Toyota Tsusho Corporation (8015) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, everyone. I am Kashitani, President of Toyota Tsusho Corporation. First, I'd like to express my appreciation to your continued support to our company. Just like last time, we decided to live stream this presentation to prevent spread of COVID-19 infection. I would appreciate your understanding for that. And thank you very much for participating in this presentation during the holiday period in Japan.

I am Yasushi Aida, Assistant to CFO. Nice to meet you. I will explain the outline of consolidated results for FY 2021 and earnings forecast for FY 2022. Please look at Page 3 of the PowerPoint presentation. This is outline of the consolidated results for FY 2021. Gross profit was JPY 759.2 billion. Operating profit was JPY 294.1 billion. Profit attributable to owners of the parent was JPY 222.2 billion. Regarding year-on-year-on-year change, gross profit increased JPY 151.6 billion. As shown at the bottom, the main factor of increase is that Toyota Automotive production increased year-on-year, especially overseas where we have strength. It made impact to the divisions, such as Africa, Metals, chemicals and electronics and Automotive increasing profit substantially. Operating profit increased JPY 81.1 billion. As gross profit increased, costs also increased by approximately JPY 50 billion, including impact of foreign exchange rate, but it was absorbed by the increase of the gross profit. Regarding the profit attributable to owners of the parent, in addition to the increase of the operating profit, there was again in the metal distribution on the exclusion of equity method affiliate in South America and other factors. As a result, profit increased JPY 87.6 billion. Please look at Page 4. This is a waterfall chart analysis of the profit. Operating profit increased by JPY 81.1 billion. Regarding the foreign exchange rate, Japanese yen depreciated JPY 6 against dollar and JPY 7 against euro from the previous year. Because of that, profit increased JPY 7.9 billion. Regarding market prices, especially in Metals Division, aluminum prices increased, and there were some other factors, including overlap profit. As a result, profit increased JPY 23.6 billion. Regarding demand trading volume, centering on Chemicals & Electronics Division, profit increased substantially by JPY 33.6 billion. As for the Automotive sales, there was an increase of JPY 20 billion from outside Africa, especially in the resource-rich countries where we have strength, such as oil-producing countries. In the countries covered by Africa Division, profit increased JPY 12.9 billion. Regarding others, because we reported the impairments in energy business and wind power generation business, there was a negative effect of JPY 19.9 billion. This page shows profit by division compared to the previous year. Profit for Metals Division substantially increased by JPY 50.4 billion. Main factors were the increase in automobile production and soaring metal market. Profit of Global Parts & Logistics Division increased JPY 5.6 billion. Profit of Automotive Division increased JPY 13.4 billion. Chemicals & Electronics Division increased JPY 15.8 billion. Africa Division increased JPY 10.7 billion. As for the Machinery, Energy & Project Division and Food & Consumer Services Division, profit decreased year-on-year due to onetime loss and some other factors. Page 6 shows one-off gains and losses. Total result of one-off gains and losses in the profit was positive JPY 16.5 billion. As for the fourth quarter, one-off gains and losses were as follows: negative JPY 1 billion for Metals; positive JPY 500 million for Global Parts & Logistics; negative JPY 500 million for Machinery Energy & Project; positive JPY 1 billion for Chemicals & Electronics and negative JPY 3 billion for Food & Consumer Services. This page shows consolidated financial position. Including the effect of foreign exchange rate, total assets was JPY 6.141 trillion, an increase of JPY 915.1 billion from the end of the previous term, especially operating receivables increased substantially by JPY 392.1 billion and inventory assets also substantially increased by JPY 320.3 billion. Regarding the financing side, net worth increased to JPY 1.735 trillion. In addition to the accumulated retained earnings, there was around JPY 87 billion increase due to the foreign currency translation adjustment caused by the depreciation of yen. As for the debt, net interest-bearing debt increased to JPY 1.2382 trillion, mainly due to the increase of inventory assets. Net DER is 0.71, which has worsened by 0.03 point year-on-year. This page shows consolidated cash flows. We achieved profit of JPY 222.2 billion, however, cash flows from operating activities were JPY 50.1 billion. Normally, if there is JPY 200 billion after-tax profit, we have around JPY 300 billion cash flow from operating activities. However, due to the increase of the inventory I mentioned earlier, there was approximately JPY 250 billion negative impact and the cash flow remained at this level. Cash flows from investing activities were negative JPY 157.3 billion. We made investments of JPY 197.8 billion, as investments for the future. As a result, free cash flow after dividend payment was a negative JPY 153.6 billion. Next, I will explain full year earnings forecast and prerequisites for FY 2022. Please look at Page 10. For the current term, our assumption of the exchange rate is JPY 125 for USD 1 and JPY 135 for EUR 1. Our forecast based on this exchange rate is as follows: gross profit is JPY 800 billion; operating profit is JPY 310 billion; profit after tax is JPY 210 billion. Page 11 shows earnings forecast by division. For the Metals Division and the Machinery, Energy & Project Division, we are forecasting profits lower than the previous year. Page 12 is dividend forecast. For FY 2021, in addition to JPY 70 as interim dividend, we will pay JPY 90 at the end of the term, total JPY 160 dividend for the full year. With this amount, the dividend payout ratio is 25.3%. As for the dividend for the current term, which is based on the profit forecast of JPY 210 billion, we forecast that our full year dividend will be JPY 162 with dividend payout ratio of 27.1%. We plan to increase dividends for the 12th consecutive year. We will endeavor to maintain a stable dividend and increase the amount of dividend per share. I have touched supplementary materials for additional information. This concludes my presentation. Thank you very much.

From here, I want to explain our 3 years management plan FY 2022 to 2024. Before I explain the 3 years management plan, I want to review the status of achievement of the midterm business plan we announced 3 years ago. Regarding the various quantitative targets, which we announced in May 2019, we were able to achieve all of them, especially profit for the year exceeded the past record substantially. As for ROE, net DER and risk asset risk buffer ratio, the results exceeded the targets as well. As for the shareholder returns, we achieved the target of the dividend payout ratio in all 3 years of the midterm business plan. This page shows the review of cash flow and investment. Even under the pandemic, which we never anticipated when we make the midterm business plan, we protected the supply chain. And by that, we earned trust from our customers. By this, we achieved good results, and were able to secure operating cash flow close to the target. Also even under the pandemic, we didn't stop investment for growth. And the total amount of investment exceeded the target investing in each area in a well-balanced manner. These investments were made within the generated operating cash flow, maintaining financial soundness. As a result, we secured a positive free cash flow after dividends. From here, I will explain our new 3 years management plan for FY 2022 through FY 2024. This page shows the concept of our management strategy. In addition to further grow our organic business, we established 5 working groups for carbon neutrality initiatives in 4 priority areas linked to materialities. By this, we will maintain sustainable growth and aim to achieve our vision to be the right one. We have been evolving and growing our business by nimbly capturing changes in the world and acting based on that. From 2000s, we have been expanding business scale by changing stages every 10 years. And now we are about to move into our next new stage. Over the past 20 years, the Nikkei stock average has risen by 2.1x, but our market capitalization has substantially grown by 15.2x during the same period. I recognize that our role and responsibility in the society has increased substantially corresponding to the size of the company. On this page, I want to explain our activities to achieve our vision in order to adapt to the changing environment and to move forward to the new stage. First, in addition to brush up our organic business, we will grow our business sustainably, tackling 4 priority areas where we have strength having activities related to carbon neutrality. Secondly, we will further evolve our capability to protect our value chain, which has been trusted and highly valued by customers. By this, we aim to establish a new supply chain, which is resilient and durable against uncertainty and secure a competitive advantage. Thirdly, in order to secure manpower who support these activities, we will promote globalization of personnel by developing local manpower in each region and assign them globally. This page shows our efforts to combine our business areas with carbon neutrality activities and secular economy. We will continue to brush up our organic business and tackle 4 priority areas in materiality. Meanwhile, in response to the growing interest in reduction of greenhouse gas and realization of the circular economic society, we established 5 working groups engaged in activities for carbon neutrality. By combining them with organic business and 4 priority areas, we will accelerate our efforts in this area. Next, I will explain the evolution of our supply chain. Up until now, we have been making efforts to expand global supply chain for mass production, strengthen it and protect it. Even during the pandemic, we were able to fully demonstrate this function and further solidify the trust from our customers. However, because of the disruption of supply chain by the continuing pandemic and the heightened geopolitical risk, it is difficult to continue production in a stable and safe manner, simply by the optimum global procurement. Therefore, we are evolving our supply chain further and securing procurement source from multiple suppliers and regions. By this multi-sourcing, we provide Plan B and Plan C and create supply chain, which is flexible and resilient against crisis. We are also establishing supply chain for local production for local consumption to complete production process regionally. Under the slogan, "Keep supply chains running", we will endeavor to establish supply systems, which provide peace of mind to our customers. In order to accelerate the activities I have explained so far, it is essential to develop and assign excellent manpower. From the viewpoint of autonomous regional management, we are seriously promoting localization of management and globally placing right people in the right places. To be specific, we identify important management posts outside Japan as global post. And in order to increase the proportion of local personnel in the management instead of ex-patriots, we will select candidates and systematically train them. By this, we will develop many [ local ] personnel who will compete for the future posts. Regarding the quantitative objectives, I will explain concrete activities in each business. As for the organic business initiatives, we will promote digital transformation to enhance visualization, safe energy and improve efficiency. As for the areas close to the production, we will evolve the production sites by digitalization and convert factories to smart factories to reduce cost and save energy. In the areas of procurement and logistics, for example, by providing easy platform in the business of spare materials for machinery, we will optimize procurement globally and provide functions, including matching between customers and suppliers, sharing of inventory and predictive maintenance of equipment. By this, we aim to further improve efficiency and achieve high resilience. At the bottom, there are examples of our digital transformation activities we already started. Regarding the next mobility strategy, I will explain expansion of the business related to the battery supply chain, anticipating further increase of electric vehicles and growth of demand for batteries. We will expand our battery value chain business coming from upstream to downstream and further pursue the business. As for the resources area, where we have strength, we will expand production of lithium carbonate in Argentina and that Toyota lithium in Naraha, Fukushima Prefecture, we will start lithium hydroxide business by the end of this year. As one example of the area related to the battery supply chain, we will provide full support for production at the Toyota battery manufacturing plant in North America, which we have 10% stake. In addition to the supply of raw materials and parts, we will provide functional support through the overall supply chain, including production and assembly process. Now please look at the video of a lithium carbonate production site at Salar de Olaroz in Argentina. [Presentation]

Thank you for watching the video. Next topic is the introduction of the electric power value chain and the renewable energy strategy. Since 1980s, we have been working on renewable energy business and that various locations in the world, we have been generating electric power from various sources, including wind, solar, water and bio mass environment. Currently, we have 3.6 GW generation capacity. We plan to increase it to 5 GW by the end of FY 2024 and 10 GW or more by the end of FY 2029. Also, we will strengthen functions of the electric power value chain and create a structure to adjust and deliver the power in order to provide stable and affordable energy and make contribution towards better global environment. Regarding the electric power value chain, while generating power from various sources, we will strengthen core development capabilities and deploy business in the areas of store adjust and deliver to firmly meet the demand from our customers, especially the Toyota Group. To expand the connection of the value chains, we are undertaking business in Northern Hokkaido to generate store and transmit the power in an integrated manner. As for the research or preparation for power generation, we are collaborating with our partner, Windlab in South Africa and Rera Tech in Japan, and conducting wind research assessment and engaged in consulting. In the future, including the current period of midterm plan, we will keep on tackling offshore wind power business and geothermal power generation in the U.S. and Japan. We will polish up our electric power value chain to become a company chosen by the customers based on our overall strength. Let me explain our African growth strategy. Since 1910, we have been doing business in Africa. And since 1850, CFAO has been doing the same with the vision With Africa, For Africa, we will expand the value chains of the 4 business areas from upstream to downstream and keep growing while cultivating markets. Next topic is the Mobility & healthcare area, which is the main pillars of our African strategy. Regarding the Mobility area, capturing needs of expanding middle class [ acuity ], sales of Suzuki brand is performing well. In our midterm business plan, we will further expand the scale and aim to achieve 6x of the volume compared to 2018. As for the Toyota brand, which is strong in B2B area, we will grow sales volume and meet the transportation demand in Africa. Regarding the healthcare area in the pharmaceutical wholesale business, we will increase the target countries and products to expand scale and function. In March this year, we made investment in healthcare, retail in Kenya, Goodlife and for the first time, entered the downstream retail drug business. In the global health area, we provided WHO certified vaccine transportation vehicles to 5 African countries, including Ghana. Also through the activities of health54, which supports health care startups, we will contribute to the development of health care in Africa. Regarding Mobility startup support, I want to introduce our activity by Mobility54. Fund #1 started in 2019, made EUR 21 million investment in 11 companies in 4 fields. Fund #2 started in January 2022 with a framework of EUR 40 million and working to synergy of investments. Here is one example, our logistic platform called Sendy. By connecting delivery companies and customers by a platform, it improves unstable logistics in Africa by providing improvements of traceability and cost reduction deemed to the improvement of convenience in the last mile. Through the support for startups in the mobility area, we will create synergy starting from grassroots and contribute to the development of mobility society in Africa. Now please look at the video about the Mobility54 and Sendy. [Presentation]

Thank you for watching the video. Next, I will explain our circular economy strategy. as a pillar of recycling business since 1970s, we have been undertaking business to collect and disposal of ELVs or end-of-life vehicles in Japan. We're also conducting this business in China. And we added India as a third country, cooperating with Suzuki and started operation in November last year. As the electric vehicles become popular, we believe that disposing of used batteries will be a big social issue in the near future. By tackling 3Rs of battery recycle, reuse and rebuild, we are going to meet our responsibility as a company deeply involved in the automobile industry. Now I want to explain constative targets of the midterm plan. 10 years ago, our profit was on the order of JPY 60 billion. And for several years since 2018, it was over JPY 130 billion. The result of FY 2021 was JPY 222 billion, exceeding JPY 200 billion. For the current FY 2022, we forecast JPY 210 billion profit. Although the profit is less than FY 2021, due to the one-off profit in the previous year, we are maintaining high profit level and moving forward aiming at further growth. I think this shows that we are moving into the next stage. Based on this for FY 2024, which is the last year of the midterm mid -- management time, we aim to achieve JPY 250 billion profit. This is our financial policy. First, investment policy, we will make investment within the range of operating cash flow. As for the operating cash flow over the next 3 years, our target is between JPY 750 billion to JPY 900 billion. Second item is regarding carbon utility-related investment, not only the existing business area, including the organic business and 4 priority areas, as an upfront investment for future global environment, we will tackle carbon utility activities. As a result of this investment, we are assuming that the total investment might exceed the cumulative operating cash flow. However, this is a future-oriented activities, which we must tackle right now. I believe this is something we must implement steadily considering the future cash flow and borrowing capacity. Regarding the financial policy, we will keep the net DER within 1.0 and secure fundraising capacity to make investments for growth. Borrowing capacity, which is equity minus net interesting bearing debt, is around JPY 500 billion at FY 2021. At FY 2024, the last year of the midterm plan, it will be around JPY 800 billion, which gives us enough room to make investment to achieve carbon neutrality. As for the RA/RB index, we will manage business keeping it less than 1.0. Regarding the dividend, basis to keep payout ratio of 25% or more and try to steadily increase the dividend. FY 2021 will be the 12th consecutive year of a dividend increase. We also aim to increase the dividend during the period of the midterm business plan. This page shows our governance structure. We adopted executive officer system and have been trying to strengthen governance. After that, we introduced outside directors in 2014, while streamlining Management Board, we clarified roles and have been operating Management Board with increased discipline and flexibility. After ordinary general meeting of shareholders in June this year, we will further evolve Board of Directors. We will increase the proportion of the outside directors to 50% and carry out management executive diversity. From here, I will explain the initiatives related to the carbon neutrality. As stated in the carbon neutrality declaration we disclosed in June last year, our group is aiming to use greenhouse gas by 50% in 2030 from 2019 level and materialize carbon neutrality in 200. In order to steadily achieve it and accelerate the activities, we introduced 2 systems in our company from April this year. First one is the in-house carbon pricing system. To be specific, we visualize greenhouse gas emission and added it as a KPI for establishing a plan. By giving incentives and penalties to the management accounting profit of each division, reduction results will be reflected in the valuation. Second is the incentive for investment to accelerate investment for reduction of greenhouse gas, we listed that greenhouse gas reduction investment in the investment approval process to control and monitor overall investment. Regarding these investments, there will be a company wide support for the depreciation cost and interest rate. And even if profit is lower than usual, we give advantage to those investments to promote reduction of greenhouse gas. Lastly, in an attempt to pass down a better global environment to the children of the future, we will keep challenging ourselves to materialize our company philosophy. After Page 29, we have attached a road map for the activities to achieve carbon neutralities. This concludes my presentation. Thank you very much for your attention. [Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]