I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Anthony Hynes, Executive Chairman. Thank you. Please go ahead.
Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to the EML Payments FY 2025 First Half Results Telecall. I'm Anthony Hynes, Executive Chairman. It's great to be here with our CFO, James Georgeson, to report our interim results for FY 2025 and provide an update on EML 2.0 progress. Following our presentation, we'll open the call to questions. I refer you to the ASX announcements, which were issued by EML Payments this morning, which form the basis for this call. Let's kick off, and we'll move to slide four. The first half of FY 2025 saw the company largely emerge from its structural challenges of the last three years and turn its focus to industrializing the business and recapturing a growth mindset, which really has been missing for some time.
Whilst there was an unplanned leadership change during the period, energy and momentum is high, and a more productive operating cadence is in place today, courtesy of a settled and capable leadership team and board. I'll touch on operational momentum shortly. Financial performance for the period was in line with expectations. Revenue was up 15% on PCP to AUD 115.1 million, with customer revenue, excluding slight interest income, up 6% to AUD 82.3 million. We continue to see growth in our existing customers and are very focused on doing more with them. The loss of a number of customers for various reasons in the second half of FY 2024 suppressed customer revenue growth somewhat. We continue to benefit from our well-managed float with interest income tracking to target, and the downwards curve on cash rates remaining consistent with our projections.
Profitability also improved significantly on PCP, with underlying EBITDA up 50% to AUD 33.4 million, and NPAT improving from negative AUD 4.7 million to positive AUD 9.5 million. Our cash balance is AUD 50.6 million, with a net improvement of AUD 7.5 million in the half. Moving now to slide five. The team is making good progress on our EML 2.0 strategy, which we shared with shareholders and the investment community at our AGM in late November 2024. Reminding you, there are three key pillars supporting our growth and efficiency agenda through to FY 2028. Firstly, building a global operating model to move away from silos and drive efficiency and scale benefits. Secondly, reviving our revenue engine by rebuilding our commercial and product teams to capture the significant opportunities that we see in the market.
Finally, deploying a single technology platform across EML to dramatically increase our speed, digitize manual processes, and drive consistency of our offering across all of our markets. Going forward, I'll share an update on each of these pillars as we present our financial results to the market each reporting period. Firstly, on our global operating model, we've deployed this, which aligns live resources together to build scale, synergy, and quality. Each region will be led by a commercial team and regional CEO to ensure we stay close to opportunities and our customers. However, the operating engine will be configured along functional lines for the benefits I've previously described. There's virtually been zero historical integration of these businesses, and that is coming to an end. Our executive leadership team, or ELT, is largely in place, with final negotiations on outstanding roles.
Next to our revived revenue engine, our commercial team is now aligned under one global leader. We've added to our business development team, up from six people to 10, with a number still to be appointed over the coming months. Our pipeline is up to $45 million, and our target is to double that by Christmas this year. It's really pleasing to welcome new customers in Adidas and the JLL Mall Group in Canada. These will be important programs in the years ahead. JLL is a particularly pleasing win as they left EML in 2018, so it's fantastic to have them back. We have a number of new vertical opportunities in development. Some of these will advance, and some won't after a period of research and validation. What's important is that we're active in developing these blue ocean opportunities for EML to underpin our double-digit revenue targets.
On our single technology platform, Project Arlo, the team is in place, and we're gradually adding resources internally and externally as the work program builds. We expect an initial deployment in Q1 of FY 2026 and progressive deployments thereafter. The project is in its initial phase, but it's building good momentum and remains on track financially and timeline-wise. In summary, we're still in the early phases of 2.0, but we're now advancing on the right trajectory and at the right pace. I'll now hand over to James to take you through the financial details.
Thank you, Anthony. Good morning, everyone. I will walk through our financial results during the half year and explain some of the key drivers before I hand back to Anthony to cover our current business priorities and outlook. There are two important elements I want to touch on upfront as to how we presented our results today. They are in relation to discontinued operations and new segment reporting. In relation to discontinued operations, all the numbers in the presentation exclude the impact of both PESEL and Centennial in 1H 2025 and 1H 2024. These businesses have both been classified as discontinued operations in accordance with accounting standards following PESEL's entry into liquidation in January 2024 and the completion of the sale of Centennial in September 2024. Where the numbers exclude the PESEL and Centennial businesses, we have referred to these as the continuing operations.
Comparatives have been restated to exclude balances relating to PESEL and Centennial. The reconciliation to the prior period reported numbers, including these two businesses, is shown in the appendix of the presentation. In relation to our new segment reporting, as previously flagged at the AGM in November and as part of our release of the restated historic financials last week, we have modified our segment reporting to show geographic segments in accordance with our new global operating model. This approach reflects the focus of the team selling all products in all markets. I will start on slide seven, where we show our key operating performance metrics. As you can see, pleasingly, most metrics have improved half on half. Underpinning the improvement in most metrics was high customer revenue and higher interest revenue, as Anthony's called out.
Customer revenue increased 6% at the group level, reflecting good growth in Europe and Australia, whilst the North American outcome was more subdued. Europe also benefited from AUD 3 million of non-recurring revenues in the half. Interest revenue was up 49% from a combination of higher bond returns, the flow through of our treasury management activities, and higher float balances. Net overheads at the group level were up 3% half on half to AUD 53.3 million, reflecting the new leadership team and investments to deliver the EML 2.0 strategy. As a result, underlying EBITDA for the continuing business, our core measure of performance, improved 50% to AUD 33.4 million in the half. Our statutory net profit after tax for the continuing operations shows a considerable improvement in 1H 2025 to a net profit of AUD 9.5 million compared to 1H 2024, where we reported a net loss of AUD 4.7 million.
Cash increased by AUD 7.5 million in the six months, reflecting operating cash flows, partly offset by risk management improvement, class action defense, and restructuring costs, as well as the repayment of debt post the receipt of the Centennial sale proceeds. Moving to slide eight, where we show the results for Europe. Our European segment, which is our largest segment, comprises our operations in the U.K. and across the rest of Europe. We have just under 500 customers across our European segment. From a product perspective, we offer a range of payment solutions across the government, financial services, and human capital management verticals, with approximately 60% of the business being GPR products and approximately 40% being gift and incentive products. GDV, or gross debit volume, was broadly stable at AUD 3.2 billion, reflecting a gradual return to growth now that prior restrictions on our U.K. business have been removed.
Total revenue for the European segment was EUR 68 million, reflecting a 30% increase over the period. This growth was underpinned by a 13% uplift in customer revenue, principally in the government vertical, as growth in our gift and incentive products was more subdued, and a 71% increase in interest revenue. The strong uplift in interest revenue reflects a combination of high bond yields, the flow through of our better treasury management, and higher float balances. As I mentioned earlier, Europe benefited from EUR 3 million of non-recurring revenues in the first half. Net overheads of EUR 28.4 million are broadly flat on the prior corresponding period, as cost reduction measures have been offset with investments in people. As you can see, we've separated out intercompany management fees charged from corporate to the segments.
The increase on year-on-year reflects the higher effort and support provided to our European business relative to the other segments. Revenue margins and gross profit margins benefited from the higher interest revenue and the AUD 3 million of non-recurring revenue, with underlying customer margins remaining broadly similar half on half once the one-off revenue was adjusted for. On slide nine, we show the performance for our Asia-Pacific segment. The Asia-Pac segment comprises our Australian and New Zealand businesses, which are predominantly GPR product businesses, with approximately 80% of the revenue currently, with a large presence in the human capital management vertical. We also offer a range of gift and incentive products in Australia and New Zealand. Across the Asia-Pac segment, we have just under 200 customers across the region. This segment achieved steady growth, with customer revenue up 6% half on half.
Pleasingly, active benefit accounts within the human capital management vertical increased 12%, which underpinned the growth in customer revenue. Over the half, interest revenue was broadly flat. GDV was 15% lower, reflecting a change in the customer product mix, with one particularly high-volume, lower-margin customer being replaced with a sizable client where we do not include their GDV in our reported metrics. Gross profit margins were impacted by several one-off additional operating costs, largely shown in selling costs, which are not expected to repeat in the second half. These totaled approximately $1 million. Normalizing to remove these one-off costs, the gross profit margin would have been approximately 68%, and the EBITDA margin would have been approximately 30%. Accordingly, underlying customer margins remained broadly similar half- on- half.
The increase in net overheads to AUD 10.2 million in the half reflects investments in people to support the growth and the EML 2.0 strategy. Turning to our North American segment shown on slide 10. The North American segment comprises our US and Canadian businesses, which operate predominantly in the retail, gift, and incentive vertical, which comprises approximately 75% of total revenue for the North American segment. These products are distributed through shopping malls and corporate programs. In addition, the North American business participates in the financial services vertical, predominantly via the VANS product, which is a high-velocity digitized expense payment offering. We also target the gaming vertical in this region as well. Across our North American business, we have just under 500 customers currently. Underlying EBITDA for North America was broadly flat in the half at AUD $4 million.
This result reflects total revenue was down 7% on the first half of 2024, reflecting lower break-even revenue across some of our incentive customers. Normalizing this change, revenue was steady in the corporate incentives area but increased pleasingly in the retail shopping malls area. Interest revenue was slightly lower, reflecting lower U.S. interest rates as the Federal Reserve entered a period of rate loosening. Net overheads reduced 12% half- on- half, largely reflecting lower levels of operational improvement investments in the first half of 2025. Lower intercompany management fee charges in the first half of 2025 also reflect a focus on other regions. Whilst GDV has grown strongly at 16%, this is predominantly due to increased volume from our VANS product, which is a high-volume, low-revenue yield product.
As a result, the total revenue yield was lower in the first half of 2025, but gross profit margin has remained relatively stable. Revenue margins for our other North American products have actually improved compared to the prior period. We are focusing on addressing the reduction in customer revenue by revamping our go-to-market strategy to improve customer retention as part of the EML 2.0 strategy. Moving to slide 11, which shows our overhead costs. Underlying overhead costs net of cost recoveries increased 3% versus the prior period and have now remained broadly steady across the last three half years. This steadying of overhead is in line with our guidance at the AGM in November last year, where we stated we are targeting a flat cost base across the next few years as we reshape the business by driving operating efficiencies as well as investing in additional sales and customer activities.
Overhead costs have shown net of cost recoveries from the PESEL business, as accounting standards require the amounts to be grossed up, yet the costs are managed on a net basis operationally. The 3% or AUD 1.7 million increase half on half in net overhead costs reflects investment in leadership talent and sales areas to support the build-out of the EML 2.0 strategy, partly offset by savings across our technology, professional fees, and travel-related cost categories. The impact of higher intercode charges reflects lower recoveries to the discontinued entities post the exit of these businesses. Whilst intercompany charges eliminated at the group level, given the results on this slide are for the continuing businesses, they are shown grossed out. Driving operating efficiencies will continue across the next few periods as part of the EML 2.0 strategy work.
As previously guided, the costs of Project Arlo, our single platform technology solution, are excluded from net overhead costs and underlying EBITDA. The cost incurred in the first half of 2025 was only about AUD 300,000. On slide, we show an overview of our interest income and stored float balances. Interest income is a consistent key source of revenue from EML. During the period, interest revenue increased by 49% to AUD 32.8 million. This reflects the flow through of our yield negotiations, higher float, and higher returns on the reinvestment of bond investments. The float balance increased materially from AUD 1.9 billion to AUD 2.5 billion when compared to the first half of 2024, following the onboarding of a number of Mastercard programs, which have a combined float of approximately AUD 500 million. EML does not earn any interest on this large float balance increase.
For the first half of 2025, our annualized yield was 3.7% compared to 2.5% in the same time last year. This yield excludes the non-interest-bearing float I just referred to. The exit yield as of December 2024 was slightly lower at only 3.4%, reflecting the impact of announced central bank rate reductions. We expect the interest yield to moderate further through the second half of 2025, given further rate changes already announced and a number of further rate reductions are expected from a number of central banks. However, given the weight of float to GBP and AUD, where the rate outlook is more stable, and the size of our U.K. government bond investments in our European segment, the impact on interest revenue is likely to be somewhat tempered by these factors.
In particular, our bond portfolio makes up 40% of the group's total interest-earning float balance and is currently earning at approximately 3.9% and has an average duration of about 1.8 years. On slide 13, we show the movements in our cash position. Overall, cash increased by AUD 7.5 million in the six months, reflecting positive operating cash flows, partly offset by risk management improvement, class action defense, and restructuring costs, as well as the repayment of debt post the receipt of the Centennial sale proceeds. From an operating cash flow perspective, the underlying EBITDA of AUD 33.4 million generated AUD 4.6 million of net cash inflows across the half. This is shown in the waterfall on the slide. Excluding the impact of the risk management improvement, class action defense, and restructuring costs, the underlying operating cash generation was AUD 14.7 million, or 44% of underlying EBITDA.
The 44% of EBITDA to cash conversion ratio is lower than our long-term average of approximately 60%, as the 1H 2025 result was impacted by timing differences on the receipt of bond interest income. To that point, as of the 31st of December 2024, we had a large bond interest receivable balance shown within the working capital movement, which was collected post-balance date. Normalizing for this, the cash conversion rate would have been 63% of the half. Overall, the strength of the balance sheet and the now-net cash position has improved materially post the sale of Centennial and a number of other initiatives. The AUD 41.4 million of net investing cash inflows primarily relates to the net cash received from the sale of Centennial, less the associated disposal of costs, and the cash to be consolidated on exit of that business.
The AUD 40.2 million of net financing cash outflows reflects the net repayment of external borrowings of AUD 38.5 million, including the second tranche of the PFS vendor loan notes. These cash flow dynamics reflect the impact of one-off outflows and strategic actions we've taken during the last few periods. As we move forward, we remain focused on improving our cash conversion rate and optimizing cash flow management to drive greater financial stability and shareholder value. The result is an improvement from a net debt to a net cash position, and the AUD 30 million of undrawn committed debt facilities currently available reflects the materially improved balance sheet strength. Stepping back, the 1H 2025 results have improved across most metrics and reflect a further stabilizing of the business.
The execution and completion of the actions to exit PESEL and Centennial and the resultant repayment of debt have improved the financial performance and balance sheet of the business. Our underlying EBITDA was up 50%, our cash generation is improving, and a new leadership team is in place to set up EML for the next phase of growth under the EML 2.0 strategy. I'll now pass back to Anthony so he can cover our 2H 2025 priorities and our outlook for the business.
Thanks, James. As we look into the second half of the financial year, we have a number of key priorities as outlined on slide 15. On the commercial front, we want to build our sales pipeline to circa AUD 65 million by the end of the financial year towards an overall benchmark of AUD 90 million.
Key members of the leadership team are spending materially more time on business development and innovation. With an expanded business development team, we see momentum building strongly here. Whilst our pipeline is not presently as full as we'd like it to be, it's not empty. The team is focused on closing deals to carry the momentum of recent wins. We're also active in several product and market expansion opportunities as we look to bring new solutions to market in FY 2026 and regularly thereafter. The team sees significant opportunities to expand market and product offerings into new TAMs, initially delivering existing customer demand both in Australia and globally. You should expect us to be biased towards this growth, supported by a new operating model which frees up some of our best talent to focus on these initiatives, something EML has not done in years.
On operating efficiency, the team is focused on embedding our new global structure and identifying opportunities to dramatically improve our operating rhythm, which in turn serves to enable more business from more customers across more products and more markets. We are moving at pace in this regard. I'll provide more detail at the full year once things are better down, and the benefits of same are evident. I can tell you the velocity of decision-making and activity in this company has changed immeasurably over the past 60 days. As part of our new global structure, we are bringing procurement and key supplier contracting together under one roof to minimize the duplication that happens today and improve commercial outcomes. Project Arlo is a critical strategic enabler for EML, whether it be global product platforms, removing manual tasks, or reducing our cost base.
The team is focused on creating our MVP for deployment early in the new financial year. Thereafter, we will test, learn, and iterate at warp speed. We aren't banking on Arlo to solve everything for us, and we'll continue to prudently deploy enhancements to our current environment, which includes initiatives like full MPP integration in Australia, which will open up a number of use cases for the sales team here. Finally, and most importantly, on our people, we will relentlessly drive the one EML culture across this company, and this has been warmly received to date. Part of that culture is getting back to basics, operating as one team, encouraging and empowering people to make decisions and trust each other's judgment, being accountable to ourselves and each other to drive iteration and innovation within our customers and partners.
This will be supported by a strong operating system and rhythm, a world-class technology platform, an effective product development function, and a sustainable growth mindset. I'm moving now to slide 16 for some key takeaways. I wanted to finish the formal part of today's presentation with a brief summary from the first half of FY 2025. Firstly, the ELT is settled and advancing our 2.0 plan at pace, all wrapped in a one EML culture. We are talking growth and operational efficiency every day, so things that increase earnings and create margin expansion. Secondly, there are encouraging green shoots in our commercial team with recent wins and a building pipeline. We have much to do here with both our existing customers and partners and to get our pipeline to the right level, but we are underway properly, and we're energized on new verticals for the first time in a long time.
Our balance sheet remains in a strong position, enabling us to make prudent efficiency and growth-driving investments. Finally, our financial performance is running the plan, and our FY 2025 guidance for AUD 54 million-AUD 60 million underlying EBITDA remains on track. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank our hardworking team, our customers, our partners, and of course, our shareholders for their continued support of EML. Thank you for listening to James and me this morning. We're now happy to take questions. Thank you, Operator.
Thank you. If you do wish to ask a question, please press the star key, then one on your telephone, and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press the star key, then two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Thank you.
Your first question is from Ross Barrows from Wilsons Advisory. Go ahead. Thank you.
Yeah, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. I've got a couple, actually. Just in terms of the pipeline, you've indicated that that's going to grow to AUD 65 million, I guess, by the end of the second half, and you also called out a $90 million goal. Can you elaborate on the pipeline either by, I guess, business or geography and perhaps also some indication on the expected pipeline conversion rates? Thanks.
Sure. Ross, thank you for your question. In terms of the geography, we've got a lot of the growth that we're seeing in the pipeline right now is coming out of the US, and that's really encouraging because it's been a region that hasn't shown us a great deal over the last couple of years.
In terms of how we convert, I don't yet have a full kind of breakdown of exactly how we expect that to convert, but essentially, we look at a pipeline of AUD 90 million is our aim, and we'd expect to convert 20% of that.
Okay. Thanks. Thank you. Just to expand a little bit, you mentioned just in your closing remarks there about you're focused on new verticals for the first time in a long time. Can you just elaborate on that comment in terms of verticals? Just expand to help us understand that a bit better.
A core part of the strategy that we announced in November was that we would look to drive more from the core. We would look at new markets, and we'd look at new verticals. I think I've said this before to shareholders in one-on-one meetings.
I expect our emphasis will be on new verticals versus new markets. There's absolutely more from the core. It's critical to what we need to do today, but we see opportunities in new verticals, and that is, I mean, we don't have anything to announce today, but we're certainly spending a lot more energy and effort in looking at those and trying to figure out which ones make the most sense for us. You should expect that we're going to have a greater focus on new verticals over new markets.
Great. Thanks. Over to the others, but I'll jump back.
Thank you.
Thank you. Your next question is from Jack Lynch from RBC Capital Markets. Go ahead. Thank you.
Hi there. On the result, two questions for me. The first one just on the earnings guidance, clearly a strong result today for the first half earnings.
Should we think about the guidance potentially being conservative now? Just trying to get some thoughts around how we should think about second half OpEx and top-line growth. The second one, just around the FY 2028 targets, just working through the numbers, it looks like it should be sort of around a 9% book growth on a KDA basis after FY 2028. How should we think about the composition of that book growth as we move out to those outer years? Should we be thinking more GPR or more gift and incentive? Thank you.
Thanks for the question, Jack. Look, in terms of guidance, we've reaffirmed the range today in the AUD 54 million-AUD 60 million. There's still a number of months to go as we close into the full year, so we still feel comfortable where we're in that range.
If that changes closer to the close of the year, we'll update the market accordingly. Just as a reminder, obviously, our first half is always a little stronger than our second half given the seasonality in the gifting business, particularly in North America, but our gifting products where the holiday season drives a lot of that volume. We've also seen interest rates already start to come off from their peaks with some rate reductions already announced and some further still to come. The one-off revenue I called out in the European segment also sort of impacts the numbers. Whilst, yeah, we've got a strong result at the half, we still think the guidance for the full year is still the right range for today. In terms of the full year 2028 numbers, look, we're still obviously very committed to those targets that we put out in November.
In terms of the composition, look, I think you'd see us sort of perform, I know, probably reasonably consistently across the various regions. Clearly, that split of GPR and gifting will depend on how that goes in the region. Clearly, the North American region is more gift-focused, whereas the sort of Australian and European margins are more GPR-focused. That being said, we do want to sort of sell all products in all markets, and so that will sort of be how we would start to look at the strategy over the next couple of years. As sort of Anthony's response to Ross's question, clearly looking at new verticals as well, which will probably be probably more across the GPR sort of segment, but again, we'll sort of see how they evolve.
Look, again, probably a bit early to give you more specifics than that, but I think the key message is trying to do more across all our markets and particularly try and take some existing products to all our markets.
I agree. Thank you.
Thank you. Once again, if you do wish to ask a question, please press the star key, then one on your telephone, and wait for your name to be announced. Thank you. We have a further question from Ross Barrows from Wilson's Advisory. Go ahead. Thank you.
Yeah, thanks. Just a couple maybe for you, James. Just in terms of the operating cash flow conversion, you noted the average is around 60% and kind of below that at this time. Do you have a kind of indication of where that mature could fall in the second half, sort of normalize back towards the 60%?
Yeah.
Look, Ross, I think that's definitely where we would go. We had about AUD 6.5 million-AUD 7 million of bond interest receivable that was outstanding as of 31 December. It came in through January. Look, we'll catch that up, obviously, in the second half. We would expect the number to be back towards our longer-term average. I think the things we're weighing up is we're seeing the velocity of spend of Project Arlo. We obviously didn't spend very much on that in the first half at all, about AUD 300,000, just over AUD 300,000. We would expect that to be AUD 3 million-AUD 4 million through the second half of the year. That would be the only one thing that would sort of go against the trend going back towards the 60%.
From what we can see at the moment, the cash generation should be reasonably strong in the second half.
Just confirm the second half should trend back towards 60%, yeah?
Yes, that's right. Yeah.
Yep. Thanks. Just on slide 12, maybe just one other comment just around the treasury side of things and the float. Historically, quite a few or quite a lot of the balance has been variable, but there's also some bonds that actually have a fixed interest rate. Can you maybe just expand on that a little bit just to help people understand for myself how much is kind of locked in for a certain period of time and how much is variable? Obviously, you can see between the pound and the euro, it's more than half of the float. Maybe some observations on that, please. Thanks.
Sure.
Of the float, approximately 40% of the interest-earning float is in U.K. government bonds. That is the average duration at the moment of our bond portfolio, which is just under two years, so 1.8 years, and it is earning about 3.9%. Effectively, we have got a fairly strong natural hedge in the portfolio for about 40% of that float. The rest is in cash, which is typically earning cash rates across all the various jurisdictions. As you said previously, we normally target at about 50 basis points less than cash as the targeted return in most markets. In Australia, we actually do a little better than that, but on the flip side, we do share some of that with customers in the Australian market. Overall, probably across all the markets, we probably earn a similar net rate.
To your point, about 40% of the float is locked in with bonds at a higher rate than the cash rate and with a duration of just under two years. It does provide us some tempering. Effectively, any interest rate reduction or raise from here from cash is probably only 60% of that is flowing through to the total interest revenue line given the bond portfolio.
That's right. Thanks, James.
Thank you. Your next question is from Charlie Kingston from K Capital. Go ahead. Thank you.
Yes, hi. Thank you. Just a few quick questions. Firstly, around capital management, and good to see that the company's generating a profit again. How do you think about capital management from here?
Because I suppose if you adjust for all the one-offs and clearly with your longer-term free cash flow targets or even the business as it stands today, if those one-offs do not reoccur, the business seems to be spitting out plenty of genuine free cash. We do not have any net debt anymore. I think we are trading at around five to six times earnings. Is there any prospect for maybe even a fully franked dividend noting? I suppose it has been a pretty wild ride for the investors in EML. Just how do you think about capital management from here? Thank you.
Thanks, Charlie, for your question. Definitely something that we have started to turn our mind to. Look, as you rightly say, first statutory profit in a number of periods, which is a positive, and definitely the trajectory of the business is much improved.
I guess probably we would say it's early days in that recovery. Look, it's definitely something that's on our minds, but we definitely come back probably by the full year results and give more clarity on what we'd be thinking. Obviously, we're weighing out the various options that would be there, obviously looking at what opportunities there are in the market, but also thinking about our investment spend on our Project Arlo. Your point on franking, given some of the challenges of the group, we generally haven't generated much franking credits or actually don't have really franking credits at all at the moment and have a tax loss position in Australia which would eat up. Would be able to utilize and save tax for the next couple of years. Franking is not—franking dividends is probably lower on the priority at this stage given where the business has been.
All those things are in the mix around how we would think about capital management going forward.
Okay. Thanks. Just to follow up, I suppose noting the acquisition history of the group and you speaking to new verticals today, I'm not sure if that implies just those comments then. Maybe you're looking at inorganic opportunities, I suppose I'd probably hope not given the wild ride that EML has been on and some of the acquisitions that have led to where we are today. In terms of your priority, I know you've got that, what is it, AUD 15 million one-off CapEx to reach your targets.
In terms of how you prioritize capital management and new growth relative to—because again, if the stock continues, I suppose, had a bit of a bounce today, which is good, but clearly it is miles off the highs and obviously not that the current team have inherited all of this. Yeah, how should we think about the prioritizing of inorganic opportunities relative to capital management? I suppose that, yeah, there was a bit of press recently on an investor calling for the sale of the company, just highlighting how cheap it does seem. Maybe it is on the priority ready, future capital management, and maybe a comment on that press speculation and letter that was published, please.
Charlie, let me take the first bit of that on the sort of inorganic.
Look, clearly it is not lost on us of the challenges the group have been heavily influenced and impacted by acquisitions, particularly in Europe. We would be and the board is very disciplined in relation to a number of those, however we would approach that. We are not looking to—there is nothing on the radar in that perspective. We are very mindful of getting back to our needing effectively of running the business well, getting it back to growth, and doing the work that Anthony sort of talked about in his slides. Maybe I will just pass to him to make a comment on the speculation you referred to.
Yeah. Thanks, James. Charlie, I would say the board will be supportive and professional should we receive a credible approach for the sale of the company or individual assets for that matter. We will always act in the best interests of shareholders, as you would expect.
I'd be surprised if shareholders had different views of that. I will tell you that our absolute focus is on optimising the performance of this business irrespective of corporate transactions or the potential of one. That in and of itself should create value for shareholders. That's where we're spending our time currently. Should we receive an approach, we'll consider it, of course.
Thank you. Just on the cost space, I suppose another point of contention has been the ever-increasing overhead. Is there an opportunity for cost out going forward, noting how much simpler the business is today once you've killed all those legacy type issues?
Look, Charlie, we're definitely looking to drive efficiency across the operations.
I think as Anthony said in his speech, we have definitely been a business that has not had levels of integration, been very siloed in its approach and thinking. We are definitely looking to address that. The global functional team that we have got in place now has accountability to drive consistency across all the regions. Look, we are definitely going to drive efficiency. Equally, we have had almost very, very small limited investment in sales and customer areas. I think we had six sales-focused people over the last couple of years. We are moving that more towards 10. We will need to increase that further. We will be recycling some of that cost efficiency into customer and sales areas. We did say last year in November in the strategy presentation, we would look to keep the cost base broadly flat from here, and that would be reinvesting efficiencies.
I guess the other thing that unlocks the efficiencies is that single global platform as well, which will unlock efficiencies in technology and in our operations. Anthony, do you want to add anything?
No, I think I would perhaps restate most of that. I would say that, look, generally in my mind, the cost base is too high. We've been overcooked in some areas and undercooked in others. Technology definitely needs to do more for us, and we've obviously got plans there. There will be some swings and roundabouts as we add talent and drive better outcomes over the next three to six months. Our ambition is to outperform, and we just, I guess, need a little bit of time for the leadership team to get embedded and drive the one EML model. Breaking down the silos that have created some of this cost structure is really important.
I'd say to you that we'll have plenty more to say on this at the full year.
Thank you. Finally, Marie, the leadership changes, and Anthony, now that you're Exec Chair, I believe, maybe just to comment on, I mean, those targets that you put out when the previous CEO was in place, was that his plan or was this your plan? Maybe just on a personal level, are you fully committed to this business? Well done on your previous successes. It seems like you had a huge amount of those, which is great given you're now running EML. Going forward, do we need another CEO, or are you fully re-engaged to go again, rebuilding EML like you have done so well with your previous successes in the industry? Just a comment around leadership would be great. Thank you.
Sure.
Let me just say that the strategy that we presented in November and the targets embedded in that was not the doing of one individual. That was a collective effort, putting that together, and the board signed off on it after their engagement in it. Definitely that plan is my plan or our plan. In short, I'm not going anywhere, mate. I'm very energized about what we're doing. I think I've just spent two weeks going around the world to meet everybody, customers, and partners in our team. I'm incredibly energized by the opportunity ahead of us and look forward to driving some positive outcomes for everybody.
Okay. Thank you. Appreciate that. Apologies for the dog in the background before, work from home today, but excuse that. Thanks for the responses.
No worries.
Thank you.
Once again, if you do wish to ask a question, please press the star key, then one on your telephone, and wait for your name to be announced. Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Mr. Hynes for closing remarks.
Thank you, Jodie, and thank you, everybody, for joining our call this morning. I'll look forward to catching up on the roadshow in the next week or so or at the full year.
Thanks very much. Thank you. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you all very much for participating. You may now disconnect your lines.