Global Dominion Access SA

MAD:DOM

Earnings Call Transcript 2023-Q1

[Operator]

Good afternoon, and welcome to the disclosures of Dominion. Before starting, we would like to remind you that once the presentation has finished, as usual, we will move on to the Q&A session. [Operator Instructions]

And we're now going to start with the presentation. Patricia Berjon, the Director for Corporate Development, speaking.

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

Good afternoon, everybody, and many thanks for attending this conference call with the results of Q1. And as you know, yesterday, we held our AGM where apart from approving the payment of EUR 50 million for the dividend, our Chairman, Anton Pradera, presented the main lines of action of the new strategic plan for '23 to 2026. And we will give you the details. We were supposed to do so this morning, but I'm afraid that due to unexpected circumstances, we've had to postpone this event, and we will present our strategic plan as soon as we possibly can.

But today, we are going to share the results of Q1. And as they are the first of this year, they come under a new reporting system that is associated with the new plan and that I will explain very briefly whilst I analyze the results. So let's start off with the financial statements -- with the global financial statement where the figures that we published show that the quarter has been very good. We have not been maintaining the good results presented at the end of the year, but we've also had growth in the operating margins about 20% and a 9% increase in the net comparable result. So this shows that our management actions have been very good because we've been capable of making the margins grow even though we've had a cost inflation in context.

In order to correctly interpret the financial statement that we're presenting, I would like to mention several elements that have to be taken into consideration. We no longer talk about the adjusted sales figure, we talk about the total business figure. And we've taken this decision because, as you know, the sale of handsets, which was the adjustment we made, has lost weight, and it no longer affects our ratios as it did in the past.

So therefore, it doesn't make any sense to continue with that adjustment and we're using accounting metrics. And this adjustment represents something like EUR 20 million to EUR 25 million per quarter, which, as regards adequate interpreting expenses is left outside organic growth. And we are also isolating the integration of the sales and margins that are produced by energy parks -- or energy farms and the integration of [ ZH Ingenieros ] in Colombia.

And finally, we also have separated the sales related to the agreement with Repsol for the commercialization of energy. So these 2 inorganic events that make a positive and negative contribution, which had the effect of ForEx in Q1. This 7% increase in the business figure has brought about solid organic growth of 6%. So once again, above the growth objective, and this is also reaching out to all of the business segments, and we'll see this later on.

As regards to margins, well, you can see that we're talking about historically high growth with a growth of 25% in EBITDA, 27% in EBIT, comparably speaking, with the first quarter of '22 and profitability has increased in all segments, especially in projects, and we've also strengthened our operational leverage.

And now looking at the last line, the net results, you can see that the EUR 12 million, well, this is a record figure for the first quarter. And that although there's been a significant increase in the financial expenses that we already saw at the end of the year, well, this logically being -- it has been affected by increase in interest rates, but this net result is 9% higher than the result reported in Q1 of 2022. So we're talking about 9% of growth in terms of comparable growth. So last year, we had nearly EUR 2 million in results that could be attributed to minority shareholders that is no longer present.

But now -- let's move on now to the behavior of each one of the segments. And to do so, I would like to explain the changes in this reporting, the changes that I mentioned at the beginning that I related to the new strategic approach. And this is a new strategic plan from 2023 to 2026. We set an objective, and we wanted to explain things better. And that means that you have to provide a breakdown by segment so that we can make things clearer and also explain the strategic elements for the company and -- so that we can evaluate the business.

So based on the figures of this quarter, in the figures we have for Q1 2023, there are going to be 2 main reporting segments: Sustainable Services and 360 Projects, which are supplemented by more information on the contribution that is made by our stakes in infrastructures. Sustainable Services will cover what until now we call B2B and B2C services, and the new strategic plan will describe the change of position after the agreement signed with Repsol, which is going to be a B2B2C and where we are providing services for commercializers and operators.

So therefore, this is going to be just another service. And there's less weight because we have deconsolidated sales. And this is another argument so that we can integrate this in a much more significant manner and give reporting much more significance. And this element of Sustainable Services is fundamental because here, we focus on sustainability, not only as an element that allows us to be in this area, but also it's a major driver for our culture because we help all customers to be much more efficient in their processes.

And as regards to projects, the reporting of projects does not change and it covers all the design work, engineering and execution for the different kinds of infrastructure including the renewable facilities. So we've included this term 360 so that we can clarify our differential element. We accompany the customer throughout the entire value chain. We want them to be more efficient and to improve their margins. And as we say, this doesn't always happen throughout the value chain.

And one of the new developments is that we've added this third segment that has to do with our stakes in infrastructures, and we'll let you know how much of the renewable energy firms are contributing, those that are under exploitation, as well as the stakes we have in concessions. And this is the case of the hospital in Chile, for instance. And this is something that we'll cover the next 15 years.

So these infrastructures will provide EBITDA and if our participation is minimum, we will include other proposals. And this will provide a very recurrent profitabilities. But in any case, above all, there will be a recurrence of cash flows that will grow as projects become -- or enter exploitation.

As regards to the analysis of the segments and looking into the figures of this for a quarter of 2023, we have to underscore the excellent behavior of the contribution margins. There's not only a contribution of EUR 2 million by the infrastructures, there's double-digit growth in the case of services. And I have to say that this evolution of the contribution margins is very positive considering the macroeconomic context that we are dealing with. And this shows that we are capable of maintaining the margins and making them grow in this context.

And sales have grown above the strategic targets, and it's now EUR 193 million, and the contribution margin has grown 11.5%. And this means that it's 11.2% relative to sales, and we have observed a very good performance of all of the services related to the improvements in customer sustainability. There's a growing demand and there are very good levels of profitability, and they usually have a higher margin profile.

And as regards to 360 projects, the margins are at exceptionally high levels above the target, and we've reported a margin of 19.9% of sales with a business figure of EUR 75 million. In other words, it's 5.1% more compared to Q1 of 2022. And we are continuing with a good rhythm of execution of renewable energy projects, we will report the data. And now we have a couple of renewable energy farms under construction in the Dominican Republic and Spain, and the operations in Italy will start in the second half of the year.

As regards social infrastructures, we are now at the final stage of the transmission networks of Angola, and this is supposed to finish in the second half of the year and we have a healthy project portfolio above EUR 600 million. And where we have a global approach that is very diversified, but especially in the last few months, it has been focused in Indian. And as you can see, the contribution made by services, in other words, we consider them to be much more recurrent activities and they are gaining weight globally.

In terms of the business figure where the services represent as a percent as well as in terms of margins where they represent 56% of the total of the contribution margin. And finally, in the documents, you can see the contribution that we've made at all levels of the financial statement regarding our stakes in infrastructures. We pointed out which projects are covered by global consolidation.

We've been talking about 2 projects in Latin America, 16 megas and 54, which generated something about EUR 9 million in EBITDA. And we also have stakes -- minority stakes. And they -- what we apply is the equity method. We have the plant in Antofagasta, the hospital there where we have stakes totaling 15% and a project of 79 megas in the Dominican Republic, where we have 50% with CMI, that's our reference partner in the area. And the cash flows generated by our stakes in infrastructures have been EUR 0.8 million.

So in conclusion, this is a quarter that has a very good business evolution, and this is -- you can see that the results are very good for each one of these businesses, and this offers some very strong prospects for the rest of the year. And finally, I would like to remind you that we've already executed 50% of the current buyback program so that we can amortize the shares. We've invested EUR 1.8 million in the quarter. And as I said at the beginning, we've paid out EUR 15 million for the dividend, what will be paid on July 5 of EUR 0.95 per share.

And with this, I would like to thank you very much for your attention, and we're now going to move on to your questions.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] I would like to give the floor to Miguel González from JB Capital.

[Miguel González Toquero, analyst]

Good afternoon. Thank you very much for accepting my questions. Three from me. And the first one has to do with margins -- with project margins because you've given us a very good margin. And I understand that this has to do with the ramp-up stage of some of the renewable energy projects you have in the portfolio. And perhaps that has to do with the final stage of the project in Angola. But my question is, what should we expect in the future? Do you think that you'll be able to maintain these margins? Or do you think that we'll be talking about margins of about 16%, which is the historic figure?

And the second question has to do with debt. Could you say something, please, about how debt has evolved in your projects that is your corporate debt too? And could you say something about financial expenses in the quarter?

And then my third question, which I suppose you'll give more details during the Capital Markets Day. But as you've already reported the consolidated sales, could you give us some more information now on the projects in operation? Could you perhaps share, I don't know, the price of the PPAs you've signed and their duration or the operating life of the plant or the OpEx or the margins of the plants?

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

Thank you very much, Miguel. Well, what I'll do is answer your questions one after the other. As regards to the contribution margin of the project, the reason for this figure to be so high has to do with the ramp-up of renewables. And it is true that we're in the final stages of the Angola project. And this also means that we are invoicing for certain additional jobs or things that are happening that have to do with the closure of projects.

And what do we expect in relation to the future? What I always say is that these are exceptional margins because we're talking about something like 20% when you know that our target is to stand above 15%. And historically, we've been situated at 16% or 17%. I think that we can expect that we'll have exceptionally high margins in terms of projects, although we do have that target, which is a little bit more conservative because in any case, during the Capital Markets Day or when we present the strategic plan, we can give you more details, but what I would say is that.

And as regards to the net financial debt, we are now in the quarterly report. You know that we do not mention anything about the balance sheet, but I dare say that there are not many changes since we reported debt at the end of the year. We've obviously generated cash flow and the usual levels we are accustomed to and it's something like EUR 15 million approximately.

And we've invested in the buyback program over EUR 11 million, as I said before, and we've obviously invested to -- in some developments and maintenance. But I think that in this respect, it would be worthwhile to analyze the yearly and half year data, which is what we've already been doing. And the strategic plan would include these kinds of targets. Because this is sufficiently relevant, I think it has to be studied in greater depth.

And what about the financial expenses on the closing date of the year? We already looked into them, and I was thinking more about the accounts. And in this quarter, we're talking about a financial result where -- well, you can see that there are 2 effects because on the one hand, we have higher funding costs. So therefore, there are greater financial expenses regardless of the fact that our debt has increased, but it's increased because of the integration of our stakes in infrastructures. So we have financial expenses of about EUR 3 million. Well, they are EUR 6 million to EUR 8 million higher than what we had if we would compare ourselves with Q1 of 2022.

And regarding projects under operation, well, I think that we should wait until we present the strategic plan. We are saying that to date and as regards things in operation, 3 wind farms, 3 renewable energy wind farms, 2 of them PV, 1 of them undergoing global consolidation and another one 50% with CMI. I think that you know better than I do, the dynamics and operating life. I think we're talking about something like 25 years in any model of this kind or perhaps the operating life could be even longer than that.

And when you talk about PPAs in Latin America that are currently under exploitation and the next ones that will be exploited are projects with closed PPAs. PPAs at much higher levels than what we are dealing with in the European context. And little by little, we will give you information on the different details that have to do with the projects that we are carrying out so that we can make an assessment. But I think that, that's all for the time being for me.

[Miguel González Toquero, analyst]

Okay. We'll leave it until the Capital Markets Day. Thank you very much for the information.

[Operator]

We're now going to continue with Carlos Treviño from Santander.

[Carlos Javier Treviño Peinador, analyst]

Hello, I have several questions. And this -- along the lines of the previous question, when you were talking about future projects for the rest of the year, I would like to know what is that you have to say about the increase in revenue throughout the year compared to that figure of 6% that you reported in terms of inorganic growth? And how do you think margins will evolve in terms of services, the services that you've reported in this quarter?

And then I would also like to ask you about the renewable energy infrastructure, EUR 3.4 million in revenues. Could you perhaps give us some reference at least for this year to know what is going to happen? Or when do you expect that you'll be connecting the project in Mexico? And when is it going to contribute to revenues? Or do you expect any other significant changes to occur in the year?

And then finally, well, this project in Angola is supposed to be finishing soon. But do you think that in the second half of the year, there's going to be less growth in the renewables project? And perhaps, well, this could counteract this effect.

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

Well, thank you very much, Carlos. Well, as regards the trends in contribution margins and sales, we -- as things stand right now, we have a strategic plan that we'll be finishing this year, and we will soon be presenting the new targets, so to speak. We'll be presenting the new guidelines, but we're going to be focusing on what we know about today.

We want to grow at least at 5% relative to sales and I think that this is something that we will achieve in 2023. So we have grown 3% organically in Q1. And as I said before, these results are very good. And the prospects are very good for the rest of the year. So it is to be expected that we will continue along these lines.

And the service contribution margin, well, this is -- has been progressing very well in the last few quarters, and this continues to be the case. And what we expect is that during the year that this be maintained and that the improved -- this might improve. And I said during my presentation, we are in cost inflation in context, and I think that we are able to implement very good management actions to maintain good margin levels relative to sales.

And as I say, there are certain businesses that have a greater demand and that have even greater margins. For instance, anything that has to do with environmental services and some of the recent integrations we've carried out in Colombia, for instance, that is also related to sustainable environmental services and so on and so forth and they have good margin profiles. And in that regard, we expect that there will be more strength in the margins for services.

And you asked about renewable projects, what contribution are they going to make and how they're going to progress in the year? I think that it's important to have certain things clear in our minds that we will also look into in greater depth over the next few weeks. But we already pointed this out on the closing date of the year. Our strategy in the area of renewables is to have partners for shared management actions in all of the geographies at which we operate. And in Latin America and the Dominican Republic, we have an agreement so the rest of the renewable projects we are executing or that we are going to carry out in the future so that they can be managed jointly with CMI.

And it's the same approach, the same approach that has to be implemented too in the European context. But what does that mean? Well, it means that to date, we have 2 projects with majority stakes. There's nearly EUR 2 million in EBITDA and the forecast would be that the rest of the projects that are executed throughout 2023 and the future years be based on the consolidation by equity method because I know that our stakes are going to be minority stakes or at least 50-50. So we have to wait for the equity method to be applied so that we can see how do these projects evolve.

We have given some guidelines on what we expected in terms of exploitation in 2023. But in any case, we will update this information. And in the documentation, you can see the different stages the project is and you can also see those that are under construction, and therefore, those that will apparently be commissioned over the next few months.

And I think you're asking me about something else. But in any case, this is what I think we have to look into for the rest of the year, in line with the strategy that we've established. And you were also asking me about how -- what's going to happen in relation to projects like the case we have in Angola. And it's not only about the fact that renewable energy is going to allow us to not have a decline in projects in the second half of the year.

But that's a -- we have a project that will replace Angola, and these are the hospitals in Chile. We have the Buin Paine hospital. They've already started with the engineering stage, but over the next few months, and in the second half of the year, this will also be included. So we also have industrial projects that are very recurrent and renewable operations and I don't think there will be any suffering declines in terms of projects.

[Carlos Javier Treviño Peinador, analyst]

Thank you very much, Patricia. Just 1 final remark. The wind farm in Mexico, you are consolidating that globally. So when do you think it's going to make a contribution? When is that going to start?

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

Well, yes, sorry, I didn't answer that question. Well, this is a wind farm. We've reached 100% with it, and it's not yet been connected. So therefore, it is not generating or producing any power. It's the only one of the farms that is not in harsh currency -- on hard currency, it's neither in dollars or euros, and it will be commissioned. It's supposed to be commissioned in the next few months or what we're going to try to do is divest it because our strategy is always based on operating infrastructures on a hard cash basis.

[Operator]

Let's continue with Juan Peña from GVC Gaesco. Hello, Juan, can you hear me?

[Juan Peña Ruiz, analyst]

Yes, I can hear you now. Okay. Well, I have a couple of quick questions. Firstly, the issue of infrastructures and what you've done for infrastructures. How does that tally with what you said about Dominion Green and about other approaches? Plus your stakes in social projects, please confirm if this is so.

And secondly, looking at the renewable portfolios and comparing this with what you told us some time ago, I think that what I'm missing is the 40 megawatts in Italy that you say are going to be commissioned in 2023, but I can't see them on the chart. I suppose that this is included in the [ 2,184 ] that you mentioned. And then as regard to operations in 2022, we have the 68 in Mexico. So I think that there's something missing there. So I would like to know how, if you can clarify these figures rather.

And finally, I have a reflection on B2C. Well, firstly, I would like to confirm that you're no longer going to report a KPI that has to do with energy customers and you were also saying that the handsets are being sold less. And after these 3 or 4 years of experience with the B2C business, now including the Sustainable Services, I don't know if there's a connection with B2C. So up to what extent has this approach been a failure? Or has this created value for the group?

I know that you've invested in shops and in the phone house, the Smart Home project. And now you're focusing on services. So what has this adventure been like? Has it been positive? Is it going to be maintained in the future? Or are you going to abandon this little by little?

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

Thank you, Juan. Okay. Well, I confirm, yes, our stakes in infrastructures in this segment, what we're going to have, we are going to have our majority or minority stakes in different kinds of infrastructures fundamentally because of the rhythm of execution but good to have in terms of renewable infrastructures. And just to clarify, we're talking about the performance of the generation of energy and the rest of the business that is related to Dominion Green that you pointed out refers to design, execution, materials, et cetera, and the projects have been reported under the 360 heading.

But as regards to infrastructures, we have the minority stakes in other 360 projects, which is the case of the hospitals because right now the Antofagasta hospital, and we will execute and this has been covered by project, with Buin Paine hospital. And once we finish the project and once it is commissioned, the performance would be here under the heading of our stakes in infrastructures.

As regards to your second question on projects, so that we can understand the information we gave on the closing date of the year. These 40 megas in Italy, yes, well, they are included in that figure of [ 2,184 ] megas in Europe and LatAm under development. And when they enter construction, it will be in the second half of the year, and then they will move on to a higher line on that chart. They will be included under projects under construction.

And you spoke about Mexico with 68 megas -- and we spoke about 68 megas. And in the presentation, we spoke about all of the megas we have under exploitation and the attributable megas because we didn't have 100% in all the projects. But in the case of this project in Mexico, which was the first project we carried out -- the first PV project we carried out in Mexico, we had a very small stake. And if I'm not mistaken, I think it was something like 18% or 20% or something like that. We've divested that in Q1 because it was something that was very residual, and that's why that no longer appears in any way. This would be the figure for the end of the year.

And as regards to B2C, well, the first thing I have to say is that this is an operation, which -- as an operation goes, you speak about how much we've invested in the shops. And what we did in 2017 with the phone house. And as an operation, well, it's an operation that is positive nowadays. In other words, what we invested in the acquisition in 2017 and what we've invested in the monies and compared to the cash flows and the returns that this business has produced and they're still producing nowadays, we are in positive figures.

It hasn't really been the growth that we expected to occur. Well, that's obvious. In 2017, nobody could imagine that there was going to be a pandemic in 2020 that was going to affect everybody so much, that was going to affect the B2C world, where we've been affected in terms of traffic and shops and so on and so forth. Everything came to standstill for a year, but then the behavior of consumers changed. And then after that, we've had these effects produced by the price of energy and other elements that have played a very big role in this growth of B2C.

So in other words, we don't stand where we wanted to stand right now, but that doesn't mean that the project is no longer valid because I think if there's something that we do well, it is to react quickly and in a very resilient manner when we have to deal with these circumstances. And it's obvious that there are lots of uncertainties. And in the world of B2C, we've had many elements that we never expected to happen, so now that we know about these elements, we have taken different decisions. And I think that we've done so very quickly in order to readjust our approach.

And this is what we're doing right now. In other words, that now that energy prices were in the last part of 2021 and in the first part of 2022, they made us think that it was not suitable or it was not possible for us to compete in an adequate manner in this market because of our size and also because we are not a generation company, but Repsol is. So what we wanted to do is discover what the guideline said, and we thought that what we had to do was reach agreements with those that could be more competitive in this operation and get some leverage in what we're more competitive about, that is distribution and commercialization of services and attracting more customers. And that's what we're doing.

So this is why this element, we are repositioning this as a B2B2C. I'm in touch with the end customer, with the end consumer, but let's say that we're talking about service for B2B. And this is where we believe that we should integrate this as if it were just another service because apart from that, you were saying, okay, well, here, yes, we're selling this handset. Well, it's not that, but -- which is true up to a certain extent, it's never been our core business, but the rest of our activities are growing more and this has less weight.

So it is now flat, but the rest of the company are growing very strongly, and that is no longer going to be significant. And I'd like to reconfirm what you said at the beginning of B2C, we are not going to report more CapEx as regards to the number of contracts. We can give you some qualitative information at some point in time, but the intention is that this will all be focused on Sustainable Services.

[Juan Peña Ruiz, analyst]

And very quickly, one final thing. So do you think that something can be done about the telecommunications business?

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

We're going to continue with the B2C agenda to boost it. Well, we, in telecommunications, already have this kind of approach because we have our own brand, but then we also have the distribution of telecommunication services. So I believe that we are following the lines of that B2B2C that is our final target.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Well, it seems that if you have no further questions, many, many thanks for your attention, and thank you very much. Goodbye.

[Patricia Berjon, executive]

Good afternoon, everybody. Bye.

[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]