Lastminute.com NV

SIX:LMN

Earnings Call Transcript 2022-Q3

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the lastminute.com Investors and Media Conference Call and Live Webcast. I am Sandra, the Chorus Call operator. [Operator Instructions] and the conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast.

At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Pier Andrea Comoglio. Please go ahead, sir.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Thank you, Sandra. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking out the time and attending this call. Today, we are taking a step ahead in our financial disclosure and have decided to hold the call to present our financial results for Q3 2022. On the call here today, we have Laurent Foata, Chairman of the Board of lastminute.com and West; Javier Perez-Tenessa, Non-executive Director of lastminute.com and Bet; Laura Amoretti, Interim Chief Executive Officer; and Sergio Signoretti, Chief Financial Officer.

The company management will provide an opening statement, the most recent update in terms of both the business updates as well as financial performance, an update on investigation, and post that, we will have a Q&A session. Over to you, Laurent.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Thank you, Pier Andrea. I welcome you to today's conference call. Let me kick off this call with a few observations. First one, the EGM has been called for the 21st December 2022. Fabio Cannavale and Andrea Bertoli are resigning from the Board effective today. Luca Concone is to be nominated as CEO. Laura Amoretti will remain as interim serial until the EGM, then she will cover the role of interim COO.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

I apologize. I think we are having some trouble here. We are trying to understand what is going on. So please hold on and we will shortly come back.

Are you good now?

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Yes, I'm good.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Okay. No, I think we lost you for a couple -- for a period of time. Can you please start again from your opening statement?

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Yes. Sorry.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

No problem. Thanks a lot. Go ahead.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Thank you, Pier Andrea. I welcome you to today's conference call. Let me kick off this call with a few observations. The first one, the EGM has been called for the 21st of December. Fabio Cannavale and Andrea Bertoli are resigning from the Board effective today. Luca Concone is to be nominated as CEO, and Laura Amoretti will remain as interim CEO until the EGM, then she will cover the role of interim COO.

Non-executive Board member change, as explained in the press release, and the transition is in place. A provision of EUR 34 million related to the investigation in Switzerland has been done, which will be covered later in this presentation. The postponement of potential ratification of the buyback transaction by the shareholder is to the 30 June 2023. The Board believes this leaves the company in a solid position to start a new phase with improved governance and strong results. And neither the company nor its subsidiaries, are parties to the criminal investigation in Switzerland. We are looking forward to answering questions on business and governance in today's Q&A session and going forward.

With this, I hand over to Laura Amoretti and Sergio Signoretti for the presentation of Q3 trading update. And let me express my sincere gratitude and respect for the excellent work they have been doing during the past weeks. Laura, please?

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Thank you, Laurent, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. First, I would like to give you a market update, which you can see here on Page 7. It's very important to note that due to the complexity of our business, there is not one market source that will exactly represent lastminute.com activity, due to the fact that we integrated dynamic package into our offering and also META business. But we think that commercial flight activity is a good proxy to follow the market trends, even if the data refer to the activity flow not directly comparable with bookings.

Also, you may have noticed that older market data related to the travel industry in Europe come more or less to the same conclusion. You can see here the combined curve of our core market -- Germany, U.K., France, Italy and Spain compared to 2019, which shows a steep recovery path from January to June. Then the recovery slowed down due to the capacity disruption seen in the European airport as well as the rising fuel prices and deteriorating economic outlook in general, that obviously has a weigh on the recovery. So overall, we have seen ongoing recovery, flattened in the summer, but we are still below 2019 levels in our core European market.

And let's move on to the Q3 overall performance. So now I'm on Page 8, the equity overview. We also are seeing a strong recovery with a very solid performance. The figures you see here show the development in Q3 2022 compared to the same quarter last year. Bear in mind that booking gross level value holiday package reflect just the data of OTA, because META is a totally different segment that doesn't produce booking or GTV. But of course, it's a part of our consolidated financials.

When we look at the volume, in Q3 2022, our booking increased by 33% and gross travel value rose a record value. Customers are spending significantly more with us even compared to the pre-pandemic level. Revenues were up 49%, so also a strong growth versus last year, but this is the effect of our strategy on shifting our mix toward holiday packages, and revenue benefited from that shift. Holiday package accounted now 61% of contribution margin compared to 49% in 2019.

In terms of profitability, we have seen a remarkable recovery. If you carve out the government subsidies that we received in Q3 2021, the adjusted EBITDA grew by 21% and our net financial position was very solid at the end of September and almost double versus September 2019 -- 2021, sorry.

With that, let's move on Page 9. Here, I would like to take you through all the strategic and operational initiatives that we have been working on continuously, and that we have made good progress on Q3 despite the disruption on the government side, which you all know. This initiative are not just related to the growth of the holiday package and the improvement on customer care, but also on product excellence and brand awareness.

Regarding our holiday package business in Q3, we have launched the dynamic package category in 5 new markets: Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Belgium and Poland, which were opened in August; and Finland and Romania were launched at the beginning of November. Some of these markets were opened through our white label partnership, some of them directly. And also, we implemented a new billing system to support this business from a per-office perspective.

On the customer operations side, we are very focused on improving the booking experience. And to do so, we moved from the very high degree of externalization that was in place pre-pandemic to a more balanced approach. We opened a dedicated customer care site in Q3, and we completed the ramp-up of a customer hub in Bangalore, where we have now more than 200 people with a strong expertise in the GDS flight booking system. And with that setup, we have reached 46% of our internal customer support, while this number was just 4% in 2019.

This, in addition, on the ongoing improvements we are making. For example, we're introducing a new way of interaction with the customer through the chat, and we're opening a dedicated channel to assist the people impacted from the operational disruption in the airport and also a 24/7 service. All these efforts are already reflected on the customer perception, where we noticed a significant improvement on the Net Promoter Score since the first quarter on 2022.

In terms of product excellence, in Q3, we concluded the hiring of over 100 tech experts and developers as a part of our strategic initiative of hiring tech and reach our tech DNA. And next week, we will have a product at Tech conference in Barcelona to kick off all the initiatives around product improvement and implementation. To maximize the impact of our sponsorship investment to increase our brand awareness, we launched the VIP package during the Tour de France reveal event. As a sponsor, we can offer VIP ticket and bundle them with attractive travel package to the major city.

The last initiative I want to mention is not exactly an operational one, but it's very important for our company. We want to publish our first ESG report in 2023, but apart of the report, we want to embed ESG strategy in the daily thinking of the company. So we established a dedicated ESG function as part of the finance team to drive this initiative. So we are implementing the initiatives we had planned.

And with that, I hand over to Sergio for a deep dive through the numbers.

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

Thank you very much, Laura. Good morning all. Pleased to meet you again. So I'm on Page 10 now, which represents with a bit more numeric ground the performance of Q3, versus Q3 2021 and Q3 2019. Let me just -- remember that this is probably the first time that the company has hold a quarterly investor call, which I think is an important step forward in order to have a broader and wider communication to the market about the performance and about what is going on.

In order to comment the figure, which are, of course, consistent with what Laura was saying before, we closed Q3 2022 with EUR 82 million revenues versus EUR 55 million of last year. So with a plus 49% increase. which is driven by plus 33% in volumes and a significant increase in GTV, so almost doubled versus last year, also driven by the higher mix of dynamic packaging sales. This represents, at gross profit level, an increase of approximately 17% versus last year, EUR 30 million versus EUR 26 million.

Of course, the gross profit trend take also into account the higher marketing performance spend that we are doing in order to recover volumes and GTV, and the investment done at customer care level in order to improve the quality of service that Laura was just describing. At adjusted EBITDA level, if we carve out the government subsidies received last year in Q3, so I would focus you on the last line of the slide, we are 21% ahead. So we were EUR 10 million last year, we are at EUR 12 million in Q3 2022, which again confirms the strong level of recovery of the profitability of the company.

Versus 2019, we are progressively recovering profitability. Remember, this has been, as Laura was saying before, a flat summer in the sense that the market has recovered a lot from March to May. And then it has been impacted by the operational disruptions that all of us experienced when traveling across -- especially across Europe during the summer months. Whereas, 2019 was a year which experienced a very significant peak in the months between June and August, that has not been registered this year.

With that, I will go forward to the comments of the 9 months results, going directly to Page 12, which once more show the strong level of recovery of the business that we are experiencing. So on the first -- on the left part of the slide, you see the volumes. So 9 months volumes are 3.4 million bookings versus the 1.6 million of last year, so we have doubled the volumes versus 2021. We are at minus 15% versus 2019, which is where the market is today. Remember, this is 9 months figure, so we are having better than the market in terms of the overall recovery, considering that in the first 3 to 4 months of this year, the market was approximately a minus 40% versus 2019.

If we translate it into gross travel value, gross value is the money that we received from our customers when they pay for the bookings that they buy on our website, we are talking about EUR 2.5 billion which is almost tripled versus 2021, and it's plus 11% versus 2019. And this is, again, a whole time high record driven mostly by the holiday package sales mix.

With that, I will go to the Page 13, which shows revenues and gross profit trends. So you see that at revenues level, we are closing the quarter and the year-to-date figures with EUR 242 million revenues versus EUR 105 million last year. So it's 2.5x the level of revenues recorded last year. The OTA revenues, which are represented in magenta color are at 2019 level already. So EUR 222 million versus EUR 229 million. The only gap that we are registering there is related to the media revenues, which is reported down, which have not yet entirely recovered, but we are talking about 5% of the overall OTA revenues.

At gross profit level, again, we are almost doubling versus last year. So it's a plus 83% increase, EUR 91 million versus EUR 50 million. And we are at minus 20%, so still recovering strongly versus 2019. Also here, we have the impact of the higher marketing spend that would we -- especially performance marketing spend, that we are incurring in order to sustain the recovery and the growth of volumes.

Going to the next slide, which is related to the fixed -- what we define fixed cost base. If we start from the left, we see the level of the HR cost, EUR 46 million over the 9 months, which is increasing versus last year, mostly because we are investing in people. We are investing in talent. As Laura was saying, we have hired 130 people for the tech department in order to strengthen the capabilities of our technology teams over the last year. We have completed this program over summer. And therefore, the HR costs are progressively going to match the 2019 level.

Whereas on the running costs, also on all the other operating expenses, we are keeping on having the strong cost reductions, efficiencies generated during the COVID period with EUR 17.8 million, so EUR 18 million versus EUR 22 million, so with a 20%, 19% decrease versus the pre-COVID level, which is, as you see below, approximately 1% of incremental EBITDA margin generated by the cost reduction programs. And that is something that is expected to prolong forward for the coming years.

Moving to the next one, which is Page 15. This is the 9 months figures represented in numbers, again, comparing 2022 versus 2021 versus 2019. I would not enter into the numbers again because I already commented, I just want to point out the adjusted EBITDA level. Remember, the adjusted EBITDA is the representation of what is the profitability of the 2 business units that we have in the group, the OTA and the META. And especially if you look at the last 2 lines, the last 2 lines represent the comparison versus 2021, so the adjusted EBITDA have more than doubled.

If you look at the numbers, again, in the -- at the bottom of the page. But if you sterilize the impact of government subsidies received this year and last year, which is reported in the last line of the slide, we closed the 9 months with EUR 35 million. We have received EUR 1 million of government subsidies in Q1 of this year, and we were at breakeven last year. So this shows a huge growth of profitability, which is going back almost to 2019 level, which was EUR 49 million as of the 9 months.

Let me go then to what happens below adjusted EBITDA, so to the IFRS EBITDA figures. Where in order to compare like-for-like figures versus last year, here, we have -- we are starting with EUR 35 million, which is the adjusted EBITDA net of government subsidies. As you see, the cancellation effect is much, much lower than what was in 2021 and what was in, of course, 2020 during the COVID pandemic. It's approximately 6% of the overall departures, which is driven by the operational disruptions that Laura was commenting. It's not driven anymore by the pandemic, of course.

So we have not yet to what was the 2019 level. But of course, we are not talking about rate similar to the 20% we were in last year or even the 80% that we were having in 2020. The impact of cancellations is entirely -- almost entirely offset by the residual voucher misredemption. As you may remember, the voucher campaign has been massive campaign launched by program during COVID order to minimize the absorption of cash and to give to the customer a very flexible instrument in order to be repaid -- to be refunded. So still 30% of the vouchers, which expire, not redeemed at the expiry date, this generates EUR 10 million revenues since the liabilities, which almost entirely offset the cancellation impact.

Then we have recorded a reduction in the liability towards employees for the incentive plan, which is related to the devaluation of the stock price of Lastminute, which accounts for approximately EUR 7.6 million. And therefore, the IFRS EBITDA prior to the provision that we have posted and was commented in the press release, and I will comment in a second, it's EUR 41 million. EUR 41 million compares versus a minus EUR 8 million last year, carving out from 2021 figures, the government subsidies.

Then of course, as we will see, we have posted a provision of EUR 34 million related to the investigation. Again, hold for a second, I will comment in the next slide. So that IFRS EBITDA net of government subsidy provision is EUR 7 million. And putting in the EUR 1 million receipt of government subsidies within first quarter, we get to the reported figures which is EUR 8 million.

Now let me go back to the investigation in order to give an update, and then of course, we can, if needed, go through that also in the Q&A session. You know that the criminal investigation of the prosecutor of the Canton Ticino is still ongoing. The criminal investigation is against individuals, as we said a number of times, is not against the companies. The companies have received CHF 28.5 million of government subsidies across the period between March 2020 and February 2022, which have been utilized in order to pay the salaries of the employees.

From what is understood by the company, the investigation aims to assess where that certain employees worked more hours than the hour declared, and therefore, the companies have received more government subsidies than what they were entitled to. In parallel, there is an audit which is performed by the relevant Swiss authority, which is the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, which stands for SECO, it's the Swiss authority which rules the irrigation of these type of subsidies.

SECO is carrying an audit on the administrative side, which is basically aimed to review if all the relevant requirements, in order to access the short-time work allowances, have been met throughout the period of COVID, and in general, where the withdrawals of allowances have been made in compliance with the law. In parallel, the Board has initiated an internal investigation as well. And in the reason of the preliminary findings resulting from this investigation, the company have conservatively posted a provision of EUR 34 million which is related to the entire amount of government subsidies received across the 2 years by the 3 legal entities, and the connected legal costs already incurred and potentially included in the future.

This represents the maximum financial liability of the legal proceeding associated to the COVID matter related to the ongoing investigation, and the company, of course, is reserving the right in order to act on an involved person, which, of course, will be based on the outcomes on the investigations, which we remember is still at a very, very preliminary stage.

Having said that, I will move on to the bottom line, which is represented at Page 18. Again, I think we need to look at the performance first. So the EUR 41 million of IFRS EBITDA prior to the provision and prior to the subsidies received should be compared with the 2019 figures over the 9 months, which was EUR 45 million. So in terms of performance and in terms of profitability at IFRS EBITDA level, we are almost back to what was the 2019 performance. Of course, then the reported EBITDA at IFRS level needs to take into account both the government subsidies received and the provision, so it's EUR 8 million.

Same consideration should be done at the bottom line level. So I invite you to go through to the last line where you see a net result which, again, prior to the posting of the subsidies and prior to the posting of the provision, would have been EUR 18 million. EUR 18 million would compare versus EUR 19 million, which was the bottom line of the first 9 months of 2019. Of course, posting the provisioning, we get to a negative net loss of EUR 9 million, which is reported in the line net results reported. But again, the pre-provision, IFRS EBITDA and bottom line are back to 2019 level, and this confirms what is the fundamental economic strong fundamentals of the group in our view.

Now let us go to cash, which is represented at Page 19. The red curve represents the gross cash, which has been EUR 144 million as of the end of September versus EUR 134 million as of September 2021. As you see, there has been a solid, strong, very steep increase of the gross cash up to July, with a peak of approximately EUR 220 million across June and July. Then considering the flat summer trend, the cash has not increased anymore. Of course, we have started to repay the hotels and to repay the suppliers related to the summer period bookings. And that's why you see the absorption, which is a bit steeper than last year because, again, it has been a flat summer in terms of volumes, as also Laura was representing before.

But what is more important, I think, is to note the blue line, which is the net financial position. Net financial position have doubled versus the same period of 2021, EUR 91 million versus EUR 47 million, which again shows a very good, a very strong cash position despite the different seasonality that we had versus last year and versus 2019.

If we go to the next page, which is Page 20. This represents the bridge of the cash flow and of the gross cash position between the beginning of the year and the end of September. So we started the year with EUR 110 million, we ended September with EUR 144 million. So the cash generation across the 9 months has been EUR 35 million. Out of this, approximately 100, summing up the 2 pink boxes is the combination of the EBITDA IFRS for the period and the net working capital. Of course, the provision done has not a cash impact, is a conservative provision done as of now.

The line -- the box, which is related to the financing shows that we are progressively reducing our liability towards the banks. So in the first 9 months, we have repaid EUR 13 million debt. The gray box, CapEx and other, includes the capital expenditures of the period, and includes also the advanced payment done of the first tranche of the reseller transaction that was commented over the press release and which was actually suspended and postponed to the first half of 2023, and which is recorded as a financial receivable as you see in the box related to the financial assets.

Having said that, I would -- take over again, Laura, for the takeaways of the call.

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Thanks, Sergio. I'm now on Page 22, and I would like to summarize what we said before. On the operational and strategic initiative, we are delivering what we planned. Financially, we are continuing on our recovery path also in Q3 despite the investigation. Revenue and adjusted EBITDA are more than doubled in the first 9 months of 2022. We have posted the provision related to the investigation.

As you have seen, we are changing the governance not only on the executive but also on the non executive level. And now we are happy to take all your questions.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions]

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Okay. So we can start with the first question about META. Why is META segment so far below 2019 levels? Laura, please.

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Yes, I can answer to this. So, it depends on the geographical shift from France to U.S.A. market. Historically, France was the first contributor and the good contributor in terms of profitability, while U.S. market is an interesting market, but less profitable. Also, we also shift our marketing spending from the marketing paid to a direct traffic. We also push a lot our app, and this is reflecting of this result. So it's more a long-term strategy that we want to implement on the META side.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Okay. Pier, please?

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes, I Okay. I think that we should hand over to the governance question, Laurent, because we haven't received so far any other, let's say, questions on business-wise?

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Okay. Yes, okay. So I can take the question regarding Luca Concone as new CEO, and regarding the new governance with the 2 executive directors. So Luca Concone is a step to reinforce governance and ensure compliance, as well as to strengthen the management team, of course. And Luca is an experienced manager with skills and competencies required to lead lastminute.com. Laura Amoretti remains as interim CEO until the appointment of Luca Concone, of course. And at that point, she will remain with the role of the Interim CEO and remain a candidate for the full-time position after the search is concluded.

The Board has full confidence in Laura Amoretti, and she will continue as acting CEO until the next EGM. About the search, the Board initiated the search for a top executive Board member to be the main responsible for managing the Group's business across all geographies. The search will continue and will be now formally named COO search. As before, Laura Amoretti is, of course, candidate in this search for a permanent position. The key criteria include, of course, for this search of COO long-standing management experience as well as competencies in digital and travel sector.

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

I would just add that, of course, Luca and Laura are not alone. We have spent a big amount of time looking for new Board member candidates. And we believe the Board that we're proposing now brings an unparalleled blend of experience and skills to the company, which are particularly relevant to the current phase of the development, right? We have people with a very, very strong track record as the worldwide leader in online travel like [ CRE ], right, and extensive Board and general business management know-how brought by [ Jan ], by Luca and by others. Technology entrepreneur and innovation with [ Valentin ], Legal and Crisis Management with [ Paola ], and communication Investment Banking.

So we think entire Board, including the executive and nonexecutive, comes in a much more reinforced fashion. Thank you, Javier.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes. Okay. I mean we have received another question. Have you received any indicative interest regarding a potential takeover offer?

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Javier, maybe could you answer?

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Well, yes. No, so in general, we cannot comment and we never comment on this element, right? Next question.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes. Yes. We have another question, why were you not able to attack the high-caliber CEO after months of time that you had as Chairman to successfully find a suitable candidate?

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

I think we just answered that one.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes, Javier [indiscernible].

[Laurent Foata, executive]

About -- I can see about sales process. I would say today, the Board and the management are focused on executing the strategy and navigating the troubled market trends and committed to delivering value for shareholders and the execution of this strategy is underway, as evidenced by the Q3 results.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Okay. We received another question. Why is the presale transaction only postponed and not canceled completely?

[Laurent Foata, executive]

On this question, I would let Sergio answer.

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

Yes, Laurent. So I mean these transactions have been put in place before the investigation started in Switzerland. It's always been subject to shareholder ratification. Of course, the scenario has changed with all this happened since the 19th of July onwards. And I would say that the Board that has considered that this is not in the interest of the company to present the transaction for approval of shareholders at this point. and has worked with all the parties in order to agree on a further postponement.

I think probably it could make sense to comment because we are receiving a number of questions on the buyback, so I think it's good also to extend the question to what the answers through the buyback, which is actually something that the Board has decided to stop, to suspend for the time being. Also given the fact that the company has been in a substantially permanent blackout period. Of course, the company will communicate to the market whether this position will change or not. And it's important to remember that share buybacks require the company to be completely aligned with the market in terms of information, and in terms of price sensitive information, which is something that considering the ongoing investigation may not be the case.

Because the company may become aware of determine the price-sensitive facts that needs to be communicated to the market through other PR in a very short notice depending on what is the progressive evolution of the investigation. Of course, if a price-sensitive information needs to be published during trading hours that sits -- as we informed, 1.5 hours prior to the announcement. And so given the risk of becoming aware of information, while share buyback is carried on, the company is under legal advice in a position of stopping the buyback and postpone it until the situation becomes clearer. That's the reason for which the Board has decided to stop the buyback so far.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Okay. There's a couple of questions on will you sue ex-management as they cause millions of damage to the company, plus losses in market capitalization? And there's a question whether, Laura, who was investigated, why she hasn't resigned yet. I will take that, those 2.

So first, well, the market cap of the company is down as a big part of all technology stocks in the world. I think the trading is solid as we have just announced, and that's probably the focus that the Board is trying to continue to ensure that there's continuity and we put all of the measures we can in place to absorb the shock that has been kind of the removal of the 2 top executives. It's been a very complex period. And I think the team and Laura in front has managed exceptionally well to deliver extremely strong results.

In terms of asking for responsibilities, I think we believe the criminal investigation -- we -- remember people that the criminal investigation still running and it is in early stages. So the company is working with legal advisers to ensure that any decision we make is in line with legal the condition in place and relevant legal provision. But remember that it's early, no one has been indicted so far, right?

Also remember that under Swiss Criminal Procedure Code, the term recuse person covers a wide range, wide spectrum of situations and includes, besides persons that are charged on an offense, also persons that are only investigated suspected of an offense, right? So for now, we have full support of Laura, and don't see a reason for her resignation.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Okay. Thanks a lot, Javier. We have received another question, which is business related. How is consumers booking behavior currently changing given the current recession periods?

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

I can take this one. So our sources show that travel market in Europe will entirely recover versus pre-COVID level in 2024. We are now approximately at minus 15%, but our current trading is in line with what we are seeing in the market. So we experienced the flat recovery curve in Europe, that could maybe contract a bit more in the last quarter of the year, but we remain cautiously optimistic.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Yes, if I can add maybe Laura to this. Yes, we are seeing, let me say, also seasonal softer Q4. We, of course, see a potential uncertainty due to macroeconomic factors. I mean there is a war which is 1.5 hours by plane from where we are. All the sources that we utilize say that a full market recovery is expected in 2024. So 2023 is expected to be still, I would say, slightly recovery versus today. Again, we are at minus 15%, but not entirely recovering. So it's going to be a slight increase probably, versus what is the current trading market level of 2022.

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

This is related to the European environment because in U.S., they already reached the pre-pandemic level.

So I also have some -- see some question about related to our relationship with Booking. So I meet them a month ago. I don't see any criticism in our relationship. So -- and the demonstration is that we had launched a new market in collaboration with them, as I said during the presentation. For sure, we want also to implement a new distributor on this area.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Okay. There is a question on the level of EBITDA. In Q4, the EUR 4 million, EUR 5 million per month?

No. The answer is no. So it will be lower. This is what we expect on a monthly basis, because the seasonality, of course, is impacting the business, which is as normal. So it's going to be, I would say, lower than that.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Sergio, there's a question about the overall market? And do you expect the gap for 2019 to continue to narrow? What is the market growth, which you expect for -- yes.

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

Yes, I was answering that before Javier, sorry, before. So basically, what -- there is a general expectation on the fact that the market will slightly, slightly low versus the minus 15% versus 2019, where we are today, which means it's going to be between minus 15% and 0%. The full level of recovery is expected at least at European level in 2024. So we should not expect here a year like this year when we started from a minus 50% and now we are at minus 15%. It's going to be more something which goes from minus 15% to a minus 5%.

So a modest increase considering also the macroeconomic trend. It's true that there is a huge pent-up demand. People want to travel. Consumers want to travel. But the combination of cost of fuel, imported inflation, electricity bills on the wallet of our consumers, and we are, again, also relying on major markets, also think to the potential devaluation of the pounds in the U.K., which is an important market for us are something which bring cautiousness. And again, this is consistent with all the major market forecast that we will be asked.

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Okay. Another question is related to the subscription programs like eDreams. So I can take this. And after if Sergio want to add something. For sure that we are interesting on building a loyal customer base. We want to gain value not only in the acquisition, but also in retention. So we look the other competitor like eDreams related to the Prime program. At this moment, we implemented an internal some experiment on this way, but we are not focused on launch now this kind of program.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

So there is also a question on investors' letters. Have we received these investor letters. We have received several letters, which we have examined carefully. Many of the proposals, including the letters, have already been under consideration by the Board. And hopefully, what we're announcing today kind of satisfies a number of those. So notably, people requested why to suspend Fabio Cannavale and Andrea Bertoli, which we did. And now we have their formal final resignation from the Board. To postpone the buyback transaction, which is done. To name and ensure business continuity, so we named an interim CEO and we kind of work with interim CEO to ensure that the organization works, to ensure that all of the operational aspects would work. And we now have named a new CEO and a new Board.

So I think a lot of what we've done is covered mostly investor letters. And we've had questions also on selling or not selling the company in those investor letters, but as we mentioned before, that's something we don't think it's an interest of anyone to comment at this point.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Okay. I see that there is a question by Rory Stocks of [indiscernible], why that the region covers all the payment from other jurisdictions.

The answer is not. So the provision covers just the ongoing investigations. So let's remember the amount that we are talking about. We are talking about CHF 28 million received across the 2 years for government subsidy in Switzerland. Across the other jurisdictions, we have received the EUR 6 million across the 2 years.

The only country that has opened an investigation, and that's already 5 months, more or less, is Switzerland. So the provision covers the provision, again, conservative for the entire amount and for the related legal expenses incurred and potentially to be incurred.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Javier, we have a question about resellers.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Which one, sorry. Can you read?

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

On the chart.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Which one? There's a number -- you can read the question.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes, but it's a bit long, but it's a question. According to the information from the end of June, Fabio Cannavale continues to hold a strong stake in the company via the main shareholder, Freesailors, according to information at the time, a control a good 72% of Freesailors. Can you answer to the question of what will happen with this share will it be continue to have controlling majority, et cetera?

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Okay. So I mean, we are not Freesailors, right, so we can't really talk about Freesailors, but Freesailors remains the controlling shareholder of Lastminute, I think at this point, and Fabio is a shareholder from what we know of Freesailors, and we continue having all of his rights intact as a shareholder. There's not much more we can say. And of course, the Board -- and the company and the Board is fully independent from any shareholder.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Okay. Sergio, have you covered the questions about the cash position?

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

Yes, I think we have commented already. I don't know what you are referring to. I was commenting before when I was illustrating...

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes, yes. Just because we received, in the meantime, some questions. So okay.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

There's a couple further on balance sheet. I don't know if you can further provide additional detail or not. Current assets and liabilities.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Maybe, Javier, I think that it will be better if we can take them off-line because they are basically asked pretty much detailed, let's say, answer and we do have at the moment. So in order to be very, let's say, consistent, we would prefer to...

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

We will provide all the answers relevant -- to the relevant questions also after the investigation, with the proper numbers detailed at balance sheet level. So I mean, this is a consolidated full financial statement balance sheet. So every detail is available.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Yes. There was another question around, let's say, about the investor relation activities. So when you will finally start road show and participate in conference as other listed companies do?

I think that we -- I mean, of course, the idea -- I think that we have shown to the market, we have boosted our Investor Relation approach. We are more than keen to restart that same activity. Currently, we are actually envisaging to restart, let's say, full activity once the EGM will be reconvened, and so the new governance will be set up.

Yes, we have received something about, let's say, our -- one of the key managers of the company. So Missy [indiscernible] still working for Lastminute? If yes, do you think that it's going to be for the future?

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

That's more for Laura to answer. Laura?

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Yes, he's still working for Lastminute. So he's one of our key manager that is in charge now of the OTA part.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Pier, do we cover all the questions we received?

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

So far, I would say, yes. There are some questions, unfortunately, that were already answered as well. So that's why we are, let's say, struggling to...

[Sergio Signoretti, executive]

No, I think that it's one question. I think there is one question. I don't know whether, Laurent, Javier, you want to answer or we can answer that, which is related to the compensation of the managers involved. In particular, there is a question from Alan, who asked whether Fabio Cannavale and Andrea Bertoli forfeit their long-term incentive plan, stock option plan scheme benefits now that they have resigned.

[Unknown Executive]

Yes -- no. So the answer is no, they have not. And we said before in respect to what the company should do or would do around it. It's -- we, of course, reserve all of our options open. But it is also true that we need to work with a legal investigation agenda and timing. And since the investigation is really preliminary steps and no one has been even indicted so far, so formerly accused like we know in most countries, then frankly, there's nothing the company can do in this respect. At this point or we're working with legal counsels to understand what the options are.

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Yes. And also, the stock option plan -- the stock options are not vested anyway. So that's...

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

It's -- most of the options are not vested.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Yes. Okay. Thank you. All right. All of the questions are details on balance sheet that you will be provided kind of later on.

[Pier Comoglio, executive]

Absolutely, yes. I think that all questions are covered. So I thank you all for your attendance. And let's see to the next investor call.

[Laurent Foata, executive]

Thank you very much all for the patience and the attention.

[Laura Amoretti, executive]

Thank you.

[Javier Perez-Tenessa, executive]

Thank you.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, the conference is now over. Thank you for choosing Chorus Call, and thank you for participating in the conference. You may now disconnect your lines. Goodbye.