XXL ASA

OSE:XXL

Earnings Call Transcript 2021-Q1

[Tolle O. R. Groterud]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the first quarter results presentation. My name is Tolle Groterud, and I have the pleasure of guiding you through today's presentation. CEO, Pal Wibe; and our CFO, Stein Eriksen, will take you through the results and key drivers followed by a Q&A session. And for media, there will be an opportunity to perform separate interviews after the presentation and then using the digital channels. Please direct your request to our press contact.So without further introductions, I turn the floor over to you, Pal.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Thank you, Tolle. Yes. Welcome, everybody, to the quarterly presentation of XXL. Very pleased with the quarter. I think it has been a roller coaster quarter this year versus a roller coaster quarter last year. But all in all, I'm proud of the way we managed a very difficult situation. It has been the first quarter where XXL has been quite sort of severely negatively hit by COVID restrictions really that certain weeks of 57% of sales -- store sales in Norway was closed and in other weeks, 100% of sales in Austria was closed. So that has been a tough situation, but we have managed to turn around and innovate and deliver. So I was very satisfied with that.Even more pleasing is the work we have done on the margins. Getting it back to historic levels, even slightly above. I think even more important than the figures is the way we have done it. Of course, it is about the market dynamics. There is also a lot about the inventory situation. The fact that we have been reducing inventory levels, also old inventory quite significantly. We've been working a lot on the campaign discipline and execution, and we have been doing great work in the category development area. So very pleased with the margins and also happy to see that cost ratios are going down and that the hard work we have done over the last year is starting to pay off both in terms of cost reductions, but also later on in this year about cost efficiency projects coming through. So all in all, a turbulent quarter, but really, really happy with the team and the result and a very strong EBITDA improvement all in all.Yes. The headlines, as we said, heavily impacted by -- last year was heavily impacted by extraordinary clearance campaign. So keep that in mind when you look at the figures. It was roughly NOK 350 million in extra sales due to the clearance campaign last year and NOK 350 million in a small quarter is, of course, quite significant when you do comparables. So all comparables is a little bit distorted. A lot of stores being closed negatively hitting us, but we have been able to capitalize on our e-comm platform. Very, very happy with the the work we've done there. 30% growth might not sound very impressive, but keep in mind that we have the clearance campaign last year. And during the clearance campaign, e-comm was actually growing 287%. So it is very tough comparable. And of course, this year, we did it with a good margin. So very, very happy with our e-comm operations. Sustainable gross margins around 40% and a solid EBITDA improvement. So all in all, very, very happy with the quarter and the outlook, we are -- sort of we have a strong cash flow, and we are basically debt free. We have been able to accelerate not just reduce the negative effect of COVID but actually accelerate the strategic projects. Also very happy with that. And I think that we are going to come out of the COVID crisis in a much stronger position than we were coming into it. Not just XXL, but I think the entire sporting market, but also us at XXL.Here's the figures. especially can maybe impressive is -- for us, is 7% growth in Norway. As I've said, as of January 23, we have had quite a significant portion of our store portfolio being closed at -- in certain times, more than 50%. So of course, being able to grow by 7% during such tough circumstances is an impressive job by the team. So we're really, really happy with that. And keep in mind that we had the clearance campaign last year. So it was quite a significant sales at very low margins last year.We talked about the margins and then a strong EBITDA improvement. And actually, the rolling 12 months, if you look ex IFRS, is now up at NOK 760 million. So the last 12 month's EBITDA is around NOK 760 million. And as we have announced this morning, we have proposed -- we are going to buy back shares in Q2. And we also announced that we are going to start working on a refinancing of the group with the aim to return to the long-term dividend policy. This is just an overview of the COVID situation. And for the first time, Norway is on the red side this time with a lot of store capacity being closed. And I think it's also important to note that what's different from last year is the approach that we have had to the covenant situation. Last year, of course, no one knew about what's going to happen during COVID. So it was all about cutting purchases, reducing marketing costs, having temporary layoffs. This year, we have been much more forward leaning. And actually, we have been increasing our purchases for the spring/summer season coming now and also doing a lot of work with the people that has been temporary laid off to get them back to work and work on the strategic projects, for example, the zoning in the stores. So we have been much more on the offensive this time than we had -- could be last year.This just illustrates on the left-hand side, the kind of roller coaster metaphor. Last year was a roller coaster and this year was a roller coaster. And I think Stein, who's going to come in a minute, will have a hard time trying to explain the some of -- net some of both those things. So I just think we should have to conclude that it was a tough quarter, and the team has really turned around, and I'm proud of what we have done in the quarter.And on the right-hand side, just a curiosity it is the e-comm share per week that we, of course, follow. And as you can say, we had an e-comm share of 57% in week 12, and that is -- I don't think we're going to get up to those levels in maybe not at least not the next year, maybe later, but not easier. Market shares. This is the area, of course, we are focusing on the long-term market share, so the rolling 12 months. We only have February figures for Norway and Sweden. We have March figures for Finland. Taking market share. In Finland, keep in mind that the rolling 12 months is March, which means that in the comparable period, we actually have the clearance sales included. So it's not as bad as it looks because there we are comparing with a 12-month period that had the clearance sales in it.What's most maybe more important and interesting actually is the right-hand side graph, which is the 2020 market share -- not market share, the market growth and XXL growth. And if you look at the orange curve in this slide, you can see that we talk about the COVID boom, but the COVID boom is actually mainly a Norwegian phenomenon. If we go to Europe, Central Europe and Austria, they don't talk about a COVID boom. It's actually a catastrophe. And also in Sweden and Finland, there isn't really like a strong COVID boost overall when you net out, of course, there's positive staycation effects, but there's a negative COVID effects. So the COVID boom is a Norwegian phenomenon. And of course, Norway makes up 50% of our sales, so it's important, but it's only half of it.In all segments in quarter -- in Q1, all segments showed improvement, except Austria. Austria, of course, had a tough time because January, the seasonal best month, the high peak of the season was when Austria was closed. So all stores in Austria was closed during the most important winter month. And then we had to do clearance in February to get rid of some of the inventory. So that was a tough month for us there. But all the others are doing improvements, and most of the market has the best quarter 1 ever in the history of XXL, so best quarter ever in the history of XXL, very, very impressive.The gross margin is, as I said, it's very -- it's good. What is extra pleasing is the fact that it's not just the market dynamics that makes it. Of course, the sport market is helped by the COVID situation, but it's also helped by the fundamentals in the sport market. So today, of course, XXL is in a totally different position. But also in Norway and Sweden, capacity has been taken out of the market. So it's a much more healthy balance in the market. And that is, of course, also going to continue after the COVID crisis.Our approach to campaigns and the execution of campaigns has also been much better factory run and discipline, which means that we are be able to improve margins on campaigns. That being said, our price policy is still the same. It's very simple. We should have the lowest prices on everything always. We could -- we are not -- never going to change that. And we are actually monitoring it every minute. This is actually a live graph from what we are looking at every day. We have -- we are not going to tell you the market and the competitors, but the low part of it is our prices on a basket and then you have the fixed line, which is the 100% index and then you have the competitors far up there. The 2 main competitors. So it's -- we are disciplined. The gross margin is not coming from price changes.We talked about the inventory levels and a more healthy assortment. And of course, that is important because retail is all about the discipline and the everyday work you do. And every week, we are working on trimming the inventory, which means that we have less inventory to clear out. And that is, of course, also maybe one of the most important drivers of of the gross margin contribution is the fact that we have less products to clear out. This is an everyday kind of work that never stops, which is the firm part of the retail sort of discipline.And then we're also doing a lot of different things in the category, the development and category department. Some things are coming already, but a lot of things is also coming in the months and year to come. But really good work in that department. And we also -- that's also one of the drivers behind the gross margin improvement. So not -- it's a combination of many things. That means which may result in us being confident that this is a sustainable low margin level. And this you can see last 3 quarters, been very good, of course.Then I think I will give the word to Stein, who is going to take us through the figures. Stein?

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

Thank you, Pal. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Yes, let me take you through the financials for XXL for Q1 2021. If we start with the P&L. Overall, this -- sorry about that. Overall, despite a weak March month due to several store closures, we are pleased to see a solid start of 2021, ending with an EBITDA of NOK 207 million, up from minus NOK 36 million last year. The improvement versus last year is mainly driven by increased gross margins, but also reduced OpEx. Overall, profitability in XXL has improved significantly during the 4 latest quarters. And a running 12 month's EBITDA is now at NOK 759 million, excluding IFRS 16. So we are very, very pleased with that. Also want to comment on net financial expenses amounted to NOK 54 million versus NOK 6 million last year, with the main deviations is negative currency effects of NOK 80 million this year compared to a positive currency effect last year of NOK 38 million. As I said, the main driver of the EBITDA improvement in the quarter was the significantly strengthened gross margins in all markets, except for Austria. And XXL posted for the third quarter in a row, a gross margin above 40%. The margins were positively affected by a release of NOK 25 million related to obsolete provision related to the inventory, but negatively affected by negative mix from e-comm and higher freight costs, both inbound freight and outbound freight. In Austria, we had a clearance of seasonal products due to the store closures in first half of Q1, which explains the low margin. As Pal mentioned, we have strengthened our operational performance in several aspects, and we believe that a level of around 39% to 40% is sustainable going forward. OpEx, we are pleased to see that the investments in operational efficiency is paying off. And the OpEx in all segments, except Austria, is down. The segments have shown good cost control during the period, especially on personnel and as well as marketing efficiency. Moving over to EBITDA. Like Pal said, it has really been a roller coaster quarter, but January proved to be the strongest January in XXL's history driven by good winter conditions, all over Nordics. And then while there are many store closures in March in Norway affected the results negatively. However, overall, pleased with the results where all operating segments, except Austria, had a positive development versus last year. Regarding Austria, please then be aware that all stores were closed in January and beginning of February. And that's the most important part of the winter season in this region, affecting then, of course, the results negatively. Net debt from NOK 71 million in net debt by the end of 2020 to a mere NOK 5 million at the end of Q1 2021 where positive EBITDA and reduced working capital are the main drivers to the improvement. So of course, very happy with the financial situation of XXL. I want to -- so we have 1 slide on how we are working with the inventory. On the left-hand side, you can see my favorite slide from last year, the strong reduction in inventory in percentage of sales from -- and as you can see, it has shown a significant improvement, of course, from 2019, but the improvement continues. However, on the right-hand side, you see one of my new favorite slides that illustrates the reduction in the old inventory from year-end 2019 until Q1 2021. And the cooperation between the departments in XXL have improved in order to activate and sell out the old stock. And we have weekly follow-up meetings where we track the development in all the inventory. And as you can see, this is really paying off.As I said, looking at XXL's financial position, we can just say 1 word, and that is rock solid, with little debt and high liquidity reserves. So to sum up the financials, roller coaster quarter with very strong January, but weaker March related to store closures, of course. However, all in all, we are happy with the EBITDA.We have sustainable gross margins. We have OpEx under control. And we have a strong financial position. Therefore, from 26th of April until 1st of June, we are buying back 3.5 million shares to cover up for shares related to the long-term management investment program and an agreement with the banks, the RCF Corona facility of NOK 200 million will be canceled. Also, like Pal mentioned, we will, during the spring, initiate a refinancing of the group where we aim for continued flexibility, improve terms and where we will be able to return to a long-term dividend policy.So that was summing up the financials Pal, leaving the floor over to you.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Thank you, Stein. As you can see, Stein is very excited about the development of the old inventory. That's good to see.So just to sum up. We are preparing for a new staycation spring and summer. At the moment, in April, of course, we have a severe store closure situation. It's actually losing a little bit now. We are now down to -- from Monday, we are down to 6 stores closed in Norway. And hopefully, 5 stores are still closed in Austria until early May, we will see. But we have to be prepared for anything. I think the last year has taught us that we just have to be flexible. So we are staying alert for fast changes. But -- and this is the main difference from last year. We are now prepared for a staycation summer, and our buyers have had a buying allowance that will enable us to buy more products this summer than we did last year. So this is -- we are better prepared than ever before.Also -- and again, we showed this last time, but I think it's important to emphasize it. Many people think what's going to happen with the sports market after COVID. And of course, the easier way to look at it is to look at how the sport market was before COVID. But then there are some things that you need to note. One of those things is that the spot market is very different going out of the COVID situation than it was going into it. As I talked about before, the balance in the market, especially in Norway and Sweden, is much more healthy, much more balanced. So that's sort of -- that's a very, very important area. Of course, XXL as the biggest player in Nordics, is also in a totally different situation with terms of financial stability. So that's a positive thing. We also believe that there is -- we have been working very hard over the last 18 months to improve all aspects of what we're doing. We are not finished yet. There's a long way to go, but a strongly believer in the fact that we are coming out of the COVID crisis much, much better towards the consumer than we were going into it. And you will see a lot of improvements now actually taking place in the next few months during the rest of 2021. And so there's a lot of exciting things happening. We will come out of the crisis much, much better company towards the consumer and, of course, also financially and with the inventory and everything.So all in all, when we look at the long-term kind of analysis and the dynamics in the sporting industry, we believe that XXL as a branded big-box concept is going to be with a strong omni-channel position and enormous e-comm capacity will be one of the winners in the market in Europe in the long term. We have just talked about our strategic project. There are much more projects and you can see here, but we just wanted to highlight that an impressive amount of the project is actually now either being completed, on track to be completed soon or actually accelerated some of them too. So we sort of even done it a few weeks or months ahead of plan because we have used the COVID situation to actually accelerate some of the projects. So I'm very, very pleased with the way the organization has been able to not just handle our crisis but actually use it to accelerate the strategic program. Very, very good.So I think we're going to come up -- out of the crisis, as I said, with -- in a different situation than we came into it, 60 -- or it's actually 61 today out of 90 stores has been rebuilt already in a much more sort of customer logical friendly structure, built around the activities that customers participate in. That is being done and will be -- the rest will be done soon. We are going to launch a revitalized brand positioning and platform very soon. We are also implementing RFID tagging and ESL in all markets. So by the end of this year, we will have done both RFID and ESL in all markets, we are actually accelerating it, not just Norway as we talked about last time, but actually accelerating it to all markets based on the first sort of results and the tests and pilots. We are improving our website and customer journey because, of course, we know that a lot of the purchasing now is happening online. We think that we are going to do much more too. So we are not stopping this year. This is going to be a continuous development topic at XXL, how we can improve our e-comm operations. And we are working on a lot of brand access, improving the category position. We see some early signs from many brands, very, very positive development, new brands coming on, extended assortment with some of our key partners. But there's long cycles in the sport industry, so we actually see much more in the years to come. They are exciting things ahead here. So I think that we also improved and value sort of additional services like the Fit Station that we launched in this quarter. So all in all, I think we will present ourselves to the consumer in a much better way moving out of the crisis than we went into the crisis. So this is important.Our long-term kind of guiding remains the same. We are -- over longer periods of time, we are going to take market share in all markets and continue the growth within the e-comm channel. We are going to strengthen and improve our gross margin and stabilize it at the 2020 levels, which Stein mentioned, to around 39%, 40%. And we are going to invest in improved operational efficiency. That is just about to come onboard. This will mean that the cost ratio and the quality of our operation will improve. And as Stein said, we suggest to have a refinancing, so we can be in a position to return some of that excess capital to our shareholders. That is sort of everything to sum up, a good quarter, rollercoaster quarter, significant EBITDA improvement. But for me, even more important than the facts and figures is the way we have actually started to improve our customer offering. There is still much more to go. We are not there today. So I'm 100% confident that you will see a better XXL in 12 months and even better in 24 months. We are started on a journey, but it's only in the initial phase. So exciting times, and I'm proud of the team and the way they have handled a very difficult quarter.With that, I think we will ask for questions.

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

Yes.

[Tolle O. R. Groterud]

So then we open up for questions. And then call up on the conference host. So please go ahead.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] And the first question comes from Markus Heiberg from Kepler Cheuvreux.

[Markus Borge Heiberg, Equity Research Analyst]

Congrats for the yet another very strong quarter in Norway, I must say I'm impressed as how it's possible with 20% of stores being closed. But I would like some more flavor on the inventory. Obviously, your core purchasing volumes have picked up, but the inventory remains low. And so the first thing is sort of are you sure that you will have enough goods this year? And more structurally, how have you changed your sort of purchasing policy and the flexibility that you have in scaling up and down volumes? I'm thinking about sort of H2 and 2022 is sort of -- it's a very, very, very low visibility on how the market will develop and have you insured more flexibility? So that first question. And then the second question is on downsizing of the stores, which you mentioned. And I would like to make some examples, could you give us any flavor on what you expect on comparable sales and OpEx per store? How many square meters are we talking? And so what could be the impact of this downsizing that you are targeting? So those are my 2 questions.

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

So I'll answer the first -- start with inventory. Yes, Markus, we are really working hard with the inventory. Just want to remind you that, yes, the inventory levels are low in Q1, but also normally, XXL build up inventory throughout especially April and partly May. So of course, now during the last weeks, the inventory has increased quite significantly. Then regarding your question with flexibility, it's, of course, important that we combine the financial prognosis together with the purchasing budget. So every month, we are having prognosis meeting where we try to say something about the future and where we open up for -- to increase purchasing when we see both that we have the financial flexibility and/or the financial -- the strong balance sheet and then also we increase, of course, the purchases if we believe in higher sales and so we did, for example, in January, then we sat down. We thought, okay this going to probably be another staycation effect. So we ramped up the purchasing volumes. We gave the purchasers allowance to increase the purchasing with hundreds of millions of kroners now for the spring/summer season, so.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

I think it's a very good question, Markus. And I think it's 1 of those most fun, but challenging parts of retail is to manage the inventory. So as Stein says, I think we have a really good process now with the prognosis and sort of adjusting up and down. So that's one thing. They will be more fine-tuned, and we are getting them in just ahead of when we need it. We don't have it unnecessarily. So that's another one.And the other one is compared to maybe 2019, we are now also installing more flexibility. So we are having a very good dialogue with our partners, and we are sharing the kind of risk. So we are not going 100% in on all the risks, and we are sharing and we're also looking at multiyear contracts and sort of flexibility in order to make sure that we are able both to ramp up, but also, of course, to push volumes out if at some point in 2023 or '24, the summer is bad or winter is bad or whatever. We have more flexibility. We're not doing all-in 100%, taking big risks in buying kinds of processes.

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

Yes. I mean but that being said, it's within 1 category that you have probably noticed where we will be somewhat lower in inventory going forward, and that is bicycles. There has been a lack of bicycling -- bicycles throughout Europe, especially shipping from Asia. And as you know, the situation in Swiz didn't really improve the situation.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Yes. So bikes is a special category, but that is nothing to do with the budgets or therefore.

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

No.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

I think everyone would have bought more bikes if it was possible. So that's a special case. But -- and that will hopefully not happen every year. So sort of a 2021 phenomenon at least. It will be challenging for multiple periods. But yes, that's the toughest one. But otherwise, we have a much better situation and now.On the downsizing, we don't have like a fixed total figure that we can provide to you with a complete effect, but we had a board meeting yesterday. And we had many downsizing cases to sort of finalize. Of course, this is a process where we talk with the landlords, how to do it, and it's an individual case by case and most of them are in Sweden. We had 5, 6 downsizing cases just in the -- yesterday, decided. We can't announce where yet because we are now going to inform the involved parties. But this is our focus in 2021 and 2022, especially in Sweden. We will have many downsizings because the stores are too big compared to our assortment and sort of concept in Sweden.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Ole Martin Westgaard from DNB.

[Ole Martin Westgaard, Analyst]

COVID has obviously given you the opportunity to test your e-commerce capabilities. And I guess, in March, you were able to test it at even higher levels. What are the sort of lessons learned, both in terms of how much volumes you can handle? And how has the margin development and the impact on margins been from that shift? Where do you sort of envisage the long-term mix in terms of revenues for XXL on the back of these learnings?

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Stein can comment on the margin. But just on overall on e-comm, I think that the e-comm capacity is not maybe limitless, but almost like we have shown during March and during Black Week last year that there is a fantastic capacity in our logistics operation. So the capacity is not really constrained and we can also increase the capacity. So I think that the main kind of development areas that we still need to work on in e-comm is to improve the customer journey, reduce friction and make it even better kind of customer experience online, so we can capture even more of the impulse sales also online. So we have a lot of plans, there is an ongoing project that is going now. And you will see it every month going forward, but there are new releases and new improvements in our e-comm operations. And this is also a topic where we will also have work during the rest of the year with another sort of go at it for 2022 and 2023 because we think that we need to just continuously invest in our e-comm operations. So that's sort of -- it is really no capacity. There's impossible to really -- it's a very special situation in market with 57% of store sales in Norway closed, what is going to be the long-term effect of this. But I think that we have seen in other sectors too, that a lot of new consumers has been used to buying their sporting goods online, and they see that you can have your bicycle prepared and everything as I said okay. Even if you buy it online, you can have your skies prepared, you can, everything. It's easy. It's fast, your delivery comes quick. So I think there's a lot of consumers that has been trained in how easy it is to buy at xxl.no or SE or FE. So I think that there will be potential going forward. And that trend towards more e-comm share will continue.

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

And then regarding the margin, well, I like the question. I mean, of course, you see it immediately on the margin in March that the margin dropped because are more cherrypicking on e-comm. So in March, isolated, the margin drop was around 2 percentage points because of the negative mix. And also, as maybe you have seen that we have been having free freights for the affected regions. So that affected the margins negatively with around 2 percentage points alone in March.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

And then, of course, part of the development of the e-comm operation is to improve to create that kind of add-on sales, extra sales also in the online experience. And we are very good at in the stores, but we just have to try and replicate better online. And there, we are not in -- not fully there yet, but there's still opportunities.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Kristoffer Pedersen from Nordea Market.

[Kristoffer B. Pedersen, Senior Analyst of Oil Services]

I was wondering if you can say something about how sales has developed in April, given that the stores have continued to be closed in Norway?

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Yes. I think it's sort of -- it's really impossible to comment on such short period, it's like 3 weeks. Of course, it's negatively affected by -- a little bit same as March, negatively affected overall by store closures. We had between 57% and 43% of stores being closed in Norway. That's negative. E-comm is booming. We have the free freight now for a period and people are learning to appreciate it. So we see e-comm is booming. We had some campaign changes. We had a big campaign last year in April that we don't have this year. So it's really impossible. But as I said, we are pretty confident about this staycation summer. So April is a very small month for us. It's the May and June that is important. And of course, that's why it's very pleasing to see that more stores are opening as of Monday because May and June is for many retailers, not just us, it is the big spring and summer months and we -- that's where we want all stores open and people being able to enjoy outdoor life.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Ole Martin Westgaard from DNB.

[Ole Martin Westgaard, Analyst]

One more question for me. You state that you aim to restate your dividend policy. How should I read that comment? Do you sort of have an ambition to bring the balance sheet back to sort of more normalized leverage ratios a sort of extraordinary dividend? Or should we look at it as that you aim to restate a dividend policy based on sort of the earnings going forward? And it will be a gradual buildup of the debt leverage in the company. If -- also if you can comment on what you consider to be reasonable leverage ratios for XXL going forward?

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

Yes. It's -- I mean, first of all, now regarding the whole COVID situation, the most important thing for us is to do a refinance where we can cover up for the uncertainty, of course, and then also that we have the flexibility, both in bad times and in good times. That being said, we, of course, want to reach a more reasonable level regarding debt. And then we are probably talking about 2 to 2.5x the rolling EBITDA. Regarding the -- if it's going to be an extra dividend or that's, of course, up to the board to decide. But I can't see any reason why XXL should hold on to the cash if we can increase the loan facilities.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

So the main message for us is that we are going to have a solid financial situation that we can weather a kind of a good summer and a good winter and a bad winter and a bad summer is part of the business in the sporting industry that we are not going to start a bank. So we're not going to compete with you as or around. So we'll give the excess cash back to the shareholders.

[Ole Martin Westgaard, Analyst]

Okay. Can you just repeat what was the leverage ratio, is that also 2 to 3.5 or?

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

No, 2 to 2.5x somewhere around that, I guess. Yes. But -- yes.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] And the next question comes from Carl Fredrik Waage from Arctic Securities.

[Carl Fredrik Waage]

I just wanted to ask another question on the gross margin. As we had talked about earlier, last year there was a negative impact from the lack of supplier bonuses due to lower ordering volumes. And I was just wondering if you could give us some color on where these terms are today sort of versus 2 to 3 years ago?

[Stein Alexander Eriksen, Group Chief Financial Officer]

I think the terms are fairly at the same -- fairly at the same level. And also, as you know that we have restated the figure. So now the gross margin is not anymore explained by the -- if we buy mortgages or yes, but now the gross profit is more following the sales. So supply bonus is not impacting the gross margin.

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Is following the sales development basically, products.

[Carl Fredrik Waage]

Excellent. And then I have a question regarding the Swedish store network. Are there any sort of geographical differences you see there? And are there any obvious white spots you're looking to fill in terms of new openings going forward?

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

Yes, there are regional differences, of course, not necessarily just in this quarter. I think that's a too short-term perspective. But of course, there's part of Sweden where we are doing better than others just because it's a 4 season kind of area. Sweden is the market except for Austria, that where we can see the most white spots. And yes, there are coming new stores in Sweden because we see that we lose a lot of sales while not having some stores in certain areas. And we also see that our e-comm sales is actually increasing when we establish a store in a new region. So there are many white spots, and we -- as soon as we have sort of put ink on the paper, we will announce yes, some more.

[Carl Fredrik Waage]

Excellent. And then just 1 final question regarding leases. What -- how are sort of the discussions with landowners these days in terms of volumes being switched from physical stores to e-commerce and the price level on new leases entered?

[Pal Wibe, Group Chief Executive Officer]

It's a little bit too early to say that there's a huge trend but I think the COVID crisis combined with the kind of fact that e-comm is taking a bigger share of sales and we are also competing with few players who don't have any stores. It means that -- I think that the many landlords are seeing that it's important to try to create more value at the kind of partnership and look at the terms, so we can be in the same boat. But it's not dramatic change. These things are quite gradual. But I think all retailers are asking questions to their landlords about how we can create win-win situation but also that we are sharing the risk in bad times.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] There is no further questions coming through, so we'll hand the call back to you again. Thank you.

[Tolle O. R. Groterud]

Thank you so much. That ends our session then, so thank you all and have a good day.