Vinci SA (DG) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, good morning. We are very pleased to meet with you again in person after these last 2 shareholders' meetings that, unfortunately, we have to hold remotely. We're very pleased to be able to talk to you directly about our progress, especially pertaining to the environment. That's pretty much going to be the central focus of our AGM. Also, we're very happy to, at long last, be able to have a spontaneous debate with you. But we couldn't begin this AGM without a thought and our deep compassion for the Ukrainians who are currently living in a hell, such a hell that we didn't think was possible to take place right nearby. We've had our few ex-patriots leave the region and colleagues from neighboring countries spontaneously volunteered to welcome hundreds of thousands for refugees as you know. Your group is feeling very little direct impact from this. We didn't have any major construction projects going on either in Ukraine or Russia. So direct impact on our 2022 earnings and our balance sheet will therefore be limited. But of course, today, no one knows what the direct impact will be due to the possible shock wave produced rippling out to the world economy in terms of business, commodities, raw materials, logistics, supply chains. So due to these uncertainties, we cannot make any predictions whatsoever with these uncertainties. Let me tell you, in your group, you're fortunate that we're very diversified in terms of business lines, geographies. We have concessions, contracts that are very long-term contracts. We have excellent order book. We'll come back to that one later. Furthermore, we're very well positioned regarding the challenge of the century, i.e., the environment and the state of our planet. As is my custom, Christian Labeyrie, CFO of the group; and Patrick Richard, who's our Chief of Legal, Executive, 3 members are seated right in front of us in the room. Many members of your Board of Directors are also in attendance. I suggest Yves de Silguy, Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors; Yannick Assouad, Lead Director; Benoit Bazin; Robert Castaigne; Graziella Gavezotti; Caroline Gregoire Sainte-Marie; Marie-Christine Lombard; Dominique Muller; Rene Medori; Ana Paula Pessoa and Pascale Sourisse. Three board members will be leaving the Board of Directors after this AGM. I would especially like to thank Yves de Silguy who has been a Director of ours for 22 years. He has made major contributions, especially thanks to his in-depth knowledge of International Relations. I'd like to thank 2 directors that are not in attendance here, but they're watching remotely, Uwe Chlebos an employee representative working in Germany, Miloud Hakim, employee representative working in France. They've been members of our Board since 2014. Here as well, we can say thanks to their common sense, thanks to their input. We've made progress on a number of fronts. So thank you for their input. I also would like to welcome the 2 new employee representatives today. Roberto Migliardi joining the Board of Directors; and Alain Said; and Claude Laruelle whose appointment as a Director will be one of the resolutions proposed to you later. It's time to begin the meeting as such. The combined shareholders meeting is meeting on the first invitation, and legal information having to do with invitations to shareholders were sent out as per legislation. The financial statements and all the documents made available to shareholders -- were made available to them in the terms provided for under current legislation and rules. The documents are to be found on this table. Patrick can hold it up and show everyone. And we'd ask you to duly note this. Now we need to appoint members of the bureau. I will act as Chairperson of the bureau. As to the tellers, I see from the shareholders' present representative, Dominique Muller; Chairman of the CPE Castor and FCPE Castor Relais; Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the FCPE Castor Relais; as well as Deborah Slama Yomtob representing Amundi have the largest number of shares. Therefore, I'd ask for them to stand as tellers. Ms. Muller. Ms. Yomtob. All right. No objection. Thank you very much for that. I'd also like to suggest to Patrick Richard of Legal to act as Secretary to the AGM. The quorum, let me tell you that our share capital currently is 500 -- is to be shown on the screen here. You need to subtract from the overall number of shares. Thus the treasury stock held by VINCI, 31 million-some shares. This gives us a number of shares with voting rights. Now the bylaws of your company don't provide for double voting rights. If you calculate the quorum, it's 70.18%. 70.18% is the quorum, which means that is well above 20% and 25% quorums that are required to be able to appropriately deliberate during combined shareholder meetings on first invitation. And I'll also remind you, this quorum is much higher than the usual quorum. Usually it hovers around 62%. So that's excellent news indeed. I'd also remind you resolutions from the ordinary session of this AGM are passed on a simple majority. Those under the extraordinary session has on 2/3 majority. The agenda for this AGM, you're familiar with it, was disclosed. It was posted. It's on Page 5 of the invitation. I'm not going to read through it verbatim. You have a reminder of the points in our agenda on these 2 slides. And of course, we will come back to each of these resolutions during the final voting session. Lastly, let me tell you that your company did not receive any request for a draft resolution or any new item for the agenda at this AGM and I can tell you that kind of decision really didn't use its right to put up a resolution as per legislation. As is our custom, I would suggest we not read out the full report by the Board of Directors to make it reliably. We will go through the summary points, and we talked about the highlights of your group in 2021. So how are we going to do this? First of all, I'll be suggesting that you watch the 2021 video of the year. And as you'll see, it's pretty much a green thumb, a focus in the environment. We'll also talk about outlook for 2022. Christian and I will talk about outlook. Then Isabelle Spiegel will give us an update on our environmental ambitions and new commitments here. And the new activities by the Board committees will be reported on other various chairpeople of board committees. We will hear from the statutory auditors. After all those various presentations, we will then begin a Q&A session. And then we will vote on the resolutions after the Q&A. Let's begin now by viewing the video of the year. [Presentation]

That magnificent video illustrates the need for administration of the incredible diversity of business minds, the major human component in all the projects. And the fact that our teams are highly mobilized on the environment which is such a major challenge now where you're talking about design, build, maintenance or operation of our projects, our employees now always bear in mind, not only, of course, providing the best possible service to clients and to be beneficial to society, to be efficient in technology and economics, but especially they also very much bear in mind come up with solutions that are going to be a plus for the environment in line with our environmental objectives. But beyond reducing our own CO2 footprint, our clients are also expecting us to help them, in turn, reduce their footprint. To be successful during this transition, we have to really have strong performance ourselves, what Christian Labeyrie will be reporting to you now on our 2021 performance as well as our 2022 strategy -- our 2022 strategy and beyond 2022. Not just 2020, which saw great resilience and our great ability to adapt, 2021, we booked a strong rebound, business went beyond its 2019 pre-crisis level. Our order book looks very good indeed and margins improved significantly. Several remarkable points. Free cash flow. Free cash flow, is up to a record level, EUR 5.3 billion. This is thanks to the rebound in business, yes, and also thanks to excellent work done on collections from our clients. Particularly cash flow at VINCI Airports is positive again in the second half, thanks to very major efforts made by your group to reduce operating expenditure and capital expenditure. Our activities are improving their operating margins, record level 6.5% at VINCI Energies and up 40 basis points 3.7% at VINCI Construction versus 2019. Motorway traffic recovered as expected very quickly as soon as lockdowns were lifted and now motorway traffic is above precrisis levels -- pre-health-crisis levels. At the end of the year, we finalized the acquisition of Cobra IS, we heard this again in the video, designed to build a global leader in engineering works and services relating to energy, but also it allowed us to step up developing concessions for renewable energy. Therefore, our overall environmental performance. Let's delve in greater detail to the starting with VINCI Autoroutes. After the first 4 months of 2021, especially in the month of April, you remember, that's when there was restrictions on mobility. After that, light vehicle traffic rebounded quickly going above levels in 2019 in the second half 2021, finishing the full year -- there have been very low trough beginning of the year, so ending the full year at minus 0.53% in traffic. Heavy vehicle traffic stayed above 2019 levels for the full period, reaching at the end of the year at a plus 3.1% for the period. We feel there's still potential for further growth in traffic, personally because foreign traffic, especially at the Spanish border in 2021 will have been below usual for the full year. Furthermore, bus traffic remained impacted and should rebound in the year. This crisis is confirmed that the road is a vital network for our country, 9 trips out of 10 are by road. We believe France will only be able to comply with the Paris Agreements with our quickly decarbonizing road transport, which is precisely what VINCI Autoroutes is doing in its own network. This is what Jean Castex, our Prime Minister, underscored during inauguration of the highly exemplary Strasbourg bypass that was mid-December last. VINCI Autoroutes is one of the main prime contractors in France. And we're very pleased to have reached the agreement with the state to make the West Bypass for Montpelier and to continue thereby our mission, purpose and to come to planning. Starting with VINCI Airports now after a first half 2021, which was fairly depressed, down. We saw a very significant uptick in traffic starting last summer. The last quarter of 2020 had seen more than a twofold increase compared to the previous period. There were big differences from one geography to another. The Americas, North and South America almost reaching a normal traffic level. Europe is normalizing and Asia remaining down due to mobility restrictions, which are imposed in China. Hard work has been underway for the last 2 years. OpEx and CapEx, making possibly significantly improved EBITDA for the full year and returning to positive operating income in the second half of 2021. What I'm saying here is that we're reaping the benefits of the stringency and we see the positive effects of that stringency when traffic bounces back. We took control of 6 airports in the Amazon, including Manaus, which is very famous. We've done, in a very determined fashion, the rollout of our processes and procedures, which are tried and true, particularly in Salvador in terms of quality of service, productivity, environment as well as ethnic diversity. A beautiful year at VINCI Energies business, up 10% versus 2019, which is truly exceptional. And all of this in spite of some delays in supply toward the end of 2021. VINCI Energies, as I said, has yet again improved its operating margin, 6.5% versus 6% in 2019, which is remarkable and proves the strength and robustness of VINCI Energies' business model. Excellent cash generation made it possible to improve by EUR 700 million, the net debt situation for the full year period and that activity. Lastly, VINCI Energies, its major tradition, continued with its strategy of external growth, no fewer than 50 acquisitions of small- and medium-sized businesses in 2020 and 2021, bolt-on activity of around EUR 300 million in a full year. Now new VINCI Construction, you remember, this was the tie-up of Eurovia and VINCI Construction, has made good on its promises. Business up by 5% versus 2019, reaching EUR 26.3 billion. That's new VINCI Construction I'm talking about, as we ramp up with the major projects that it won previously. There's a great deal flow of projects. And even more importantly, I would say, we are seeing a return of the small- and medium-sized deals. These are very important to ensure resilience of the entire business. Operating margin, significant growth to 3.7% versus 3.3% in 2019, should continue to grow. Lastly, excellent cash generation, improving by more than EUR 1 billion, the net debt situation of the division throughout the full year period. Just like VINCI Energies for several years now has done a lot more activity, business outside of France and inside of France. That is now also the case of VINCI Construction. New VINCI Construction, which has more than half of its business, which is outside of France. That's very much in line with our strategic policy. Property development turned around beautifully after the pandemic. Accommodation reservations are slightly above 2019, particularly when we're talking about managed residences. These are developing well. VINCI Real Estate division, VINCI Immobilier is the #1 developer to commit to the target of zero net artificialization by 2030, which is 20 years ahead of schedule, ahead of the law called Climate and Resilience. This very necessarily will make for an in-depth change in the overall model for property development, preferring using surfaces that are already artificial or through recycling surfaces in urban areas. I'd like to hand the floor to Christian Labeyrie now.

Ladies and gentlemen, VINCI shareholders, good morning. I'll briefly run through the key figures of the year 2021. Firstly, our revenue closed on EUR 50 billion, EUR 49.4 million, up, well, 14% versus 2020. All our businesses recorded revenue increases. Xavier said plus 21% for Autoroutes, thanks to the traffic rebound plus 10% for VINCI Energies, 14% up for VINCI Construction. They resisted the COVID crisis in 2020. Revenue for the group is slightly higher than its pre-health crisis level in '19, plus 3%. The operating income on activity, that is the operating income of our subsidiaries consolidated, comes in a EUR 4.7 billion, sharply up on its 2020 level, which stood at EUR 2.9 billion, but it remains below by EUR 1 billion to its pre-health crisis level, owing to the drop in the contribution of VINCI Airports impacted by declining air traffic. By business unit, we see the following. The earnings of VINCI Autoroutes close to its 2019 level, a loss at VINCI Airport Limited, thanks to drastic savings and generates positive income in H2. The results of VINCI Energies and VINCI Construction that are topping the 2019 levels. VINCI Immobilier is up -- down versus its precrisis level. Consolidated net income group share EUR 2.6 billion, twice its 2020 level but lower by EUR 700 million of its 2019 level. The '21 results impacted by one-off tax liability in the U.K., EUR 200 million following the increase in corporate tax rate in the U.K. This increase led us to assessing our tax liabilities, but no cash impacts. The good news is that for '21, high level of cash flow generated over the year that tops the EUR 5 billion mark. More about that later. We're able to maintain debt at a very reasonable level in spite of the major acquisition of the -- acquisition of Cobra IS, Spanish company finalized at the end of the year. Next slide, debt has only increased by EUR 1.3 billion on the year. So in spite of the acquisition of Cobra IS, it represents a net impact on debt of EUR 4.2 billion. Excluding acquisition of Cobra IS, debt shrank by close on EUR 3 billion in '21. This was made possible by this cash flow generation at record level EUR 5.3 billion as against EUR 4 billion for previous years in addition to the EBITDA coming in at close to EUR 8 billion, up EUR 2 billion versus 2020. We need to stress the improved working capital requirement, EUR 1.6 billion. Good CapEx control that will be at VINCI Airport. M&A, in addition to the acquisition of Cobra IS, let's mention the investment in Brazil to obtain a 30-year concession for managing 7 airports in the Amazon, as well the acquisition by VINCI Energies of some 100 small companies in Europe. Other financial flows are a total of EUR 2 billion concerning payment of the dividend in cash for the year 2020, as well as the interim dividend for 2021 and share buybacks that we resumed in Q4 of the year in order to offset in accordance with our policy. The dilution brought about the creation of shares, essentially in the corporate savings plan. So net debt coming in at EUR 19.3 billion at December 31. It's interesting to put things into perspective to better assess the quality of the financial performance in '21, in the past 10 years. Free cash flow generated by group companies is up by 10% on average per year, whereas net income has only increased by just over 3% in spite of the economic, financial and health crisis and now geopolitical that we weathered during the period. But we also note an acceleration in cash generation over the past 3, 4 years. Excellent performance reflects the strength and resilience of our business model. There were some varied and complementary businesses on an increasingly more geographic diversity. In 2022, international turnover, we'll talk for the first time turnover in France. We're able to develop this business model on a large scale, thanks to rolling out a highly decentralized organization. Wage profits enter each business unit as several thousand is responsible for its own cash from operations, its investments and its earnings. This empowerment of men and women on the ground who enjoy great autonomy for decision-making is the VINCI hallmark financial policy. We always ascribe great importance to liquidity because it's the price of independence. So at the end of December, we have just over EUR 80 billion in liquidity, half of which in the form of confirmed undrawn bank credit lines. The rest, in terms of the EUR 18 billion, represents the available cash and the group's balance sheet. Large part can be rallied rapidly through the Central division of the holding company. We must be able to meet our commitments, that is to reimburse VINCI or the loans or those of its subsidiaries that are maturing as we did in May '21 by reimbursing a bond loan of Cofiroute of EUR 1.1 billion, and we wish that every point to seize new opportunities for acquisitions that form part of our strategy, which was the case last year for Cobra IS that represented cash out of some EUR 5 billion at the end of last year. And lastly, experience in recent years and beyond in the past shows that if it's not certain, the worst can indeed happen as the health crisis in March '20 demonstrated. It led to a brutal halt in our activities in France and our plummeting income, we were able to weather this ordeal without too much stress. It's thanks to our prudent financial management that has always presented liquidity as a paramount priority. Whatever the outside circumstances, we plan to respect our commitment, vis-a-vis the lenders as well as our shareholders, whilst continuing at our pace the execution of our expansion strategy. This context is key for a group as VINCI, whose financial debt grows, that is actually in treasury is close on EUR 30 billion, EUR 28.5 billion with an average maturity of some 7 years. And it's key to have good access to the bond market. They are prime source of refinancing, be it for our debt in euros, in sterling or in dollars. That's why we ensure that we always enjoy the best possible credit rating, give us our business profile. Our financial situation of rating is a key benchmark for lenders to assess the quality of borrowers that we are the 2 main rating agencies, S&P -- Standard & Poor's and Moody's confirmed recently in March of this year for S&P. After the Ukrainian crisis on October '21 for Moody's, our long-term ratings, A- A3 with stable outlook. These represent the solidity of business model, concessions, energy, construction, the diversity of our businesses and our prudent financial management. In these troubled times, these items allow us to remain confident. Lastly, as the curve bottom right shows we've continued to benefit from declining in the average cost of our debt because of the debt maturities that were issued previously at much higher rates than presently. We're able to reimburse these loans in better conditions. This good result and the cost of debt is also the consequence of the proactive dynamic way that we manage our interest rate, risk and exposure. Our policy entails maintaining variable rates. The part of our debt that is backed onto the recurring cash flows of our concession activities. The inflation index, we take advantage of the positive effects of the yield curve, short rates being almost structurally below those of long rates. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you, Christian. Before talking about the future, I'd like to just say a few of my thoughts. First of all, during the pandemic, we all understood really just how we draw our strength, our creativity or energy, from our relations with other people. Of course, remote working became more prevalent, but it does have its limits because our company's first and foremost the location, a place where people get together, all working toward a strategy, a shared dream. That's the whole reason the lead teams from the various business lines moved to the L'Archipel, our new shared home in Nanterre where almost 4,000 employees can work together, get together, think together in a very pleasant environment, full of light, open to the city. You saw it briefly in the video. And I would invite you to come visit us there at the L'Archipel building. It's very interesting. Next, in a period when it was very difficult to get together with people more than ever before, we've got to be shouldering our social and societal responsibility. Let me underscore some initiatives such as the leg-up program for young people called Give Me Five in France plus there are other good citizens actions we began in many countries since the very beginning of the health crisis and more recently to accommodate refugees from Ukraine by our subsidiaries in neighboring countries. We want to really set the example in all of our countries. As we are in Qatar, where the recent report by the International Trade in an IBB really does clearly demonstrate that we are pioneering when it comes to workers' rights, in terms of hiring, working and housing conditions and most importantly safety on the job. These actions plus many other actions in all of our countries are great illustration of our policy, our approach as being a humanist company as well as our ability to mobilize and push, move forward toward a more inclusive society that shows greater solidarity. We need to build on these initiatives, add to them, extend them. Clearly, we can say there's no option to (sic ) [than] Saving the planet today. Furthermore, the environmental transition is only going to happen if we don't (sic) [do] pay greater attention to societal and social points -- societal, environmental, social economic performance. That's our view. This is comprehensive and is explained in our policy manifesto, which guide our teams -- all of our teams with an eye to ongoing and constant progress in all of these areas. Lastly, the last point, agility, ability to adapt. We've, I believe, clearly demonstrated this during the pandemic. And this is thanks to our local managers. We repeat our belief that the right decisions are made closest to the field. This results a highly decentralized organization to make it possible for us to continue moving forward in spite of possible macroeconomic disturbances, which may happen due to the war in Ukraine. Let's talk more about the short term, how we view 2022. If the continuity of the good trend we've seen in recent months, visible on the slide on the screen. VINCI Autoroutes is assuming annual traffic above annual traffic booked in 2019. This is what we observed in the first 2 months of 2022. VINCI Airports, you'll remember, is benefiting from a position of almost 80% in tourism and business trips when you meet with friends and family. Only just over 20% is job-related business trips. We benefit from this positioning, 78% tourism, 20% business. We believe that there's going to be a resumption -- a faster resumption in tourism and travel for pleasure than business trends and we're observing this. That should make it possible for us to book yet another step toward a traffic recovery. Our central scenario is reaching traffic levels in 2022 of 60% between '19 levels, producing net income near breakeven. We're almost back to a normal situation in the Americas, North and South America. We're observing a significant improvement in Europe and especially in Portugal. This is very important for us. Furthermore, we're seeing the beginnings of takeoffs, no pun intended. In Gatwick, they've just reopened the South terminal, which has been closed since the pandemic. I mentioned Asia still low-ish air traffic, but we're seeing some signs of recovery. Now we talk about engineering, construction services business lines. We've got an excellent order book, as you can see on the slide here, VINCI Energies, which should continue growing in. 2022, all the while maintaining the high level of operating margins booked in 2021. Furthermore, we'll see now the full year consolidation of Cobra IS, the group we acquired at the very end of 2021. Lastly, VINCI construction, the ambition is to continue growing the operating margin by being ever more selective in terms of the projects we invest in every year. So all in all, for your group, VINCI as a whole, net income in 2022 should be above the level of net income we achieved in 2019, which was before the pandemic. Now you'll observe, we are very much in motion moving forward. We're moving to the future realistically and with great confidence. For main reason, our business lines, construction, energy, mobility put us at the very core of global challenges. We're talking about transforming cities and buildings to make them more sustainable, more virtuous in terms of energy consumption and the environment and more pleasant to live and work in. We are seeing the digital revolution in all industries and human activities including decarbonization, mobility, every type of mobility. We're talking about speeding up the energy transition by boosting green electricity and the energy mix. We're looking toward low-carbon hydrogen for industry and longer, we're also for [ heavy ] mobility. We're tackling that project from an angle of carbon footprint and preservation of biodiversity, developing circular economy, i.e., your group is very much involved and is very much a solutions provider in all these areas and to all these challenges, these can be great leverage for growth in the future. This is the backdrop. This is why we reached agreement with the ACS Group to accommodate Cobra IS. Cobra IS, let me tell you, is a set of companies active throughout the energy value chain and engineering, construction, maintenance. Furthermore, they're able to develop, finance, operate renewable energy facilities. They make about 45% of their business in Spain and 9% outside of Spain, particularly in Latin America via business units, which dedicated to small and new size deals, making up about 60% of their business. The remainder is projects that are turnkey, bigger projects. For instance, very long, very high-voltage power transmission lines in Brazil, sometimes 1,300 kilometers worth of high --very high-voltage lines, gigantic project. Also, there's cogeneration such as in Mexico, there are critical systems for management, monitoring of tunnels and roads in Australia. Cobra is one of the first in Spain, I mentioned, who has been active either as a builder or more comprehensively as a developer and a builder in renewable energy. And new renewable energy is growing apace. Cobra solutions in terms of new projects under development at various levels of maturity. Their portfolio is an overall installed capacity of 14 gigawatts, and it's about 30% in the Iberian peninsula and about 75% outside of Spain. This portfolio contains around 25% onshore wind, 75% photovoltaic and then some offshore wind projects such as a 100-megawatt project, which is floating offshore project off the coast of Scotland. And then I did one recently 480 megawatts in the Irish Sea. Now I talked to you about the future in the short and medium term. In the longer term, what we think is crystal clear is that our future very much depends on the future of the planet. Last year, you'll remember, you approved, 98% of you voted in favor of our climate resolution. You know that this is a long-term endeavor. It means we have to reinvent ourselves very significantly to improve our own impact and also to help our clients, our subcontractors and so forth to reinvent themselves. That's Scope 3. So we decided this year to give you an update on this program of environmental ambition. I'll be giving the floor to our Head of Environment, Isabelle Spiegel, to talk to you more about this. Isabelle? She has just been appointed to the Executive Committee at VINCI, it shows you just how important this subject is in our group. And I will give the floor to her now. Isabelle?

Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, good morning. VINCI is continuing rolling out its environmental ambition close to the field, which means we take into account specifics of our various business activities as well as the specifics of the geographies where we operate. A reminder, our environment ambition is based on priority challenges in our business areas. And most importantly, these are areas where we have direct leverage over where we can provide solutions. Here we're thinking about the climate, acting for the climate, optimizing resources, thanks to the circular economy and preserving natural use environment. Before giving you an update on our various environmental action plans, I'd like to talk to you about method briefly. We began 2019 by really systematically listing, putting together an inventory of the actions where we could address the environment. We then gauged this evaluated potential for reducing impacts, such as greenhouse gas emissions, as well as economic impact, amounts to be invested and return on these investments. This led us to commit to cutting by 40% greenhouse gas emissions under Scope 1 and 2 by 2030. We'll continue with this, moving towards Scope 3, which is indirect greenhouse gas emissions through our value chain. We're identifying the main contributors to this by working on this to decarbonize various materials, decarbonize mobility and so forth, buildings, energy efficiency and so on and so forth. These actions took about 18 months. Today, we can now commit to these greenhouse gas emissions, which is called indirect under Scope 3 to cut them by 20% by 2030. This target for reduction is for the entirety of our value chain, which is both upstream, the materials we use, the purchasing, but also downstream, which is to say, energy efficiency of equipment we use, buildings we build and concessions to traffic. These are 2 commitments, and we wanted to call an international recognized international body, the initiative science-based targets. Science-based targets initiative did certify these 2 comments, the minus 40% of scopes 1 and 2 and the minus 20% additional reduction in indirect emissions in Scope 3. They are certified. This is in line with a trajectory, which is called well below 2 degrees. So we're very much in line with the Paris Agreements. We've got common milestones for all of our entities and that's our course. Of course, if we want to go faster or better, we will do so if feasible. In terms of rollout of these plans, they're rolled out to fuel level and all divisions are involved here. We're going to begin by listening -- just watching a video. [Presentation]

You saw all these projects, concrete actions that are an illustration of where we stand right now in terms of rollout. Let's talk about the commitments pretty much in order to talk about some of our priorities. First of all, it comes to cutting greenhouse gas emissions, particularly in the Scope 1 and 2, those that are within our actual scope of action. We cut this by around 8%, and '21 compared to the baseline year, which is 2018. We will get specific actions, as we just saw them to go, such as energy efficiency actions in our factories. Also electrification of our vehicle fleet, also tracking consumption of job site equipment with an eye to reduce their consumption, also using more renewables by setting up solar panels for our own energy consumption. As you can see on the screen, this is how we track our carbon trajectory to reduce our emissions by 2030. In 2021, we're ahead of schedule in terms of the overall reduction time line. This time line is to be seen in absolute terms. We're talking about actual Scopes 1 and 2 emissions restated for scope effects, if there are acquisitions or possible divestments. You see a slight increase in 2020 and 2021, which is mainly due to increased revenue and also due to the first efforts toward decarbonization. Now to talk to you about indirect emissions. We mentioned these earlier, that's Scope 3. We're moving forward systematically here. Here, we can see 1/3 of our Scope 3 emissions are upstream, and that's where we're making progress in terms of low carbon concrete, for instance. Concrete itself is around 3 million tonnes of CO2. So it's the biggest proportion, bigger proportion than Scope 1 and 2. 60% of downstream. This is traffic of concessions, installation of quick electric charging stations on the road, on the motorways to boost use of electric vehicles. Also, we're talking about modulating prices based on carbon usage in airport areas. Furthermore, their energy efficiency solutions we saw in energy equipment and also buildings. Some specific examples to talk to you about. These are group offerings and solutions. We talked about Exegy that's our low-carbon range. Here, we see Rehaskeen, which is a facade renovation using external facade installation, and this brings us right to the core of renovation requirements. We're also talking about optimizing things such as amount of time that aircraft taxi on the ground. So this has to do with working with the airport operators. There is also another offering where you've got both production of renewables, so using PV panels, local storage and then recharging stations to serve our clients' vehicles. That was our REVE. Furthermore, we're going to be optimizing resources by the circular economy. That's the second focus of work. Here, I won't go through the objectives in detail. You can see that on the left-hand side of the screen. Just a couple of key figures, though, I'd like to mention to you to show some of our specific actions. Currently, in production of aggregates, 15% of aggregate production comes from recycled materials. We can say that 50% of production sites have zero landfill waste. Now some examples, illustrations we saw motorway maintenance. This is about recycling, 50%, 70%, even 100% recycled route road. Also decarbonization because we can make around 50 -- cut the greenhouse gas emissions by around 50%. Now think of perpetual quarries, a quarry where you recycle and produce aggregates. And then also daily actions such as some aerosol spray cans that can be recharged, reused infinitely, these were in-house produced. And then we work with partners, initiatives like zero plastics wastage on rest stops. Next, to talk about natural media. We're talking about moving toward zero net loss biodiversity. We do this step by step pragmatically. Some of our actions have to do with no longer using phytosanitary products. So you have zero usage there, some reduction in usage of these at all of our concessions. Further, we're working on this as a partner. We've got research partnerships. We've also got partnerships with local associations to address biodiversity and local impact. We've also talked about the target zero sealing, zero net are the visualization of soil. This is a major step we're making in this direction. Examples, let me just give you a couple of examples. Water and we're using, for instance, air conditioning, humidity. We're doing this at the Salvador Bahia Airport. We're moving towards zero liquid release at that airport. We're also talking about reuse of industrial brownfield locations. This helps us move toward zero net artificialization because we use land that's already sealed brownfield and we do properties development there. So these are just some examples. To give you an update, of course, I had to mention something else. I had to talk to you about the mobilization of our employees. 2021 was a strong year at VINCI. We really got -- set things into motion. We said to the group environment is something that each and every one of us is responsible for. We can't wait until 2019 (sic) [ 2029 ] to act. We have to react right away. We supported employees. We organized trainings. We organized togetherness sessions, environment days in September each year. Furthermore, we did in-house contest, the environment prize throughout 2021 had an impact and helped us achieve several things. First of all, 2,500 applications that we received. 2,500 applications in this in-house contest, these are always very specific actions they were applying for, not just ideas, but specific actions. Over 25% of employees, 57,000 employees voted to select initiatives. There were local and regional votes. So we had strong mobilization of our teams. And then we can say we have 800 contact people whom we trained and they're going to support, too. So they can support the candidates locally with expertise and so forth. All in all, 200 winners in the regionals, 14 winners in the finals in this contest. This has really brought to fruition a real portfolio of concrete actions for the group that we just need to roll out so we can mitigate environmental impact and improve the economic viability. This is something that's well underway. We're moving forward. We're really specific on brass tacks here. The people are highly mobilized. We're seeing some of the initial tangible results, especially with your carbon trajectory. And we can say this is very much part and parcel of operational strategy in every division now. Thank you very much for your attention.

Thank you, Isabelle. I'd now like to turn to the governance session by suggesting that the Chairs of Committees summarize for us their work. As I indicated at the outset, the term of Mr. Yves Thibault de Silguy is coming to an end. He served the group since the year 2000. Firstly, as Board members, then as Chairman, then as Vice Chairman, Lead Director; and lastly, as Vice Chairman. And during the course of the 22 years, Yves has brought an outstanding contribution to the group, notably as part of our international expansion strategy. But above all, by putting in place and steering a very effective governance system. Please express your appreciation along with mine.

Ladies and gentlemen, dear shareholders, I'd like to present my report of last year as a member of the Board and Chair all the strategy and CSR Corporate Strategy. The universal registration document in its various pages, 122, 139 and 273, describe these activities. So I'll be brief and focus on some essential points. As Vice Chairman of the Board, it falls to me to provide my insight on business and the group. And given the knowledge of the group and experience, I establish contacts with the foreign personalities, trade associations and individual shareholders without forgetting my attendance at many forum and conferences which requires having regular contacts with all members of Exco. In spite of health conditions that made foreign travel more difficult these past 2 years, this mission in '21 represented some 41 business days of work. The Strategy and CSR Committee met 7 times. It is open in addition to the 7 permanent members that you see in photo on this slide, all Board members who so wish may attend its meetings, and experience has shown the interest of this setup because there's a high participation rate. It is a forum that is appreciated, useful for discussion, for assessing group development projects in CSR, all M&A projects, disposals of public partnership projects representing a commitment greater than EUR 50 million for the group has submitted for opinion. If it exceeds EUR 200 million, they are submitted to the Board for agreement. In '21, we reviewed projects you saw a number of them in the film earlier in the energy, hydrogen construction, airport concession sectors. And for CSR, particular focus was given to the health and safety program and to the vigilance and compliance programs. Since 2018, the commitments of Xavier Huillard's manifesto presented earlier, aiming at comprehensive performance environment, sharing the fruits of growth, gender equality, diversity, ethics, safety, professional pathways, civic commitment, human rights, all these commitments were examined since 2018 on 13 occasions by the committee that illustrates how much your Board is vigilant on all these issues to build a sustainable world. That's why CSR is part and parcel of the strategy. Lastly, in closing, because it's the last time that I have the pleasure and honor of reporting on my activities within the VINCI Board, I should like to thank all of you, our loyal shareholders, Xavier and all his colleagues, my Board colleagues, for your support, your commitment and your professionalism. Thank you for allowing me to live at your side this great success story. I've been a Board member since the year 2000. Back in 2000, the group numbered 120,000 people, EUR 17 billion in turnover, EUR 400 million net earnings. With Cobra, these figures are now 260,000 employees, EUR 54 billion in revenue, EUR 3 billion in earnings. It's a superb performance and adventure. And the shareholder can only be satisfied because had he invested EUR 1,000 in 2000 and assuming the reinvestment of the dividend, he's at the head of capital of some EUR 16,000. The performance has topped 13% per year. I don't know many CAC 40 companies delivering such a feat. I leave confident in the future the growth potential of VINCI's has never been so great. There's every reason to be optimistic and believe that thanks to its businesses, thanks to its proactiveness and assessing the challenges that our societies are facing, mobility, urbanization, the energy transition, the circular economy. Well, thanks to its geographical footprint, thanks above all to its amazing human wealth, it's a breeding ground for success. It will continue in the interest of all stakeholders. Thank you.

Thank you, Yves. Now I'd like to give the floor to Yannick Assouad, Lead Director and also Chairperson of the Nominations and Governance Committee. You have the floor.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, VINCI shareholders. Of course, the health crisis often made us meet remotely. We weren't able to talk as much about governance in the past couple of years as usually. So I'd like to make up for that. First of all, governance, we talked about how we're organized in the group on governance. In addition to our formal sessions, the Board of Directors also has a Vice Chairperson. We just mentioned this, as well as a lead director who is independent, that's me. And we have specialized, 4 specialized committees, and you'll hear reports from them in just a moment's time. One of the specialized committees is the Nominations and Governance Committee. The Board has 15 members, the number of women members is 54%. That's well beyond the required level, and the independence level is 67%. All these Board members have a great deal of confidence and expertise, which is perfectly suited to all the various issues in the VINCI divisions. As we saw in the video, these divisions are quite diverse in terms of business line, business area as well as geographical location. To talk to you more specifically about the Nominations and Governance Committee, you have 5 members. You can see their pictures here on the screen. In 2020 and 2021, we focused mainly on questions of succession. We'll talk about this in a moment's time, talk about the term in office of the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, among other. We didn't only talk of a succession of the German CEO, who we talked about succession plans for all the main top managers at VINCI. We also talked about changes in the composition of the Board of Directors. We'll talk about that in a moment as well. Talk now, though, about succession and specifically, the succession of the main manager of the group, Xavier Huillard. As you can see, his succession is not right on the immediate agenda. Your Board of Directors is proposing to renew Xavier's term of office as Director of VINCI Group. The Board will also appoint him Chairman at a Board that will take place after this shareholders' meeting, and we'll propose keeping him in his office as Chief Executive Officer. The reason we have opted for this format. Well, there are actually 2 reasons, it's twofold. First of all, you just heard the financial results from Christian Labeyrie. We haven't returned to financial performance, which is the same as the performance before the COVID crisis. As you know, contracting business, construction, VINCI Energy have performed beautifully. They've gone beyond their 2019 results. That is not yet the case in the concessions business. So for airport concessions, there's still going to be a period of time before they achieve their 2019 performance levels. There is a second reason, which is probably even more important. In our view, when we approved the acquisition of Cobra IS, we felt we couldn't propose a new senior management, change in senior management during this important period of integration of Cobra IS. Cobra IS is a new activity of the group. Geographies, Spain and Latin America, which are not new to this group, but they've got a much bigger footprint there than VINCI Group has had. Therefore, it's our view that only Xavier Huillard, as Chief Executive Officer, could properly carry out integration of Cobra IS. However, it's crystal clear that Xavier will reach the age limit of our bylaws during this term in office. The Board is fully aware of the fact that the when he reaches the age limit as Chief Executive, he will hand over to a successor. This will take place during this upcoming term of office of his. Furthermore, as I said, the Nominations and Governance Committee looked into succession plans. It's too early to talk about any specifics. But I can say, rest assured, we've got a pool of top managers for VINCI Group, a very significantly sized pool of top managers. Precisely because of the way the group is managed, people have their careers, whereby they manage ever bigger business units as they move forward in their career. It's a learning process for them. And that means that we've got many highly mature, highly experienced top managers. So a big pool of top managers as opposed to what you might sometimes see in some other major corporations. We've scanned through the whole pool. We know there will be potential people to replace the current CEO and also people to replace all members of the Group's Executive Committee. Now the Board of Directors, Xavier said this, there are several renewals we would like to propose for your vote this year. First of all, to renew the term in office of the Chief Executive Officer as a moment -- I mentioned a moment ago, plus further terms and office. Ms. Marie-Christine Lombard, current Chairperson of the Compensation Committee, the term of Rene Medori, who is Chairperson of the Audit Committee; and the term in office of the company, Qatar Holding, which -- whose term in office is also to be renewed this year. We also said the term in office of Mr. Yves-Thibault de Silguy is not up for renewal. Mr. Claude Laruelle, we propose to you as his replacement. Mr. Claude Laruelle is Deputy CEO of Veolia, in charge of Finance, and let's watch his video right now.

As a young engineer I started my career at the Transport Ministry at Seine-Saint-Denis. At that time, government has decided to build Stade de France stadium. I delivered iconic things such as covering of the Northern motorway plus one of major [Foreign Language]. I worked as a subsidiary, well-known in Vinci [Foreign Language]. In 2000, I became part of the Veolia Group. I learned about water processing and water selling in France and in the U.S., where I turned around our construction businesses. Then in Hong Kong -- in Hong Kong I worked a great deal in Mainland China to help our concessions there. I went back to the head office of the group in 2013 when the group was in throes of transformation. I worked with François Bertrea and then I took charge of our construction activities, toxic waste and water technology. I became CFO in 2018, among other things, I was involved in all the major financial deals that happened with merger with Suez. As I see it, a director is, first and foremost, a resource for the company, particularly when major decisions are to be made, high-impact decisions. A director represents the shareholder of course, and director must take into account all stakeholders. My view is that a director needs to play his or her role in every respect and together with the board needs to define the company's strategy as I see it is probably the most important role of his, and he also has a controlling function, supervision. For the Vinci group, I can bring to them my international experience in Asia and North America. Furthermore, I can contribute my knowledge of long-term businesses in range of between 20 years to 50 years. Also my knowledge of short term business lines, such as constructions and major projects, which I have led within Veolia. I will be contributing all my experience that I got during Suez transaction from liquid point of view, financial point of view and also strategic point of view. We worked a great deal within Veolia on all comprehensive performance. I take into account all stakeholders, particularly when it comes to our annual performance and our long-term performance by defining performance indicators that are right ones, the relevant ones. All of this I am helping to contribute to Vinci group.

Lastly, the terms of office of the 2 board members representing employees on the Board of Directors are coming up for renewal. The term in office of Uwe Chlebos and Miloud Hakimi are up for renewal. The company used the procedures that are required for their replacement. They do not need to be elected by the shareholders. The 2 new directors representing employees will be Mr. Roberto Migliardi and Mr. Alain Said. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you, Yannick. I'll ask Rene Medori, Chair of the Audit Committee, to come up on stage.

Ladies and gentlemen, dear shareholders, the Audit Committee of VINCI's Board is comprised of 4 Board members, 3 independents. It met on 5 occasions in 2021 with an attendance rate of 100%. Your CFO, Christian Labeyrie, and his main colleagues as well as the statutory auditors took an active part in all these meetings. The committee also auditioned the Legal Officer, Development Officer, Head of Ethics and Vigilance, the Head of Insurance, also the main executives in charge of group businesses. During the course of 2021, the Audit committee organized its work according to the four focus areas defined by the order of the December 8, 2008, taken up in the AMF recommendations. The first focus area concerns following the process to draw up financial information. Secondly, to track the effectiveness of the risk management system and the review of in-play litigation and the anticorruption scheme. Third focus area on following the efficiency of internal control systems and final area concerns monitoring the legal control of the statutory accounts and consolidated accounts by the statutory auditors. Thank you.

Thank you, Rene. Last but not least, I'll ask Marie-Christine Lombard, as Chair of the Remuneration Committee to come up on stage, please.

Ladies and gentlemen, dear shareholders, good morning. I am pleased to present to you for the first time the work of the VINCI Remuneration Committee that I've been sharing since the 17 April 2019 since AGMs were not able to be held physically in '20 and '21. The committee has made up of 4 Board members, including 1 director representing employees. It met 3 times in 2021 with an attendance rate of 100%. As you know, the task of our committee is to prepare the decisions of your Board concerning first point on the remuneration of company executive officers on the share ownership systems for employees, the employee share ownership and share allocation plan and on remuneration plan for Board members. I'll start with this latter point. I'll start with the 11th resolution that concerns the remuneration policy. The members of the Board, this compensation is within a ceiling of EUR 1.6 million set by the General Meeting of 17th of April 2019. As you can see on the slide, the remuneration of Board members, VINCI comprises a fixed portion in blue linked to the fact that they are Board members and their role of chair or members in the various Board committees, a variable component in red that's linked to their participation at Board and committee meetings. The top of the chart represents the ceiling of what might be paid if the individual were to take part in all meetings scheduled and bodies of which you remember, that is to say 8 board meetings and 5 to 8 meetings of each committee. That's for Board members. Twelfth resolution concerns remuneration policy applied to executive officers, in this case, the Chairman and Chief Executive, Mr. Xavier Huillard. Every year, this is the subject of an ex ante vote body AGM. On this occasion, the Board can adjust the components for calculating this remuneration for the future in order to better reflect the challenges of your group. The policy that we're submitting to your vote this year is not very different to that, which you approved in 2021. In its cap structure on the left, it comprises a fixed portion in blue, a short-term variable portion based on the company's performance full year and a long-term portion in yellow. However, what we propose comprises a few adjustment. The fixed portion would be of an amount of EUR 1,300,000 as against EUR 1,200,000 in the previous policy set in 2018. The amount of the short-term variable portion cannot exceed 160% of the fixed portion that's EUR 2,080,000. It depends, of course, on the attainment of 5 indicators, financial managerial and CSR, the variable long-term portion is a conditional allocation of VINCI shares over 3 years, subject to conditions of presence and performance concern, of course, economic, financial and CSR based and assessed over the 3 years. The level determines the number of shares that will be awarded at the end of the day in the event of termination of the term of CEO before the mature at the end of the plan. The number of shares is reduced proportionately as to the practical application of this policy in respect of in 2021. It is also the subject of an ex-post vote by the AGM. For 2021, Mr. Huillard’s remuneration comprised as follows: fixed portion, EUR 1,200,000; short-term variable portion, EUR 1,862,400 as against EUR 928,038 for 2020, and we recall that it was penalized by the health crisis. In '21 as we saw in the previous presentations, notably that of Christian Labeyrie, the economic performance was indeed excellent. The net earnings per share has increased 105%. Current operating income is up 77.8%. Free cash flow rose by 120.2%. The nonfinancial performance was also good as we saw in the presentations. Your Board took into account the way in which management defines and ensures that the group's environmental ambition is genuinely and actually rolled out within the group. The presentation's testified to that the inclusion of all employees, including international employees in the employee share ownership program and continued international expansion of the group in spite of the health crisis. Long-term variable portion. It's a conditional allocation. The 8th of April 2021 of 30,900 VINCI shares, representing a fair value of EUR 2,429,976. This allocation is, of course, accompanied by performance conditions, reflecting the challenges that the group is facing. 50% of the allocation is subject to creation of value for the shareholder, 2.5% linked to the share price performance better than that of a comparable set of companies, 2.5% to containing reasonable debt and 25% subject to environmental or social targets such as safety at work and managerial feminization. In order to be complete, let me state that the remuneration in 2021 of your Chairman and Chief Executive comprises the making-available of a company car. As you know, VINCI attaches prime importance to employee share ownership. For 20 years now, the group has been offering its employees in France and the 41 countries in which it's present, the possibility of becoming a company shareholders. These employees benefit in this respect of a top-up by the company, maximum EUR 3,500, as well as a favorable tax treatment as long as they accept that their assets be frozen for 5 years. The result of this policy is that employees today own 9.9% of the share capital as at December 31, 2021 through common investment funds. And there are many who are shareholders, over 60,000 people, employees and former employees, and of course, they're very motivated in the group's performance. The participation rate of employees remains quite stable, just under 10% because if every year, there are many employees who subscribe, many also sell shares, in particular, those who retire. That's why we are asking you to approve the 16th and 17th resolution that allow an issuance of shares with a discount of 5% maximum within a limit of 1.5% of the capital in order to undertake capital increases reserved for those employees. Lastly, the committee examines the introduction of long-term incentive plans through which the group allocates to certain categories of employees. 3,419 senior executives and employees in '21. Share of the company based on conditions of presence and performance, and that performance must be assessed over a 3-year period. Such a plan was put in place on the 8th of April last year covering 2,458,780 existing shares. These shares will be delivered to the awardees on the 8th of April 2024, if they meet the performance requirements. The number of shares will be based on economic stock market and CSR performance criteria. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you Marie-Christine. Let me give the floor to statutory auditors who are going to summarize for you the various reports. You can find their full reports in the information document and the annual report. And we'll be hearing from Mr. Belhiba.

Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, a good day on behalf of the group of statutory auditors, PwC and Deloitte that I would like to now report to you on our assignments. In summary, we prepared 12 reports, including our 2 reports on the consolidated annual financial statements of your company. The report on the regulated third-party agreements, full reports which are additional reports using -- with use of delegations previously granted in your AGM. Full reports authorizations to be given to the Board of Directors to carry out capital transactions on the 2 reports on selecting information, vital information from your company, another one on consolidated information on nonfinancial performance. As per the custom of this AGM, I would just like to summarize the contents of the report. First of all, our 2 reports on the annual financial statements. Our report is designed to give us assurance that there's no material mistake in the financial statements. To that end, we have assignments in France and abroad in the main group entities. Our approach is tailored to VINCI's organization, its business activities and risk evaluation. 2021 the context was the global pandemic due to COVID-19 and we took that into account. We presented detailed conclusions of our work to the Audit Committee on February 2, 2022, and the summary was given to the Board of Directors meeting on February 3, 2022. Having to do with consolidated financial statements, we paid special attention to impairment testing of group assets and recoverable value of these assets. Also booking of construction contracts, provisions for contingencies and risk litigation, as well as acquisition of energy activities from ACS Group. Pertaining to annual financial statements now, our main points were to evaluate the stakeholdings. By way of conclusion, we confirm we examined the ways and means used by management to evaluate all of these elements. We certify the consolidated interest savings in the annual financial statements are fair and sincere, giving a fair representation of the results and the financial situation and the assets of VINCI as of 31 December, 2021. This brings me to a report on regulated party agreements. We inform you -- we were told of no such agreement during this or previous financial period. This brings me to the resolutions for the extraordinary AGM. We have 3 reports here. And the main points are highlighted on this slide. Has to do with authorization to reduce company capital by canceling treasury stock, authorization to issue ordinary securities or shares, getting access to share capital reserved for employees of VINCI Group companies for employee savings plan and price increases to make it possible for certain foreign subsidiary employees to have similar benefits to those given to others in the savings plan. All of these resolutions in our 3 related reports. We have no observations we would need to make. Lastly having to do with corporate, social, societal and environmental responsibility of your company. We have -- first of all, we have a report from an independent third party. And we can confirm that we did not see any significant mistake which would, in any way, jeopardize the fact that the now financial performance of VINCI as reported is compliant in all respects with applicable regulations. Information as a whole is presented in a fair fashion as per VINCI standards. On VINCI's request, we did a second report by the statutory auditors to give reasonable assurance, having to do with some of the indicators, which are used by VINCI in the area of social environmental considerations, having to [ report ] job accidents, energy consumption, direct greenhouse gas emission Scopes 1 and 2 and emissions from clients on motorways. Based on this work and information, we feel in all significant aspects this is compliant with VINCI standards. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your attention.

Thank you, Mr. Baloche and Mr. Belhiba, our statutory auditors. This brings us to the question and answer stage. First of all, let's talk about our written questions.

We did receive questions in writing. Two questions in writing. Each of them have several sub-questions. This came from 2 shareholders. The Board of Directors met before this AGM and approved the answers given to these questions, and you can read the answer to these questions in writing, read the questions as well as the Board's answers to those questions on the company's website. Now this is the most important part of the session. The Q&A session. Your questions from the room, we're available to you to answer your questions you would like to ask us. This is our custom, you raise your hand, tell one of our hostesses here are with holding panels. And then I will try not to frustrate anybody, but I'll decide who gets to ask the next question. Let me just say to you after the AGM, you'll have an opportunity to have discussions with our shareholders relations team. They're just outside this room in the lobby, you'll be able to get information from them about various events arranged by the shareholders' club. The team will also answer any questions you might have on news items. Furthermore, I'd like to say that you should also have discussions with VINCI Ambassadors Network. We started an initiative several years ago that aims to really bring our shareholders even closer to a full understanding of our company's projects. Okay. So I don't see anyone raising their hand. I'm going to take a question, #7.

International development of this group is a major strategy, but it's also a risk because we can see with the current geopolitical instability. Just to read out 2 questions I would have, firstly, how do you select the countries where you'd like to do business and develop that business? Second question -- sorry, that's all, just the one.

That is a very important question, very topical, Unfortunately, sometimes in a very abrupt fashion, we see both sections of the global world can shift over into a situation where we could no longer conduct our business. Therefore, we have to be very cautious. I think to summarize, I would say this: we first of all, go into a new country in a small-scale way gradually. We feel that to really do a good job in a new geography, we need to learn to fully understand that geography. We need to understand their habits, use those subsequent habits. We need to understand the vendors' networks, the subcontractors and so forth. What we often do is we begin by going there, small scale, into a new geography, we will transcend our high technology, at value business areas. It helps get an understanding of that country and possibly roll out more business to that country, something broader subsequently, maybe all of our business lines. Now as to the priority geographies, it's important to add a point on this. Our current focus is on Europe. We still have a great deal of potential, much to be done in Europe. Our business -- various business lines where we're strong in all business lines in France, but not all of our business lines are equally strong in all European countries. So there's still a lot of potential in Europe. Next, we have a special focus on the 2 Americas, North and South, proven by the acquisitions we've done in recent years. For instance, our acquisition in road-building in North America 3 or 4 years back, and then the recent acquisition of Cobra IS. But beyond the intrinsic plus points of that company, that gives us a broader footprint in the Americas. So small scale to begin with, gradually slower but surely with a long term in mind. But for the time being, highly focused on Europe and the 2 Americas. Now let's go to the other side of the room. Question #8?

I have a question, something in the news now, news that's important to all of us here. It's not just a French problem, it's a European issue: the return of inflation. Inflation, everyone problematic, less and less controlled. My question, at VINCI, will inflation be a problem in upcoming years in terms of business generally and then profits?

You're right. This is a subject that's very much in the news. Here is what we have to keep a watchful eye on things, be very stringent and very agile. Now we have to temper what you said by the fact that a lot of our businesses are short term, for instance, pick VINCI Energies or also road activities. And my point here is that -- here deal will begin to wrap up within a few months' time. So it's fairly easy-ish to include in subsequent deals, the right prices, where you're talking about concrete, electric cables, steel or what-have-you, so that we won't feel negative effects of inflation, the skyrocket inflation in some commodities. So that's pretty much settled for short-term business activities. The problem is also settled in a lot of our concessions activities because we've got prices, tariffs in airports and also in motorways that, more times than not, a directly indexed on inflation, inflation is a record you're alluding to. Now the area where there might be a difficulty is more long on more longer-term projects. Sometimes there are price revision clauses that are fine-tuned enough to actually replicate increased prices, we must pay subcontractors and for raw materials. We're very careful about this. A decision made recently, for instance, was to no longer accept to sign contracts over the medium term, several years, if the contracts don't contain price revision clauses. This had been the case in a lot of our business lines previously, but now we're being very strict on this and systematically requiring this. So it doesn't mean that it will be completely unscathed after the period of inflation. But we're trying to control this, contain it, and make sure this does not have a significant impact on our income statement in upcoming years. Now the second thought I might have, I believe if we're talking about availability of equipment supplies. Wisdom would dictate we need to diversify sources of supply. It's always very risky to have one single source of supply. So wisdom says you need to have many sources of supply so that you can make use of them as need be if there are any problems with long-standing sources of supply. Thank you. Next question. I think you have a question for us.

Yes. Sorry, I'm not a good public speaker. Just a short statement. Thank you for the films. They were really very good and it encouraged us to invest into VINCI the group Mr. Chairman, but you, as Mr. Xavier Huillard, Board members, Mr. Patrick Richard, you received an e-mail recently I'm just a small shareholder of this big group with a great many subsidiaries. And I'd like to thank Mr. Huillard for the response given to a mail and to follow-up action. Defending the group and its image is important to guarantee the future that you described very well in your presentation. I welcome the group's results without voting on the resolution for the distribution of the dividend this year. I don't wish to offend you, but an ancillary situation asks me to solicit you to explain this reason and discuss it with your Board. This audition would allow VINCI to be fully this builder of cathedrals and to better satisfy all its shareholders, small or large, its public image and its future clients.

Thank you. So I didn't quite understand your point, but what I suggest is that after this meeting, that you should speak to Patrick Richard, so as to have the follow-up on that. Let's now move to the other side of the room, microphone #3.

Mr. Huillard, could you please set out the VINCI plans as regards to hydrogen, please?

Well, I really would be pleased to do that. As you know, VINCI is a pretty technical group with obviously, a great many engineers and technicians as soon as there's a new subject to address it with a lot of enthusiasm. It's the case for hydrogen, hydrogen has a great future as part of the energy transition and the environmental transition that has been mentioned at length since the start of this. We've done 4 things so far not in any particular order, but we've invested at the side of prestigious people such Schlumberger, CEA, FIKA, the cement maker but also in Carole Delga's region, a company called Genvia. That has its ambition to develop a new type of extralizer which is a high-temperature electrolyzer, which offers 2 advantages. The first is to allow higher energy output in current electrolyzers and to operate in both directions. In one, you put water and electricity, and the other, you recover oxygen and hydrogen, but it works in the other direction. You inject hydrogen and you recover water vapor and electricity. So it's both an electrolyzer and a fuel cell. The idea is to develop its state of development. Gigafactory capable of producing every year, many stacks that have the high temperature electrolyzes so as to boost green hydrogen production. Secondly, we've mounted a hydrogen business unit, thanks to the skills in oil and gas, a business unit that might propose to our clients all the information that you need to put about electrolyzers, compressors, systems so as to have systems that use or distribute hydrogen that are efficient. Third initiative by VINCI Concessions, we were in the driving seat with some colleagues in setting up the largest green hydrogen global fund, which, down the road, will have investment power of some EUR 15 billion. That's going to invest minority tickets in production and distribution at green hydrogen for industry or for heavy mobility because we're convinced that heavy trucks will be propelled in part by green hydrogen technology. And as was mentioned at the new frontier of aviation is probably the use of liquid green hydrogen and we're preparing for that. It's my fourth point. We're seeking to develop on our concessions, be it highways or airports, the first initiatives to pave the way for the advent of hydrogen as an energy powering mobility, highways. Of course, the hydrogen gaseous green plant near Toulouse Airport, a 3-phase plant that in the years 2030, 2035 produce locally liquid green hydrogen, which will be injected into aircraft, which should begin to be hydrogen-powered. So it's an absolutely extraordinary opportunity that fascinates many of our employees are well versed in the matter because we've done a lot of outreach through our structure for foresight called Leonard. Sorry, it was a bit of a long answer, but it's really one of my pet subjects. Next question?

Mr. Chairman, it will have escaped no one's attention that we're in the midst of a presidential campaign. One of the candidates in the runoff vote has, in the program, a plan to nationalize the auto routes, the highways. VINCI Autoroutes makes a very significant contribution to the group's operating profit. I'd like to have your thoughts on the risk that might represent such a plan for the group's strategy and even on its financial soundness going forward.

Well, it's not appropriate to make comments on the presidential campaign that's currently underway. But I'd just like to say that we've already experienced a similar episode a few years ago as you'll recall, and back then we clearly demonstrated our ability to effectively and professionally and loyally deliver outside of the contract. We accelerated down that route. That is to say we have modernized, we were really strong in making proposals for our French autoroute networks in many areas through all the initiatives shown earlier in the films or in what Pierre Coppey was saying. For example, we conducted a survey recently in conjunction with think tank, Altermind aimed at showing that there's a huge collective effort required if we want to have a chance that our country can deliver on its COP21 commitments because as was rightly said, the company won't be able to comply with the 2050 carbon-neutral deadline if we don't hurry up and decarbonize mobility, especially road mobility and specifically motorway mobility. As we speak, we are putting up these subjects for public debate, floating ideas, be it car sharing intermodality, putting in place public transformation -- transportation and dedicated bus lanes by rolling out e-charging stations such as the owners of e-vehicles can use their e-vehicles, including over long distances without running the risk of being blocked by the unavailability of recharge stations. So all this to say that we've always managed our side of the bargain with a great deal of loyalty, professionalism. As witnessed during the pandemic, we ceaselessly assumed our role as a public-private partner facilities manager for these auto routes and we're even more needed to decarbonize mobility. I cannot imagine that these new realities will not take this into account the state is a granter. We're just a concession of the state grantor knows that it needs us and our peers from the other motorway networks in order to accelerate the decarbonization of these infrastructure. And lastly, final point, it's widely accepted is that these motorway concessions have a lifetime, the initials will come to their end of their lives cycle beginning in 2032. Is it useful to have a big national debate in anticipating this period, which is soon at a time when there are gigantic efforts to be undertaken in order to help to decarbonize this activity. Thank you. There's a panel over there, but I can't -- number 6, next question.

Mr. Huillard, I represent the investment publication and its readers who've entrusted us with 215 proxies to vote. I just like to say well done, bravo for all these efforts on the environmental front that endorsed by science-based targets, reduction of greenhouse gases, you've given many practical examples that show your efforts in this field. Could you say a bit more about the impact in terms of investment? And the cost of these emissions reductions linked to these efforts?

Yes, of course. Without paraphrasing anyone in particular, I would say that it's whatever it costs. Why? Because as was mentioned by Isabelle earlier, when we drew up our environmental road map in parallel, we calculated what it would cost us in terms of investment, the various progress to be achieved between now and 2030 and what it would bring in over the same period. We did the long-term calculations between 2020, 2030, what it costs to move to an e-fleet of vehicles, how much it costs to improve the energy efficiency, and above all the type of energy that we use in our plants manufacturing asphalt et cetera. Each time we did the costing we wanted to check whether overall it cost us or whether benefited us. And the good news is that, of course, certain initiatives in spite of the fact that it's a long time frame, certain initiatives, we don't get the payback even over a 10-year period. But there are great many initiatives that have investment payback times that are very short. All in all, we realized that an actual fact this environmental transition doesn't cost. It benefits. Once we acquired that belief on concrete cases, part of this study for our ambition by 2030. Of course, we would have been ridiculous to limit our investments because we are firmly of the view that these investments have an investment payback, an IRR, an internal return on it that's positive. It needs to be driven home. You know that even if it's less the case today that gradually, progressively they're emerged in idea such the only way to solve the state of the planet was to build down. We're saying the opposite, the only way of solving the planet's problem is to continue to grow but not in a way organized growth up till now. And in doing so, not only does it not happen to the detriment of economic growth, the ability for companies and governments to generate economic value-added, but what's more, it creates economic and financial value. And if I'm emphasizing this, it's our belief at VINCI, you'll have seen that we've been very committed for a very long time on social and societal issues is that if collectively that we were minded to build down for the planet's sake, it would have very rapid consequences on the social and societal fronts that through their knock-on effect would prevent us from delivering the environmental transition, the economic, social and the environment are 3 components that help one another. We're in a virtuous spiral. The more you work for the planet, the more you develop the economic activity then the more you can afford to do good things on the social and societal. Those 3 components going hand in hand, and it's a concept of global comprehensive performance that I tried to summarize earlier. Number 4 now.

I'm an individual shareholder. First about congratulations, and thank you for the financial performance and nonfinancial performance. I have a question mainly for your CFO. I saw your chart properly, I see your debt level is going down significantly. I believe the figure was quite significant. You're preferring liquidity cash on hand, and you're right, cash flow -- and using floating rate debt. Now you know very well, interest rates may well go up. We don't know how fast. Could you tell us broadly what will the impact be if rates go up? How have you protected the company to prevent a negative impact if interest rates were to spike?

What we're seeing right now isn't a spiking in short interest rates. I was referring to 3- to 6-month rates. The rates went up 1 to 2 years, and then it flattens out up to 10 years. We prefer liquidity receives cash on hand. The cash we are investing at 0 or negative interest rates. It was very costly in 2020, 2021, cost us less in '22. We spent EUR 5 billion, as I said earlier end of the year. So 2022, we think risk may go down. As I tried to explain to you our debt is fully only floating rate -- some of the debt is floating rate, but most of it's fixed rate debt. So our exposure is fairly limited and controlled exposure. As we said, it's backed by our cash flow, which, to some degree, is indexed on inflation and the interest rates, there's a natural balance between the 2, which means all in all, we're in a pretty good situation. The longer run, 10, 15 -- for 10, 15 years, we've been practicing this policy, and we can modulate it to shift it as need be. And we're doing better than others who set their rates years back. We set a portion of our interest rates fixed, but not all interest rates are fixed. We believe they are not going -- years rates are going to trend downward. So it wouldn't be right for us to get too much fixed rate debt. Cash will be costing and we'd be investing it at a lower rate. The outcomes that you saw earlier, I think of 2022 and 2023, certainly in '22 based on our current interest rate forecast, we think the trend is still downward in terms of our cost to debt. Even though some of our debt is dollar and pounds sterling denominated, indeed those currencies, interest rates are much higher than your own interest rate.

Which is why it's great to have a CFO because I would have been fairly uncomfortable answering that question. Another question, please? Further questions. If I'm not mistaken, no one's asking -- yes, okay. Question number 3, now.

Mr. Chairman, regarding the economic environment is inflation is also energy prices, petrol prices, taxes on petrol, does all that have an impact on the motorway concessions business? Second question, again on energy. Electricity prices are going up significantly. Big investments are being made in changing energy systems for geopolitical reasons and also for the purposes of energy transition. Question, the acquisition of Cobra, does this mean we're moving into the energy field?

Let me start with the last part of your statement, yes, certainly. One of the reasons for acquiring Cobra I asked is their demonstrated ability for 20 years now to develop renewable energy assets, onshore and offshore wind and so forth indeed is to begin activity of development, build and operation of renewable energy activities, a focus on the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America. A figure here to be cautious in increasing supply prices make it difficult to some of the calculations, but our view is good reasons we'd be able to produce per annum approximately 1 additional gigawatt was meaningful. I talk in terms of peak gigawatts related to energy. So renewable energy, green electricity, an extra gigawatt per year, once we've demonstrated our ability to reach those levels, we'll ramp things up so we'll be able to produce even more. Interesting, since we've moved into this new area of energy production, these are in the videos and some of the talks today. Several of our businesses has moved more and more into renewables. This is the case for airports and motorways. Motorways, we realized we had a great deal of land available that wasn't directly needed for motorway purposes that we could use to set up renewable assets to produce energy for own consumption and also conceivably to produce green hydrogen that could then be beneficial to our motorway clients. Same point for airports. In an airport, the surface area used for airport landings, taxiing and parking. It's really small compared to the overall land area. For security reasons, there mustn't be any obstacle to aircraft landings and takeoffs. So there's a space if you get the permits that can then be used for things such as photovoltaic panels, first of all for our own consumption. Secondly, to produce green hydrogen, which could then be used to fuel future aircraft that use liquid green hydrogen. VINCI Energies like Cobra have many activities -- works activities where we're renewables construction. You also talked about prices and question, if petrol price increases could have a knock-on effect to our motorway traffic. I think that's what you were driving at. The answer is yes, it's possible. But if we think it through, we realize firstly, heavy vehicle traffic or trucks don't drive because of fuel prices. They drive somewhere if they need to transport product from point A to point B. There may be an impact by significant increases of petrol prices in light vehicle traffic. We've seen this when there's an abrupt increase in petrol prices, the initial reaction of our customers is to cut their driving. They don't want to be spending too much on petrol. But then they get used to the increased prices because people need to drive. This is part of how people are. So, initially possibly, we're not seeing this today yet, but possibly if things continue like this, there may be an impact on light vehicle traffic in our motorways. But our firm belief is subsequently after a few months' time, traffic would end up bouncing back to usual levels because people necessarily need to travel and be mobile. As to energy prices, particularly electricity, that's what we were talking about earlier, on our ability to pass on these price increases to our clients, either by short contracts or using -- having price revision clauses in our longer-term contracts. This brings us to the end of the Q&A period. I'd like to thank you very much for taking part in this and for asking your questions. I'm very pleased to observe that there's no one who's frustrated. We've been able to field every single question people wanted to ask.

We will now move to the vote. You will have received a voting tablet. Simple to use, even if you don't see anything for the time being. When the vote begins, your tablet will be switched on automatically. For the time being, it's not the case. I hope it will happen. And once it is on, you will see that you have 3 buttons. A green button for a vote For; orange, Abstention; and a red vote, Against. Green, amber, red. I will declare the vote open for each resolution and you will make your choice abstention, for or against. But don't forget to validate to confirm your decision by pressing the corresponding button and you'll be able to do it until I say that there's no more voting and we'll have the result of the vote on that resolution almost immediately. I hope I was clear. I'll ask Patrick Richard to kindly run through the list of resolutions. We'll do it slowly to begin with. So as to allow you to get used to this new tablet that is presented as more efficient, but we'll try and see and manage.

First resolution approval of the consolidated financial statements for 2021. Net profit group share of EUR 2.597 billion. If your tablet is not on, you can press the button that is just here allows you to switch it on. For those of you who have not switched on their tablet. Vote is open. [Voting]

Vote closed. Resolution is passed.

Patrick, second resolution not yet up on the screen.

Approval of the parent company financial statements for 2021 net profit of EUR 2.580 billion. Please vote now. [Voting]

No more voting. The resolution is passed. Third resolution set the dividend, EUR 2.90 per share. An interim dividend of EUR 0.65 paid out next -- last December, the balance EUR 2.25 per share. Coupon will occur in April of this year, and the balance on the 28th of April. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed. Fourth resolution, renewal of the term of office as Director, Mr. Xavier Huillard for a period of 4 years. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is adopted. Thank you for your confidence.

Fifth resolution, renewal of the term of office as Director of Marie-Christine Lombard for a period of 4 years. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. The resolution is passed with a -- well done. Well done, Marie-Christine

Sixth resolution, the renewal of the term of office as Director of Rene Medori for a 4-year period. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Very fine score for Rene. Well done.

Seventh resolution, renewal of the term of office of Qatar Holding LLC as Director for a period of 4 years. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed. We're pleased to be able to continue to rely on this important partner, both operationally and as a shareholder.

Eighth Resolution, appointment of Claude Laruelle as Director for a 4-year period. Please vote now. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed. Well done, Claude.

Ninth resolution, ratification of the decision taken by the Board to transfer the head office of VINCI from Rueil-Malmaison to Nanterre, the l'archipel Rueil-Malmaison. Please vote now. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed.

10th resolution, authorizing your Board to trade in 10% of the company's shares set out in the text. The share price not exceeding EUR 140, maximum yield set at amount at EUR 4 billion valid for 18 months. Please vote now. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed.

11th resolution, approval of the remuneration policy for members of the Board of Directors presented Pages 142 of the registration document. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed.

12th Resolution, approval of the remuneration policy for executive company offices, particular that applicable to Xavier Huillard, Chairman and Chief Executive presented on Page 143 of the universal document. Please vote now. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed. 13th resolution, approval of the remuneration policy for Board members presented on Page 447 of the universal registration document. Please vote. [Voting]

Vote closed. Resolution is passed.

14th resolution. Approval of the fixed variable exceptional items of total remuneration and benefits of any kind paid in 2021 or granted in respect of the same year to Mr. Xavier Huillard, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, on Pages 150 of the universal registration document that you're asked to approve. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed. Turning now to resolutions requiring the approval of an extraordinary shareholders meeting. 15th resolution, renewal of the authorization granted to the Board in view of the reduction of the share capital through cancellation of VINCI shares in treasury, the capital within the limit of 10%, 26 months. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed.

16th resolution, delegation of authority to the Board to carry out share capital increases reserved for employees of the company and its subsidiaries within our limit of 1.5% of the capital with a discount not exceeding 5%. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed.

17th resolution, delegation to the Board to make capital increases for a category of beneficiaries for certain foreign subsidiaries with a limit of 1.5% of the share capital. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed.

Lastly, 18th resolution concerns powers for formalities following this meeting. Please vote. [Voting]

No more voting. Resolution is passed. Ladies and gentlemen, there being no further business, we can now adjourn this meeting. I'd just like to once again say how pleased we are to have met up with you again also to -- thank you for your attention, your participation, the quality of the discussions that we had earlier and by expressing the sincere wish that we will see you all again next year. And that if you are interested, we are quite prepared to organize guided tours of our new head office at Nanterre which we're particularly proud. Thank you all very much. Stay safe. [Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]