Poste Italiane S.p.A. (PST) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Poste Italiane 2025 Strategy Update. I'm Giuseppe Esposito, Head of Investor Relations, and I want to thank you for joining us today. Over the next hour, we'll be presenting our 2024 full year preliminary results as well as our 2025 Connecting platform strategy update. As shown on the agenda, you can see on screen, our CEO, Matteo Del Fante, will kick off with an overview of the main achievements to date, the strategic outlook at the group at divisional level and the key financial targets. Then our CFO, Camillo Greco, will take the floor to deep dive into the financials. After some closing remarks from our CEO, we will start the Q&A session. And as usual, for any topics we won't be able to cover today, please do reach out to me and my team, and we'll get back to you. Now before we start, I must ask you to read through the legal disclaimer on the screen. With that, I think we're ready to start, and Matteo, please, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Giuseppe, and good afternoon, everybody, and a very warm welcome to Poste Italiane 2024 Preliminary Results and 2025 Strategy Update. In today's event, we will provide you with insight into what we have achieved since we launched the Connecting platform plan in March last year, our 2025 guidance and the proposed upgrade of the planned dividend policy. We reported unprecedented results in 2024. We achieved record-breaking revenues of EUR 12.6 billion, record adjusted EBIT at EUR 2.96 billion and net income at EUR 2 billion, which is 2 years ahead of plan and aligned to our updated guidance. On the back of these results for 2025, we can confirm our growth trajectory with a guidance of EUR 3.1 billion adjusted EBIT and EUR 2.1 billion net income. Thanks to strong visibility on future cash flows and group capital optimization, we're yet again upgrading our dividend policy by structurally increasing the payout ratio from 65% to 70% through the 2028 plan. As a result, our new target of cumulative dividends for the 5-year plan increases from EUR 6.5 billion to around EUR 7.5 billion. We will be proposing a full year 2024 dividend per share of EUR 1.08, up 35% year-on-year for a total distribution of EUR 1.4 billion. The balance will be paid in June this year. Let me remind you that last year in March, we gave a target EPS of EUR 1 in 2026. We are overachieving that target 2 years in advance. Besides the financials, which are ahead of plan, all the key strategic initiatives of the connecting platform plan, such as the new service model and the logistics transformation are fully on track. Let's move to Slide 7, please. We pride ourselves in being Italy's largest digital platform, connecting our extensive network of almost 13,000 post offices and 49,000 third-party networks. Overall, we manage 25 million digital daily transaction with our 46 million clients, 18 million of which are already digital. In a digital age, Poste Italiane remains one of the most trusted institutions in Italy with a physical presence in every community as well as the largest digital platform in the country. With the Polis project, which we are extremely proud of, 17,000 post offices will be providing key public administration services, supporting social cohesion and reducing the digital divide. Finally, as you can see at the bottom of the page, we have a proven history of delivering strong financial returns to our shareholders. We will deep dive into these numbers later. Let's move to Slide 8, please. 2024 has been a record year. Revenues reached EUR 12.6 billion and adjusted EBIT EUR 2.96 billion, almost 3x what we posted in 2017. Net profit landed at EUR 2 billion, in line with the updated guidance provided in November last year. Since the start of our journey in 2017, our revenues have grown at an average annual rate of 3%. However, due to the operating leverage of our business and the unwavering focus on cost discipline, EBIT and net profit have increased at average annual growth rates of 15% and 17%, respectively. One key takeaway is that our shareholder remuneration growth is fully aligned to profitability growth. With the proposed EUR 1.08 dividend per share for 2024, our dividend growth since 2017 has achieved an average annual growth rate of 14%. Moving to Slide 9. The slide highlights that all our 4 business units have contributed to year-on-year revenue growth in 2024, further validating the strength of our highly diversified platform business model. In Mail, Parcel and Distribution, double-digit Parcel revenue growth is driven by strong performance across all customer segments, while Mail revenues have been stable and supported by favorable business mix and repricing. In Financial Services, results are above plan and mainly driven by solid investment portfolio revenues. Insurance Services had a groundbreaking year in protection as we now have reached over EUR 1 billion in gross written premiums, a remarkable milestone. Our Life business has once again demonstrated its resilience, outperforming a challenging market with positive net flows and a lapse rate well below the market average. Postepay Services revenues were driven by double-digit transaction value growth, supported by our leadership in e-commerce transactions and a growing stock of IBAN-backed Postepay Evolution with higher transactional activity and recurring fees. Strong energy revenue growth confirms positive commercial trends and favorable market conditions. Let's move to Slide 10 on shareholder remuneration. Since 2016, we have distributed EUR 7 billion to our shareholders. At the same time, our market capitalization has increased from around EUR 8 billion at the end of 2016 to over EUR 19 billion today. As a result, our total shareholder return has materially outperformed the Italian stock market index. With a record net profit of EUR 2 billion and an increased payout ratio of 70%, 2024 dividends will amount to EUR 1.4 billion. That's EUR 1.08 per share, reflecting an impressive 35% year-on-year growth and a 14% average annual growth since 2016. Let's move to Slide 11. Allow me to highlight our key achievements for 2024, which confirm that we are on the right track to meet our Connecting Platform targets. Each of our four business units is accelerating its strategic priorities, ensuring synergies and coherence within our overall strategy. In Mail and Parcel, we continue building an end-to-end logistic operator and a sustainable business. Our leadership in parcel has been reaffirmed across all customers we serve. The partnership with DHL is now fully operational and will significantly accelerate our international strategy and footprint. In 2024, we delivered over 300 million parcels, marking a 20% year-on-year increase. Importantly, 39% of these parcels were delivered through the postal network, enhancing overall efficiency. In Financial Services, we have established ourselves as Italy's most trusted omnichannel financial institution. Our investment portfolio generated EUR 2.6 billion in revenues in 2024, exceeding our target by 13% and securing higher yields for the medium term. The renewed CDP agreement and our intensified commercial focus on postal savings remain central to our strategy. Additionally, we have doubled our specialized client coverage to 64% through the rapid implementation of our new commercial service model. In Insurance Services, protection gross written premium have reached the milestone of over EUR 1 billion in 2024. Our fully fledged and resilient insurance company has continued to deliver positive net flows in Life in the face of significant market headwinds, thanks to a strong commercial focus and a loyal client base. Additionally, PosteVita's robust capital position enabled us to affirm today an additional remittance of EUR 1.5 billion to the parent company over the plan while maintaining post distribution a pro forma Solvency II ratio of around 300%, well above managerial ambition. Postepay services is confirmed as Italy's largest ecosystem for everyday needs with payments at its core with 30 million cards, 30.5 million digital payment wallets and an undistributed leadership in e-commerce payments. Additionally, the energy business is ahead of plan with 700,000 active clients. Finally, let me highlight the two key group-wide achievements. First, the landmark new labor agreement, which enables the transformation of our logistics network and ensure full visibility on HR cost evolution through the plan; second, the full release of our SuperApp, which serves as a single access point to our platform. This is crucial for enhancing customer experience and boosting cross-selling opportunities. Let's move to Slide 12, please. We are accelerating our digital journey across the platform, also thanks to the boost coming from the SuperApp. In 2024, we managed more than 25 million daily customer omni-channel interactions across all our platforms, totaling 8 billion interactions in the year. Our digital clients continue to grow reaching 18 million, with digital channels accounting for around 30% of our total transaction and sales. At the same time, we further improved our Customer Experience Index by almost 12 percent points since 2017 to 35.4%. Expanding our hybrid client base while enhancing customer experience is essential for strengthening client loyalty and driving cross-selling opportunities. Moving to Slide 13, please. We continue to create value for all stakeholders, delivering on our integrated ESG strategy. Let me remind you that the Polis project, partially financed by the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, is a flagship initiative encompassing innovation, digitalization and green transition. We're transforming post offices in smaller municipalities into digital service hubs with the aim of providing a broader access to public administration services while strengthening our presence in remote areas. Our 2024 Polis target has been overachieved with renovation in 3,600 post offices, of which over 3,000 are already completed and delivering key public administration services to citizens, including passports. Given its great success, the passport service is now available in 32 large cities as well, and we have handled more than 400 requests per day. Today, mail and parcel deliveries rely on a full modernized eco-friendly fleet while we are significantly improve the network's energy efficiency with lower environmental impact and cost savings. We continue to invest in our people strategy through training and professional development providing our employees with future-proof skills. We're proud to have engaged and committed people who are the true driving force behind the transformation of Poste Italiane. Let's move to Slide 15, please. The SuperApp, it has become a reality as the single access point to our platform. It is already actively used by more than 5 million clients. And by year-end, we will complete the transition of all our clients. Powered by AI, the SuperApp adapts to the needs of each of our 46 million clients, delivering a highly personalized experience. The SuperApp will be a key tool to boost cross-selling through targeted and integrated offers, also facilitating trigger-based campaigns. Finally, let me say with pride that our SuperApp is already the most downloaded app on iOS and Android stores in the financial service category. Let's move to Slide 16. On this slide, we look at how artificial intelligence will support our business, optimizing processes and streamlining decision-making. We want to extend our hybrid cloud infrastructure with our large data footprint to the edge to provide a faster, seamless and more pleasant user experience, not only to our clients, but also to our workforce. To optimize the transformation process, we have built an hybrid AI layer that is flexible and cost effective. This accelerates the industrial development of GenAI-based applications and allow us to move towards a collaboratory system of autonomous AI agents. On this page, you will find some examples of how AI agents are used to generate efficiencies, improve customer experience and optimize commercial efforts. Finally, we're very committed to ethical AI governance, ensuring that AI is used responsibly and aligned with our values. Let's move to the key divisional message from Slide 17. Starting with Mail and Parcel, logistics transformation aimed at ensuring the financial sustainability of our Mail and Parcel business is a key pillar of the connecting platform plan. By the first half of 2025, we will launch our new courier network directly managed and staffed by Poste employees. Parcel delivered through the postal network, which will include both Postini through the joint delivery model and the newly created internal courier network will further grow and reach 42% in 2025. In Mail, we will continue to work on pricing to offset the volume decline from e-substitution. In Parcel and Logistics, we will consolidate our role as the leading operator in Italy, leveraging on our strong customer relationship, unmatched network reach and ever-improving quality of service. Our growing international business will be further enhanced by the DHL partnership and reached EUR 350 million in revenues from inbound e-commerce volumes. We are continuing to develop our end-to-end counter-logistic client base, capitalizing on synergies with the Express Courier business. As the exclusive logistics partner of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, we will gain greater international visibility. Finally, we're uniquely positioned to capitalize on the public health care logistics opportunity, a market that we estimated could generate over EUR 3 billion in revenues over the next 15 years for Poste Italiane. Moving to Slide 18. In Financial Services, the focus will continue to be on the full rollout of the new commercial service model to maximize the value of our client relationship and improve network productivity. We will continue to increase specialized coverage, adding around [ 2,080 ] financial advisers covering our premium and affluent clients. Our advisers will be provided with new advanced front-end and advisory tools powered by GenAI and will benefit from new incentive schemes linked to [indiscernible] portfolio targets. As we continue to adapt to the new rate environment, we're working alongside CDP in revamping the Postal Savings offering, keeping it at the core of our commercial efforts. In 2025, we will celebrate this year 150 years of the Postal Books, the Libretto, and 100 years of the Postal Bond by launching special anniversary products and hosting targeted events. At the same time, we will continue to connect with our clients to streamline the post-maturity reinvestment process, and we launched dedicated products to manage the reinvestment. Finally, we will enhance cross-selling by simplifying the process for Banco Posta depositors and Postepay card holders to access super smart time deposits. Let's move to Slide 19 on insurance services, please. Our Life business has demonstrated remarkable resilience recently, successfully navigating through a highly challenging market. In 2024, we had EUR 1.6 billion of positive net flows, while the rest of the market continues to experience outflows. For 2025, we anticipate a more favorable market condition for life insurance with a normalizing interest rate environment and returns narrowing the gap with competing investment products. We anticipate improving net flows through stabilization of lapses and the launch of new products with appealing returns and higher margin compared to the in-force portfolio. We continue to see a supportive market environment for protection insurance with still low customer penetration and increasing demand for personal insurance, particularly in health and property sectors. We will focus on cross-selling with investment products and leverage net insurance third-party distribution network to tap complementary markets. Let's move to Slide 20. Looking at Postepay services, we continue to outperform the market, leveraging on our unique everyday ecosystem synergies to enhance services and drive customer engagement. Despite the rapid acceleration in recent year, digital payments still account for less than half of total spending in Italy, indicating substantial growth potential. We will continue to outperform market growth, capitalizing on our e-commerce leadership, wallet innovation and increased penetration of our flagship IBAN-based Postepay evolution cards, carrying on average higher transaction values and recurring fees. In Telco, we anticipate a stable mobile customer base and revenue while capitalizing on the fiber growth opportunity from the ongoing rollout of high-performance connectivity in Italy. No synergies with TIM have been considered so far. Finally, the energy market remains highly dynamic with a very high switch rate in Italy. With a renewed commercial effort and a unique product offering, we aim to reach the milestone of 1 million active contracts by the end of 2025. Let's move to the key financial targets starting from Slide 22. On this slide, we analyze the evolution of our revenues mix since 2017. Over the past 7 years, we have more than mitigated revenues coming from businesses in structural decline, such as physical mail and payment sleeps with EUR 2 billion additional revenues from our fast-growing parcel and payment businesses and solid performance of our financial and insurance activities. As a result, our business is now perfectly positioned to continue generating sustainable growth with 80% of our revenues coming from growing and stable markets. Let's move to Slide 23, please. We are presenting 2025 figures that are ahead of our business plan targets by 2 years. We expect organic revenues to continue to grow steadily, reaching EUR 12.8 billion in 2025 with a positive contribution from all segments and increasing exposure to growing businesses. The profitability growth will continue into 2025 with adjusted EBIT at EUR 3.1 billion and net profit at EUR 2.1 billion, demonstrating continuing operational leverage benefits. Going forward, we are committing to a structurally increased payout ratio of 70%. Camillo will provide a more in-depth analysis of the divisional growth drivers. With high confidence in future cash flows and optimized group capital, we are excited to announce the enhanced dividend policy. This upgrade will result in targeted cumulative dividends of around EUR 7.5 billion for the 2024 to 2028 period, representing 40% of the current market cap compared to the original target of EUR 6.5 billion accumulated less than a year ago. The new dividend policy results in a proposed 2024 DPS of EUR 1.08, marking an impressive 35% increase compared to last year and overachieving our 2026 target. As a result, total dividend for 2024 amount to EUR 1.4 billion, reflecting an outstanding 9% dividend yield. Once again, we're firmly committed to provide competitive remuneration for our shareholders. Let's move to Slide 25, please. Let's look at what drives our full confidence in upgrading the dividend policy, and I'm sure there are going to be many questions on this. It is backed by a strong visibility on our future cash flow and capital generation, thanks to an increased and diversified dividend upstream from all our subsidiaries with a solid coverage ratio of over 1.6x through the plan. Our net financial position will remain stable in 2025 and is expected to significantly improve over the plan, even with the upgraded dividend policy. Distributable reserves at parent company level are projected at over EUR 3 billion by the end of this year. Additionally, we have substantial untapped debt capacity, which will further increase in line with our EBIT over the plan. And finally, PosteVita Solvency II ratio at around 30% is very solid even after taking into account the EUR 1.5 billion additional remittance. And this gives us further confidence in the sustainability of the policy. Thank you, everybody. And now over to Camillo for a deep dive into the financials.

Thank you, Matteo, and good afternoon, everyone. I'm pleased to report strong fourth quarter and full year results for 2024. Revenue grew 6% year-over-year to EUR 3.4 billion in Q4 and 5% to a record EUR 12.6 billion for the full year. Adjusted EBIT for the quarter is up 33% to EUR 685 million, whilst the full year, we recorded EUR 2.96 billion, 3x our 2017 EBIT number, beating our previous guidance of EUR 2.8 billion. Adjustments include EUR 341 million pretax extraordinary charge related to the voluntary risk assessment agreed with the Italian Revenue Agency with the aim of derisking our tax credit portfolio. Our 2024 net profit of EUR 2 billion is the highest ever reported by the group and is 2 years ahead of the 2024 plan. On Slide 28, you can see a snapshot of the adjusted EBIT by segment, confirming solid underlying profitability across the board. Mail, Parcel and Distribution's improved operating profitability is driven by resilient Mail revenues, strong Parcel growth and continued cost discipline. In Financial Services, the operating progression continues, mainly driven by solid investment portfolio revenues. Insurance Services EBIT grew by solid 5%, supported by both Life and Protection. Postepay Services' constant double-digit growth is driven by strong revenue trends with energy contributing positively to EBIT ahead of the plan. On Slide 29, let's look at how we have overachieved all our key targets for 2024 and are, in fact, 2 years ahead of the 2024 plan. Looking forward, we are guiding 2025 revenues towards EUR 12.8 billion with adjusted EBIT up to EUR 3.1 billion and net profit up to EUR 2.1 billion. Our healthy profitability, visibility on cash flows and capital generation give us the confidence to further upgrade our dividend policy by increasing the payout ratio from 65% to 70%, leading to a 2024 DPS of EUR 1.08, overachieving the target we gave for 2026. In 2024, Mail, Parcel and Distribution revenues were up 3% to EUR 3.8 billion, with double-digit Parcel revenue growth driven by strong performance across all customer segments. Mail revenues were stable, thanks to a favorable business mix and repricing measures. We expect these trends to continue in 2025. Mail revenues will be supported by the repricing actions, partially offsetting volume decline. Parcel revenue growth will be driven by all customer segments with the International business further supported by the DHL partnership on cross-border e-commerce. Overall, we are looking at EUR 4 billion external revenues for 2025. Positive adjusted EBIT is confirmed and again ahead of the plan. In Financial Services, revenue grew 6% to EUR 6.4 billion in 2024, mostly on the back of strong investment portfolio revenues. We envisage 2025 top line of around EUR 6.5 billion, with investment portfolio revenues resilient in a normalizing interest rate environment, thanks to yield-enhancing management actions in 2024 and 2025. Postal saving fees are stable, benefiting from a revamped commercial focus and improving net flows, offsetting record high maturities. In consumer loans, distribution fees will grow as a result of higher fee margin and stable volumes. Higher assets under management and margins will boost asset management fees. Adjusted EBIT growth reflects top line evolution. We have strong visibility on 2025 investment portfolio revenues. Based on interest rate assumptions in line with the market forward curves, we anticipate a stable NII year-on-year and active portfolio management in line with 2024. This is due to our balance sheet structure with a limited net exposure to variable short-term rates at around 10% of the total portfolio. Should rates drop faster than anticipated, our sensitivity towards 100 bps downward parallel shift of the swap curve would lower fiscal year '25 NII yield by circa 20 basis points, less than EUR 200 million, while generating substantially higher unrealized capital gains. Insurance service revenues reached over EUR 1.6 billion in 2024, up 5% year-on-year, driven by both Life and Protection. Life Investment and Pension net flows accelerated in the last quarter of 2024, reaching EUR 1.5 billion for the full year, thanks to newly launched products and strong network commercial focus. We expect this trend to continue also in 2025 due to improving market conditions, leading to EUR 1.5 billion Life revenues. Protection gross written premiums have surpassed the EUR 1 billion mark for the first time. We see this trend continuing in 2025 with solid growth in gross written premiums and stable profitability. Protection's contribution for the division EBIT is already at more than 10% in 2024, and it is projected to further increase through the plan. Our Protection combined ratio is confirmed at around 85%, in line with our target. Finally, the steady growth in adjusted EBIT and net profit is fully in line with our original plan. The Solvency II ratio 334% as of year-end 2024 allows us to implement group capital optimization actions. On top of the 100% in the profit remittance, which is confirmed, PosteVita will remit to the parent company an additional approximately EUR 1.5 billion across the plan from 2025 to 2028, with the first EUR 500 million to be paid already in 2025. The pro forma Solvency II ratio embedding the entire EUR 1.5 billion additional remittance is around 300%, well above our 200% managerial ambition. 2024 saw another double-digit revenue growth for Postepay services, up 10% year-on-year to EUR 1.6 billion, with strong adjusted EBIT up 20%. In 2025, we are looking at revenues of EUR 1.7 billion, with payment revenues driven by organic transaction value growth above market levels, more than compensating the decline of instant payment revenues. Our loyal customer base, along with opportunities in the fiber market will drive stable telco revenues this year. The energy business will continue to grow in 2025, supported by a renewed marketing effort with a positive contribution to Postepay service profitability ahead of the plan. Finally, we see solid EBIT growth in 2025. In 2024, the number of FTEs remained stable at around 119,000 people while we continue to work on our workforce transformation, driving higher productivity with the value added per FTE reaching EUR 86,000. In 2025, we will further renew our workforce and we will focus our hiring efforts on expanding business activities, leading to 120,000 FTEs by year-end. Total HR cost came in at EUR 5.6 billion in 2024, embedding the impact of the new labor agreement and confirming improving productivity trends with ordinary HR costs on revenues down 40%. 2025 HR costs are expected at EUR 5.7 billion, reflecting a new salary increase from September 2025. Total non-HR costs for 2024 are at EUR 4.5 billion, with variable cost trends reflecting higher business volumes while managing inflation. We expect these trends to continue also in 2025 with non-HR costs landing at EUR 4.8 billion, driven by higher variable costs due to business growth, stable fixed cost and D&A up on higher CapEx, also related to the Polis project. Variable cost/variable revenues is anticipated to slightly improve at 61%. Our focus on cost discipline remains laser sharp and protecting our bottom line profitability remains, as usual, a top priority. We continue to increase our capital expenditures in key areas of development to support business transformation. In 2025, we expect EUR 0.10 billion CapEx with an acceleration of digital investments. We are showing here the key areas of focus. And again, let me highlight that around 70% of our total CapEx are related to initiatives supporting our ESG strategic pillars. That's all from me. Over to Matteo for some closing remarks.

We were excited to share our vision in March last year at our Investor Day, and 1 year into the plan, we have exceeded our financial targets with a strong performance across our platform and deliver on our strategic priorities. We remain focused on delivering sustainable revenue and profitability growth with EUR 3.1 billion adjusted EBIT and EUR 2.1 billion net profit guidance for 2025. Compelling shareholder remuneration is a cornerstone and always will be of our investment case. And today, we are again upgrading our dividend policy with the payout ratio structure increased to 70%, resulting in EUR 7.5 billion accumulated dividends over the plan. Our targets are well grounded and credible and our year-to-date results confirm that we are pointing in the right direction. Stay tuned. Please allow me to say a few words in Italian, [Foreign Language]. Thank you, over to Giuseppe for the Q&A session.

[Operator Instructions] In any case, again, for any topics that we won't be able to cover today, myself and the rest of the IR team will be available to take your questions at any time. The first question we have today is from Gian Luca Ferrari, Mediobanca.

The first one is on the EUR 1.5 billion remittance. I was wondering why you are planning to do so. Of course, the solvency of post-EBITDA is very robust, very solid, but there are still geopolitical tensions and macro uncertainty. So I was wondering if you expect to upstream that cash to capture opportunities in other businesses rather than keeping the extra capital in PosteVita, or if there was another decision made here? Second is on Telecom Italia. During the speech, you said there could be synergies emerging from cooperation with TI. I will not ask you about revenue synergies here, but I was more curious to hear what are the ICT-related costs for Poste. Are you already having something together with Telecom Italia? And do you think this partnership could also create some cost synergies? And sorry, I have a third and final one on the extraordinary numbers in Protection. I think the upside potential is absolutely clear. But you are targeting mainly retail clients. And of course, retail clients are the bread and butter of Poste Italiane. Yet I think there is a big opportunity also in SMEs, and I was wondering if you are thinking about extending the protection solutions also to SMEs?

Thank you, Gian Luca, first of all. The EUR 1.5 billion remittance, which leaves on after-remittance pro forma basis, the solvency ratio at 300% is justified by the fact that we have reduced significantly our market sensitivity in Solvency, and we simply would not -- we don't want to leave too much capital in the subsidiary. Let me say it in a different way. If we had not done it, I'm sure that today, I would have had a question saying, why you're not upstreaming dividend from PosteVita? TIM -- I think TIM is -- for Poste Italiane, I can call it more of the same. What do I mean? We were counting the number of M&A transactions. At least one is much larger than TIM we have done in the last 8 years, and this is a transaction #18. And what has been our philosophy and our approach to this kind of equity transaction we did several times to be an industrial partner, which is what we communicated on Saturday on our press release, and that applies obviously to TIM and to extract synergies. Synergies are, as you correctly pointed out, Gian Luca, easy often to see on the cost side. And as we have already communicated to the market, we are working on some low-hanging fruit in that space, which is positive for us and positive for TIM. I'm sure there are more. So with the trust we have on management, we will start working on extracting more cost synergies. The revenue synergies are clearly more of a challenge always in these kind of transactions, and we will be working on that side as well. There is no road map yet defined. As we said in the press release on Saturday, we are conscious that the market is going through a consolidation. There is a market repair topic on the table. And the company was already working on curing the market repair and the excessive competitiveness together, obviously, with the regulators, and we will try to support that process. On Protection, I will hand the question, Gian Luca, to the CFO.

Yes. So very briefly, Gian Luca, the answer, yes, we do intend to interact -- continue to interact with SMEs, specifically what we call with small economic operators. And we see, as an example, the new mandatory nat cat policy, an opportunity which we want to work on as of 2025.

Thank you. The next question is from Alberto Villa, Intermonte.

Congratulations for the results. I remember commenting the business plan that, in my view, had some room for additional improvement. And I'm happy to see that you are delivering on that. First question is on the provision you're booking on the tax credit. I'm a little bit lost on what has happened so far. So you had the provision in 2022 and then now again, another provision. If you can help us understanding how we should see in the future the contribution from tax credit for Poste? And if this closed completely all and settle all the issue, and what has happened to the 2022 provision as well? The second question is again on telecom, TIM. There were rumors in the press about potentially Poste looking for even a higher stake in the company. I was wondering if you can comment on what is the ideal share in Telecom Italia you think is the right one for Poste Italiane? And the third and final one, if you can eventually comment or give an update on pagoPA, if there are any news on that front?

Okay. I will answer, Alberto, in reverse. So on pagoPA, no news. We're still working on the file. On TIM, it's also very easy. There are many, many rumors on this company, and I will stick to the answer I gave to Gian Luca. There is nothing more and nothing less we want to say about it. And on the tax credit, I will let Camillo go a bit more into the details, and obviously, we're available after the call to deep dive into the topic, but it's a derisking of that side of our portfolio. So it's a unique perfect opportunity for us in a very good year because this is clearly a very good financial we're announcing to have the room to go to the tax authorities with whom we have a cooperative agreement and do a cleanup exercise, which I think we did in a very substantial way. But please, Camillo?

Yes. So as Matteo explained, we have been in discussions with the Italian Revenue Agency for some time as a result of their assessment of a portion of our tax credit, which is identified as riskier. So we enter into these discussions and, together, we identified jointly a portfolio which led to this voluntary assessment, this one-off payment of EUR 341 million, which will -- which is a cash payment in 2024. This is not a provision. The provision we did in 2022 was a provision done on a sort of independent basis with respect to our overall portfolio, which we cover 2, let's say mega classes of credit. The first class of credit have been seized by Italian authority, which are still fully covered and other part of that provision was against the rest of the portfolio. And as part of the exercise, we also released around EUR 150 million of debt provision against also the assessment with this year. We also got as part of the agreement, tax deductibility, both tax deductibility on the one-off payment this year, but also tax deductibility on the accrual we made in 2022, where we have not booked -- we have not got the benefit of the tax shield. In fact, if you look at our numbers, we see that the tax rate in 2024 goes down to around 25% from around 29% the year before. So the after-tax impact of the overall transaction is around EUR 100 million.

Okay. Maybe can you help us understanding what we should, let's say, assume on that on 2025, no impact...

Well, I mean, the assumption is that as the Italian Revenue Agency identified, that portfolio is risky. By difference, we are assuming that the rest of the portfolio does not have an issue. And that's the assumption we're working on and we have no information to not adjust that.

The next question is from Manuela Meroni, Banca IMI.

The first one was on the NII. Thank you for providing all the information regarding 2025. I'm wondering if you can give us the sense of the trend that you expect in NII in 2026. So should we expect the NII remaining stable or the decline of rates is going to abate starting from 2026. And the second question is on the Parcel business. In the fourth quarter, tariffs were up. So I'm wondering if you can elaborate on this trend, and if we can expect a similar trend also for 2025. And again, on the parcel business, I'm wondering if you could elaborate on your new directly managed courier network that you are going to start in the first half of this year. What are the characteristics, what are the benefits for you or for your clients?

Thank you, Manuela. In terms of the benefit of the new Express Internalized Courier, it's clearly quality which, as you know, for all our clients, starting from Amazon, Zalando, [indiscernible] is top priority. So when you work with your employees, you have clearly a much better performance on quality. Just to give you an idea, the indices that are monitored by our clients ask us to have a percentage of what they call FTD, so first-time delivery, which means the first time you try the delivery, which are above 98%. So there is very little room for mistakes if you want to have a happy client. And a happy client, call it, Zalando, is a client that gets positive feedback from the e-commerce buyers. Then on -- if we stick, Camillo, to the Parcel question and tariff and increase and then you answer also the NII, please.

Yes. So with respect to parcel, obviously, the dynamics are different to Mail. And with respect to what we expect for 2025, we do expect around 10% to 12% total revenue increase with around sort of 10% driven by volume and around 1% driven by tariff. Obviously, we have large customers with whom we have special agreements that are also volume driven. But as we have been working out on expanding our customer base, we have also smaller countable with whom we have a bit more leverage in terms of pricing and working specifically on those. The other thing that is helping obviously the profitability of the division, but we already talked about that last year, is the fact that we are continuing our in-sourcing of the delivery of parcels, which has gone up to 42% this year.

And I think on NII, Manuela, it's always the same story, if you allow me. We have a portfolio of fixed rate bond. We're showing the sensitivity for 2025 which, as you can see, is very limited. We're not posting 2026 guidance on NII for Financial Services. We can tell you that there is a slightly down value, as you can see, we already experienced from '24 to '25 on Page 32. But let's not forget that in our assumption of rates down, we still hold our capital gain ammunitions in the balance sheet. So let's not forget, and this is very important, that for the last 8 years, we went from 30%, 35% of net interest margin coming from capital gains to 3% this year, NII coming -- sorry, EBIT -- company group EBIT coming from capital gains, only 3%. So we stopped using that lever, protecting the in-force portfolio. But that lever is clearly still there and will be there to support if there is a need and that lever will be much stronger in case of lower rates.

Okay. Thank you. Next question is from Elena Perini, Banca IMI as well.

I've got only one. It is on the CSM because I saw that it was basically stable in -- at the end of 2024. So I was wondering, as you mentioned about growth in the fourth quarter due to the acceleration in the new business, as we can expect for 2025, a growth in the CSM?

Thank you, Elena. Yes, you're certainly right in terms of the growth of the CSM in the fourth quarter, which is coming from a progression. So Q2 was better than Q1, Q3 was better than Q2, and Q4 was the best CSM growth last year. As far as the projections and what we have in mind, I will leave the floor to Giuseppe.

Yes. No, I mean, for 2025 we do expect CSM growth to continue and to have a normalized growth that progressively aligns with what we had in the plan we announced in March last year.

Okay. And if I may, a follow-up on lapses from the traditional products. Do you still expect them also for the coming months or are they normalizing now?

They normalize. Obviously, we'll monitor the lapse rate very closely. It normalized last year, certainly in the second half and so far is okay, is more or less in line with our budget. But it's something that, I agree, Elena, we have to keep watching very closely as one of the priorities for our operations.

If I may add to that, we've already taken a more prudential approach to lapses because as you have seen in our CSM buildup, we have negative impact from operating variance. That is exactly coming from an add-on to the lapse assumption we included in our model for the next 2 years. So we are already kind of anticipating a higher lapse environment in our year-end CSM. And by the way, there is part of this lapse which starts to be generated by our own sales force. So we are becoming a bit more dynamic in managing our clients which, as you know, is not part of our history and background. But it's improving. So I can say that it is probably, let's say, 15% of the total lapse that is prompted by commercial activities from our consultants.

And the lapse rate in Q4 has improved compared to Q3.

Yes.

Because in Q3, it was 7.1%. And in Q4, it's less than 7%.

Okay. So we move to the next question now. It's from Farooq Hanif at JPMorgan.

Congratulations on your delivery. So my first question is on the Slide 25, where you show your remittances to the holdco and then your dividend. Clearly, you will have CapEx, interest costs. But it feels to me like you still have a lot of flexibility, particularly with this EUR 1.5 billion that you're remitting. Can you just talk about some ideas around what that gives you as a group? That's my first question. My second question is on the SuperApp. Could you give me an example of the kind of integrated offers that are working really well or you think will work well on the app? So for example, a customer that owns one product, that you can offer something else that you think will really drive multiple product holdings?

Okay. Thank you, Farooq. Two very good questions, and I'll take both. I think you're right. There is an element of cautiousness. Notwithstanding the 35% increase in the dividend policy, we still have a cautious and conservative approach to capital distribution. Because if you were to ask me, and maybe we can take this off-line, but I'll just give you a few highlights -- if you were to ask me, at the group level, how much capital gain positive do you have -- we have? Could you remit more than EUR 1.5 billion? And probably there is room. You pointed out to the coverage ratio. Yes, we have CapEx above. We have interest cost, which is very limited because we have very limited debt. But I agree, we could live with a lower coverage ratio. If you were to ask me what about your net financial position today and end of the plan, which is -- will keep improving year after year? The company is not geared. And finally, probably the most important one, you have today, this year, we will have EUR 3 billion distributor reserves, and this will increase over the course of the plan. So there are many areas where we have room for maneuver. I'm going back and I'm asking -- sorry to Gian Luca because part of his first question was, this cash that you're not distributing, do you keep it because you have something special in mind? No, no. We keep it because we always had a conservative approach to managing the expectations of the market and because we thought, to make a long story short, that a 35% increase, which is the largest increase in dividend we have ever done, was already a big statement from the company. The SuperApp, I mean, we could talk and we're spending a lot of time on this. We have preliminary data last 2 months of last year and already January pointing that the cross-selling that we experienced in the SuperApp with all our products is a multiple for the clients using the SuperApp. And I remind you, we have already more than 5 million clients using it. And the synergies need to be -- and the potential cross-selling in keeping all products in one digital space need to be managed, and we have built an engine to do this on a case by case basis. So you have markets like the energy market that you make money selling the products, but you need to keep the client and lower the churn. So you can propose a discount on other products provided that your clients remain with you in energy, just to give you an example. Or somebody that has bought life-saving product can be the ideal candidate, and this we already do in our post offices to buy some protection and to have the protection guarantees embedded already in the life contract. And then more than anything else, it opens the way to analyzing all the data of our clients' activities, and on that basis, having rules proposing to clients specific products or specific activities that are improving our cross-selling. So we think this is extremely powerful. We have to keep working in improving this engine. And after all, we look at it from our standpoint, more cross-selling, more revenues. But the way we're also approaching the initiative and the focus and the development is in making the life of our clients easier. Because that's what really makes the difference at the end of the line for the client, and therefore, for our product penetration capabilities.

Next question is from Michael Huttner from Berenberg.

I had two very specific ones. One is on the NII, going back to that topic. Just to get a feel for the drivers, can you talk a little bit about the deposits both in '24 and your assumptions going forward? And the second question is on Slide 25 again. It's a fascinating side. There's certainly a little bit that you can draw out of it. But my key question is what are the assumptions, and I'm sure you said it before, of upstreaming from each part of your business? My assumption, obviously, you said insurance, 100%. But I can't quite gauge the assumptions from the others. I guess that goes into answering your point about flexibility?

And the second one is easy. 100% also for the other main subsidiaries. And on NII?

NII, the question was on what has been the evolution of the deposits. And I think on Page 12 of our Q4 presentation, we do show that we have had retail deposits increasing by around EUR 1 billion. These are retail deposits and overall, deposits growing by EUR 2 billion. So we have had a performance at the level of flows in our bank account that has been -- in bank accounts and on Postepay, I should say, that have been better than expected.

And what's the assumptions going forward?

The assumption is going to be a marginal -- a continued marginal improvement in terms of cash position.

And if I may, the reason I asked the question, and the answer is roughly, and I should have spotted it, is you also have huge, I mean, positive net inflows into Life and Mutual Funds. So I was thinking one is cannibalizing the other, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Can you maybe just comment on that?

So look, the idea is that the bank accounts that we have are not saving accounts, but are working capital facilities. So the average size of our bank account is around EUR 5,000. And to the extent that there is a customer of ours that wants to actually have a yield on the cash with us, then it's the job of our financial consultants to address the need either through the sale of a postal bonds or a postal book or through PosteVita life products depending on the customer specific characteristics. But the idea is that if you're looking for yield, you need to move to one of those products. And depending on what our specific individual needs, we would go out there in the direction of PosteVita, where as you rightly said, we had more than EUR 1.5 billion net inflows this year are into the saving products.

Next question is from Andrea Lisi at Equita.

I have a question on your guidance you gave for 2025. If I understood correctly, the impact of tax trade on the tax credit of -- on the tax credits net for the tax rate was kind of EUR 100 million. So if we added toward the bottom line of this year, we would already have arrived to the EUR 2.1 billion that is the target for 2025. But 2025 is kind of EUR 150 million more in terms of EBIT adjusted. So I want to understand, if the EUR 2.1 billion you said in terms of net income for 2025 is something that is prudent, and so there is a high margin for upward revision. And still connected to the guidance for 2025, if you have already taken into account the contribution that can arrive from the potential partnership synergies that you can develop with telecom?

Okay, Andrea, there is nothing in terms of synergies. So that's the first answer. Then in terms of your correct observation, I think there...

Yes. Well, there are a couple of points. First of all, the number is rounded. So it can be [indiscernible]. So there are EUR 100 million of margin that we have there, point number one. And then point number two, we had also an important contribution of financial profit coming between EBIT and before -- profit before tax, which was in excess of EUR 100 million in 2024. So also on that, we have been cautious with respect to what's happening the following year.

And we're not anticipating, Andrea, to have the same level of below EBIT performance next year because of lower rates.

And the final question is from Daniel Wilson at Morgan Stanley.

Just two, one on Telecom and one on Postal Savings. On Telecom Italia, I remember you mentioned in your press release earlier this month that you guys are proponents of consolidation in the telco space. And I was wondering, as a virtual network operator, it would kind of strike me that consolidation might be bad for your negotiation position with your suppliers. I'm just wondering if you could elaborate on why you're positive or why you're proponents of consolidation in that space? And then secondly, on postal savings. I'm wondering if you can tell us if there's any way you can recapture people who are -- who have maturing bonds or maturing books in any of the products in your line?

Thank you, Adrian (sic) [ Daniel ]. No, to be precise, we're not proponent. I mean we are supporting the process of consolidation that has already started, okay? So we're not here to stop it. That's what we meant. Sorry, maybe we were not clear. And in terms of how this will happen in terms of MVNO or different solution, as I said, it's still premature to have any thoughts. In terms of your second question of maturing postal bonds and converting maturities into other products, I mean, our priority is to keep the conversion rate within postal savings as close as possible to 100. So we try to keep the postal bonds stock as intact and as integral as possible. Obviously, there are situations where clients need the saving for living often, and that's clearly not a reinvestment opportunity. In terms of the investment opportunity, when we see more risk appetite, and we have obviously a profiling models of our clients, we consider the proposal and the switch into mainly capital-protected life product and increasingly noncapital protected life product as well. And I think what the new service model in Financial Services will allow us to do is to do this proposition and its coverage and this anticipation of the maturity and anticipation of the client needs in a more efficient way. That's the whole purpose of the new service model.

So there is no further questions. Thank you all very much for joining us today.

Thank you, everybody. Thank you for taking the time for Poste. Thank you.