other components that are impacting differently the income tax. And I will mention these different components as being with the carryforward losses, which can be deducted from tax. We have also specific to Romanian legislation, the sponsorships, which are expenses in the profit and loss account, but they can be deducted directly from the income tax up to certain limits. And also we have expenses that in the prior periods were considered not allowed for tax, but in the current period due to the changes in the transactions, they became tax allowed. So all of these factors are making that the income tax is not always exactly 16% from the gross result. And the same was also in previous quarters that was different, either more, either less few percent compared to the 16% income tax in Romania. Thank you.

The next question is, how is it possible that in Q2 One makes profit -- net profit of EUR 40 million, but instead of increase the equity decreases. Taking into consideration the dividend payment, the equity in Q2 should be around EUR 614 million, not EUR 603 million. Where did this equity go? I will ask Cosmin Samoila to address this question.

Thank you for the question. We have the equity movement in a detailed note at Page 5 in the financial statements. Specific to this question, I can mention that the change is because all the dividends are deducted from equity at the annual shareholder meeting. And the annual shareholder meeting took place in April, so -- this year, so in the second quarter. and the dividends that we paid last year for the financial year 2023. And the once the second tranche that we paid also this year, all the amount of these dividends were -- was deducted from dividends in -- from equity in the second quarter of this year. And also, we had our other movements related to the stock option plan and also related to the shares buyback. So all these transactions made the equity to have like a slight decrease compared to Q1 equity, but this increase is really, really minimal. Thank you for the question.

We now move to the questions from the chat. I see already we got 3 sets of questions. I kindly invite all of you to type your questions in that chat. So going from the top, the next question is also for Cosmin. Did anything significant change in the revenue recognition method for residential property sales in Q2 as it was significantly lower than estimated by trying to replicate the method?

Thank you for your question. No, there is no change in the revenue recognition. So the method is applied exactly the same as it was applied also previous years. Related to the revenue that it was a lower recognition in this quarter. I can mention that there are two aspects here to say. First, the fact that almost all construction sites are in the let's say, second to final stage of construction until finalization, the speed of work that is developed is lower than in the initial stages where there are heavy works and where there are high costs deployed in a small period of time. Right now, it's the moment of finishing inside the apartment or façade works and this -- the costs that are deployed in this type of work is lower than in the initial stages. So we have a stage of completion that is advancing at a lower pace in this quarter. And the second aspect, if you see the sales performed according to our estimations, and we have good volume of sales as we published in the trading update. But I can tell you that these sales, we had a part of them in the second phase of One Lake District, where the stage of completion as of 30th of June was minimal because we didn't start the construction. We started in Q3 this quarter, we started the construction. So from these sales, basically, as of the end of June, we did not recognize any profitability. So basically, it will be for these sales to recognize profitability in the moment we progress with the construction.

We now move to the next set of questions. I have three questions. The first one is, can you please provide an update on the development of like-for-like selling prices and cost inflation over the last 12 months and potentially share your view about the development of selling prices and costs in the next 12 months? I will invite Victor Capitanu to address this question.

Regarding cost inflation, we have to say that last year, 1.5 years, the cost didn't increase. So maybe it was the first period after 7, 8, 10 years, where we had 12 months without the cost increasing. I don't think this will be permanent. So we think over the long term, the costs are increasing 5% to 10% per year, and this will push the prices of the product as well. Regarding the selling prices, I can say, for example, in One Lake District where we just launched sales for the second phase in June, although the cost is the same as in the first phase, the prices are probably around 15% more. So if you analyze it, you will easily see that. So hopefully, we have some short-term advantage out of it. But on the long term, I think both costs and prices are increasing with at least 5% to 10% a year. Thank you for the question.

Thank you, Victor. The next question is also for you. On the capital increase, how quickly you think you will be able to deploy the proceeds?

Look, the capital increase is meant mainly to enter into the premium affordable segment, which basically means building apartments for the middle class. So basically, building more affordable apartments and selling to the -- to a much larger segment in the market. Our cash flow is very strong over the next 2 years. So theoretically, if we waited, we could have done also this from the cash flow, but we decided that we could accelerate this by raising more capital at this stage. So hopefully, we will be able to deploy this money over the next 12 months and accelerate our performance on this segment. As you know, when we listed the company in 2021, we decided to go from the high-end segment to the medium to high income segment, and the money raised was invested with priority in One Cotroceni Park, One Lake District and those have been extremely successful. So I think it really validated our model and we really were able to scale from 100, 200 apartments that development to 1,000 in One Cotroceni Park and 2,000 in One Lake District. So I think at this moment, we see it is not so complicated for us to scale even more to do larger-scale developments for the more affordable segment. So basically, this is our plan with the money, and hopefully, we'll be deploying in a good pace. One of our target lens has been made already public. [ Zalando Trocar ] is 21-hectare land. It's an amazing land very close to the center of the city. And we have advanced discussion with a few more. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Victor, and we hope it answered your question. The next one also for Victor, can you please provide an update on the regulatory environment in Romania? Any recent upcoming changes worth highlighting?

Look, I'll ask Cosmin, if you have any ideas on this. I mean I don't see any material change on the regulatory environment. So I don't know, Cosmin, do you have any view on that?

No. At the moment, there is nothing material changing in the regulatory rights. Neither fiscal, neither in other areas of the regulatory.

So it's [indiscernible] we seem stable from the regulatory point of view. Thank you also, Thomas.

The next question, do you expect you will need to continue to raise equity also in 2025 and 2026 and in the coming years? And I will invite Victor to address this question.

Thank you, Jakub. Actually, no. So actually, we have a very, very strong cash flow. So we expect just the tipping point, I'm not sure when it's coming over the next 2 years, probably, hopefully, 2 to 3 years. So hopefully, there is no need to raise more equity. I mean, on the long term, you never know what opportunity can arise in the market. But I think for the short period, we are very well capitalized, maybe even too well. So I think this will be enough money to implement our plan and our strategy that we have presented.

The next question, have you considered selling properties and/or discontinuing dividends instead of raising capital?

Thank you again. I think this is a very legitimate question. I think it makes a lot of sense to sell rental properties as long as they -- I mean, from our calculation, the rental properties that we own, bring a return on equity compounded the year to the shareholders around 11%, 12% over the next 5 years. So I think it's good, but it's not at the level we target and what we desire for the equity that we deploy, which is more like in the 30% range. So I think it makes sense, but our rental portfolio and larger properties in general are not so quick to sell. So the time to market is quite long. So we are analyzing this very seriously. I think the trend in the decrease of interest rates will help us a lot. So I think this is -- of course, this is a much better alternative to raising equity. I mean, I would prefer it 100%. On the discontinuing of dividends, I mean, I'm not so hot with that because a lot of our shareholders, especially from the early shareholders, rely on that or like that. I think theoretically, and mathematically, you are right. But I think psychologically, a lot of the shareholders like to receive dividends. So I don't think it would be a good idea to discontinue that. Thank you, Jakub.

And the last question from this set is how many apartments do you expect you may sell in 2024 and in 2025 roughly? And how many handovers? I will invite Victor with a note that as you know, we do not provide this precise estimate related to the sales of the apartments, but I will let Victor take it overall on the handovers.

Yes. I mean I don't think we can make a forecast on that. So I don't think this is something we can give today.

The next question is, can you give some color on gross margin drop in Q2 compared to Q1, please. I will invite here Cosmin Samoila to address the question, which was partially already addressed. It's related to the revenue recognition, but Cosmin, please go ahead.

Thank you for the question. Indeed, it is related to the revenue recognition on one side because the advance in the construction stage is slightly lower than in the previous quarter. And also another reason, if you are looking on the structure of our profit and loss, you'll observe that -- we have also the gains from the fair value adjustment of the investment property. And these gains were less in the second quarter of this year compared to the first quarter of the year. So basically, these two components brought a drop in the gross margin.

The next question will be addressed by Victor. Can you comment on progress [indiscernible] project issues with PUD and authorization? And do you see similar situations in other projects of yours?

Thank you for the question, Christian. So basically, you referred to One Cotroceni Towers, which is the second phase of the larger development of One Cotroceni City. The first phase, as you know, has been already finalized and handed, we started to hand over last year. It takes some time. One Cotroceni Towers, the land we acquired with existing building permits. So theoretically, we can start building even today without any new authorization from anybody. But from our point of view, the project that we acquired can be significantly improved from the point of view of attractivity to clients and profitability of the equity deployed. So this is why we decided to upgrade it. We actually make it a bit smaller than it was before. So I think the authorities should love that. And we are doing a new detailed plan for this development, just to look nice and have better impact on the neighborhood and to return more money for our equity employees. The plan was passed by the sector 5 city hall, which appreciates very much our effort and investment in the sector. I think we are the largest investor in sector 5 at this moment. Indeed, the General Mayor stated publicly that he's against such a development there, although it is affirmative and legally approved project, Nevertheless, the sector 5 decided to approve it anyway, we are going now for the approval of the new building permit. Hopefully, we start construction next year. It is with some delay. It is true, but I think it will be an exceptional development. Also, it will be the tallest residential development in the country so far with more than 30 floors for two of the towers. So I think it would be really a landmark for the city. So it's just -- I would say it's just normal and so that we have what everybody has in generally with permitting process, which I think it's everywhere around the world. It's also in Romania. In other projects, we don't see even that because I see your other question, if we see also similar situations in other projects. We don't see -- I mean, this is very visible because it's the tallest residential in the country. So I think it attracts more attraction, it attracts more attention. And I think also this year is an electoral year. So generally, the comments and the positions taken publicly this year shouldn't be -- shouldn't be taken at face value. Thank you very much for the questions.

Thank you all very much for joining our call, and thank you for all the questions. We have answered to all of them. So we will conclude this call. Just as a reminder, the next time we're going to hear each other, it's going to be on -- after we publish the Q3 2024 results on November 11, we will have a call on November 12. We thank you all for your attention, and we wish you a great day ahead.

Thank you very much.