Hornbach Holding AG & Co KGaA

XETRA:HBH

Earnings Call Transcript 2022-Q1

[Operator]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the conference call regarding the first quarter results 2021/2022 of HORNBACH Group. [Operator Instructions]. Let me now turn the floor over to your host, Axel Müller.

[Axel Müller]

Yes. Thank you very much. Good morning, everybody. It's just 1 hour ago that we released our fine set of figures this morning at 7:00. And I think it's worthwhile to have a deeper look on in the details, and that's why I'm sitting together with my colleagues, it's CFO, Karin Dohm; and Investor Relations Manager, Anne Spies; myself is Axel Müller, Head of Investor Relations. And yes, I would like to directly hand over to Karin, please.

[Karin Dohm, CFO & Member of Management Board]

Thank you, Axel. And also welcome from my side to our Q1 analyst call. Very happy to guide you through some of our figures and the results of the last quarter and take your questions afterwards. So let me highlight first a couple of our Q1 results and here and on the following slides. We saw in the first quarter a very persistently high demand from our clients as we saw in the previous year for our DIY products. And therefore, as a result, net sales rose by 6.4% and online sales surged more than 70%. This was, of course, also influenced by the fact that Q1, in our case, saw a couple of closures across our regions. And therefore, we saw this very -- increased sale on the online side as well. All-in, adjusted EBIT close to previous year's records is our guidance, and we see a slightly sales increase above previous year's roughly between 1% and 4% going forward. When we look a little bit deeper into the sales, as said, we have here previous year's record level, once again beyond those with a total increase, as I said, of 6.4%. That is, of course, the majority in our HORNBACH Baumarkt Group. And all that, despite the strong restrictions and the negative weather effects that we saw specifically in March, April and partially also in May. The shop closure affected on an average 50% of our stores still in this quarter. So I would like you to take that into account when you take a deeper look into our sales figures. In Germany, it was even across 60%. Underlying also, you have the results of one of the subsidiaries of the holding, which is the Baustoff Union, the business merchant outlets, which in itself increased the sales by more than 20%. Thanks to also its high-performing network of logistics and the ability to have the stocks in place that customers demanded. I mentioned roughly the rising e-commerce sales in my opening remarks, and I think it's worth looking here not only into the ones of Q1, which, as said, rose by 71% all-in. Thereof, click-and-collect, as you see here on the slide, which was nearly double what we saw before. But also if you look into the bars, which gives you an indication of the 12 months rolling, we managed to get beyond EUR 1 billion in Q1 with the combination of direct delivery and click and collect. Underlying is the strong performance not only of our logistics team but also of the merchandising, which was able to make sure that we have those products in stock that customers needed, whether that was professional or our C clients, specifically in light of the, as you're well aware, the global challenges on both sides, both logistics as well as prices for commodities and some of the products. Taking all this into account and as published, we have an adjusted EBIT that remains on a very high level. So we're continuing on the record year that we had until the end of February. We had no adjusting events in Q1, and the EBIT margin is well above the pre-crisis levels at 10.1%. The high demand, as I said, which we see on the sales side is at the end of the day also coming through here as net result on the EBIT level. Sales growth, nevertheless, also required some increased expenses, partially as mentioned in the logistics and fulfillment area, which was influenced by the closure and the high portion of click and collect. In addition, we saw some normalized expenses in the field of marketing, which held back some of our results. Net EBIT, as said, only marginally reduced, and you see this also when you look into the lower right side of this chart where you have the subgroup segments of the HORNBACH Group. Looking a bit into our cash flow and investments during Q1. As mentioned and announced in our last call in May, we have the intention to invest more in this full year than we have invested in the previous year. We have -- and you see those effects now coming in already in Q1. The increased CapEx is going or has gone mainly into buildings and real estate. That is, of course, related to our intended new markets. We said we will open 5 this year and probably another 5 in the next year. And of course, this has now the effects here also into our CapEx. In addition, there is a little bit of plant and office equipment in existing markets. And last but not least, some intangible assets that we invested into. The change in working capital that you see is driven by a deliberate prepayment of liabilities to also make sure we use cash efficiently and effectively. And therefore, reduce those payables accordingly. Strong balance sheet is still existing. And as you know, one of our core aims as well. So you see here a continued stability with increases, of course, relating to the investments on the asset side and a reduction in the net financial debt, which reduced from EUR 295 million to EUR 137 million, rounded. Equity ratio. Shareholders' equity and the ratio rose. We are now at 45.1%. And of course, as said, we have new openings in our store landscape coming up. We will have, at the end of June, our store in Trollhättan. And we have in July, then Cluj, as the next one being opened in northern part of Romania. And as announced, that will be followed by a couple of others across our existing countries and a similar portion also, as I said before, in the next year. Looking into the full year, as said at the beginning of this call, we expect and believe that sales will be slightly outperforming again in this year, so we will keep the record year's figures and go a little bit beyond on the sales side, probably as said, 2% to 5%. The adjusted EBIT will fall slightly short, but they'll be way beyond the levels that we saw precrisis from our current expectation, probably around EUR 290 million to EUR 326 million with an EBIT margin that is somewhere between 5.3% to 5.7%. CapEx probably moving beyond EUR 200 million we had last year on the group level, EUR 154 million, as you know. So that all is built on the expectation that we have, as you currently know, lower infection rates regarding corona across our countries. We, of course, are well aware that we might see a couple of more customers going over summer on a vacation and spending both time as well as money in other places. But these figures and expectations for full year take into account that we will have, based on current expectations, not the same closures in Q4 as we had them in the last year. So if that would come again, our expectation would be adjusted. I think those were the main highlights, which I wanted to bring forward and bring into your attention. So I would stop here and would be delighted to take your questions.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions]

[Axel Müller]

Is there anybody who would like to start first?

[Operator]

We have now one question coming up from Thilo Kleibauer, Warburg Research.

[Thilo Kleibauer, Research Analyst]

Yes. I'm currently a bit confused about your outlook because in the presentation you just gave to us, there are other EBIT ranges and also a sales range, plus 2% to plus 5% and then in the press release and then in the report from this morning. So maybe you can check this and clarify what is the exact EBIT range you would like to communicate to the market?

[Axel Müller]

Absolutely, Mr. Kleibauer. It's absolutely right. We had -- the version before the final one and the dates and the figures published in the Q1 press release, the most recent and the actual one. So the sales guidance is plus 1% to 5%, and the adjusted EBIT range is EUR 290 million to EUR 326 million on the HORNBACH Group level with -- that means EUR 10 million range starting from the downside. And on the Baumarkt level, it's from EUR 240 million to EUR 278 million, which was the level of previous year. I have to apologize for the irritation. We will correct that and of course, on the website. And so then in the hope that we don't trigger any more questions on that misleading picture. Sorry for that.

[Thilo Kleibauer, Research Analyst]

Okay. No problem. And then maybe one question on the gross margin. You had a dip around 40 bps in Q1. So is this mainly due to the higher share of online orders? Or is there also an effect from increasing raw material prices? And is this slight decline that what we should also expect for the coming quarters?

[Karin Dohm, CFO & Member of Management Board]

The net effect -- and thanks for that question. The net effect is mainly driven by the changes in the product mix in the online sales. So we have the -- as you said, the high portion of online sales, whether it's click and collect or direct delivery, that contains a slightly different mix of products with different margin and that is the main driver. The aspect of increased pricing on -- between what we buy and what we sell was not the main driver here. That was more or less offsetting. And same applies in general for the logistics, but the net effect is the product mix. And of course, one needs to see how that -- we couldn't yet, so to say, net totally what is there potentially as a slight effect of the weather, which was quite specific in Q1. But in general, it's a product mix.

[Operator]

At the moment, there seems to be no further questions. [Operator Instructions]. The next one comes from Tim Ashton, Frilsham Group Fund.

[Tim Ashton]

Thank you very much for putting up the country-based like-for-like on Page 3. I know one of the other gentlemen who often are going to this call have always asked that. It's always very interesting. Just looking at the different country numbers that you've put here, should -- I mean there are a lot of different numbers and different trends there. What are the -- would you say that the degree to which countries have locked down is the biggest determinant in how like-for-like have changed from last year to this year? Or do you see -- I don't know if you're plotting, for example, like-for-like versus average basket spend? Or do you see any other interesting details country by country?

[Karin Dohm, CFO & Member of Management Board]

Yes. Thank you very much for the question. Absolutely, as you pointed out, the -- what you see here is -- on the page with the various country results is affected strongly by closures. Take Netherlands, for example, they had a similar picture, I would claim, in Q1, as Germany had with similar closures. Majority of interaction with clients was only possible by, of course, online, but beyond that only by click and collect. Professional clients could enter the stores but also that's not everywhere and with reduced numbers. So that is very similar to Germany. And we had a little bit of a mixed picture in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia. That is why you see here a couple of twists. That was also partially with closure, partially that public life there was, in general, a bit limited, which made people stay more at home and therefore, not come to the store. So yes, I would expect that, that is looking more homogenous, if you want to say so, in Q2 and going forward. Assuming, as I said, everything now stays as we currently see it, currently, no restrictions in any of our markets across the countries.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from [ Dileep ] [indiscernible] [ SIM ].

[Unknown Analyst]

Congratulations on the strong numbers. I was just wondering, will the store expenses start coming back down now as stores start to reopen as a percentage of revenues?

[Karin Dohm, CFO & Member of Management Board]

Yes. Thank you for your remarks. Yes, of course, so to say, on a, let's say, percentage view, I totally expect that. We already can see that in the current month. As said, it needs to be seen how things play out. What we currently see as a continuation, I would claim from May is strong demand and people like to use HORNBACH and assess us and interact us, if I may say, across all channels. So there is an addition of what we have so far seen in the online and in the click-and-collect area now added up with people coming to the stores. So yes, of course, the ratio between shop visits and expenses of the shop is more favorable whenever we have now more people in our stores. What we see also in general is an increase in basket size that is going -- still going on, which underscores our perception that project as a scene, as a topic is still a very important part of what clients do and think about when they interact with us.

[Unknown Analyst]

Got it. And may I ask one more question? I was wondering, are you seeing any inflation in the price of the goods that you have in your stores?

[Karin Dohm, CFO & Member of Management Board]

Very good question. I feel it -- currently, it's quite difficult to judge which part of the rising prices is really classical, if you want to say so, inflation, and what is an over demand, which is driven on a global scale, of course, by the by the effects that we have from specifically U.S. and Asian/Chinese demand. So think about -- would think about some oil-related products, that is, of course, all going up currently, but it is -- it is not yet clear, I would claim whether that's inflation or whether that's more a little bit of a short-term mismatch between the demand and supply. So I would think we will see that coming. The blurring of the picture will evaporate, hopefully, over summer and autumn is my expectation.

[Operator]

At the moment, there are no further questions. [Operator Instructions]. There are no more questions from the audience.

[Axel Müller]

Okay. So I would like to once again and maybe the last time to ask you whether you have still left some questions we could answer right now? Are there any more questions, please?

[Operator]

There are no more questions from the audience.

[Axel Müller]

Okay. So it was a very brief and dense and focused Q1 call. Hopefully, you will take this number positively in your -- in your view on the company, we would like to share the news flow upcoming on the first half of year -- half of the fiscal year with you in September. And yes, we are very eager to work on our good progress and sales development. And we wish you a good day, stay safe and bye-bye. See you next time.