Good evening and welcome to the Safilo Group first half 2025 results presentation. This call may contain forward-looking statements related to future events and operating, economic, and financial results for the Safilo Group. Such forecasts, due to their nature, imply a component of risk and uncertainty due to the fact that they depend on the occurrence of certain future events and developments. The actual results may therefore vary, even significantly, from those announced in relation to a multitude of factors. Today's participants are Mr. Angelo Trocchia, Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Michele Melotti, Chief Financial Officer, and Ms. Barbara Ferrante, Director of Investor Relations. I will now pass the call over to Mr. Angelo Trocchia, Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Trocchia, you may begin, sir.
Thanks, thanks very much. Good evening, everyone, and thank you for joining us today to discuss Safilo H1 2025 results, including a training update on the second quarter. Let me begin by framing the broader context of our performance. Throughout the second quarter, we continue to show our ability to adapt to the multiple layers of uncertainty streaming from geopolitical tension and shifting macroeconomic pressures, particularly those related to tariffs. Despite this challenge and a landscape that continues to change, our sales performance at constant exchange rates remains solid across key regions, reflecting the strengths of our brand portfolio, our operational agility, and the execution discipline of our teams across markets. Supported by our long-term customer focus, this momentum translated into consistent economic and financial progress, allowing us to deliver one of the strongest semesters in our history.
At the same time, we advanced on our strategic agenda, further strengthening our licensed portfolio and our commitment to long-term shareholder value. Turning to the key highlights of the period, in the second quarter, our sales at constant exchange rates continued to grow, in line with the performance we recorded in the first quarter, driven by positive momentum in North America, where the recovery was more marked, and by the resilience of the European market despite increased market uncertainty weighing on consumer confidence. Once again, France stood out as one of our leading markets, underscoring its role as a strategic priority. Second quarter trends were substantially a continuation of Q1, also in emerging markets, where Asia remained largely positive, while sales in the EMEA region remained weak. Our results were again underpinned by the strengths of our contemporary and lifestyle brands across our core wholesale channels.
From an economic and financial standpoint, we delivered another quarter of significant profits and margin expansion, supported by a series of effective measures which mitigated the negative impact of the U.S. tariffs. Gross margins reached a new high, and we were able to convert much of these improvements into a higher operating performance. Combined with strict working capital management, these results also drove strong cash generation and a significant reduction in net debt. In short, I would say that the balance of our geographic exposure, the quality of our brand portfolio, and our operational discipline continues to sustain our performance through a complex and evolving cycle. With that, I will hand it over to Michele, who will walk you through our results in more detail.
Thank you, Angelo, and good evening to everyone. Let me start with an overview of our total sales performance in the second quarter and over the first half of the year. At constant exchange rates, total net sales rose by 2.3%, substantially in line with the +2.2% recorded in the first quarter. Differently from Q1, foreign exchange rates were a significant headwind for our reported revenues, given the approximately 5% depreciation of the U.S. dollar against the euro, which impacted on our top-line translation. Q2 sales were down 1.1% at current exchange rates. We closed the first six months with net sales of €537.6 million, up 2.3% at constant exchange rates, and in positive territory also at current exchange rates, up 1.1%. From a brand perspective, in the second quarter, momentum remained strong across our core portfolio.
David Beckham, Boss, Tommy Hilfiger, and Marc Jacobs delivered another quarter of double-digit growth, while Carrera and Carolina Herrera recorded solid high single-digit increases. Across product categories, prescription frames remained the main positive driver, supported by resilient demand across all key markets. This helped us offset the softer performance in sunglasses, which were influenced by a more prudent consumer spending and persistently promotional environment, especially in the United States. The quarter was overall flat for our sport products, largely due to a different phasing of delivery of winter products. I will come back on this later. Looking at our distribution channels on a half-year basis, momentum remained solid among our independent competition and retail chains, up high single digits, while online sales were moderately positive, stable at around 16% of revenues.
What we saw here was continued strong performance in direct-to-consumer channels and sales growth towards international players, offsetting a subdued performance in blended e-commerce business. Turning to our regional performance, starting with Europe, second quarter sales were moderately positive, by 0.5% at constant exchange rates. Sunglass sales remained broadly stable, sustained by solid momentum through international players, while performance in physical stores, particularly in Italy and Spain, was more uncertain and volatile. Prescription frame posted resilient low single-digit growth, fueled by increasing the adoption of the UN Safilo B2B platform among independent competition and retail chains, further strengthening our commercial execution. As I highlighted, France confirmed its role as the region's main growth driver, supported by robust demand for optical products, both prescription frame and sunglasses, and further boosted by our in-store communication initiative. We saw continued solid results also in Northern and Eastern Europe markets.
As a quick note, our sales performance in Europe was also marginally impacted by the consolidation effect from the disposal of Valenti in June. In the first half, our sales in Europe increased by 1.7% at constant exchange rates, supported by double-digit growth from David Beckham, Tommy Hilfiger, Boss, and Marc Jacobs, which showed a continued performance across both prescription frame and sunglass collections. Carrera closed the first semester with a very healthy high single-digit growth, while Polaroid posted a low single-digit upside, supported by the enhanced brand visibility as the official partner of the ATP Tour, particularly during the Madrid and Rome tennis tournaments. Turning to North America, Q2 sales at constant exchange rates rose by 4.8%, reflecting the continued recovery of the U.S. market.
This performance was led by the double-digit growth in Carrera, David Beckham, Boss, Marc Jacobs, and Carolina Herrera collections, which significantly boosted total prescription frame sales and helped sustain the sunglass category in what remained a challenging market environment. In direct-to-consumer channels, not withstanding the fact that Blenders continue to be impacted by promotion-driven demand, particularly evident in the entry-level price segment, its performance showed some improvement compared to the first quarter. In the second quarter, sales of mixed products were held back by our decision to temporarily limit the import of new winter elements from China following tariff announcements. This move resulted in the deferral of some deliveries to the second half of the year. Zooming out to the first six months, our sales in North America increased by 2.8% at constant exchange rates, driven by mid-high single-digit growth across its core channel and product categories.
Notably, we closed the winter season 2024-2025 in North America, further solidifying its market leadership in snow goggles and snow helmets. This, combined with solid results from our leading high-performance in all sales, helped us sustain the region's positive trajectory. Turning to emerging markets, the second quarter presented a mixed picture across regions, shaped by a combination of macroeconomic and geopolitical factors. Asia-Pacific continued to make a positive contribution to our performance, with second quarter sales up 11.5% at constant exchange rates. Momentum remained healthy, especially in China and across distributor-led markets, which continued to show solid demand and engagement across our portfolio. In the first semester, our sales in Asia-Pacific were up 14.7% at constant exchange rates, so far confirming the region as a steady contributor despite some local volatility. In the period, Tommy Hilfiger, Smith, Marc Jacobs, and Levi's were up, our top-performing brands in the area.
Turning to the rest of the world, in the second quarter, sales were down 5.2% at constant exchange rates, while in the first half, business was down 3.8%. AMEA markets and Latin America showed contrasting dynamics, with challenging conditions in the former and more positive trends in the latter. In the Middle East, the region continued to face a combination of political tensions and operational restrictions in certain key markets. This disruption affected distributor selling and weighed on overall business visibility, making the operating environment more complex. In contrast, Latin America posted a positive performance in the second quarter, led by a business recovery in Mexico, thanks to a strong performance by Carrera and Carolina Herrera.
Let me now turn to our economic performance, starting with our gross margins, which was one of the highlights of the second quarter, reaching 61.6% of sales and taking the first semester to 61.1%, among our all-time highs. What made the difference here was the combination of several factors. First of all, we were able to maximize the use of existing inventory to serve the U.S. market efficiently, a move that helped us minimize the immediate cost escalation due to the high tariff level introduced by the U.S. administration in early April. Starting from June, we also implemented target price increase adjustments and engaged in focused supplier negotiations, which further contributed to preserving profitability.
In addition to these levels, price needs continued to play a favorable role on gross margins, especially a lower contribution from the total supply business and from store products on top of a more favorable dynamic on total sales. Gross margins also benefited from the lower obsolescence costs supported by continued improvement in inventory, both in terms of quantity and quality. Finally, we had some 50 basis points support from foreign exchange movements, which also contributed to lifting gross margins during the period. Altogether, this factor led to a strong and healthy margin profile, with 160 basis point improvements in the second quarter and 110 basis points higher in the first semester.
In the second quarter, we continued to deliver strong progress at the operating level, effectively converting a significant portion of the gross margin improvement into higher profitability, even if we maintained a sustained level of marketing investment to support the development of our own brands. During the quarter, reported EBITDA included a gain of EUR 9.7 million due to the disposal of the subsidiary Valenti, which, together with few non-recurring costs, is clearly excluded from our adjusted results. On this basis, our adjusted EBITDA grew by 9% in Q2, with the margin improving by 100 basis points from 10.1% to 11.1%. In the first semester, we recorded the strongest operating performance of the past decade. Adjusted EBITDA was up 8.1% to EUR 62.3 million, while the margin reached 11.6%, 80 basis points higher than last year.
This result was supported by healthy operating performance as the increase in SG&A expenses, which rose by around 1%, was mostly absorbed by sales growth. This moderate increase in selling, marketing, general and administrative expenses was primarily driven by higher marketing investment and by a greater allowance for doubtful accounts in certain emerging markets. Yet, as a percentage of sales, SG&A remained stable. The improvement in profitability was further supported by lower depreciation and amortization, which helped drive a 15.3% increase in adjusted operating profits, with a margin expansion of 100 basis points to 8.1%. In summary, this was a milestone period for us from an operational standpoint, one where top-line quality, margin discipline, and focused investment came together to unlock one of the best underlying profit delivery in our recent history.
Turning now to the bottom line, our strong operating performance was clearly the main driver behind the significant improvement in our net results over the first six months of the year. Below the operating line, the positive trend was further supported by lower net financial charges, which declined from EUR 6.9 million to EUR 2.9 million, mainly due to the lower average group net debt during the period and a net positive impact of around EUR 2.4 million from exchange rate differences. We also recorded a higher non-operating gain linked with a fair value assessment of the option reliability on minority interest, which is due to blenders' lower than expected results. Finally, we closed the first semester with an adjusted net result of EUR 33.7 million, recording an increase of 39.4% compared to the EUR 24.2 million recorded last year.
If we net out the effects of the put and call option, our adjusted net results still showed a healthy year-on-year improvement of 32%. Let me now finish with our cash generation and financial performance. We closed the second quarter with a strong free cash flow of EUR 29.1 million, bringing the total cash generation for the six months of the year to EUR 43.5 million. This result reflects a sharp improvement in cash flow from operating activities, which reached EUR 40.7 million in the semester, up significantly from the EUR 27.3 million last year. This strong performance was driven by the solid earnings and by continued discipline in working capital management, particularly through tight control of inventory levels. This efficiency was further supported by the strategic decision taken in the second quarter to limit imports from China, a move that helped optimize stock dynamics and preserve cash.
Cash flow for investing activity was also a positive flow at EUR 8.4 million in the semester due to the disposal of Valenti, which generated net proceeds of EUR 11.9 million. This compared to the cash outflow of EUR 41.1 million in the first six months of last year, mostly related to the strategic investment for the perpetual license of Iowa by Teddy Pettit. At the end of June, our net debt was halved to EUR 42.4 million, compared to EUR 82.7 million at the end of December last year. Notably, excluding IFRS 16 lease liability, we were substantially net debt-free at the end of June, a significant achievement that confirmed the strength of our financial profile. With that, I'll now hand it back to Angelo to share a few closing remarks.
Thanks, thanks to you all, Michele. Before concluding our presentation, I would like to outline three strategic milestones we achieved in the last couple of months. First of all, the early renewal of our licensing agreement with Carolina Herrera, which we have extended for another five years through December 2031, allowing us to complete the path we began in 2023 to secure long-term visibility over all our core licenses. With the renewal of Carolina, we have indeed completed the important journey. We are particularly pleased to continue this successful collaboration with one of the most iconic names in global women's wear. The synergy between Carolina's Creative Director and our design and craftsmanship expertise has produced distinctive modern eyewear collections that truly reflect the essence of that. That has allowed us in just a few years to place it among our leading licensed brands.
Secondly, this renewal has given us that additional hint of confidence also to proceed with the launch of the share buyback program we had announced in March, not withstanding the highly uncertain landscape. We continue to navigate markets by still evolving tariff negotiations. As we had already declared, the program is designed to set up the reserve of treasury shares, ensuring we retain the flexibility to size the future investment opportunity, whether for growth or strategic initiatives. It underscores our focus on long-term value creation for our shareholders. As a quick reminder, the plan allows for the purchase of up to 15 million shares, equal to approximately 3.6% of our outstanding capital, and this is expected to be concluded by December 2025.
Based on the share purchase program we started on June 2025, at the end of the semester, we had bought around 438,000 Safilo Group ordinary shares, equating approximately to 0.11% of the outstanding capital. Finally, we entered the third quarter announcing the addition of Victoria Beckham to our portfolio, a brand that further enhances our women's offering and strengthens our position in the aspirational entry to the luxury segment. Victoria Beckham is a signature in women's fashion, backed by one of the most influential Creative Directors in the industry. We are thrilled to welcome her into the big Safilo family. Together, we aim to establish the brand as a global reference in eyewear, with collections defined by minimal design and highly distinctive brand identity. This new partnership explains our ambition to lead in the segments where creativity, quality, and brand storytelling make the difference. With this, I conclude our presentation.
Thank you all for your attention, and we are now happy to take your questions.
Excuse me, this is the conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the touchstone telephone. To remove your question, please press star and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. We will pause momentarily while participants join the queue. The first question is from Oriana Cardani of Intesa Sanpaolo.
Yes, good evening. Thank you for taking my three questions. The first one is on price development. Do you think that the price increase already implemented in North America is enough, or are you considering a further slight revision in light of the updated tariff scenario? How do you expect the price mix effect to be in the second part of the year? The second question is about gross margins. What are the headwinds you expect in the second part of the year? Considering this business scenario, do you think that there is room for margin stabilization at the level of the second half of last year in terms of gross margin? The third question is about current rate. Can you give an update on the trend you saw in July for the group and across each region? Thank you.
Sorry. Thanks for your question. I will start answering to your last question, and then I will answer the other two. In terms of current trading, we can say that we exited the second quarter with the same trend, with the trend largely in line with what the overall performance was of the period. If we look by region, North America, June was a solid month, particularly in our wholesale channels. In July, trading remained positive but showed some sign of deceleration related mainly to uncertainty and volatility. If we look to Europe, in Europe, we had a solid April. We had a very challenging May related to a very rainy period, especially in the south of Europe. Europe has been almost divided in two, but we have been penalized in the southern Europe, mainly Italy and Spain, which has impacted our sunglasses.
June saw a very clear improvement of the performance in terms of both selling and sell-out. In July, we see a pickup of the sunglasses capital. This is divided by region. If we look to the answer to the price, and then Michele will answer on the gross margin. With the current scenario and with the current assumption, except that big changes will happen on the tariff side, we don't see a need to do other activities or take other actions on the price increase. We've been very careful in doing it. We've been differentiated by different categories. As it stands today, that's it. We don't see a need for further acting on price. With relation to the H2, I think H2 now, to be honest, we don't see an effect on the demand from the price increase. At least we have not seen it for our categories.
Obviously, to be honest here, the question is what's going to happen on the inflation in North America. As it stands, we don't see a negative impact from the price increase that has been done so far.
On the gross margin for the second half, clearly, our key headwind will remain tariffs and our ability to mitigate all the tariff-related costs. I would say as a matter of fact, in Q2, we have been able not only to offset most of the impact arising from the tariffs, but even to build margin, primarily from a positive price mix effect. Of course, also some development on obsolescence reduction and also some tailwind from the forex import. Our ambition for H2, of course, depending on how the tariff scenario will evolve, is to continue to build margin. The level of which will highly depend on one side, on our ability, as I was saying before, to counter the impact arising from the tariffs, and on the other side, also the mix of our sales in the second semester.
Great. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Niccolo Storer of Kepler.
Thanks. Thanks for taking my two questions. The first one is on the transfer of your production capacity. If I remember well, you were mentioning to lower China to below 50% by the beginning of Q2. I was wondering if this has actually happened. The second one is on CapEx. I see that CapEx has remained extremely low in the first part of the year. Why that, and should we expect any kind of acceleration in the second part? Thank you.
I answer on the first one on the sourcing. No, I think we are absolutely in line according to the plan that we've been discussing last time. All the so-called differentiation of the supply chain toward Vietnam, Philippines, Cambodia, and Thailand is going absolutely according to the plan. So far, there are no main variants versus the numbers you were referring to, and then we have been talking like stuff. What is important, I think the way in which we are working gives us also flexibility. If anything will change in the current waves, you know that we need to get used to quite some instability, we will be able to eventually rebalance or take the right decision according to the different situation. In the current scenario, we are definitely in line with the plan we've been discussing and declaring last time.
On capping, as you can see recently, we have a very light, I would say, input pass-through on setup. I would say that around €10 million would be a reasonable estimate for the year. This is mainly related to maintenance CapEx, which this year is more skewed to the second half.
Great. Thank you.
The next question is from Andrea Bonfa of Banca Akros.
Hi. Good evening to everybody. Some of my questions have been already answered. I got two remaining ones. You mentioned some benefits on the working capital from, say, the trade tension with China, which benefited exploiting current stocks in the U.S. Does that imply that you will have some net working capital absorption in H2 that we need to consider? This is my first question. If you can elaborate on the Victoria Beckham license, which seems interesting, and if you can give us an idea in terms of potential vis-à-vis your overall sales. Thank you very much.
On working capital, yes. I mean, Q2 and overall H1 have been helped and supported also by, let's say, the decision of delaying some of the input to the second half. I would say the amount is roughly in the range of $10 million inventory that has been delayed. We should assume in the second half a build-up of this working capital for these related drivers. At the same time, as precisionality, H2 would also foresee a reduction in receivables. We should expect anyhow an end of year with an improvement on our working capital efficiency versus prior year.
Answering about Victoria Beckham, Victoria Beckham is in line with the strategy or the strategic direction we have been defining some years ago, which is let's catch the women opportunity. This is related to the fact that we have been adding Isabel Marant, the fact that we've been adding Carolina Herrera, the fact that we have been launching Carrera women. Victoria Beckham is in line to reinforce in a substantial way our presence and our strength in the women part of the market, which, by the way, is the biggest part of the eyewear market. About how we see the license, I mean, I believe that the start of the relationship, the collection that you would see, and all the campaigns we have been developing, I think they're quite encouraging. We are getting some first positive, very positive feedback.
In the medium term, this is a license which can represent something between 2% and 3% for Safilo.
Thank you very much.
The next question is from Domenico Gallotti of Equita.
Good afternoon. I have a few questions. I'm starting, so I follow up on the tariff situation. First of all, I'm trying to understand if there is any risk of so-called pooling orders. Maybe clients in North America anticipated, brought forward some, say, purchases, and you will see then the impact in the second part of the year. In general, if you can give us an update on what's going on, how are you managing the situation, for example, in the negotiation with the suppliers, also in terms of transferring to them part of the impact. Another question is related to the opportunities for capital allocation. You were mentioning in an article interview the possibility to come back to dividend payment, but also some opportunities in terms of M&A. If you can elaborate a little bit.
Last, on the limited disposal, just to understand what is the rationale for the transaction and what are actually the impacts that you are seeing apart from the cash in that we have seen in the capital gain.
I will try to answer the full set of questions. Thanks very much for that, Domenico. You are pushing me to work. Let's start from the tariff. Honestly, we don't see an effect on the American customer to build up stock because, to be honest, now the customers are, I think, have been taught by the COVID. In general, the customers now have quite a more conservative profile in loading or in buying or in getting higher stocks. I would say that we don't see that effect talking with our customers. Question on the supplier, obviously, we don't give the details there, but you know thanks to the fact that we have a strong, strong historical relationship with at least four or five suppliers. The discussion with them has been a combination between getting better negotiations on what is produced in China versus with some of these suppliers.
We have been building a strong relationship with them, allowing them to go to Vietnam or to go to other countries. I would say that on that area, honestly speaking, my feedback is very, very positive on the, I will not call it negotiation. I would say the discussions which are going on with some of our top suppliers. On capital allocation, as we said, I think in this moment, also thanks to our financial situation, the priority is M&A. As I said, we have clear direction of the M&A. As I said, it's optical, it's sport, and it's women. These are the three directions. We think that in this moment, still, that is the priority.
If at a certain stage we think that we will come to the conclusion that there are not M&A at the price or at the multiple that we think are the right ones, then we can do different capital allocations. The scenario is quite clear. Let's see what's going to happen in H2 on the M&A side. On the last question on Valenti, then about numbers, I will leave Michele to answer to you. Valenti was not strategic for us in the sense that Valenti is a small factory producing lenses, also producing other categories like plastic, shield, and for motorcycles or for cars. I don't think it was enough strategic for Safilo. In the light also to make our manufacturing setup lighter and more flexible, we have decided to sell the asset. Also, it was an asset underutilized for us.
I think that as we've done for some other manufacturing activities, the asset can be by far better utilized by others. That's where the reasons behind the decision.
Yeah, with the number, I mean, the consolidation will impact, I would say, on a full year base, not specifically on the remainder of the year. 1% of sales on third-party sales is not really material from a profit standpoint. Basically, next year, we will be missing roughly five months out of the 12 we have in our consolidated numbers.
Thank you.
As a reminder, if you wish to register for a question, please press star and one on your telephone. For any further questions, please press star and one on your telephone. We have a follow-up from Domenico Gallotti of Equita.
I have a follow-up on the M&A scenario. Do you see in the current situation a better scenario compared to the past few years in terms of opportunities? Maybe some players are less active and more focused on their own business. I don't know if there is any kind of reading.
No, I agree with your reading. I think there are some of the other guys which are now busy maybe more on internal topics than external. This is one dimension. Also, all this variability of the market and with all this tariff is, let me say, putting under discussion some of the more traditional supply chains. I would say that in this moment, we see a more viable environment for potential M&A if we compare with one year ago. Yes, it's more viable now.
You have not mentioned the regional gap, the Asia-Pacific area. Is it a focus of potential M&A, or do you think that you want to improve and strengthen the core markets of North America and Europe today?
I think priority remains North America and Europe, especially along the direction of the optical. I think that's where the biggest opportunity is here. To be honest with you, we are looking to some opportunity in Asia. If I would rank it, Europe and North America definitely are the two areas where I think we have the highest priority there.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks.
Once again, for any further questions, please press star and one on your telephone. Gentlemen, at this time, there are no more questions registered.
Okay. Thanks very much. I'm assuming that this is the last call before holiday time. I wish you the best holiday time. I think we will be in touch, I don't know, when you're in November.
November. Good, thanks very much.
Thank you. Bye-bye.
Thanks very much.
Thank you. Bye-bye.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over, and you may disconnect your telephone.