Good afternoon. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Tinexta Group Consolidated Results as of the 31st of December 2021 Conference Call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there'll 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. Josef Mastragostino, Chief Investor Relations Officer. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, and good morning to the folks in the U.S. Thank you for joining Tinexta's FY 2021 Results Presentation. Here with me today, Oddone Pozzi, Group Chief Financial Officer of Tinexta Group. As a reminder, all the relevant documentation of FY 2021 results can be downloaded from our company website in the investor relations section. For the purpose of this call, I will go over the FY 2021 highlights and updates, as well as provide all the relevant information relating to the recently announced news. Oddone instead will go over the FY 2021 financial results as well as provide us with a business unit update. The last part of the call will be dedicated to Q&A. A recording of this conference call will be available on our company website, and it will be posted upon completion of this call.
At this point, I will kick it off by turning to page three of the presentation. FY 2021 was another year of growth, registering strong progress. Please note that in order to allow as complete an analysis as possible, FY 2021 results are compared both at constant 2020 perimeter as well as on a 2021 perimeter, which includes all Tinexta's companies with the addition of the newly acquired ones. Revenues came in at EUR 375.4 million, posting a +39.5% growth versus prior year or 7.7% growth on a 2020 base. EBITDA adjusted, which excludes stock options and other non-recurring revenue, came in at EUR 98.7 million, posting a +21.5% versus prior year or 2.7% on a 2020 base.
EBITDA reported came in at EUR 93 million. EBITDA adjusted margin was 26.3%. EBITDA reported margin was 24.8%. EBIT came in at EUR 56.9 million, growing 8.1% versus prior year. EBIT margin was 15%. Net profit came in at EUR 44.9 million. If we were to include the purchase price allocation, net profit actually was EUR 39 plus EUR 6 million or growing 4.9% versus prior year. Net financial position reflects entirely the recent acquisition and stands at EUR 263.3 million. That is EUR 193.3 million if we consider Bregal's investment, which was completed on February 3rd, 2022. Leverage ratio is at 2.67 x on a reported basis, 1.96 x pro forma for Bregal.
In 2021, most of the business lines continued to grow. In fact, Digital Trust grew a healthy 13.3%, growing 11% on a 2020 basis, and EBITDA increased 17%, with EBITDA margin posting short of 28%. Cybersecurity revenues reached EUR 73 billion roughly, and EBITDA margin was close to 14%. Credit information management increased 2.2% in revenues, with a slight increase in EBITDA of 3.7%. EBITDA margins were healthy at close to 29%. Innovation and Marketing Services posted a +24% in revenue growth, 11.3% on a 2020 base, with EBITDA rising 14%. EBITDA margin of Innovation and Marketing Services was over 43%.
In terms of the recent news, Tinexta, as you all know, presented its 2022-2024 business plan presentation during its capital markets day on February 28. You all have seen the provided 2022 guidance and 2024 business outlook. As of today, there was also a proposal of dividend equal to EUR 0.30 per share, which will be presented to the general assembly at the end of April. Turn to page four. On page four, we highlight most of the KPIs. As you can see, the growth has been already mentioned, and we are providing healthy double-digit growth both at a revenue level as well as an EBITDA-adjusted level and net profits. Probably most importantly are the results on page five.
We're highlighting Q4 results, which were superb in our opinion, with revenues growing close to 42% and EBITDA adjusted growing even more, at 46% growth versus prior year, showing the strong operating leverage of the entire company. Net profit grew 36%. As all the numbers have been mostly commented, let's turn to page six. On page six, we provide you an EBITDA walkthrough, which is comparing H1 results and H2 results in order to provide you a bit of a more color from the growth in terms of EBITDA. We expected back-ended year EBITDA growth, and we over-delivered on all accounts. In fact, 2H 2021 actual results were expected to be around EUR 54 million in terms of EBITDA, and they came in at EUR 56.4 million.
EBITDA, in fact, adjusted on a 2021 basis was EUR 98.7 million. The main takeaway of this slide is that quarter-on-quarter performance is not representative of the group's yearly performance. Going to page seven, we give you a reported to adjusted KPI walkthrough, and we are now providing the EBITDA adjusted versus the EBITDA adjusted last year, as well as the EBIT and the net income. As you will all appreciate, the only items or the major items that represent the walkthrough from reported to adjusted are non-recurring service costs as well as stock option costs. In terms of operating profit and net profit, we also are including the amortization of other intangible assets from business combinations. Turning to page eight, I will leave it to Oddone to give us a deep dive on the 2021 financial results. Oddone?
Good afternoon, everybody. After you know the introduction done by Joseph you know I will go through the P&L of the full year. As you see also you can see the comparison on a same perimeter basis, 2020. You know the results as shared you know achieved EUR 375 million you know with a significant growth over previous year, partially driven by the you know the organic growth, but you know still having a high single digit growth on the same perimeter basis.
In terms of marginality, and if you look at the EBITDA margin, you know, we should remember that during 2021, we incorporated, following the acquisition, of the cybersecurity company that currently has a lower margin than the average of the group. The 26.43% that we achieved is basically aligned with our expectations, although it is lower than 2020 results. If we move down from the EBITDA, you know, starting from this year, we incorporated the amortization for more than EUR 7 million of the PPA that we run over the acquisition of the cybersecurity as well as Queryo. If we go down, we are up to net financial charges of EUR 3 million. That is basically what we expected.
The net profit is EUR 39.6 million compared to the EUR 37.8 million, but you know, we have to remember, as previously showed by Joseph, that on an adjusted basis, the net income moved up from slightly above EUR 40 million to more than EUR 49 million. This is on adjusted basis, which is very, very strong net profit increase. The Q4, you know, we perfectly remember that, you know, during the year, so a lot of question was posed on our capability to deliver the second half and the Q4. As Joseph mentioned, you know, we should look at our performance.
It's very difficult to compare on a quarter-by-quarter basis, as basically our business is not a consumer business that usually the consumer business has more or less similar trends. Our business is a B2B business, and you may clearly understand that if you have a big project in one quarter one year, and you have probably the following quarter the following year, result may change. Having said that, Q4 has been fully aligned to our expectation. We were able to deliver a very strong Q4 with significant growth over previous year and with an important contribution to the results.
At the end of the day, you may see that, you know, the net profit of the quarter has been EUR 50 million compared to the EUR 11 million the previous year. It means a growth in the range of 35%. As we'd already shared, you know, I want to anticipate that the figures we are presenting now are perfectly aligned to the figures that we already shared with the market during our conference call on the 28 of February. You know, I go back here to the invested capital. Obviously, the level of acquisition that the group delivered, as indicated during the presentation of the plan is mainly driven by the several acquisitions that the group delivered during 2021.
The invested capital went up slightly above EUR 500 million, starting from EUR 265 million, and this is, I have to say that this is entirely related to the acquisition we performed. During 2021, the group was able to basically improve the working capital management despite the significant growth of the revenue from this. The net financial position landed on a pro forma basis. If you exclude the acquisition of Ropo, we include, you know, the share capital increase from Bregal, we just landed around slightly below 2x the EBITDA. This is what we planned since the early beginning of the year.
You know, at the 3rd of February, we had the share capital increase of Bregal. On a pro forma basis, we landed at EUR 193 million. Shareholders equity increased despite the distribution of dividends during 2021 of 2020 results. You know, also considering the buyback program, but the profits came up to almost EUR 40 million, and we have to include also the contribution from Intesa Sanpaolo in equity for the acquisition of Forvalue. Our shareholders equity now is slightly EUR 250 million. Acquisitions during the year were material.
You know, we had the acquisition of Corvallis and Yoroi to build up together this Swascan, the cybersecurity program, and also the Queryo acquisition that occurred during Q1 2021. In November, we completed the acquisition of CertEurope already in 2021, delivered more than EUR 1 million EBITDA in just two months. If we move to the free cash flow, the free cash flow is still strong. We need to point it out that in 2021 we had a payout of taxes for EUR 25 million, driven by the growth in the profits from 2020.
Still, as I already mentioned, we were able to generate cash from the working capital in 2021. You may see here the flow from one period to another at page 30. Now I will go deep diving into the business units. I will move directly to page 16. Digital Trust had definitely a very strong year. The company on a pro forma basis, on a same perimeter basis, was able to grow 11% with the EBITDA growing more than 13%. This is an excellent performance.
On top of the financial performance, we have to remind that, InfoCert were more and more able to become a very strong partner to large corporation and large banks in helping them through the digital transformation management. Very frequently, InfoCert is appointed as a main contractor from this large corporation, and is helping entering into intimate level, with the clients in developing, this business. This is exactly what InfoCert is looking to do with the new acquisition of, CertEurope infrastructure. EBITDA landed at almost 28%, with a strong growth and including also a continuous investment, in order to refresh the product, to develop new product, to develop new solutions. Cybersecurity. Well, we are happy about the performance of the Cybersecurity.
This is wasn't something that basically when we completed the acquisition was not, you know, granted, because the task from the manager's standpoint was really tough. Basically, we acquired three different companies, three different cultures, and our goal was to try to put them together and to be able to have an integrated go-to-market, an integrated organization, and an integrated offer to the customer. You know, this has progressed accordingly to our expectation, and I would say even more important, we were able to exactly deliver the profitability we committed at the beginning of the year. The EBITDA margin landed not far from 14%. This is slightly above our expectation. This is a good indicator.
Definitely, you know, here we have, you know, the first challenge has been achieved and overcome because this was the first step. Definitely, going forward is where the challenge is more important. Credit information and management, you know, definitely this is the only area that basically delivered slightly below previous year. You know, I think we should look at this from a different perspective. Here, you know, we are showing figures from 2019 to 2021, but, you know, during the plan presentation, we show figures also from 2018 to 2021.
Well, if you look in a row, you know, the three or four years, we may say that despite the revenue is more or less flat, and this is something according to the market of the credit information, I have to say the profitability of credit information business unit improved quite significantly. We move up from below 24% in 2018 to 24% in 2019, and we landed at the end of 2021 at 29%. Obviously, being able basically to confirm the exceptional performance of 2020 is been a great achievement. The company is delivering close to 30%. I mean, the business unit is delivering close to 30% EBITDA margin.
That is an outstanding performance. Innovation and marketing service is so like this within the credit information. I would add that Re Valuta had a very good year, improved its position, improved its profitability, and this is, you know, another factor that allow us to achieve the results that we are showing here. Forvalue obviously is just started. It has already shared with the market. Basically Forvalue for us is long-term investment that we performed. The first six months were basically a warm up, try to set organization and to set the operating model together with the bank being Forvalue in the middle and the process between the bank and our companies that are delivering services and products.
Innovation and Marketing Services had the, you know, quite tough year, but was able to continue to improve the performance in terms of revenue, EBITDA. You know, in this business unit, basically we have three components. The component of Warrant that is delivering most of the profitability, Warrant in a tough year, driven by, you know, like the mixture of the budget law was able to deliver very positive results, you know, slightly above the previous year. Co.Mark was able to rebound from the 2020 that was penalized by the COVID. We are glad to share that Queri yo is performing according to an ambitious plan we put together when we acquired the company.
The integration between Co.Mark and Quero is performing well, and I have to say that Warrant is continuously improving its revenue mix, being less and less dependent from the Finanza Agevolata, and the Warrant is bringing on the market new business line, new products, facing, you know, all the opportunity coming from sustainability, green, ESG and whatever. The bunch of offer of Warrant is improving, and this allow us to look at the future in a very promising way.
Okay. Thanks, Oddone. We're gonna quickly turn to page 21, where we are presenting our already known key financial targets for 2022 and 2024. In order for you guys to appreciate the numbers on a 2022 base in a constant perimeter, that means with organic growth, we expect revenue in the range of 10% to 12% growth versus prior year. The equivalent EBITDA adjusted is gonna be anywhere between 8% to 10% versus prior year. Considering the acquisitions, we expect to grow strong double digits anywhere between 18% and 20% on a revenue base and 20% to 22% on an EBITDA adjusted base with net financial debt over EBITDA adjusted landing at around 2x by the end of fiscal year 2022.
On a 2024 base, giving you an outlook all the way to the end of the plan horizon, with acquisition, we expect to grow CAGR 22-24 low double digits in revenue and mid-double digits in EBITDA adjusted. The NFP over EBITDA adjusted is expected at the end of 2024 to be any sub one, anywhere between 0.7 x and 0.8 x. More importantly, it's important to say that on slide 22, I think it's important to provide you some bridging between the net financial position expected to the guidance, right?
We provide you a bit of a waterfall scenario here to see how to bridge anywhere between the EUR 263 million at the end of 2021, all the way to the expected numbers that we just said in the guidance. I think it's fair to say, you know, Oddone already had mentioned this during the preliminary results on February 28, that basically the free cash flow in 2022 is expected to be around EUR 60 million. The Bregal payment has already been cashed in around, during the 3rd February for EUR 70 million. Let's all remind the market that the overall commitment of Bregal is EUR 100 million.
The first tranche has already been cashed in February 2022. We have to consider the entire earn-out and put adjustments both for Digital Trust and Cybersecurity of around EUR 40 million. Dividends and minorities, so to third parties, are expected to be in the range of EUR 20 million. We are putting expected numbers, okay? These are averages between buyback and other. We're considering EUR 10 to EUR 20 million each. The landing net financial debt over 2022 at adjusted EBITDA is, as we said, 2x. Then bridging all the way to 2024, we expect an additional EUR 160 million of a free cash flow generation, Bregal investment to be completed within 12 months of February 2022 for the remaining EUR 30 million, and then dividends and others to be in the range of EUR 35 million each.
Which lands us exactly on average to sub 1 or 0.7x or 0.8x the NFP over 2024 adjusted EBITDA. We wanted to give you a bit of color because I think it's important so that the market knows exactly how our free cash flow is, given our predictability with the free cash flow. Putting all the numbers together, you're looking at at least greater than EUR 220 million of free cash flow between 2022 and 2024, and the Bregal investment, which is gonna be, as we said, EUR 100 million spread out between 2022, 2023, and 2024.
At this point, I will leave it to Q&A. If you can, we have questions.
Certainly, sir. Thank you. 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 your question, please press star and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. We will pause for a moment while participants join the queue. The first question is from Renato Gargiulo of Stifel. Please go ahead.
Yes, good afternoon. Well, my first question is a general one. In your outlook, in your press release, you stated that clearly it's not possible yet to assess the potential impact of the ongoing Ukraine crisis. I just wanted to ask you if to date, are you seeing any impact or any of your businesses is somehow affected by this new macro scenario? On the positive side, if you are experiencing already an acceleration, strong acceleration demand for cybersecurity services, given the higher, let's say, cyber risk after the Ukraine crisis. Second question is, yesterday, you announced another acquisition in Italy, Enhancers, which seemed pretty interesting from a business standpoint.
Just if you can provide us any more color about the rationale and potential synergies from the integration? Last one is quite general about your you have recently clearly provided your business plan targets. In terms of divisions, which business in your view may have the highest upside potential? Also, maybe considering the impact of the recovery plan in the medium term. Thank you.
As of today, honestly, I have to say that, you know, we have no direct business with Russia and Ukraine. We checked out with all our companies, and this is not the case. I have to say that no direct business there. Potentially, you know, our clients have business with Russia and Ukraine. You may think of some banks where we sell services and so on. As of today, we have no impact, you know, that has been reported to the headquarters from the different companies, as of today.
I would say that also, you know, if you look at the pandemic, we have no impact, although, you know, the month of January was, you know, quite from that standpoint, with 500,000 cases per day in Italy, there has been just a little slow down in real estate estimates requirement, because basically banks has a lot of, you know, people that were not working because they were COVID and visiting new houses was something that was not so easy. But overall, nothing really material is going to impact us driven by these two strains. As regards Cybersecurity, well, you know, there is a trend. We are confident to overperform the trend that is there in the full year.
You know, an acceleration still. You know, I would say that companies are not reacting just to this, you know. Probably we need to perform extra controls, but you know, generally, you enter an agreement with the company and you have you know, managed security services during the period. You know, we have not seen an acceleration, but driven by this. Definitely, we expect you know, the clients are more careful and they are trying to understand if there is a risk there. The third question was on
Enhancers.
The last acquisition was the last one. Maybe I can complete. The last one was-
Renato, you were asking which of the business is expected to grow most? Was that your question?
Yeah. The upside potential related to your business plan targets medium term.
As of today, on a same perimeter basis, we have already a quite ambitious plan. You know, we are talking about double digit growth, basically revenue and EBITDA, with the EBITDA running a little bit faster. So everybody has a quite tough planning role. We have to say that looking at the trends over the last quarters, and the expectation we have, definitely Digital Trust is the most promising business among a portfolio that is growing overall 10%. But I would say that driven by the last performance and the expected performance that the InfoCert and Digital Trust is the business that is expected to deliver better. We have to remind that also we do expect a material growth in terms of profitability from the Cybersecurity.
The plan that we have shared is projecting a growth of 30% on an average growth rate. It means that we have a very challenging plan in front of us. We will see that, you know, we have a look at it over the period over the full year.
To answer your last question on the recent acquisition. So just so everybody's on board, we're talking about innovation and marketing services division. In particular, it's Warrant Hub that purchased 100% of Enhancers. So this falls into the typical acquisition that the group has carried out. You know, we always said that we will carry out some bolt-on acquisitions, and in particular here, the acquisition is the purchase of this company called Enhancers, which is based in Turin and Bologna. Their main product line is that of offering task-oriented digital systems. So the idea here, the takeaway is these are digital product suites in particular that can improve the consultancy services that we provide to small medium enterprises.
Now, alongside what has already been announced on the press release that you all have seen, we're talking about, so just to give you some flavor of an EBITDA in the range of a bit shy of EUR 2 million on a given year. That's obviously these are the typical acquisitions that the company carries out, and they are considered bolt-on to complete the offer.
Perfect. Thank you. Thank you very much.
The next question is from Isacco Brambilla of Mediobanca. Please go ahead, sir.
Hi, good afternoon, everybody. Just one question from my side. Since we are now in mid-March, is there any call, any color you want to share on current trading on how 2022 has started, maybe with some qualitative comment by division? Thanks.
Okay. Well, you know, basically the year just started. You know, we have confirmed, you know, our board confirmed the guidance for the full year. This, as already said, is a very challenging guidance and targets. You know, in answer to, you know, basically, we can only confirm what we shared. You know, we expect Digital Trust to be, you know, the driver in terms of percentage of growth and size of our growth. Obviously we do expect a material improvement in growth from the Cybersecurity.
Lower growth, we expect in terms of profitability from Warrant Hub, and Co.Mark and Quero, but still, you know, overall, an important growth from that division. Now, as of today, I have no specific news that we are committed to the plan for the full year. You know, as in the previous year, I would not focus on single months and quarters or whatever. You know, we have seen that, you know, since the early 2021, we shared with the market our target for 2021. You know, we delivered them during almost Q4, but we were confident we knew what we were managing, and this is what happened.
As of today, I have no other significant news to share. If we would have shared, obviously.
The next question is a follow-up from Renato Gargiulo of Stifel. Please go ahead, sir.
Yes, thank you. Just very quick follow-up. Regarding the reorganization you talked about during the business plan, simplification of the corporate structure, et cetera. I was just wondering if we can expect any material restructuring costs or one-offs on this side? Thank you.
No, no. When we are talking about simplification, we are talking about especially in the area of innovation marketing services, where you may see, you know, many legal entities. I think there we are going to simplify, means we're going to some merge between the companies in order to integrate them in the major company that is a Warrant there. No restructuring cost about that, absolutely. You know, this group has, you know, this, the merger that we are going to perform during 2022, they are focused to streamline the operation and to make, you know, all the life easier around that and avoiding some duplication of cost.
We are talking about a group that is continuing to grow on an organic basis. We never have a redundancy of people there, you know, because we are always, I would say most of the time we are short of people, because if the business is growing, you need people to support it. When we are talking about simplification, it's a matter of not overcomplicate our activity, but we have no redundancy, so we are not expecting restructuring costs.
Okay, perfect. Thank you.
Mr. Mastragostino, there are no questions registered at this time, sir.
We would like to thank you again for connecting to the Tinexta conference call, and if you have any additional information, please don't hesitate to contact us. Take care.