Good morning. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Fincantieri first quarter 2022 results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing star and zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Gallia, General Manager. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you. Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the first quarter presentation. I'm here with Giuseppe Dado, our CFO, and our team, and we'll guide you through the first quarter results 2022. We can start saying that it's a robust set of results. Revenue came in at roughly EUR 1.7 billion, excluding pass-through activities, with an increase year-on-year of roughly 15%. Contribution has been positive and consistent across all segments. EBITDA is up, roughly the same measure, around 17%. It reached almost EUR 120 million, with a margin of 7%. This confirms operating profitability and confirms also the resilience and ability of the company to face unprecedented increase in raw materials and challenging condition in the supply chain, and I would say in overall business environment.
Net debt at south of EUR 940 million to be precise, brought in line with year-end 2021 and within our last year figures. We stand in CapEx. CapEx expenditure plan is going on, is proceeding according to plans and higher revenues. The backlog is quite solid. Total is around EUR 34 billion, with 111 units representing a multiple of 5x plus our 2021 revenues. While the backlog is EUR 25 billion with 93 units. Ships delivered in the first quarter. There are 5 ships, and they've been delivered in 4 different shipyards. I will also say that diversification and consistency across different business lines and different geographical footprints is one of characteristics of Fincantieri.
CapEx, as I said before, is mainly devoted to building and strengthening our U.S. shipyards capabilities, upgrading our yards in Italy, investing in technology. Production volumes are coming in around 4 million hours. That's very high productivity level. I would say as a general comment, even considering that we do business with foreign clients, which represent almost 90% of our revenues. This represent and I would say confirms the resilience of our business. If we flip to page six, we have some comment regarding the business update. As I briefly hinted before, operating performance has been consistent across different segments. Delivery in first quarter has been of six Princess Cruises in Monfalcone.
Enabled construction activity for the Qatari Ministry of Defense continue at a regular speed as anticipated, with the launch of the fourth combat and the delivery of the first OPV unit in the quarter. Activity also for Italian Navy progress has seen the delivery of the first PPA, which is the first of seven units. Construction activity for the first two of the generation of submarines for Italian Navy has also started. I would say very constructive news coming from the offshore division, thanks to the competitiveness of our subsidiary VARD in building a market leading position on international level in the vessels for offshore wind. We've also been awarded a new contract for six marine robotic vessels for Ocean Infinity.
In the last divisions, ESS, we launched the construction activity for MSC terminal in PortMiami. Strategic ESG initiative. You can see at page seven that we are fully committed on four different axes. We would like maybe just to highlight the fact that we continue to work and commit ourselves in a wide range of partnerships from decarbonization to digitalization to ecological transition. We signed a few memorandums of understanding, one with ENEA regarding energy transport and circular economy with Remazel for decarbonization of port infrastructures. Regarding people and society, we pride ourselves with remembering and reminding that VARD has offered its facilities in Romania to accommodate up to 250 Ukrainian refugees.
We launched School4Life along with other important Italian companies basically to combat issues which is important and such an issue in our society. We also launched, as announced a few months ago, a corporate nursery program. We also been working with our subsidiary Nextech for an agreement with Almaviva and Leonardo to offer digital solutions applied to digital monitoring for the security of Italian critical infrastructures. Last but not least, we had an agreement with BNP Paribas for issuing a sustainability-linked guarantee facilities related to the achievement of two KPIs regarding energy consumption management and sustainable supply chain. You know how important supply chain is for us. A key part of our effort is also to involve all of our suppliers, most of them in our effort.
Page eight, you have a picture of our ratings and awards, just to confirm our effort to become a model of excellence addressing social, environmental, and governance topics. Page nine, we have the levers in order. We already commented before, just to highlight the fact that we've been working for different ships just for this delivery. We've been also managing to acquire new orders, roughly half a billion EUR. The majority of this, I mean, I would say the offshore division represents the bulk, the very bulk of these new orders acquisitions. In terms of backlog, page 10, you can capture with a glance how diversified our backlog is, how deep in terms of duration.
That allows us to state that we have long-term visibility for backlog, both cruise and naval. That the diversification of our wind offshore operations allows us to be very constructive for the future, considering also the development and investments which are expected in the next few years in order to drive this energy transition process. I will hand it over to Giuseppe for financial results.
Good morning, everybody. I'm on page 12 now. For a quick comment on order intake, we already went into it, but what we need to note is the very important pickup in all the acquisition with the reference to the offshore specialized vessels. You will see also in this. Result has been consistently going on through the last quarters. It has had a very important impact on revenues. Backlog visibility is north of 5.2 times current revenue, so it's still very good notwithstanding you know the lack of new orders in the cruise segment for the moment. Revenues on page 13. We grew roughly 18%.
You can easily note that the bulk of the revenue growth comes from the naval shipbuilding activity and offshore, which doubled revenue with respect to the first quarter of last year. Of course, also Equipment, Systems & Services, thanks to the consolidation of the INSO acquisition. We do expect, of course, cruise revenues to grow throughout the year, and therefore, don't take this first quarter as a reference for the year 2022 when it comes to cruise revenues that are still in a growth path, at least for this year, 2022. 86% of revenues, we said it before, come from international clients, confirming our truly global footprint. As with EBITDA on page 14 and 15, EBITDA growth roughly mirrors the growth in revenues.
You saw that you can see that we did roughly the same production hours as last year, as the first quarter of last year. We are working at full production capacity at this point in time. The growth, of course, comes mainly. I'm on page 15 now. Mainly from higher production volume. We have to say it differently. From the production of projects that have higher margins, let me say. This is the contribution of the revenue growth, notably of the naval segment. Of course, also in improvements when it comes to shipbuilding, of course, improvements also in operating margins, thanks to the fact that we're still reaping the benefits of all the efficiencies and change management that we implemented in the past few years.
As we said also in the past conferences, allows us at this point in time to offset and compensate the very important, I would say, increases in commodity prices. CapEx program is proceeding as planned. We still are in the tails of the investments in our Italian shipyards, notably Marghera and Monfalcone. These investments should phase out this year. We have a very strong activity in the United States in order to be ready to start the construction of the new frigate program for the United States Navy. As for working capital net financial position, basically the two figures are roughly broadly unchanged with respect to last year.
We do expect, as I said, a pickup, very important pickup in the second part of the year of cruise revenues, as we expect to deliver seven vessels this year and seven cruise vessels next year. Therefore, you're going to see net working capital levels to increase. There is already evidence of this. If you look at work in progress, it has increased by over roughly EUR 800 million in the first six months, notwithstanding the delivery of one cruise vessel. It's also evident that we financed the bulk of this growth through construction loans, which have increased from roughly EUR 1 billion to EUR 1.5 billion. Therefore, net financial position is roughly unchanged.
Of course, we reiterate the message of, you know, being able to fully support our net working capital needs with our funding sources. All our funding sources do not have no covenants at this point. At this point in time, also we do not have any major exposure to interest rate risk as we are fully hedged. Now I turn the floor back to Mr. Gallia for the outlook.
Thank you. Just page 19, you can have a good description on how we see our near term and a few comments on the longer term prospects. Regarding the cruise segment, which represented the majority of our business, there are a number of information here, but I think it's important to highlight the fact that booking trends for 2023 are in line with 2019 levels at higher prices. That bodes well for a comeback in new investments, and we can confirm that we are expecting for next year new orders. Should things go better and faster, there might be also some I would say consolidation regarding these expectations we have.
We also know that public information regarding the companies which are listed say very clearly that they turned positive regarding what is the short-term prospects. Above all, they all confirm that it is a long-term business which is about to grow and expand its share in terms of household expenses as far as the travel destinations are concerned. Clearly, the industry is fully committed to net carbon neutrality, and we say so because a lot of our investments and efforts are about becoming better and faster than others to adapt and provide our clients with ships which have a technological edge versus competitors regarding the commitment for this carbon neutrality path.
On naval, you know that the global spend in defense reached EUR 2 trillion-plus, and the unfortunate events of the last few months are pushing investments in this field at a higher level, and that is true, I would say, globally, and clearly that impacts also our continent and our Europe. To just give the major comments, we are exposed to basically three business lines. Cruising. Cruising is a sector which historically outperformed GDP growth. It's cyclical. We're being able to cope with COVID. Now we're coping with the conflict in Ukraine. But long-term trends are solid, and we have very robust competitive positions versus our competitors.
We look at the long-term prospects in this field, which is about to enjoy our technological edge, our industrial culture, and the investments we're doing in order to provide better and more and more ESG compliance vessels. Defense. This business is going up and there will be an acceleration in investments. Again, we're exposed to a sector with a leading competitive position in surface vessels, and we're also about to strengthen our positions in submarines. Offshore. Offshore has been through hell and back because it was basically exposed to oil and gas. The sector lost roughly 90% of its revenue base.
Our competencies, our experience, our technology, and in order to reorient the business model and exploit the boom in investments, particularly regarding offshore wind farms. We have been building leadership position at worldwide level. Clearly, that is also possible to the strong culture of these companies, which also proved how resilient it has been, so that we can confirm that assuming no further relevant deterioration in geopolitical and global health situation, long-term growth and profitability can be preserved and defended by a company. We can expect solid revenue growth, which is about to increase, exceeding 2021 levels, with solid marginality despite what is happening at the commodity prices.
In a nutshell, that was our total capacity to face unforeseen events and exploiting and leveraging a strong competitive position we have in the global market and a very strong industrial and cohesive culture. Thank you for your attention. We're happy to take your questions.
Excuse me. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. The first question is from Monica Bosio with Intesa Sanpaolo. Please go ahead, madam.
Good morning, everyone, and thanks for taking my questions. The first one is on the naval defense business. I'm not asking if you are getting or no further contracts, but can you comment on the main tenders currently underway in the sector? On top of Italy and USA, where do you see further opportunities for Fincantieri? My second question is on cruises. In occasion of the full year 2021 results, the group was not seeing any new orders increases in 2022. Do you still keep this view? I know that you do not comment press rumors, but it seems that Norwegian Cruise Line aims to ask for new cruises.
Any colors on this would be helpful. The very last is on the Equipment, Systems & Services area. Can you give us just a rough indication of the breakdown of the division or at least how much is the infrastructure business? Do you have any down payment in this area? Thank you very much.
Okay. Thank you, Monica Bosio. Giuseppe Dado speaking. On naval and defense business, at this point in time, we are pursuing some commercial leads, but we'd rather not to be more specific than this on what leads we are pursuing as competition is very fierce among European players. We still have a hefty backlog to execute the two programs we have in execution, the one for the Italian Navy and the one for the French Navy, and we're going to start, as to our US operations, the US Navy program. Those three programs give us very good visibility for the future. You're seeing in the numbers right now that, you know, activity is picking up. It's picking up in terms of revenues and also in terms of margin.
We do expect a change in you know in the appetite and demand for our vessels in the defense business, as you know the geopolitical situation is in a turmoil, I would say. Therefore, and also let me add, you said leaving aside the Italian Navy, but the Italian Navy has some development programs under study from what we gathered. In cruise, there have been press rumors about an interest of NCL for new vessels. I don't, I do not comment press rumors, but we said it during the call. The cruise business has been growing above GDP growth for years, has proven to be very resilient to you know sudden shocks and to the economic cycle.
Of course, by also listening to the, you know, to what our clients say, the recovery is underway in terms of passengers, resumption of passengers levels, especially for 2023. Of course, uncertainty still linked to what will happen in winter, if there will be a new pandemic wave or not. Therefore, you know, there are still a few question marks. But we still believe, even under these circumstances, that all the activity will resume, if not in 2022, we're sure about 2023. Of course, I forgot to mention that, you know, to the cruise operators that are listed, they raised huge amounts of capital either through equity and debt and hybrid forms.
You know, there is still a need to, let me say, sort of repair their balance sheets for the near future.
Mm-hmm.
If I take from you know the CLIA study on passenger forecast, and if I plot also the current capacity plus the capacity growth embedded in the deliveries for next years, we you know if we plot these two lines you know passenger growth and capacity are going to meet in 2026, 2027. That means there could be the need. There's going to be the need for further capacity. If you need further capacity in 2026, 2027, I think 2023, 2024 are the right times to make the orders. You know this is a purely you know an analysis based on numbers and forecasts. We're going to see what happens. ESS, Equipment, Systems & Services, we'd rather not split give indication of EBITDA margins within the segment.
We can tell you that roughly 30% of the total revenues is related to the infrastructure business. There is a very important part related to the interiors for ships, which is roughly 25%. The rest, 1/3 is on support systems for propulsion systems for the captive business.
Okay.
We are thinking about, you know, improving and giving more disclosure on this segment, but we still haven't taken the, you know, the decision, let me say. Okay?
Okay. Thank you very much. Sorry, about down payment in infrastructure business, do you have any down payment at least yet?
Well, we have some projects ongoing that we're being paid for. We haven't announced or closed any major project. Usually in this business, though, we do not experience what we see in the cruise business. We are paid at milestones, so it's a more naval-like terms of payment business.
Okay. Very clear. Thank you very much, Giuseppe.
You're welcome.
The next question is from Alessandro Pozzi with Mediobanca. Please go ahead, sir.
Hi, good morning, all. Thank you for taking my questions. The first one is on margins. I think it's great to see that you still managed to deliver a 7% EBITDA margin despite, as you mentioned, the-
Alessandro.
raw material price.
Alessandro, can you?
Yeah.
Can you speak a little louder because we can't hear you? I don't know if it's the line, the volume, or
Okay.
Or the both. Grazie.
Okay. I was saying, it's great to see that you managed to deliver a 7% EBITDA margin despite the raw material cost price pressure. I was wondering, can you give us a sense of what that has been in Q1 and what the margin could have been, using, let's say, flat cost versus Q1? As a follow-on from this, there is a consensus basically that probably we are reaching peak inflation right now. Is that what you see? I mean, do you expect inflation to moderate when you talk to your suppliers? Or do you expect inflation to basically carry on throughout to accelerate or stay where it is throughout the year? Thank you.
Well, commodity price inflation has been going on since last year. It has reached higher levels in the past few months, also due to the, you know, war in Ukraine and Russia. We saw it in the prices and in the numbers. Since March, steel prices have increased further. Also, you know, it's visibility of, you know, supplies in terms of quantities and price is very limited. We're not in a situation in which we were two years ago, three years ago, in which we could plan, you know, make orders with a six, nine, 12 months visibility. Those times are over.
What EBITDA levels would I have had if with no price inflation on commodities? Probably for the first quarter, I would say half a point higher, so more in the 7.5%-8% range. Also last year. Last year, probably, you know, the price inflation has cost us between 0.5 and 1 point of EBITDA, 1 percentage point of EBITDA. What is remarkable is that we are able and thanks to, as I said before, to what we did in the past and what we're doing now in a very difficult production environment.
Let's not forget, in the past two years, we worked under, you know, a pandemic, in a production model that, you know, is very intensive in terms of labor. Let's not forget this. We were able-
Okay.
We are able. I maintain the stance and this guidance. We are able to offset price increases. At this point in time, we are factoring in our forecasts prices that are higher than, you know, last year. I think we have taken a prudent stance in this for the year 2022. Of course, we don't have a crystal ball and, you know, things can worsen, things can improve. I make reference to what you said. Are we at the peak? I don't know. I really don't know. In my forecast, we're taking the peak prices as a forecast. We stand in this. We are pretty confident of being able to maintain these margin levels throughout the year.
Okay.
Just let me add one comment to what Giuseppe just said. In the long term, we think that energy prices, steel prices are really out of equilibrium, any equilibrium models you can find. We don't have crystal balls, clearly, but we might expect that the price levels will normalize. You can have the sense of the effort that Marinette put in place in order to improve profitabilities in this period through pandemic, through supply chain disruptions. It's not just price, it's having the availability. It's having the availability of materials. Clearly a credible spike in prices. Investments which we have been doing, we're about to continue. The economies of scale we're enjoying.
that I would say allows you to somehow predict, when things, if and when, clearly things will normalize, that our earning capabilities, the engines which underlie the competitiveness of our company are stronger than ever, and importantly, are stronger than anyone else in the sector.
Okay, thank you. Just to remain on the inflation theme. I know your orders at the moment are, of course, because of COVID, on the weak side. The orders that you are booking right now in Q1, are you able to pass to your customers the increase in raw material cost inflation with the new orders? Or do you expect to offset the raw material cost inflation in the future just based on higher efficiency?
Well, you know, now we're studying the, you know, the very low amount of order intake for the first quarter. The answer is, yes, we are able to pass through to clients, in new orders at least, to pass through to clients the price inflation. Otherwise, by no means we would be able to reap the benefit. Of course, you know, when it comes to new orders, there is a negotiation process, you know, that involves several things. Technical specifications, of course, are in first place. There is a mix of things. Therefore, we do balance everything out, but I do not expect us to experience important margin pressure on new order intake.
Okay. Thank you very much. I'll turn it back.
You're welcome.
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Excuse me, this is the operator. We have a question from Gabriele Gambarova with Banca Akros. Please go ahead.
Yes. Good morning, and sorry for the late question. Regarding the offshore business, this very strong growth you called it in Q1, I was wondering if we can take this number as a reference for the remainder of the year. If we will see a similar growth in the coming quarters. Also, what you envisage for margins. More or less, say, same question on ESS. I understood we can't consider this number, EUR 359 million in revenues, as the new normal. I was wondering on margins, if you have any comment, any indication on the 2022 expected performance. Thank you.
No. The answer to your first question is no, we do not expect the revenue to fully double in offshore specialized vessel year-over-year. The revenue growth has been going on also in previous quarters. Of course, this is a very important pickup. I remember last year, order acquisition in this segment was very good, and mostly focused on wind offshore, which is good and beyond expectations, I must say. Also, what we need to appreciate, understanding, you know, the bulk coming from wind offshore, it's the diversification of order intake because we have wind offshore as the bulk. We also have, you know, vessels for the fishing and industry.
In this quarter, we have the continuation of orders for robotic vessels, which are very small vessels that enjoy some degree of automation for a company that does research, deep water research. Again, no doubling of revenues year-over-year, but still good growth. To stay on revenues, as I said during the presentation, don't take the cruise revenues quarter-over-quarter as a reference for the year because we do expect a double-digit growth in cruise revenues as well. Again, the ships, the revenues we're going to book this year are related to the ship we're going to deliver in the second part of the year 2022, but mostly related to the seven vessels that we're going to deliver in 2023.
The average size, this is also a reference I make for, you know, for the potential comments on net debt levels. The size of the vessels in terms of physical size and also cash inflows size of ships we're going to deliver in 2023 is much higher than the size of the ships we're going to deliver in 2022. On ESS, I'd rather not give you further details on margins. As I said before in answering Monica's question, we do believe the time is right to be more analytical and give more disclosure to that, but we're still taking our time.
Okay, thank you very much, Giuseppe.
You're welcome, Gabriele.
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Thank you all. Thank you for attending this presentation. Have a good day. Bye.
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