Syensqo SA
XBRU:SYENS
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Earnings Call Analysis
Q1-2024 Analysis
Syensqo SA
Syensqo has recently completed its first earnings call since its separation from Solvay. The results for the first quarter of 2024 were reported as marginally above expectations. The company emphasized that while year-over-year comparisons were complicated by strong performance in Q1 2023, there were signs of stabilization and sequential improvement from Q4 2023.
Syensqo reported a net sales figure of €1.6 billion for Q1 2024, a decrease of 10% compared to Q1 2023. However, EBITDA showed a significant sequential improvement of 23% from Q4 2023, reaching €363 million, with an EBITDA margin of 22.3%. The company's EPS stood at €1.48. These results were driven by stronger volumes and improved product mix, particularly in the Materials segment.
The Materials segment, which generates over 85% of Syensqo's EBITDA, was a standout performer. Composite Materials showed a remarkable 16% revenue growth due to better volumes and increased pricing, particularly in commercial aerospace and defense applications. Conversely, Specialty Polymers faced challenges with lower volumes, especially in Electronics and Medical, but saw slight growth in batteries.
Syensqo has maintained a disciplined approach towards capital expenditure, with €72 million spent on growth capital in Q1 2024. This includes €28 million on research and innovation and €44 million on capacity expansions. The company plans to continue investing in these growth opportunities to position itself well for the future. The total capital expenditure umbrella for 2024 remains between €600 million and €650 million.
The company's strong cash generation was notable, with positive cash flow from operating activities of €244 million, resulting in a cash conversion rate of 89%. The balance sheet showed further improvement, with net debt at €1.5 billion and a net debt leverage ratio below 1x. Despite expected cash outflows in Q2 due to dividends and a legal settlement, the financial position remains robust with significant liquidity available.
For the full year 2024, Syensqo targets an underlying EBITDA in the range of €1.4 billion to €1.55 billion, with free cash flow between €400 million and €500 million. While there is improved volume momentum, the overall demand environment remains uncertain. The company expects continued positive momentum into Q2 but has not adjusted its full-year guidance yet. The focus will remain on maintaining pricing discipline and managing costs effectively.
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Hello, and welcome to the Syensqo First Quarter 2024 Results Call for analysts and investors. Please note, this conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] I will now hand you over to Sherief Bakr, Head of Investor Relations, to begin today's conference. Thank you.
Hello, everyone, and welcome to Syensqo's First Quarter 2024 Earnings Call, and I'm joined today in Brussels with our CEO, Ilham Kadri; and our CFO, Chris Davis.
As a reminder, today's call is being recorded and will be accessible for replay on the Investor Relations section of our website later today at syensqo.com/investors.
I'd also like to remind you that during this call, we will be making forward-looking statements regarding our future business and financial performance that are subject to risks and uncertainties. The slides related to this presentation, along with today's press release are also available to download from our website.
Okay. Turning to today's agenda. Ilham will begin with an overview of our first quarter 2024, and Chris will then go into more details on our financial performance before turning the call back to Ilham, who will touch on our outlook for Q2 and the balance of the year. We'll then be happy to take your questions.
With that, I'll turn the call over to Ilham.
Thank you very much, Sherief, and good afternoon, good morning to everyone. Today marks the first earnings call for Syensqo. Following our separation from Solvay and along with our teams, we are fully focused on unleashing the full potential of our growth strategy, which we believe will unlock significant value for our stakeholders.
Indeed, I have been inspired by the renewed sense of purpose and energy that the separation has fueled, which is already providing new opportunities to better serve our customers and allocate capital more efficiently and effectively. And this all comes after a historic and somewhat hectic 2023.
So it has been 2 months since we last presented our full-year financial results for 2023. And in that time, I'm pleased to report that we have now delivered results in line with expectations for the quarter, continue to improve our financial position, sharpened our capital expenditure and research and innovation priorities. And last but not the least, we did this without disturbing a single customer.
Syensqo's first full quarter saw us deliver on the outlook we provided you at the time of our full-year results. And Chris will take you through some of the details of our quarter 1 performance a bit later. But at a high level and as expected, we saw improving volume momentum compared to the fourth quarter of last year, particularly in Novecare and Specialty Polymers, consistent with the trends we referenced in March.
While the overall demand environment has improved in a number of our end markets from the lows of last year, confirming our view that quarter 4 of last year was the bottom of our quarterly EBITDA performance, just we told you in March.
But it's too early to call it a trend. Indeed, we continue to see it as more of stabilization of demand, primarily driven by the absence of destocking rather than being due to a significant improvement in underlying demand, and I'll come back to this later when discussing the outlook for the year.
Turning to the highlights for quarter 1. The improvement in momentum in quarter 1 also translated to our financial performance, with underlying EBITDA, as you've seen it, up 23% compared to quarter 4 2023, with a strong sequential margin improvement to 22.3%, which we believe to be best-in-class.
Gross margin, another important metric for a specialty company, also [Audio Gap] reaching 35.9% in quarter 1. And despite the impact of lower year-on-year volumes, we demonstrated strong gross margin resilience down by only 70 basis points. Our quarter 1 gross margin performance also compares favorably to the full year 2023 gross margin of 34.8%. This is up by 110 basis points, reflecting the specialty nature of our business and a higher mix of high-margin Materials net sales.
Over the last few years, this is a metric that has shown consistent and steady improvements and not just in the years of inflationary tailwinds, up by more than 500 basis points since 2019, the year I joined Solvay. We also continued to deliver strong cash conversion, reaching almost 90%, which helped us to further deleverage our balance sheet with a leverage ratio below 1x at the end of quarter 1.
The first quarter of the year also saw us accelerate the execution of our growth strategy, which has brought a new energy and [ focused ] growth across the organization. We see it in the engagement of our people and how we are already better serving our customers.
We have also taken the opportunity with our team to drill down, sharpen our innovation and commercial pipeline to ensure we are prioritizing our investments and strengthening our commercial practices to deliver value to our customers and support our growth.
In conjuncture with these initiatives, we are developing what we call the [ handing ] culture, which will allow us to capture incremental share at a faster pace than before. As you can see on the slide, it has been a busy first few months at Syensqo, including, by the way, the announcement of a number of exciting partnerships, which will advance the next generation of our clean mobility innovations.
In January, we announced a partnership with DS Penske Formula E team, part of Stellantis Group, giving us the ideal opportunity to showcase our high-performance materials for lightweighting and battery technologies for electrification in the world's most sustainable sports.
Continuing on this theme, we renewed our partnership with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, focused on advancing the circularity within our sector. With over 80% of Syensqo's innovation pipeline dedicated to developing sustainable solutions, the partnership underscores our commitment to contribute to the transformation of value chains towards circular business model.
And in the field of truly groundbreaking or I should say, air braking innovation, we announced that Syensqo will be the main technological partner for a new emission-free project, a green hydrogen-powered airplane, which will fly nonstop around the earth.
The Climate Impulse project aims to revolutionize the aviation industry using Syensqo's thermoplastic composite materials, membranes and adhesives to provide the required lightness of the aircraft and fuel cells, mechanical and [ thermal ] properties to maintain liquid green hydrogen at minus [ 253 ] degrees centigrade. This is almost the absolute zero during the estimated 9 days of the flight.
Continuing on the theme of disruptive innovation, we launched syensqo.ai in February. Only 3 months since its launch, we have already seen tangible benefits across the company, boosting our innovation, better equipping our sales team to [ hand ] and making our operations smarter and more responsive.
This was then complemented by one of my favorite events of the year, our Innovation Week program, which took place in March, focused on the bleeding edge of science and how we collaborate with some of the leading start-ups and institutions in the world.
During the first quarter, we also launched a number of new innovations into the market, covering both our specialty materials and consumer segments. For example, in Composite Materials, we launched our next generation of epoxy-based structural adhesives for our customers in advanced end mobility, commercial aerospace and defense, which will support higher rates of assembly and joining.
We also launched a new Polyphenylsulfone or commonly named PPSU films for our Automotive customers to increase energy efficiency and sustainability in e-motors. And for our Novecare business, we added a brand-new specialty additive for waterborne architectural paint as an alternative to fluorosurfactant products. Additionally, we launched a new-generation specialty monomers designed to improve adhesion and provide excellent corrosion protection in waterborne direct-to-metal coating.
A fundamental leg of our strategy is to solve the unmet needs of our customers. And to do that, we need to master their application processes better than anybody else, working in the lockstep with them to align our road maps, deepen our relationships and enhance our value proposition.
At the end of quarter 1, we announced the opening of new state-of-the-art application development lab in Bollate, Italy, dedicated to Specialty Polymers, which complements by the way, the other application labs we have today in the United States of America, in South Korea, in China and soon in Belgium.
This has translated to a significant increase in the number of customer visits, particularly at the CTO and researchers level, covering multiple end markets and technologies, creating new opportunities to win more business with them. This was quickly followed by more groundbreaking, in this case, relating to our production site at the heart of the American battery belts in Georgia.
Together with our joint venture partner, Orbia, and with more than 40% of the project funded by the Department of Energy and local incentives, the site will be the largest production facility in North America enabling the long-term growth of the EV and hybrid mobility industry with our differentiated suspension-grade PVDF technology. Indeed, we were also joined by a number of largest Automotive customers, who we look forward to supporting over the coming years.
And finally, we recently announced a bolt-on acquisition of JinYoung Bio, which will extend the portfolio within Novecare to high-value specialty dermocosmetic skincare and haircare applications. And from a sustainability perspective, their flagship ceramide products are produced to biotechnology aligned with one of our 4 major growth platforms.
So before turning the call over to Chris, I wanted to make some high-level comments on our segment's performance in quarter 1. As a reminder, Syensqo's mix of revenue and earnings reflects our position as one of the leading pure-play specialty companies. Indeed, in quarter 1, more than 85% of our total EBITDA was generated by our high-margin Materials segment.
This was led by another strong quarter of year-on-year growth in Composite Materials, driven by demand in both civil aviation and defense as well as healthy margin expansion.
Following the record performance in quarter 1 2023 when year-on-year revenues grew by 18%, Specialty Polymers saw year-on-year declines, albeit with slight growth in batteries. At a segment level and as expected, net pricing was modestly lower, primarily driven by Specialty Polymers, partially offset by an increase in Composite Materials. Combined with strong margin improvements in Composite Materials, this supported healthy EBITDA margin expansion compared to quarter 4 2023, reaching 33.1%.
Now for Consumer & Resources, we saw improved momentum in most end markets, particularly in coatings, industrial applications and personal care, consistent with the trends we called out on our last quarter's call.
The exception remains Agro, as we told you, where we, like many of our peers, continue to see soft demand. Nevertheless, with a 5% sequential increase in revenues, combined with improved margin in all business units, which resulted in underlying EBITDA margin of 15.5%.
I now turn the call over to Chris before we discuss our outlook for the second quarter and the balance of the year. Chris, the floor is yours.
Thank you very much, Ilham. Good morning and good afternoon to everyone on the call. As Ilham has already mentioned, we delivered a set of results marginally above expectations. With that in mind, let us turn to Slide 9, which looks at the summary of our financial results.
As expected, the first quarter of 2024 saw a significant sequential improvement in performance, with net sales and EBITDA in the quarter increasing 3% and 23%, respectively, versus the fourth quarter of 2023, driven by stronger volumes and improved mix, particularly in the Materials segment.
Looking at the first quarter results for 2024, net sales of EUR 1.6 billion was down 10% against the first quarter of 2023, driven by reduced pricing, a reduction in volumes and mix and adverse foreign exchange. The impact of pricing remained in line, with our expectations with the largest decreases in Specialty Polymers, most notably Construction and Food Packaging, and in Consumer & Resources, particularly in Agro and Home & Personal Care.
Lower volumes were experienced in both segments, specifically Electronics and Medical within Specialty Polymers and Agro and Technology Solutions within the Consumer & Resources segment.
Composite Materials was the standout performer, delivering 16% revenue growth as a result of better volumes and increased pricing, particularly in commercial aerospace and defense applications.
At EUR 363 million, underlying EBITDA is in line with expectations, which I will outline in more detail on the following slides. Importantly, despite the impact of lower volumes year-on-year, our focus on pricing discipline and costs within our control means that we've been able to achieve an EBITDA margin of 22.3%, a significant improvement on the fourth quarter of 2023.
Taking into account the profit attributable to Syensqo's shareholders of EUR 156 million, this results in earnings per share of EUR 1.48.
Turning to the EBITDA bridge on Slide 10. Considering the basket of currencies in which Syensqo operates, the impact of the strengthening euro on the translation of our foreign currency earnings has had an adverse impact of EUR 10 million compared to the prior period, most notably from the translation of the Chinese renminbi, the Argentinian peso and the United States dollar.
Uncertainty related to a global economic recovery, pending elections across the globe, heightened geopolitical tensions and high inflation and interest rates has resulted in a slowdown in customer investment projects as well as them adapting their supply chain to carry less inventory, thereby managing for cash. As a result, reduced volumes and mix had an adverse impact of EUR 39 million compared to the prior period.
Looking at our Specialty Polymers business, the first quarter of 2023 was the highest first quarter on record. Despite that, sales into smart devices were strong as a result of growth in the electronics market.
Additionally, positive volume momentum was achieved in PVDF, with strong demand in auto in the first quarter of the year. Reduced volumes were experienced in the Industrial segment, most notably in Food Packaging.
Additionally, whilst we are seeing some early signs of recovery in semiconductor production, there remains delays in fab investment, which has a meaningful impact on our volumes.
Sales in Healthcare continue to be impacted by destocking in medical equipment and devices. Our channel and distribution sales continued to be below the prior comparable period as a result of destocking, with EMEA and the China regions being the most impacted. That said, our March sales volumes were the highest level since June 2023 and indicates early signs of improvement.
Importantly, Composite Materials experienced strong volume growth as the business improves its operating efficiencies and continues to address the challenges associated with labor tightness in the U.S.A. Specifically within the aero and defense sectors, the order book remains strong for the remainder of this financial year.
Looking at Consumer & Resources. Within our Agro markets, we continue to see weak demand, particularly for green solvents and specialty surfactants, as customers manage their inventory levels.
As I've previously mentioned, the weak demand in China and structural overcapacities continues to impact Aroma volumes and pricing. As part of our restructuring plan, we have effectively mothballed some production lines at Baton Rouge and Saint Fons.
Particularly -- sorry, finally, the closure by the Panama government of the Cobre Panamá mine in the fourth quarter of 2023 led to a reduction in demand for mining chemicals which, alongside lower sales to [ Illumina ] customers, has reduced volumes in Technology Solutions. This is considered to be temporary in nature.
Pleasingly, within Novecare, volumes improved, in particular in our coatings business, as a result of market share gains in North America as well as increased volumes in Home & Personal Care and Industrial applications.
Whilst most of the analysis presented today is based on the prior comparable period, being the first quarter of 2023, which, as already stated, was a particularly strong quarter; I need to emphasize that versus the fourth quarter of 2023, we have seen improved sequential demand across all key sectors.
Net pricing had an adverse impact of EUR 35 million in the first quarter of 2024, in line with our expectations. This was experienced mostly in Novecare, notably Agro and in Specialty Polymers, notably Food Packaging and Construction. This was partially offset by net pricing improvements in Composite Materials and Technology Solutions.
The increase in fixed costs of EUR 10 million and other of EUR 9 million includes the impact of inflation on our cost base and increased investments in research and innovation, partially offset by structural cost savings. The net result is that EBITDA for the quarter finished marginally above expectations at EUR 363 million.
Turning to capital expenditure. We have continued to maintain a disciplined approach to capital management and capital expenditure in particular. With this in mind, spending of EUR 72 million on growth capital included a further EUR 28 million in research and innovation and EUR 44 million on capacity expansions and operating efficiency capital.
It is important to note that given the longer-term nature of the investment cycle, these growth projects will contribute to increased earnings in 3 to 4 years' time, albeit that these assets under construction will increase our asset base in the short term. We strongly believe that continuing to invest in the growth opportunities available to us will position us well in the future to respond to and capture growth and market share as demand levels improve.
Additionally, we continue to interrogate all capital expenditure to ensure an appropriate balance of returns over both the short and long term. As I've previously mentioned, the use of cash to invest in growth capital is a choice. It is a choice we make based on market demand, customers' needs and expected returns. In the absence of these, we will not invest capital on the ground.
Looking at the sustenance capital expenditure of EUR 46 million, this includes spend on health and safety, One Planet and maintenance to ensure our sites are safe, reliable and sustainable, also on digitalization as well as the costs associated with leasing contracts. Our capital expenditure umbrella for 2024 has not changed, and we continue to target spend of between EUR 600 million and EUR 650 million.
Moving to our strong operating cash flows on Slide 12. The generation of strong operating cash flows remains a key focus for the business. In this respect, I'm extremely pleased to report strong cash generation in the quarter with positive cash flow from operating activities of EUR 244 million. Based on the last 12 months, this results in a cash conversion of 89% driven largely by the release of working capital.
As a reminder, we have adapted our cash conversion calculation to better demonstrate our strong cash generation before investments in growth capital. And as such, the metric includes the movement in trade working capital and spend on sustenance capital expenditure only, as these represent nondiscretionary outflows of cash and is a reflection of how we manage our assets. Going forward, we expect this cash conversion metric to remain above 70%.
Turning to our strong financial position, I am pleased to report that our balance sheet has further improved, with our net debt at EUR 1.5 billion. This results in gearing of 17% and a net debt leverage ratio of just below 1x, which gives us the firepower to execute on our growth strategy and create value.
We continue to have strong levels of liquidity available, as demonstrated by the EUR 1.7 billion of undrawn committed bank facilities and a further EUR 1.2 billion of cash on hand. As we've previously mentioned, the second quarter of 2024 is expected to see a net outflow of cash as a result of the one-off payment of $180 million paid to the NJDEP.
The payments of the full year 2023 final dividend in respect of the combined 2023 Solvay Group of EUR 172 million and the timing of the annual payments of employee incentives, this will see net debt in the second quarter of the year increasing, with gearing expected at just over 20%.
With that, I'll now hand you back to Ilham. Thank you.
Thank you, Chris. So before we take your questions, I wanted to quickly touch on our outlook for 2024 and provide some color on how we see quarter 2 shaping up.
On a full-year basis, we continue to target underlying EBITDA to be in the range of EUR 1.4 billion to EUR 1.55 billion, with underlying free cash flow in the range of EUR 400 million to EUR 500 million. As I mentioned at the start of the call, while we did see improved volume momentum in the first quarter of the year, it's too early to call it a trend. And the pace of a broader recovery remains unclear.
Overall, we continue to base our outlook on flattish overall volumes, with similar demand dynamics compared to the first quarter of this year. While there is much debate around the potential recovery in the second half of the year, we have based our outlook on what we have seen rather than what we would like to see.
Nevertheless, given our strong performance in the first quarter of last year and the softness we experienced in the second half of 2023, we should see our year-on-year comparison ease as we get into the second half of this year.
From an EBITDA perspective, we saw the inflection in our quarterly performance in quarter 4 2023 and expect that positive momentum to continue into quarter 2, aligned with current consensus estimates. As Chris mentioned, we continue to expect our cash flow performance to be skewed towards the second half of the year, given the -- some of the drivers he referenced. On a full-year basis, however, we have reiterated our underlying free cash flow outlook.
With that, we are now ready for your questions. Sherief?
Thank you, Ilham. We'll now move to the Q&A session. Francois, can we please have our first question?
[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Wim Hoste from KBCS.
I have two questions, please. The first one is the outlook for net pricing. You did EUR 35 million in the first quarter and guiding for EUR 50 million to EUR 100 million for the full year. Can you maybe elaborate what that means for pricing sequentially? Are you expecting to gain some back? Or is it just because comparison is getting easier that you can maintain that EUR 50 million to EUR 100 million? So that's the first question.
And my second question would be on capital allocation, and there's two parts. First, is the U.S. tax treatment of the separation holding you back in any way in doing acquisitions or mergers or whatever? And also, in light of the dividend approach that you take, can you maybe elaborate what the dividend approach will be post the one you already announced for 2023 results? Those were the questions.
Yes, let me take the pricing question first. The first quarter of 2024 saw negative net pricing, as I explained in the chart, of about EUR 35 million, and this is very much consistent with our expectations. And you see that reflected in our quarter 1 EBITDA, which was slightly ahead of the outlook that we gave you in March.
Looking at the full year, we do reiterate our EUR 50 million to EUR 100 million impact of net pricing, with the majority of that pricing impact in the first half of the year. And this is what -- this is very much consistent with what I said at the year-end.
Now, we're not going to go into quarterly outlooks, but what you will remember from last year is that we had significant net pricing gains in the first half of the year. It was [ $230 million ] out of $248 million in 2023. And as a result, there was only $18 million in the second half of the year, which really reflected the selective price reductions we gave in the second half of 2023.
So the year-on-year comparisons are less of a headwind for us in the second half of 2024. And in addition to it, we are constantly pricing for value, most notably in Composite Materials.
I will remind you, however, that over the course of the last 4 years, we've achieved net pricing benefits of EUR 900 million. So we would consider that a reduction of up to 10% as sticky pricing in our mind, and we will continue to selectively either gain or defend share whilst generating healthy margins.
Now the last point I'd like to just end off on, you'll see that over the last 4 years, we've had a steady improvement in the gross margin percentage, which has increased by more than 500 basis points since 2019, and that's a reflection of the specialty nature of our product and our focus on driving for value.
Yes, thank you, Chris. Wim, your question was about our constraints, right, due to the power of [ Solvay ] split with the United States of America and IRS taxes, right?
Yes, yes, absolutely.
Yes. Well, obviously, when you do such transaction, and obviously, I was aiming and we succeeded have a tax-free spinoff; you have some constraints, which we don't believe that it's going to delay our organic growth, obviously not, but in neither M&A.
So for example, the carve-out for Syensqo was on Composite Materials. That's the -- one of the largest business we have in the United States of America. The rest, I mean, we are free to do what we want, right, in the framework of what we have been agreeing with taxation authorities.
And when you've seen recently, we've done the acquisition of JinYoung, a relatively small deal, as you say. But frankly, a huge deal for us in terms of augmenting our expertise, technology and penetrating the profitable dermocosmetics, Personal Care in the Novecare segment will drive that value. And we remain focused on pursuing our organic growth opportunities.
As we outlined at our Capital Market Day, you remember we have some EUR 10 billion of opportunities, right? So we'll continue laser-focused like you've seen me in the past 5 years, laser-focused on capital management. And we will consider all the levers, right, including opportunistically some M&As, bolt-on technologies, et cetera, like we did in quarter 1. Back to you.
And then how does the dividend approach fit into the capital allocation plan, if I can just ask that as a final question?
Well, I think you've seen our -- obviously, there was a big change post the split, as you could expect, between our former company and the new Solvay and us. We adopted a growth dividend policy, right? And that's one of the reason why we did the split, right?
So, so far, I mean, we say on what we announced at the split. And we will consider all the levers on the capital allocation and management, including dividends, share buybacks; as a further way to ensure the right level of leverage. And again, I mean, this is the arbitrage we will do as we believe that we're going to generate solid cash in the coming years.
The next question comes from the line of Laurent Favre from BNP.
I got a question on mix and on Materials or -- Polymers, actually. Chris, I think you've mentioned -- I don't know if it was Chris or -- I'm sorry, but one of you mentioned, I think. A lot of areas that have been struggling and others that have been doing better. So clearly, that are doing better, Electronics, Healthcare.
Should we be aware of any meaningful difference in margins between those different areas? In other words, as you see some recovery later this year, should we assume that maybe some of that recovery comes with a lower mix in terms of margins?
I don't expect anything significantly to change in the portfolio. The biggest impact on your mix can be depending on what happens on the volumes on Consumer & Resources, going forward. As we know, Specialty Polymers is our largest margin business. And so when the Novecare volumes return and when we see the growth in Agro and the return of mining, well, that will obviously change the mix.
And that's something we watch very carefully. We watch gross profit margin and EBITDA margin at each of the individual business. Anything you want to add, Ilham?
Yes, Laurent. Yes, go ahead.
Sorry to interrupt. Just to be clear, my question was within Specialty Polymers, between Electronics and Consumer Packaging and PVDF and Healthcare. I mean I think you gave us a pretty detailed and granular lay of the land in terms of volumes. I'm just wondering if it has any implication on mix and margins within Specialty Polymers.
Yes. Okay, I see. We understand better. We were struggling between the segment. No, within Specialty Polymers, Laurent, I mean, remember, we're not [indiscernible] company, we're not PVDF company. We are not a compounding company.
We have the broadest portfolio in the market. So really, the broadest in terms of technology right? Remember, I mean, this beautiful slide we shared with you in the Capital Market Day is real. And on the compounding side, right? And even now, as we develop thermoplastic composites, we bring the Composite know-how into the Specialty Polymers.
So -- and the diversification of the sectors is equally interesting. I think we did our coming out on PVDF for auto, right, because it was a bit of a [ bedding ] story for a few quarters. You have the numbers right? So -- and even in PVDF, we have diversification, Laurent, between auto and non-auto.
So for me, I mean, in my business life, and I've been working now for [ 30 ] years in the industry, diversification is good, including in specialty companies, right? And we like that without the [ diversification ] of regions and sector.
So we believe no, I mean the mix can change here and there if there is a softness here and there. But if a sector has a cold, we don't want to have a flu, right? So we really want to have that diversification going forward. Back to you.
And then maybe my second question, and I apologize in advance. But you mentioned that you had in March, the highest level of sales in polymers, I think, in June 2023. Has there been a reversal of that momentum into April?
Yes. That was the highest level of sales in Specialty Polymers channels and distribution business.
And that was in March or April? Sorry, my question was...
That was in March, and it was the highest level since June 2023.
And did it reverse into April?
We're not commenting on our April results at this point.
Yes. We are a new company, Laurent. So we still have a few days more to close our books.
The next question comes from the line of Aron Ceccarelli from Berenberg.
I have two questions. The first one is on Composite Materials, which had another very strong quarter. At the beginning of the year, the FAA imposed a cap of 38 airplanes per month on the [ 737 ] MAX. But I believe that in March, the figure was around high single digit. And I believe that the [ F-35 ] is also going through a rough patch at the moment. So I just want to understand, how should we think about the potential impact or delayed impact in your earnings from these issues?
The second question is about your Q2 guidance. If I'm correct, so you are expecting Q2 EBITDA showing a 4% sequential increase after 23% in Q1. I understand that you are not expecting continued restocking in Q2, but the comps base becomes much easier. So maybe can you elaborate a little bit about the moving parts of the different segments here? And why should we see this kind of deceleration?
I'll take the Composite one. Yes, thanks, Aron. Well, listen, in Composite, I mean, I'm very, very glad and, frankly, proud of the teams in what we've done in the last 5 years. Our order books today are full and healthy. So we don't see any material impact. And I'm going to [ site ] and I talk to Boeing's leaders, right? I'm going to tell what they said publicly.
We know that they want to ensure the supply chain is ahead of final assembly, even with the lower monthly deliveries of 737, for example, and the restrictions in place from the FAA. Lead times are very long, as you know, in this industry. So we wouldn't see changes for a few quarters, right?
I think there was a -- I mean, a wake-up calling, [ COVID ] times. And I experienced it as I joined, at that time, my former company. It's difficult to stop and restart. And as you know, stop and go doesn't work in this industry. So Boeing has intentions to increase the rate plan over the next couple of years. And while 737 is slower than anticipated, as you know, is being offset by twin-aisle aircraft sales that are building faster than expected growth, for example, 787, 777, 900, which have higher revenue value per ship set.
So our focus remains, frankly, on ensuring we can meet overall demand from Boeing and other customers, by the way, it's not only a Boeing story; as well as improving the efficiencies of what we control.
Yes. So let me take the question on the quarter-on-quarter. I think what we've seen come out of quarter 1 is a stabilization of demand, following some restocking at the beginning of the year. So I think it would be incorrect to extrapolate the 23% uplift in Q1 to your expectations for quarter 2.
It is also important to note, and then we noted this as part of our year-end results, the fourth quarter of the year is historically the lowest quarter as a result of seasonality and customer order patterns. So historically, we've always seen the seasonal lift between quarter 4 and quarter 1, has been in the range of about 15% to 20%. So based on what we saw at year-end, we guided the market to an increase of 20%, reflecting that cyclicality, an improved outlook at the time.
The market does remain uncertain at this point, as Ilham said, as part of her concluding remarks. And based on what we see today, we believe that the current consensus estimate for Q2 is appropriate. And I believe this is what you referred to in the 4% uplift. In terms of easing comparables, this is probably more likely to be an H2 driver than a Q2.
The next question comes from the line of Peter Clark from Bernstein.
I've got two questions and just a clarification. First question, coming back on the guidance again for the full year, I know it's very uncertain. You don't want to get carried away or anything. But you're obviously quite comfortable with close to [ 0.75 billion ] of EBITDA in the first half.
It's very difficult to gauge the seasonality of the business now because of everything that's happened in the last few years. But I don't think it's far off 50-50 with a slight weighting to the first half. So I'm just wondering why you didn't decide to lift the bottom end, particularly given the comments on the net pricing discussion when we look forward from here [ with those ] hitting the first quarter.
The second question, just around, [ obviously ], the clarification; is on the free cash flow. Did you say, Chris, that you were expecting an outflow in the second quarter? Because I know [ I'm like it's ] delivering on that free cash flow every quarter, but with the dividend payment and the PFAS payment coming out.
And then thirdly, on Composites, obviously, that business has done well on the margin. You [ tested ] it with trying to close the gap on Specialty Polymers. Certainly on my numbers, it's [ almost ] with an EBITDA margin starting with a [ 3 ]. Just how that looks going forward because it certainly has been delivering for you over the last few quarters?
So let me take the first question around the historical splits half 1, half 2. I think you're right. The historical split, half 1 and half 2, has been 53%, 47%. And if you take the estimate for this half and apply that same average, you'd probably end at the bottom of the range.
If you apply to 50-50, you'd end up in the middle of the range. And if you applied something marginally above that with a stronger second half with a slight recovery in volumes, you'd be towards the top end of that range.
Now as we've said, we've seen some stabilization. It's not enough to call it a trend, but we still remain committed and reiterating our guidance of 1.4 to 1.55.
On cash flows, yes, Ilham, over the last 19 periods or whatever it is; has had positive cash outflow. There are 2 reasonably large onetime items. The dividend is in respect of the full, combined Solvay. It's the full 40% that we are paying in the quarter.
And then the cash flow for the PFAS settlements, as we've noted for some time now, was pending and has been agreed with the courts. And so the flow of money has took place on the 10th of April. So yes, we will have a negative cash outflow. But as we go into the second half of the year, we expect positive cash inflows to start commencing again.
Yes. And I think you talked about the margin, right, at Composites, right? So we don't give, obviously, margin by business unit, I think, as you may know. And there are old proxies before we acquired the business back in 2015 that Composite Material is lower than Specialty Polymers, right? Remember, I mean, Composite Material, the volumes are still below 2019 levels, more labor-intensive business. So it's different business model, all right, than Specialty Polymers.
So now that I'm -- frankly, I'm extremely pleased with the Composite Materials. When I joined the company, was a bit not even integrated fully in the system. I think the COVID-19 has helped us and helped me as a newcomer at that time to really stress test the business. You remember that we closed [ 2 ] manufacturing assets. They were, at that time, the lowest return on capital employed, the site level, in the whole company. So we closed them, we restructured.
And frankly, we have the opportunity to close the gap, right, and continue improving our productivity, our efficiency. The automation and Gen AI even, machine learning is going to help us actually to modernize Composite assets. The industry itself is extremely labor-intensive, right? So we are working on it and more to come. Back to you.
The next question comes from the line of Chetan Udeshi from JPMorgan.
Maybe I'll start with the first question. I was just reading and it was, I think, in your annual report as well, you're now talking about insurance compensation for your PFAS settlement payment, and I think the initial amount is $32 million. Do you have now some clarity on what should be the insurance compensation for the full payment that you're expecting? Is it 30%, 40% that we should keep in mind, which, of course, will hopefully reduce your net cash out on this line?
The second question was I saw -- and I think you also referred to this acquisition you did in South Korea. It seems more -- but typically, we tend to see when management teams and companies don't deliver on organic growth targets, M&A is seen as a route to grow earnings.
Is this an indicator of that at Syensqo? Because my understanding was clearly the CMD was far more focused on organic growth opportunities over M&A. But I don't know if there is a change now given the weaker demand dynamics that you seem to be seeing at this point.
And the last question was, can you talk about what you see in your Electronics and semis? I think you mentioned maybe early signs of some stabilization, but we've seen a few of the other semi-exposed polymer companies talk about a rebound, which was actually stronger than expected in Q1. Is that something you see in broader semi and Electronics overall?
Thank you, Chetan. Chris?
Yes. Thanks, Chetan. I'll take the first one about insurance, if you don't mind.
I think we had already said to you as part of our previous announcement that we had been taking a conservative position, where we provided for the full amount of the obligations. And we had indicated that we would seek to recover this from the insurers and previous owners. The initial settlement with an early group of insurers is the [ $32 million ]. It was reflected as a receivable in our December accounts, and we received the proceeds in February. So it's a first quarter cash flow.
As to other receipts, I don't think it's appropriate that we comment on that at the moment as the ongoing discussions are happening with insurers and other related parties, if you don't mind.
Yes. Thank you, Chris. On acquisition, well, we always have and we continue to look at M&A as part of our growth agenda. The acquisition of JinYoung Bio is a relatively small deal, Chetan, and is aligned, by the way, with our strategy and is augmenting our technologies and our competencies with something we don't have, simply. So it's more. It's more -- it's not material financially, but it's huge in terms of what we will be doing with it in the Personal Care and the ceramide space, right?
Now, we have also a venture capital, by the way, fund of some EUR 80 million that looks for small opportunities. Now Chetan, we have been very disciplined in the past years, right? I mean -- I focus personally with my former team on cash and deleveraging the company. And that said, we are not prepared to do -- what we are not prepared to do is to overpay for an asset where it doesn't drive value.
So we remain focused. You said it on our organic growth opportunities, as we shared with you during our Capital Market Day. Remember, we have said [ EUR 1 billion ], again, of opportunities. In terms of capital management it's, again -- I mean, the cash, the EUR 7 billion of cash we shall generate in the coming years, we will prioritize growth, right?
We have organic opportunities, a beautiful one. And the rest is -- we will reward shareholders, share buybacks and other things and continue deleveraging the company. We are committed to stay in at strong investment grade.
Semicon, yes, that was another one. On the semicon, I think you asked, Chetan, about the drivers, right, what we see in the market. Is that the question? Yes.
On the semicon production, we are seeing some signs of recovery versus quarter 4 last year, with destocking expected, frankly, to have been probably -- to have peaked in the first quarter. That said, as you know, there are delays and construction being pushed out, which is limiting the growth specifically in the fab investment side.
So let me give you maybe 3 parts of the outlook. In the short term, consumer electronic demand is slow to recover. Integrated chips unit shipments dropped lower than expected in the first quarter. Demand for Industrial and Automotive chips remain very weak, for obvious reasons, impacting the high-volume discrete, et cetera. Demand for advanced AI chips and their memory components remain the focus of the industry, even though they make up a relatively small portion.
In the midterm now, 2024 will be -- in my mind, that's me saying; it's a recovery year for the semicon industry. Probably with a stronger second half still expected from -- for the [ IC ], the integrated chips and the [ wafer ] fab equipment market. As end markets will recover, demand for AI will grow. I mean the world is [ building ] with Gen AI and all of this. Some analysts as well as TSMC, you can read what this -- they have lower growth projection for 2024 versus their original forecast.
But despite the construction delays, announced plans for a new major fab constructions are maintained. And new projects are expected to be announced -- continue to be announced, by the way, in H2 2024 to support the demand for chips. And we are in conversation with our customers and including in the United States of America.
When I was there for our groundbreaking for the batteries, we had several conversations with customers who are building mega factories, right, for semicon, for securing -- with, by the way, DOE grants to secure the sovereignty of the United States of America in the field.
And the final one, long term, I believe that after 2024 is probably the start of a new semicon cycle. Probably, some people talk about double digits for 2025, '26 in terms of equipment spending, et cetera. The integrated chips are expected to reach $1 trillion mark within a decade. So that's my view in 3 time horizons.
Next question comes from the line of Matthew Yates from Bank of America.
A couple of questions, please. First on your Aroma business, where you've mentioned some restructuring. Forgive me, not overly familiar with the asset base there. Are you able to contextualize sort of what share of capacity you're taking down? And then, how flexible is that to bring back, should you get a price signal from the market that justifies that?
And then the second question is just around PVDF. And I guess the news today from your Belgian peer [ Umicore ] that it's going to slow down its battery investments in light of weaker EV demand. If -- is there the potential for Syensqo also to review the pace of its CapEx plans if needed? Or is it now too late, given you've broken ground and you'd lose access to the U.S. grants?
Let me start the Aroma. Listen, let me put it in context, Matthew. Aroma represents around 5% of our revenues, right, Chris?
Yes.
And even lower percentage of our EBITDA, right? That said, I mean, we have taken, as we've always done, decisive actions to improve profitability and adjust our industrial footprint to serve the market competitively, given not only the new capacity addition from competitors in China, lower -- as you know, the lower domestic demand in China, which has seen a greater focus on exports, specifically for some more commoditized chemicals into other markets.
And higher raw material prices in Europe, right, raw material prices and energy prices in Europe and the U.S. without efficient protection, I would say. While between you and me, many antitrust filings have been done by regional suppliers, but it just takes time with bureaucracy.
So at the start of the year, Matthew, we started to mothball 2 units. To be specific, this is the [indiscernible] in Baton Rouge in the U.S. and the synthetic [ veining ] in Saint Fons, this is in France.
So not [ boring ], what does this mean? It doesn't mean closing. They're, in a way, in care and maintenance model, right? The assets are effectively, in a way, on [ follow ]. And remember, for those who were following us and me since I joined the company, we implemented such industrial agility at COVID time when I came into the company, which were not existing there.
So I mean, that muscle, we have it. So we can really be adaptable and agile in the way we adapt our existing capacity to the reality of the market. And we should expect to see an improvement in performance in the coming quarters aided by these actions. What was the other question, sorry?
It was around PVDF and given the announcement by our competitors such as Umicore in the market, do we have the capacity to flex the capital expenditure?
Yes. Okay. So listen, let me go straight to the question first, Matthew. It's -- first of all, any plans in Specialty Polymers, specifically this one in the U.S., is going to take 3-year timeline to build the new capacity. And we do not believe the short-term dynamics is changing the rationale of our PVDF investment in the United States of America.
Number two, we have the flexibility in how we see the capacity expansion, right? Groundbreaking doesn't mean that you have to spend the money overnight. It doesn't mean -- if there is no market, by the way, in my playbook, there is no point to put steel on the ground. So we can see the capacity expansion to align with market growth -- by the way, securing low costs, right?
I mean, lower total cost of ownership end-to-end because remember, we elected rather than going alone is to partner with -- and vertically integrate to our partnership with Orbia, who is going to give us the lowest cost possible and the security, reliability of supply of critical minerals, right, and they are the largest mining of Europe [indiscernible] in the Americas to make our materials affordable and boost the EV adoption.
And in addition to this, Matt, I believe now it's a regional now -- you've seen the sovereignty and the policies are becoming more and more regional. We believe, in region-for-region strategy, which will also provide a significant barrier to entry, particularly in North America, given the existing -- by the way, has high tariff of -- for PVDF against Chinese imports at the level, I think, of 32% these days.
So I mean, we've discussed it many times with you on the performance, rights, et cetera. So all in all, I think with the IP protection, with the tariff in place, with the customers -- I met 20 different customers flying for the Americas during the groundbreaking and asking us even if there are delays in EVs, there is a switch to hybrid, which between you and me, I love hybrids because we can double the revenue spend between internal [ conversion ] and [ Gen car ] moving to hybrid, not only -- we're not a seller of PVDF. We sell solutions for lightweighting under-the-hood applications.
So we love hybrid. So for us, it's not a headwind yes. And I know the headlines are [ buzzing ], but it's not happened to happen here. We are not a [ cathode and anode ], a producer. PVDF represents less than 2% of the batteries bill of Material.
We are agnostic to technologies. We can go to LFP, NMC and the [ super alpha ] that's right in batteries. Yes, and suspension technology is good for all binders application. At the opposite, emission technology is not good for NMC.
So we can choose what to allocate our capacity, adapt to the market evolution. And I remind you that half of our business is auto to finish with, and the rest is non-auto application. Back to you.
Our last question comes from the line of Martin Roediger from Kepler Cheuvreux.
Thanks. Actually, all my questions have been raised. But only one from my side, again on PVDF. Half of your 400 million PVDF sales is non-Automotive applications. Why is this business...
[indiscernible].
Okay. I get a bit closer. It's about your PVDF business, half of your 400 million sales is non-Automotive applications. Why is this business so much different to the Automotive applications? Isn't there a theoretical risk that some competitors in PVDF, who supply the automotive industry, can also switch over to supply non-Automotive applications?
Well, I mean, first of all, yes, as we told you and we shared even the numbers during our last call, I believe, or during the Capital Market Day, half of our business, more or less, is half, half. It's auto and non-auto. The non-auto goes from Oil & Gas to Construction. There are different mixed bag of different industries. Oil & Gas, for example, it goes to [ risers ] application, Martin.
Imagine -- let me explain this once again to just show you how qualification can be very long. A riser in offshore application is for nonmetallic. So it replace a piece of metal, which is really bending 2 pipes, right? It has to be tested under 3,000 meters, right, in the seawater, subject to, obviously, corrosion resistance, pressure resistance, abrasion resistance. We bring [ against ] metal -- our value proposition is very strong, not only the waste, but the moldability, corrosion resistance, obviously, et cetera, et cetera.
So when you do such qualification, it takes a lot of time, right? I mean, since I joined the company, I think there is one pipe somewhere in the Latin America seawater, right? And when we get the business, it's pretty sticky, right, and including, I mean, probably to a lesser extent, in Construction.
So I mean, we don't undermine our competitors, right? Everybody can come into any space. And that's, in a way, good for any business. They keep us on our toes.
What is more important for me is the barrier to entry we build, first of all, through innovation, right, through the IP barriers, right, number one. Through contracting with customers, we have key accounts, right, with whom we build those long-term qualification campaigns. It lasts 2 years, 3 years, right? Like in the Oil & Gas industry, batteries, for example, you need a healthy 18 months, right?
Superior technology. Remember my suspension and my emission discussion. I just shared with you that suspension can do it all, for example, in batteries; and continue upgrading your innovation. That's why you've seen us spending more in innovation. Not only on new products or new molecules, we are not here to reinvent the wheel. It's also an application development.
So -- and I welcome you to Bollate, we should make a session there, where our customers come with their own [ mode ] and they use our innovation in their own [ mode ]. When you start co-innovating, co-brainstorming with your customer, you cocreate, you go faster to market, it's sticky.
So those application labs, in my career, and frankly, that's what we are doing now; have been the secret source of accelerating time to market. And as a growth company, if you want to accelerate time to market, if you're going to date with the top line growth, we need to be closer to our customers, we need to do more application development.
So on PVDF, to close with, very happy. I know you've been asking us many times on margins, et cetera. I told you in Q2 last year, I remember before the split that the margins were stable. I can confirm that the margin of PVDF in quarter 1 was stable versus quarter 1 last year and versus quarter 4, right? So even the raw materials can be up and down, this is one of the technologies where we defend our gross margin. Thank you.
This concludes the Q&A session. I hand you back to Sherief Bakr for closing remarks.
Thank you very much, Francois. So that ends the session for today. Thank you very much for your participation and great questions. As usual, the Investor Relations team will be here to answer any of your remaining questions, and we look forward to seeing many of you on our upcoming roadshows. Have a great day.
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