I have now the pleasure of handing over to the CEO, Mr. Stefano Felici. Please, the floor is to you.
Good evening, and thank you for joining us. I'm with Stefano Beretta, our CFO, presenting the first half 2025 results and the guidance for the third quarter of this year. As usual, a Q&A session will follow at the end of the presentation. Revenues recorded in the second quarter have been positively affected by, first of all, a very good performance coming from the DIS related to the seasonality of the business. We couldn't benefit last year because the acquisition was finalized at the end of May. Second, by the long tail of a big AI campaign started at the end of 2024. Third, as expected, a new campaign in the customer market. From a market standpoint, we confirmed trends discussed in our last call in May. About artificial intelligence, artificial intelligence is doing very well, confirming an extremely strong trend.
We are benefiting from our leading position in the testing of the logic chips, and we are assuming a progressive and steady increase in demand for advanced logic testing solutions. Comparing the performance of campaigns in the AI segments with those in the consumer segment, what we have observed is that the former trend tends to have a longer duration than the latter. This implies a contribution spread over multiple quarters, as opposed to a typically concentrated impact in a single quarter associated with products such as mobile or PCs. Second market is about the consumer market. Consumer exposed markets continue to show modest growth in the second quarter as well. As discussed in our previous calls, we believe the real boost will come from the adoption of AGI.
Together with our clients, we are working on solutions capable of testing new products that incorporate artificial intelligence features, but we have no visibility on their decisions regarding time to market. Third and last is the automotive and industrial market. As confirmed by our clients, industrial is performing a little bit better than automotive, which is expected to have reached its bottom in the first half of the year. Now, let me turn to Stefano Beretta, who will give you more colors on our numbers.
Thank you very much, Stefano, and good afternoon. Thank you for joining us. As you will have seen in our press release, revenues in the second quarter were €168.7 million, slightly above the mid-range of our guidance, registering an increase of 21.1% compared to the same quarter of prior year, with a sequential increase of 7.3% compared to Q1 of 2025. The gross profit increased at 38.4% compared to the same period of 2024, up to € 79.9 million, representing a 47.3% margin. At the high end of our outlook range, and consistently, also the EBITDA increased at 61.8% compared to the second quarter of 2024, up to €58.3 million, representing a remarkable 34.6% margin, well above the mid-range guided during our prior call. If we move to the year-to-date figures, total revenue were close to €326 million, with a year-on-year increase of 35.2%.
Gross profit was €150.6 million, 49.5% higher compared to the same period of 2024, and representing a margin of 46.2%. Finally, the EBITDA closed at €106.4 million, up 75.2% compared to the same period of 2024, representing a margin of 32.6%. For the completeness of information and comparison purposes, it's worth to remind that all the above figures include a new perimeter of consolidation, as already anticipated by Stefano, inclusive of the contribution of DIS Technologies, which was acquired on May 27, 2024, then present for only one month in the same period of 2024. Just to anticipate some split of revenues, DIS Tech contributed to Technoprobe revenues and EBITDA for the six months ended in June 2025 for approximately €74 million and €9 million, respectively, inclusive already of approximately €2.9 million of U.S. reorganization charges, mostly related to the Santa Clara operation shutdown.
Moving to this page, you can see a summary comparison between the financials at the end of the first six months, 2024 and 2025. To comment further, the revenue increase of 35.2% was mostly driven by the change of the perimeter, as I just mentioned, DIS inclusion and Santa Clara shutdown, for approximately €50 million, in addition to an organic growth of €35 million, representing more than 14%, largely sustained by artificial intelligence volumes, as well as soft recovery in the consumer segment, all of them partially mitigated by the continuous weakness in automotive and industrial. If we want to look at the revenues as expected at the cost and currency, so using the same FX rate of the RFI 2024, it would have been approximately €1.3 million higher than the reported revenue, meaning less than 1% unfavorable impact.
In fact, the six months average EUR/USD rate for the semester was approximately €1.09 compared to €1.08 in RFI 2024. On a gross profit level, the increase in the margin from €41.8 million- €46.2 million was the result of the recovery efficiency in our production processes, together with the many operating leverage that our business model allows us when certain production thresholds are exceeded. All of these impacts have more than compensated the increase of the depreciation following the great investments in the fixed assets made during prior year to expand our capacity and increase our automation. If we look at the cost and currency impact, the gross profit would have been approximately €1 million higher. Consistently, also the EBITDA reflected the same trend, showing a significant increase in the margin from 25%- 32.6%, and benefiting also from the savings attributable to the U.S. organization, and even including a negative forex impact for approximately €1.5 million.
Finally, just a look at the net financial position that is down for approximately €14 million in this semester, mainly due to €69 million generated through the operating activities, more than offset by €28 million absorbed by the investment of the period in Capex, €20 million absorbed by the acquisition of a remaining stake in eWay that now is 100% owned, €7 million absorbed by the acquisition of a minority stake in InStar Service IC, a Taiwanese company listed in the emerging market, where we have currently slightly more than 9% stake, and €29 million theoretically absorbed by the unrealized FX impact on the foreign currency bank accounts we currently have, denominated in currency different from euro. If we move to the next page, please.
As already said, during our latest Capital Market Day and during also the latest press release, we confirmed once again the trajectory for an organic mid-single-digit growth in our reference market on a yearly basis, together with a consistent strengthening of profitability and confirming the volumes and market share we currently have. That said, the third quarter of the year is expected to show the following figures, also significantly impacted by a continued deterioration of the U.S. dollar against the euro. Revenue to be about €137 million, plus minus 3%, gross margin in the range of 41.2%, plus minus 2%, and EBITDA margin in the range of 28.2%, plus minus 2%. Thanks everyone for your attention. Now we can move to the Q&A session.
Thank you to the management team. We now have an opportunity for questions. Please remember, if you're asking a question, you should press the raise hand function on your screen, or for those dialing in, press star nine on your keypad. First question today comes from Mr. Giovanni Selvetti. Please, the floor is to you.
Hello, everyone. Can you hear me well?
Yes, we can indeed.
Thank you. Thank you for taking my questions. I have a couple. The first one is quite easy. I was wondering how much of the current cash is currently held in USD deposits and how it's employed, really. The second question is more on the outlook because your main competitor is flagging a quite still weak demand for phone and PCs in the second half of the year. Because you said that you see slightly growth in the first half, is it something you're seeing as well? This again, weakness in H2, or do you see room to grow again in H2 in consumer? The third one is mainly on HBM. I was wondering if you have an update on where are we in terms of authorization with the main producer? Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Giovanni. Let me start from the information about the cash. You will see a great amount of cash overall in terms of euro, and the conversion is pretty significant for us when we move from the amounts denominated in foreign currency rather than euro. We currently have approximately €250-260 million that are denominated in U.S. dollar originally, so the conversion brings it to €260 million. Another bunch of currencies with a minor impact, we talk about something less than €40 million, if I don't remember well. If I remember well, we talk about in overall €300 million of our cash are denominated in foreign currency, but the most significant impact are for those denominated in U.S. dollar, representing €260 million.
Okay. About the outlook for consumer, what we see is kind of stable, but slightly positive, I would say, for the second half of the year. Of course, the major increase is going to come again from AI rather than consumer, but we don't see the consumer market stable, by the way. For HBM, I want to remind, yes, that we are qualifying our technologies with the major players, and here we don't expect to have any revenue for this year because in qualification, and eventually it would be for the next year, 2026. What I like to remind is that the next HBM generations will be more complex and going towards the complexity of logic dice, logic chips, and that's the area where we think we can make the difference with our technologies. Also, the implementation of new technologies will depend on the decision of our customers, please. When they will think that they will acquire a better technology because HBM chips will be more complex, that is the time where we will start to have some traction.
Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Selvetti. Next question today comes from Mr. Fabio Pavan. Please, the floor is to you.
Yes. Good afternoon, and thank you for taking my two questions. The first one is if you can help us in reconciling the 2025 outlook in the light of the guidance you provided us for the third quarter, and this applies to both revenues and margins. If the EBITDA margin of 30% is still confirmed as a floor. Second question is, in the light of this update, what is the impact on, if any, on your expected guidance for the target model you suggested us at the Capital Market Day? Thank you.
Thank you. It's very simple. We confirm all the information we provided in the prior press releases, including also the Capital Market Day. The trajectory for the company was to grow in terms of organic growth for 2025 on a mid-single-digit growth, so in the region of 5%, 6%, more or less, plus the addition of the missing months of DIS in the first half of 2025. We are still respecting this trajectory if we talk in local currencies. In local currency, we are targeting to reach probably something more in terms of U.S. dollar because in the first half of the year, our market share was consolidated, and we got a significant campaign from some customers. In terms of local currency, it's probably higher and close to a high single-digit or even a low single-digit growth.
When we come down to the euro conversion, unfortunately, the trajectory of the FX rate is continuing operating our value in terms of revenue, and we expect to have an impact on a full year base on the total revenue compared to the consensus we have on the market right now in the region of $25 million, $27 million. I included also a chart you can see now projected on the screen if you're looking at the screen, where you can clearly see in the trajectory of the U.S. dollar rate compared to the same periods, comparable period of 2024, where on a quarterly basis, the accumulated average was very consistent, moving from 1.0 to 1.09, in that range. Every single quarter was not impacted by a missing or a plus for the following quarter. In 2025, this is what's happening.
If you look at the actuals two quarters, the accumulated average for the RFI year one was 1.09, and what we expect as a trend for the next quarters, Q3 and Q4, is even a more weaker U.S. dollar compared to euro, arriving to bring the average for the 12 months up to 1.1314, in that range. It means that when you go down to the accounting and you have to convert not only the current quarter, not only the Q3, but the Q3 at the end of September, you have to convert back the RFI results, and you have to start with a deficit. You start with an ending up because the current figures of revenue are converted in 1.09, but when we go down for the nine-month period, we have to reconsider the six-month figures and to have a decrease of what we have already recognized.
This is how accounting works, and this is what we expect for the year end. This is all included in our current estimates. This is not an addition to new estimates or new guidance to be raised in the future, but our figures on Q3 already incorporate this impact. That's why the most significant portion of the decrease on a sequential basis you see on Q3 compared to Q2 in 2025 is impacted. A large impact is due to the significantly weaker U.S. dollar compared to euro. This is a prudential, a very prudential trend, but I want to be prudent, as you know me already since a lot of time. We expect to have the U.S. dollar by the end of the year reaching 1.20, so the average in the last quarter to be 1.1819.
This is a prudent scenario that revises all our consideration we made at the beginning of 2025 and during the Capital Market Day, when the estimate for the full year average was in the region between 1.09 and 1.1. That's why we are still very confident in our business, projecting the same level of revenue we projected at the beginning of the year and at the end of the year in local currency. The only difference we expect in terms of revenue is just the conversion from U.S. dollar to euro, and this impact is estimated to be, as I said before, in the range between €25 million and €27 million for the top line. If we go down to gross profit and EBITDA, of course, in terms of dollar euro, there will be an impact. In terms of profitability, we confirm absolutely the trend for our current EBITDA.
The consensus was in the range between 31% and 32%, and this is what we expect to still achieve at the year end. We do not expect any decrease in our profitability in terms of percentage, and this is due to many, many savings and reorganization savings we had in the U.S., but not only in the U.S., but also at domestic level here in Italy, where our production capacity is at the very positive path. We are not facing particular issues in our production, even for the more complex products. We are making efficiencies also in our local structure, together with other savings and efficiencies due to the integration of the DIS group that brought already in the second quarter of the year a significant contribution higher than expected.
I have to thank you also, DIS management, for what they brought in the second quarter and expect it to be consistent in the third and fourth quarter. Despite the volume, it will be lower as we can come further, but the contribution in terms of efficiency and savings will be very positive. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Pavan, for your questions. Next question today comes from Mr. Alberto Gegra. Please, the floor is to you.
Good afternoon. Can you hear me?
Yes, we can indeed.
Okay. My first question is if you can give us a sense of what level of sales you expect from DIS in the third quarter, maybe also on the EBITDA level. On the margin guidance for this quarter, can you help us in better understanding a sort of bridge embedded in the guidance in terms of dollar impact, operating leverage, and mix impact? The third one, at this stage, looking at the fourth quarter, which kind of moving part should we expect compared to the third one on probe card and DIS, so on both sales trend and profitability? Thank you.
Starting from the first point, the contribution of DIS for Q3 is expected in the region of $35 million, and this is a positive result. Usually, we expect something in the region of $10 million per month, so we expect to reach something more. The contribution at this level in terms of EBITDA stands alone, even if, as I warned you many times, in this case, DIS is still now much more integrated than in the past. There are many intercompany transactions between Technoprobe S.p.A. and DIS, but if we want to have a figure just to have in a range, the contribution in terms of EBITDA is in the region of 12% to 15%. This is very, you know, I don't want to say complicated, but doesn't bring much added value if we want to see DIS standalone because DIS is no more standalone business.
It's now very connected to probe card and Technoprobe S.p.A. customers. The contribution is positive. We are happy for the integration we are performing. The contribution is no more so diluting as it was in 2024. If we exclude the extra charges we had for the reorganization of Santa Clara, as I mentioned before, in the region of $2.93 million in the quarter, even with excluding this one, the profitability will be confirmed in the region of 13%, even 14%- 15%. Okay. What was the other question about the?
About the revenue, margin bridge embedded in the third quarter guidance.
Okay. The increase compared to, okay, in Q3, in Q2, sorry, in Q2, we had a very positive gross profit, more than 47%. The operating leverage is very consistent. Compared to, if we look at prior quarter, same quarter, 41% in the region of second quarter of 2024. We have a 6% gap. This 6% could be attributable more or less 4.4% to operating leverage, 4%- 5% to operating leverage. That is a lot. We have some charges affecting this gross margin. The reorganization impacted not only G&A, R&D, but also inventory and other operating costs above the gross margin, and the impact is in the region of 1%, 1.5%. All the remaining part is efficiency rather than operating leverage. The efficiency we have recovered when transferring some operation from a high-level cost, high-level labor cost location, meaning the U.S. to other countries like Taiwan or Italy. This is more or less the percentage driving the increase of the gross margin. The same could be reflected for the increase on the EBITDA.
Thank you. My last question was about an early view on the fourth quarter in terms of sales and profitability compared to the third one that you are guiding.
Usually, you know, we do not provide any guidance for the following quarter, but we can comment, as I said before, already the trend we mentioned already many times since the beginning of the year. The trend is to confirm a mid-single-digit organic growth, meaning that if we look at the consensus out there, if you want to make some math, if the consensus was using an FX rate of 1.09, you can have the same level of revenue in USD, but using 1.136. This is the same path we started declaring, and this is what we are committed to follow to achieve. No changes in our trend.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Gegra Next questions come from Oliver Wong. Please, the floor is to you.
Hello. Thanks for taking my question. My first question is, you know, since I understand the headwind from FX, on an organic basis, since you're confirming for the full year to be growing at roughly mid-single digits, I was curious about the moving parts. You mentioned you got significant campaign from some customers, and at the same time, the consumer market remains slow. Would you say, relative to perhaps at the CMD when you were giving your target for the year, that certain portions, like the sort of leading-edge logic portion, have gotten better, whereas the consumer portion has gotten worse? I was curious about that. The second question is on ASICs. A Taiwanese probe card maker, more specialized in VPC, has recently won a project with a major hyperscaler who was previously using VPC but now using MEMS. They've won a MEMS project.
Curious, since you guys haven't really talked about ASICs in the past, how you think about that. Is that a potential risk to your market shares, or could that be a potential opportunity as these ASICs customers seem to be transitioning more into MEMS? Thank you.
Okay. Let's start to answer about what we see in the AI market. First of all, I'd just like to give you some information about the type of seasonality we see. Typically, we have seen in the past what we expect for the future because then you can understand that the quarters can be different between each other. It's depending on the main campaigns we see. For consumer, typically, since many years, it's very predictable, the campaigns of consumer products. Why this? Because typically, the launch of a new phone, for example, is always the same month. No matter if it's one company or the other company, typically, they pick the same time of the year to launch new products. That's why this reflects for us to be a typical seasonality of the chips when they need to produce the chips and when they need to use the probe card.
For AI, in the last few years, it was a bit different because they were following an accelerated trend to release new chips. Not once per year or once every two years, but they're accelerating. They changed the time between two new chips. That's why it's a little bit more difficult to predict the seasonality. As said by Stefano, as we don't typically provide guidance for, for example, for the Q4, we expect the second half of the year similar to the first half because also some, I think, positive trend on the AI business. About ASICs, this is already happening that we are already making business with some major players, custom ASICs players. What happened, I think we already mentioned in the previous call, is that these type of chips are also becoming more complex, high up in count, and more demanding as far as technology for probing.
We're already not only engaging, we're already doing business with the major players. This is a great opportunity for us because there's still margin of improvement for us as far as gaining market share in that area.
Mr. Wong, do you have any follow-up questions?
No, that's it. Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
Okay. Perfect. Next question comes from Mr. Gianmarco Bonaccina. Please, the floor is to you.
Yes. Good afternoon. One question, please, on DIS. If I understood correctly, you had something in the region of €45 million revenues in Q2, which is going down to €30 million in Q3. That's a delta of €15 million. You have also sequentially some effects, Edwin, but I calculate a few millions. Am I right in saying that the €30 million decline in sales Q3 versus Q2 is basically half DIS, a little bit of FX, but also some deterioration, let's say, organically in logic probe cards? If that's the case, how do you reconcile this with the comment that you see, let's say, a stable market also in consumer? The second question is just to put things in context. You mentioned the impact of the effects for the total year. Am I right in assuming that translating what you're saying, a level of revenues in euro for you for this year could be in the region of €620 million? Thank you.
Thank you, Gianmarco. I have to correct you on the number of DIS. If we talk about USD, DIS contributed more than $49 million for the quarter, for the single quarter. We expect something like $35 million for Q3, and then you have to convert that into euro. This is the level of the contribution currently for DIS. DIS is very affected by cyclicality. The second quarter is usually the best quarter of the year, as announced already in our prior press release. The normal path for the remaining months is usually $10 million per month. Already reaching more than $35 million is a very good result for a quarter. This is the contribution in terms of revenue for DIS. If you go down to the numbers of Technoprobe standalone, taking into consideration only probe card business, the contraction in the revenue in Q3 is.
Technoprobe is experiencing some technical problems, I assume. Just allow us a few seconds, please. Management team will now reconnect. Just allow us a few seconds. Thank you.
Hello, can you hear us?
Yes, we can hear you. Thank you.
Okay, sorry for the disruption.
Can you please mute the other laptop in the room? Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. Sorry for the disruption. I'm not sure when the call was interrupted, but I believe when I was talking about the revenue of Technoprobe. If not, please let me know, and I will repeat what I said also for DIS. When we talk about Technoprobe in Q3, there is also a cyclicality to take into consideration, other than the huge FX impact on the quarter standalone. We said already there were big numbers of campaigns already exhausted in the first half of the year, and something more is expected at the end of fiscal year 2025. Q3 will be a potentially weakest quarter of the year. We talk about probably $10 million less than the other quarters in terms of campaign from customers. This is what we see on Q3.
As we guided already in the other quarters, in the other press releases, we expect on a yearly basis to have alpha one and alpha two on the same level of revenues. There are no particular concerns in Q3 that was largely expected. This is something we can really control. This is our business. What we cannot control, literally, is the FX that unfortunately we have to take care of in our guidance as well.
Yeah. I want to add, when we say it's stable, we don't mean that you will see always the same, exactly the same revenue for consumer because, as said by Stefano, these also go by campaigns. When we say stable, it's because we see what we call NPI, new product in the introduction. There are certain numbers of these NPIs that this company will develop and launch during the year. At the beginning, it's just a small revenue, and then it's becoming a big revenue when they start in high volume. The stability, when we see the same number of NPIs or even more, we can have a sense of how the business will be. When we say stable, it's basically that we see the same amount of NPIs coming. This is the meaning of stability. Of course, you will always see a quarter better than another quarter, depending on when really there is the high volume campaign.
Just to follow up on the full year, am I right in saying that with the effects you showed, we can assume $620 million as a base now, $620 million?
We usually don't say exact number of the year-end. You know, this is something we cannot guide expressively. Basically, we can say you are in the good range. I mean, just take the current consensus in $6.63 million, and we just remove $25, $27 million, you will arrive.
Okay, right there.
At the level of revenue.
Okay. I just have a quick follow-up. I think it was commented before that you don't have a lot of visibility into the new launches from the, let's say, end customers in terms of AGI. We saw that recently, TSMC indicated in their last call that in the next 6 to 12 months, they will see a significant pickup in AGI. Given your exposure to TSMC, I wanted to ask if you can comment, although clearly the visibility is what it is, on the fact that in 2026, maybe the end of 2026, we should see this pickup, or let's say you don't see this as a potential, maybe it's more longer term. Thank you.
It's a good question. For sure, what I can tell you is that there is a strong push for the GPUs. That is definitely happening. When I talk about the cloud AI, you can see what the major players are announcing in that area. There is really, even though we don't have a committed forecast, so we cannot tell you exactly, but we see very strong, can be very strong demand in that area, GPUs, cloud AI. There is the edge AI, which is a little, is more difficult, let's say, to predict. What I can tell you, as I mentioned before, for sure, TSMC is working in many new NPIs. They're really, yes, they're working on the AGI chips, but it's difficult right now, I mean, for now, but also for TSMC. I don't think they know for sure when they will go in mass production.
It means that, of course, they're preparing the designs, they're preparing the first engineering chips, but the moment that they will go in mass production, it cannot be predicted with very high precision. For sure, this is where they're going and where they also, what we are doing to follow them.
Very clear. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bonaccina. Next question comes from Mr. George Brown. Please, the floor is yours.
Hi, guys. Can you hear me?
Yes, we can indeed.
Perfect. Yeah. Thanks for taking my questions. I have two, if I may. Firstly, if we look into 2026, we've had a lot of positive commentary recently from your peers, like Advantest, Teradyne, specifically on AI. I think Advantest gave a very bullish outlook on their tester sort of market size in logic. More test capacity is being added in 2025 and 2026. Can you give us an idea on growth in 2026 and what will be the drivers here, whether that's still AI or maybe some first HBM sales as well? Secondly, on HBM, Teradyne recently called out first wins in HBM for testing singulated stacks. After the HBM wafers are diced, and this is a new type of test. I'm just wondering if this type of test is relevant for Technoprobe as well, or whether there are multiple stages of test in HBM where Technoprobe is being qualified.
Thanks, Brown a bout the estimates of 2026, you know our business model works, and it's very hard for us to make some statement on the growth. What we expect is for sure a growth, and this is due to all the reasons you mentioned. All our players, all our partners like Advantest and Teradyne and all the other players in the same space seem to be very aligned on that. What I can tell you is that we are considering further expanding our capacity. In fact, one month ago, we acquired a land very close to our headquarter where it could be expanded up to 50,000 square meter capacity. This is the double of the current space we have in all our headquarters here in Italy. We are also looking for another potential acquisition of another building. This is what we can tell you.
We are preparing ourselves to a significant ramp in the future in 2026 or 2027. Of course, a new building will not be ready in 2026, but the expansion will be gradual and very important for our business. That's why we are not giving up and stay as we are. We are currently on a capacity production rate in the region of 80% overall in all the departments we have here in Italy in the headquarter, even if some departments, specific departments, started showing like a bottleneck for certain processes. We don't want that to be a problem for the next few months. That's why we are very looking in the future to expand our capacity and to avoid any bottleneck and to avoid any disruption in our business, not only in Italy, by the way, but also in Taiwan. We're making a project also to expand in Taiwan.
Yeah. About the HBM testing, one of the problems that everybody's facing is how really to assemble all these chips the way that they, without losing yield or without throwing away all the other ones. This is really the main point. This is an opportunity for us because testing part of the assembly, the part of these chips already assembled or the whole stack already assembled, is very close. I mean, required technologies that are much closer to a logic technology for probe card rather than a memory technology for probe card. Typically, the memory probe card is testing many, can be thousands of chips in parallel, but it's not a real good non-good die test. If we are going in the direction that really we need to test subassemblies or a singulated die chip or a mix of these, this is for sure an opportunity for us for the type of technology we can provide.
Okay. Brilliant. Thanks, guys.
Thank you, Mr. Brown. Next question comes from Ms. Frangillo. Please, the floor is to you. Ms. Frangillo, I kindly ask you to unmute your line.
Can you hear me?
Yes, we can now. Thank you.
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. Two questions on my side. The first one is on the FX impact for 2026. I know that it could be early, but could you help make a simulation also on 2026, considering that market expectations are for further deterioration of the euro-dollar rate next year and therefore still an adverse comparable basis for next year? The second question is if you could share your initial thoughts on the tariff evolution and also on whether probe cards could be considered semiconductor equipment and therefore eventually be exempted by the euro-U.S. agreement. Thank you.
Thank you. You touched two very delicate points: FX and tariffs, where we have not complete control, and in most cases, we have totally no control. Starting from the FX impact on 2026, what I see is the same information you can easily see from all the banks and all the FX offices around the world. The deterioration is expected to be in the region of 120 to 125, but this number is very far to be achieved right now. You see the change. If you look at the chart I just projected on the screen, you see that every quarter there is a deterioration of more than 5% on that currency in very few days, basically. The scenario can change literally from one day to another. Also, depending on many decisions on a macroeconomic level, you can imagine the Fed can cut the rates.
I don't know if under pressure or with no pressure, nobody knows. Probably now they are expected to cut in September once and maybe another cut in December. I said maybe because it could happen, it could not. European Central Bank could do the same. They are now expected to make a cut, only one by year-end. There are many other elements that could affect the trend of the rate. As you know, we are usually very prudent when we make estimates. In case we will see another deterioration, we can ensure you that we will incorporate, we will not bet against the market. We do not speculate. We follow the most available information that is available on the market. About tariffs, I'm confused as you are. As you have seen a few hours ago, President Trump declared the intention to raise 100% tariffs on semiconductor.
I don't know how this could be reliable with all the exceptions you mentioned, but in a pretty confused and not specific way. It is very hard also to predict what they have in mind. What we can say now is what we see formally on the papers. What we see now is a 15% impact, which is what is currently in place. This impact is not a direct impact on our business, meaning that we are not the importer in the U.S., but as explained already in another situation, it's our client that imports. That means that we could have an indirect impact in the sense that our product could be less competitive in terms of pricing compared to competitors' products.
It doesn't mean that competitors don't have any impact because we have seen a recent press release from one of our competitors admitting that they have an impact on tariffs, especially on the purchase of raw materials from Asia, in particular. They will have a higher cost impacting between 1.5% and 2.5% of gross margin. In our case, we don't have this situation on the side of the costs, but as I said, we can have the impact in terms of competitiveness. As of today, there are no signals at all for the moment to have a different competition in terms of pricing. The impact now is nil on Technoprobe S.p.A. business. We have, as I mentioned before, an impact on DIS for the importation of some goods in the region of $1 million impact in terms of additional cost in the first half of the year.
This $1 million could be probably recovered through the clawback procedures in the U.S. because these products have been, after the assembling in the U.S., re-exported to Asia. In that case, you can have a refund in different times, probably 12 months, 18 months timing for a refund. In any case, it could be neutral in the mid-term. I want to confirm currently, Technoprobe S.p.A. is not directly impacted, but could be indirectly given the pricing the customer pays.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Frangillo. Next, we have a follow-up question from Mr. Giovanni Selvetti. Please, the floor is to you.
Hello, guys. Again, I just wanted to know if there is any update in terms of M&A, if you're working on any new deal. I saw that you basically purchased the last 20% of, I'm not sure if I could pronounce it right, but the company where you had 80% stake before. I was wondering if you're scouting for any targets and if possible, in which area?
Thank you. We are always scouting for new targets, but there is nothing really in progress right now.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Selvetti. Currently, we do not have any more questions queued. Therefore, I have pleasure handing back over to the management team for any final comments. Thank you.
Thank you, everyone, for attending today, and stay tuned for the next time. Thank you.
Thank you very much. This presentation will now come to a close.