Good afternoon. This is the course call conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Fiera Milano first quarter 2025 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. Vincenzo Cecere, Head of Investor Relations and Sustainability. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Fiera Milano's first quarter results conference call. This is Vincenzo Cecere speaking, Head of Investor Relations and Sustainability, and I'm here with Francesco Conci, CEO, and Massimo De Tullio, CFO of Fiera Milano. The presentation of today will be structured in four sections. During the first section, Mr. Francesco Conci will give you an overview of the business, main financial highlights, and 2025 outlook. Mr. Massimo De Tullio will go through the divisional results and financial figures in greater detail. On a final note, an update on sustainability will also be provided. At the end of the call, you will be invited for a Q&A session with management available for your questions. At this point, I leave the floor to Francesco Conci for the key messages of the Q1 2025 results. Please, Francesco, go ahead.
Thank you, Vincenzo. Good evening, everyone. It's a pleasure to welcome you to Fiera Milano's first quarter 2025 results conference call. Today, we present our performance for the quarter, the key highlights of the period, and the 2025 outlook. Let me start by saying that the underlying performance we delivered in the first quarter of 2025 was solid, especially considering the challenging comparison days. As you know, Q1 2024 included Mostra Convegno Expocomfort, one of the largest hosted exhibitions in our calendar, covering approximately 86,000 sq m. This event is biennial, and so it did not take place in the current quarter. This was the main factor behind the revenue decline we recorded in the quarter. Despite the expected calendar effect, our core business lines continued to perform well, showing encouraging signs of organic growth. Let's take a look at the main figures.
Revenue stood at EUR 63.7 million, down by EUR 8.7 million compared to Q1 2024. The negative calendar effect, mainly related to the absence of Mostra Convegno Expocomfort, accounts for EUR 14.2 million. Excluding this one-off effect, we recorded a +1 0% like-for-like increase, equivalent to EUR 5.5 million of growth. The performance was driven by + 4% in organized exhibition area, + 4% in hosted exhibition area, + 7% in physical and digital services, + 27% in congresses. This result confirmed the resilience and the momentum of our recurring activities. Compared to Q1 2023, the most recent seasonally comparative period, with revenue stood at EUR 48.1 million, we recorded a growth of 32%. Looking at profitability, EBITDA was EUR 12.1 million, down by EUR 13.7 million. The decrease reflects, in large part, the missing contribution of Mostra Convegno Expocomfort, estimated in EUR 11.3 million at EBITDA level.
However, if we look at the most recent seasonally comparable period, Q1 2024, we actually see an improvement. EBITDA in Q1 2025 was higher than the EUR 9 million recorded two years ago. Net income was negative by EUR 3.2 million compared to a profit of EUR 7.6 million in Q1 2024. This result, too, is in line with the calendar driving effect observed in revenue and EBITDA. On a more positive note, our financial position before IFRS 16 improved significantly, with a net cash position of EUR 111.5 million at March 31st, 2025, up from EUR 77.8 million at year-end 2024. In a complex and uncertain macroeconomic context, these results show that our business is solid, our model is flexible, and our portfolio is well-balanced, giving us a strong foundation to face the rest of the year with confidence.
Looking ahead, 2025 presents itself as a year of further growth, supported by a particularly strong exhibition calendar and a favorable seasonal effect, typical of odd-numbered years. A key driver of this momentum is the return of several major biennial exhibitions, including Host, SICUREZZA, MADE, as well as the Innovation Alliance, featuring the multi-year event IPACK-IMA. We are also strengthening our portfolio with new events such as NetZero and H and Saudi Arabia. Additionally, we are pleased to welcome back important international traveling exhibitions like Gastech, already hosted in Milan in 2022, and to introduce a new event to our OST lineup, Artigiano in Fiera Anteprima di Stato. Despite the ongoing macroeconomic uncertainties, the strength and flexibility of our business model allow us to confidently confirm the 2025 target set out in our strategic plan.
For 2025, we expect revenue in the range of EUR 320 million-EUR 340 million, EBITDA between EUR 110 million-EUR 120 million, net cash between EUR 100 million-EUR 110 million. This projection, fully aligned with the 2024-2027 strategic plan, does not include the potential upside from Olympic-related opportunities, which could further support medium-term performance, particularly in services areas like setup, logistics, hospitality, and venue management for Milano Cortina 2026. To further strengthen our outlook, we recently completed the acquisition of a 51% stake in Expotrans SpA, a leading logistics company in exhibition and congresses and events sector. This transaction is fully in line with the direction of our 2024-2027 strategic plan. It allows us to internalize logistic operations, improve goods flow efficiently within the ROI exhibition center, and expand our service offering to both exhibitors and organizers, reinforcing Fiera Milano's position as a provider of integrated event solutions.
For more details on the acquisition, I now hand over to Massimo De Tullio.
Thank you, Francesco, and thank you all for being with us. Let me walk you through the key elements of the Expotrans acquisition. As announced in April, we have signed by the end of the April month, and we have completed the acquisition of Expotrans SpA, a leading Italian logistics provider for exhibition, congresses, and international events. The company brings with it over 30 years of experience in the sector and has long been a trusted partner of Fiera Milano. Expotrans headquarters is in Rome and operates across several strategic locations in Italy, including Milan, Bologna, Parma, Rimini, and Vicenza, and Singapore as well. In 2024, the company generated revenues of EUR 28.7 million with an EBITDA of EUR 2.2 million and a net cash position of EUR 3.8 million.
This transaction fits fully within the priorities of our 2024-2027 strategic plan and strengthens the Fiera Milano positioning as a provider of integrated services. The rationale of the acquisition is clear. By bringing logistics in-house, we can improve operational control, increase efficiency in goods handling at our Rho exhibition district, and capture margins currently outsourced to third parties. Let me take a moment to outline the core business area of Expotrans. The main area, which generates approximately 40% of the revenues, is the event logistics. This includes activities like moving goods inside the exhibition halls, storing materials, and renting equipment to support exhibitors during setup and dismantling phases. The second area of business is the exhibition shipments, which accounts for 34%. This covers shipping services for exhibitors, both within Italy and internationally, helping them move their materials to and from trade shows safely and on time.
There is the general cargo, which represents 18% of revenues. This includes logistics solutions beyond the exhibition world. Finally, about 5% of the business comes from the fine arts transport, a highly specialized service focused on the secure handling of artworks, including customs, packaging, and transport, under very strict and safety conditions. From a strategic perspective, we see meaningful synergies emerging from this integration. These include better support to organizers and exhibitors through direct logistics management, improved service quality, broader commercial reach and stronger contract development, greater loyalty from international clients, and last but not least, more effective control of traffic and logistics flows inside our venues. Now, let's move to the financial structure of the deal. We have acquired 51% of the company for EUR 6.3 million payment, with a price adjustment mechanism linked to the net financial position at the closing.
The entire transaction will be financed through available cash, and we expect the deal to be completely closed also in terms of this price adjustment by the end of Q2 2025. The agreement also includes a pull-and-call option on the remaining 49%, exercisable in 2029, with a maximum valuation of EUR 13.7 million, bringing the total payment value of the transaction to EUR 20 million. This structure allows us to fully consolidate the company while ensuring operational continuity and retaining the current management team, which is a key factor in securing a smooth and effective integration. Now, before moving on to the detail of the quarterly results, I'd like also to highlight an important step we have taken in the area of the sustainable finance.
On April 29, we signed two sustainability-linked loans, each worth EUR 10 million, one with Crédit Agricole Italia and the second one with Banco BPM, for a total of EUR 20 million. These five-year loans are designed to support the investment outlined in our 2024-2027 strategic plan, particularly in digital and technological infrastructure, while also helping us optimize our financial structure and maintaining liquidity for the future growth. What makes these instruments particularly strategic is that they are directly linked to two ESG KPIs fully aligned with our integrated sustainability plan. The first one, an environmental target, increasing renewable electricity to 73% by 2028 as part of our 2030 decarbonization plan. The second one, a social target, with a commitment to allocate at least EUR 1 million per year in free shares to employees, to our employee share ownership plan, reinforcing engagement and alignment with long-term value creation.
The margin on these two loans will be adjusted annually by plus or minus six basis points based on the performance against these two KPIs. This initiative reflects also our commitment to embedding sustainability into all dimensions of our strategy, including how we finance our growth. Now, before we get into the details of the performance effect and calendar effect at consolidated level, which will help you to understand the dynamics of this quarter, let's first take a brief overview of our divisional performance. We will briefly cover the Italian and foreign exhibition business as well as the congresses, providing what we call the divisional legal entity view at slide number 10.
As Francesco already highlighted, the comparison with Q1 2024 is significantly affected by the absence of Mostra Convegno Expocomfort, one of the largest hosted events in our calendar, which was not scheduled in Q1 2025 due to its biennial nature. This clearly impacted both the Italian exhibition business and our consolidated performance. Looking at the divisional breakdown by legal entity, including at this point inter-company, we can comment in this way. About the Italian exhibition business, the main factor, again, that is the main driver for the revenue decrease compared to the previous year is the different exhibition calendar. As I already mentioned, it is the absence in the beginning of Mostra Convegno Expocomfort.
That said, the solid performance of the annual exhibition and congresses of the annual exhibition, together with higher penetration of the value-added services, has partially offset the impact of this, let's say, calendar effect, confirming the underlying strength of our recurring business. On the EBITDA side, the negative variation is mainly due to the calendar effect already mentioned. On top of that, we have also to highlight two additional impacts. The first one is the impact of the sponsorship agreement signed with the Fondazione Milano Cortina. Clearly, this is a non-recurring impact, or let me say, this impact will recur for 2025 and 2026, and clearly is affecting the comparison of the result of 2025 compared to the result of 2024. We are accounting in our first quarter EBITDA result clearly for the costs already incurred for the sponsorship.
We have also additional costs compared to 2024, driven by all the actions that we have taken in order to enhance our relationship and our loyalty to our employees. I'm referring specifically to the health insurance costs that, as part of 2025, extended towards the employees. The second impact is driven by the share plan, the free share plan that we launched at the end of 2024. Clearly, we are projecting in our results the expectation of achieving the trigger to give this free share to our employees for the second year in a row. It is also, as I already mentioned, one of the key drivers and the key performance indicators linked to our sustainability-linked loan. Very important for us.
Going to the foreign exhibition business, revenues reached EUR 2.2 million in Q1 2025 with an increase of EUR 1.3 million, which was mainly driven by the presence in Q1 of the second edition of Freight Attraction São Paulo, which last year happened in the second quarter. This is a calendar effect, a positive calendar effect, clearly a smaller one compared to the one we mentioned before related to Mostra Convegno. On the profitability side, EBITDA decreased slightly by EUR 0.2 million. This now is stemming from the good performance of also the other exhibition that we run in South Africa, which is Investec Cape Town Art Fair.
This EUR 0.2 million decrease is mainly due, basically, to, again, a kind of calendar effect because our JV with Hannover Messe did not leverage this year on the commission linked to the exhibitors that are brought from China to an exhibition that normally happened in Germany, which is called Domotex Hannover. This exhibition this year became a biennial exhibition, so it did not happen in 2025. It happened in 2024. All the commissions related to the business of bringing exhibitors from China to Germany this year clearly were not present in the P&L. This created a little bit of slowdown in the Q1 result of the foreign division. Finally, congresses. Congresses segment continued to deliver outstanding results. Revenue reached EUR 10.5 million in Q1, up to EUR 1.2 million compared to Q1 2024.
This increase is mainly driven by the good performance of recurring congresses, such as those held by Zurich and Allianz, and by higher revenues from non-recurring international events, including Biospring Europe and Intergrowth. I would also highlight that, in Q1, the congress legal entity could not leverage on the results and revenues and margins, particularly coming from a fair exhibition, which is beat the events organized by Fiera Milano that was hosted in the Raw venue. This clearly does not create any kind of impact at consolidated level, but when we look at the congress legal entity view, clearly this created an impact of reduced revenues, but more importantly, reduced margins because this activity was highly profitable if we consider just the legal entity view. This is one of the reasons the EBITDA decreased by EUR 1.7 million, going from EUR 2.8 million to EUR 1.1 million this year.
This reduction is due, first of all, to the absence of Beat, which was really profitable for the legal entity. Again, I highlight there's no impact at consolidated level on this point of view. On top of that, congresses had to face clearly the setup costs of the new venue. We know that congresses started using, from January 1, the new Pavilion One and Two. These were completely renewed by Fondazione Fiera Milano, so the landlord completely restructured these two pavilions. In order to start business and to start hosting exhibition and congresses in these two pavilions, clearly we had to face some setup extraordinary maintenance costs, accounting almost for EUR 0.6 million. On top of that, we have to consider that, again, the insurance cost, the share plan.
There are additional costs linked to the human resources, and also there has been a growth in terms of number of employees. We know that congresses is increasing this to another year after year, so we need also to grant a solid structure to maintain and to further develop this growth. Looking at consolidated level, I think it could be useful to move to slide number 11 to better understand the calendar effect and the like-for-like growth of both the auto-organized exhibition. Moving from this legal entity view to a business line perspective, so excluding the impact of the inter-company, we can see that all the business line grew, compared to the comparable result of the previous edition. The organized event grew by EUR 0.5 million in terms of revenue, which accounts for a 4% increase.
The hosted division, net of the calendar effect, grew by 4%. Clearly, the hosted division is the one affected by the calendar effect because Mostra Convegno is a hosted exhibition. The revenues from services increased, again, in a like-for-like perspective by 7%, and congresses grew by almost 27%. As usual, we can also provide in slide number 12 some examples of the selected case study of square meters growth within our portfolio of organized events and also of hosted events. You can see that on the organized side, we registered positive growth from Milano Unica, which grew by 5%, both International and Tourism Bit, which grew by 8%, and also the small exhibition PTA that grew by 4%. Also, the hosted events grew compared to last year, so MIDO grew by 5% in terms of square meters.
Milano Unica and Intrasic growth, accounted for 25%, highlighting once more again that this exhibition, Milano Unica, is winning this competition with all the main competitors in Europe in the same sector. My Plant and Garden, which grew by 21%. At this stage, considering that we have already highlighted all the main impacts for all the division, I would move to the balance sheet and cash flow. I will start commenting on the main driver for the changes in our balance sheet, and in particular, I would analyze the networking capital, which moved from EUR 86 million negative to EUR 121 million almost at the 31st March 2025, showing a change of EUR 35 million in the quarter. This variation is mainly the result of two opposing effects: an increase in current assets and an even more significant increase in the current liabilities.
On the asset side, we saw a rise of EUR 21 million, primarily due to a EUR 22.8 million increase in trade and other receivable, reflecting higher receivable from customers and organizers, which is consistent with the typical invoicing cycle ahead of major events in the spring. On the liability side, current liabilities increased by EUR 56 million, and this is due to a combination of two factors. First, we had a EUR 18 million reduction in trade payables related to payments made to suppliers from services linked to the event held in late 2024.
At the same time, we had a EUR 43.4 million increase in customer advances, driven by advanced invoicing for events taking place in the upcoming months, and particularly, for a key exhibition like Salone that happened in Q2, that will happen in Q4, IPACK-IMA and TUTTOFOOD that, again, happened in, TUTTOFOOD happened already in Q2, and IPACK-IMA that is going to happen in the coming days. Third impact, a EUR 32 million increase in provision and other current liabilities, mostly due to higher payables to organizers, around EUR 10 million, and to defer the income related to the InWeek telecommunication infrastructure contract, which alone accounts for around EUR 16 million. Overall, this evolution of working capital, sorry, EUR 11 million.
Overall, this evolution of working capital reflects the seasonal and operational dynamics of our business model, which, with strong prepayments ahead of major exhibitions and normal timing differences between revenue recognition and cash collection or payments, also highlights a healthy advanced booking trend, which supports the strong free cash flow we reported and underlines the confidence of our customer clients in the upcoming trade calendar. Let's now turn to our cash flow and financial position. We remain solid and supportive of our strategic flexibility. As of 31st March 2025, our net financial position, pre-IFRS 16, showed a net cash position of more than EUR 110 million, precisely EUR 111.5 million, compared to EUR 77.8 million at year-end 2024, with an increase of almost EUR 34 million over the quarter.
This improvement is primarily due to the strong cash generation from advanced payments received for events scheduled in the coming quarters, like I already mentioned before. Looking at the free cash flow generation of EUR 33.7 million, this clearly can be summarized into an EBITDA of EUR 12.1 million, offset by the normal rental payment of EUR 13.7 million, and then we have to account for the aforementioned working capital contribution of EUR 35 million. Overall, this cash performance confirms the resilience and efficiency of our financial management, and it also allows us to sustain future growth initiatives, including the recent Expotrans acquisition without compromising on liquidity or strategic optionality.
Coming to our guidance, we repeat, we can leverage this year on a very strong exhibition calendar, which is typical of the year, seasonal effect, let's say, and this is clearly due mainly to the presence of exhibitions organized by Fiera Milano, like Host, SICUREZZA, and MADE, all biennial exhibitions. Here, we also benefit from the expanded event portfolio, so we launched new events. NetZero will be opened today or tomorrow. Host Arabia will happen in November of 2025, along with the return of high-profile events to Milan like Gastech and the new launch spring edition of Artigiano in Fiera Anteprima di Stato. The congress sector is expected to remain stable compared to the very important and impressive performance of 2024, supported by the opportunity linked to the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics.
Meanwhile, the development of services and entertainment offerings will continue with an extended outdoor event season from May to September. Despite all the macroeconomic uncertainties, the group still confirms and even increases confidence in its 2025 targets, which are clearly aligned with the strategic plan. We confirm, without considering the impact of Expotrans, that we still are in the revenue range of EUR 320 million-EUR 340 million and in the EBITDA range of EUR 110 million-EUR 120 million, and we confirm also the net cash position in between EUR 100 million and EUR 110 million. We will clearly work on a review of our guidance in the second quarter. During the second quarter, very soon we will disclose the impact of the acquisition of Expotrans, so the impact that clearly will affect the period May-December because the acquisition happened at the end of April.
I will now leave the floor for Q&A.
Thank you, sir. 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 touchstone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star and two. We kindly ask you to use handsets when asking questions. The first question comes from Emanuele Gallazzi of EQUITA.
Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for the presentation. I have three questions. If you prefer, we can go one by one.
Yes.
Is it okay? Okay. The first one is my usual question about the second quarter events. Clearly, the first quarter was strong with an organic growth of 10%. Can you just comment on the performance of the second quarter events, including clearly TUTTOFOOD ?
Thank you, Emanuele, and good evening from Seville, sorry. We hosted in the second quarter so far, Salone del Mobile. I will just mention the primary events: Made in Steel, Lamiera, and TUTTOFOOD . The results were, all in all, considering all the exhibition, fully aligned with our expectation and budget. Some exhibitions did perform as low, you know, slightly less compared to the budget, but other ones performed, in a, in a better way. One of the ones that performed in the better way is TUTTOFOOD , just closed. That happened in the last week. TUTTOFOOD performed with almost 80,000 sq m net area sold to exhibitors. It was an impressive growth compared to the previous exhibition.
A growth that, in a way, it's better than the budget, and it's better, compared to our expectation, but it was expected in some amount. It was part of the, you know, all the operation that we performed with Fiere di Parma, but the main goal was to develop TUTTOFOOD as being one of the most important international exhibitions in Europe. In this perspective, the plan is working, and also the results that Fiera Milano is getting as the hosting venue are fully aligned with our expectation, even slightly higher compared to what we expected. The two is very positive. Another important indicator for TUTTOFOOD is that the organizer, Fiera di Parma, has already announced a kind of 70% rebooking rate, which means that 7 out of 10 exhibitors already, at least signed on paper.
I don't know if they already, I mean, they already confirmed the participation to the next event that, by the way, will happen in 2026. TUTTOFOOD will happen again next year. It was not granted that a 70% rebooking rate for an exhibition that normally is a biennial exhibition. Where exhibition normally, you know, come after two years, having 70% rebooking, knowing that exhibitors will come back again next year is a very astonishing result. Also for us, it is very positive news.
Yeah, very, very clear. The second one is on the, let's say, your recent acquisition, Expotrans. First of all, thank you for all the details on the, let's say, strategic rationale behind it.
It might be, let's say, a little bit early, but can you just discuss on the expected contribution on your 2025-2026 P&L from the acquisition? And just a clarification, is it included in the current guidance or not? Guidance for 2025.
I start from the last part of your question. It's not included in the impact of Expotrans in the confirmed guidance for revenues and EBITDA. I can anticipate that we expect an additional contribution in terms of revenue for the period May-December of almost EUR 20 million coming from Expotrans in terms of revenues and around EUR 1.2-1.3 million in terms of EBITDA, additional to what was our initial budget. Clearly, this doesn't mean that it's additional to our guidance, at least for the EBITDA. I can anticipate that will probably be completely additional in terms of revenues.
For 2026, I cannot anticipate at this stage the expected result for Expotrans, so let me run the first budget of the company also in order to give you my personal view on the expected result. I would say that we will not be so far from the historical result of the company. I mean, so if you look at what Expotrans achieved in 2024, I mean, that's the baseline. On top of that, clearly, we will work to get all the possible synergies. If you want to have an idea about what will probably be added on our guidance, in terms of revenues and EBITDA, I mean, the 2024 result can be a reference for you.
Okay. The third one is a quick one on the Winter Olympics Games. Just to understand, when do you expect to have visibility on the services tender?
Okay. We have nothing to be communicated officially, but we are confident to get contracts signed by the end of the second quarter. We are working on two contracts. Probably the first one will be signed, I mean, I would like to be optimistic. I think probably in the next two, three weeks. The second one will be hopefully signed by the end of June. Very clear. That is one of the reasons why we are also waiting in order to understand which kind of update we have to give to our guidance in this moment.
Yeah. Very clear. Thank you.
The next question is from Simonetta Chiriotti of Mediobanca.
Yes, thank you. My question has been basically already answered. If you could just repeat the impact on revenues of Expotrans, I did not catch the number.
More in general, looking at Expotrans data for 2024, did the company report growing numbers in 2025? Should we expect further growth in 2026 or flat numbers from these acquisitions? Looking at the events, you have underlined that Tutto Food performed very well. If we look at the sectors that are weaker at the moment, like fashion and so on, could you give us your view on how these segments performed and is performing based on the events that you are hosting and organizing? Thank you.
Thank you, Simonetta. The first question was about Expotrans. Expotrans performed in 2024, revenues around EUR 29 million and EBITDA of approximately EUR 2.2 million.
We expect that Expotrans, in the period May-December, will bring to Fiera Milano additional EUR 20 million revenues and EUR 1.2-1.3 million EBITDA. For 2026, I was mentioning before, I would, in this moment, because we have, I repeat, we have not even run the first budget process with the new management, with the management of Expotrans, I would consider EUR 30 million revenues as a reference for 2026. Again, an EBITDA in the range of EUR 2.5 million-EUR 3 million, something like that, which probably will include already some synergies that we hope we will start creating in 2026. Also, Expotrans is now probably working on and will be possibly impacted positively by opportunities arising around the Olympic Games. At this stage, we are not able to evaluate these possible impacts.
In the coming months, we will have probably more clarity on this as well. The second question was about the sectors, so the fashion sector, which is suffering at general level. We had in our Q1 results, clearly, we have consolidated the results of the main exhibitions from the fashion industry. We hosted Milano Unica, we hosted MIDO, we hosted MICAM, and, as I already highlighted, MIDO grew by more than, if I remember well, grew by more than 5%. Milano Unica grew by 25% compared to the last edition. Some other exhibition like MICAM basically confirmed the performances of 2024. Despite, generally speaking, the sector, the fashion sector is suffering, the exhibition were solid and were, some keeping their performances, other, as I was mentioning before, were even improving their performances compared to 2024.
Perfect. Thank you.
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Thank you, everybody. Should you have any other questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at the investor relations conference. Thank you.
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