Good morning, everyone. For those of you who do not know me, I am Isabel Green. I am Head of Investor Relations, and welcome to our FY 2025 results presentation. Before we start today, just to remind you that we will be making forward-looking statements, and the relevant disclaimers for that are in the presentation and in the results press release. We start today with a short introduction by our CEO, Nicolas Huss, and will be followed by Brendan Brennan, our CFO, who is going to talk through the results in more detail. After that, Nicolas is going to come back to give us an update on our strategic priorities for FY 2026.
At the end, there is going to be plenty of time for your questions, both in the room, on the conference call for those of you who have dialed in, and I believe on the webcast. We should have some to read out as well if anyone submits them. Thank you. I will now hand over to Nicolas.
Thank you, Isabel. Good morning, everyone. We have reported our results today and achieving, as you have seen, 8% in total transaction value growth, 5% in revenue growth, and 10% of adjusted EBITDA growth at constant currency rates. All of this was within the guidance range that we provided at Q3. Our cash conversion remained strong, just over 100%, which, along with the proceeds from the IPO, cut our adjusted net debt in half to EUR 639 million. These results, of course, were achieved for us in a more challenging and volatile market. I will come back to that. It was also a year of change for the group, with our beginning as a listed entity helping to better position us for future growth.
While I'm happy with everything that we have done this year, I'm also convinced that we expected to do better, and I would want to tackle that upfront. The revision to our guidance in the year was disappointing. We have taken a long, hard look at the performance. We identified a number of areas where we can improve. In particular, we realized that we needed to be more agile in our response to changes in the travel patterns and stay closer to our customers to deepen our relationship and be in front of mind when they need our help and support. We have done that. I will come back to that in a few minutes. I think we, as a company, have this important place in the intermediate travel market. We provide a critical connection between supply and demand, accommodation and distribution partners.
The actions that we have taken over the past months have already started to have a very positive impact on TTV, with a step up in bookings giving us confidence that we have turned the corner and for the results in our first quarter of 2026. You know, if I look at it from a strategic perspective, I think that we have this durable business. We are very well placed to grow and deliver value better for all of our stakeholders in 2026 and beyond. If we move to the following slide, please. Here we go. Sorry. What's very important, if I start maybe by a look back at the market dynamics in 2025 and the market trend, I think what we know is that the accommodation market is highly fragmented.
The role of intermediaries, both in B2C and B2B, remains critical to connect, as I was saying, supply and demand. The market grew approximately 4% in 2025, below what we expected at the beginning of the year. There was a form of normalization post the COVID recovery to a trend and a growth that was below what we used to see pre-COVID, actually. This slowdown was, of course, as you know, driven by macroeconomic, by geopolitical volatility in the spring. The uncertainty over trade tariffs caused a short-term trend towards spending on different goods before coming back gradually and progressively to the tourism industry. For us, it was the timing was not good, actually, because you know that we have this booking long in advance. This happened exactly at the minutes or at the time where we were booking our summer accommodation and plans from a travel perspective.
What also was very interesting is that we saw that travelers were showing heightened price sensitivity and a preference for shorter lead times for regional and domestic travels. What we have observed recently is that we see a normalization. This is quite traditional in our industry. I mean, it's an industry where things evolve very quick. Usually what we see is that in a trend, the recovery is also very important. We have seen in leisure travel, which is our industry, a price sensitivity with a lot of demand from consumers reacting quickly to the different offers, which, of course, puts pressure on distributors to secure their possible price from the B2B intermediaries, who in turn need to seek the best prices from the hotels. In today's highly automated environment, I'm certain that we'll come back to that. From a trading perspective, changes happen very quickly.
Dynamic pricing scale, of course, must be balanced with differentiation to sustain a competitive advantage. This is certainly when we lacked over the spring and probably at the beginning of the summer. As I said, we've turned it around. We're in motion, and I'm very positive about 2026. Looking back, I think probably the mistake that we made as a company is that we've stuck to our strategy, outpacing the market on TTV growth. We also looked very hard at holding our tech rates relatively steady because we had just introduced the company into the listing environments. As a consequence of that, we did not achieve the growth that we aimed for and the relative performance that we believe we're capable of. This is why we have made some changes. You have followed that. I will come back to that.
Changes in the way we operate, better using third-party supplies alongside with our direct contracting, our SPA models, but also capturing shelf wallet with targeted commercial actions. One last slide before passing on to Brendan, where I think I would also want to reflect on the successes that we had this year. Our business is built around, you can see that on the slide, first of all, strong partnership, and of course, this technology platform that we are very proud of. If I start maybe with the relationship, I am actually very pleased by the level of acquisitions of new commercial partnerships that we did in 2025. I think it's a very important topic. We have been very successful in closing new partnerships, and of course, it's helping us in our recovery and acceleration.
Maybe we commented along the year on Despegar that we had announced just before IPOing, and many of you were keen to see if it was working. I think it's a great partnership. It's working incredibly well as the largest OTA in Latin America. This had an immediate impact on our distribution in the regions, and we are very pleased with that. We have also signed a lot of hotel partnerships or reinforced partnerships. You remember that during the year we mentioned Minor Hotels. The reason why we mentioned that as one of the examples is that we've added close to 200 hotels in a region which is very important for us and where we want to do better, which is Asia-Pacific and the Middle East.
Maybe also to remind you that we've strengthened our positions in the airlines industry through our partnership with Perfect Stay, the dynamic packaging capability, Southwest Airlines that we started to implement last year, Turkish Airlines. These are two major players in the airline tourism industry. We also invested in product, which is very important. We have always been doing that. We will keep doing that. The example that comes to mind almost immediately is the luxuries. It's been very well. You know that it's the most resilient part and the highest growth part of the travel segments. We connect through the luxuries 8,000 premium properties around the world, a lot of AI-powered itinerary planning with natural languages, which is something very positive, and it works well.
Technology, it's been a massive year in terms of volume when you think of it, even though we grew at a slower pace than expected. It's the biggest year that we ever did from a volume perspective. Our technology has been really reliable, as you can see here in some of the numbers with a record uptime and really an absence of unplanned downtime in 2025. I touch wood by saying that, but it's always a very important factor. Brendan will say that investment in technology keeps being a priority for us as we want to keep growing organically. We see also some corporate milestones that we keep on investing in the products, in the segments that we think will make a difference for the future. In May, we announced the acquisition of Civitfun. It's a technology innovation business that connects us to the hotel.
It's a catalyst for digitalization, which is very important these days with AI. It connects us seamlessly to the different PMS of the hotels. It helps us supporting online check-in, check-out, many forms of digital payments, and cross-sell tools. As a company, last comment, I mentioned the fact that, of course, we debuted as a public company, which is very important. I was very positively impressed by the work that Brendan and the team did to deleverage us. You would see, or you have seen, that I think we have reached a very good level. We had a double upgrade from a credit rating perspective, which is very positive. Over to you, Brendan.
Thank you, Nicolas. Thanks, everyone, for joining us today. We'll go into a little more detail now into our financial results for the full year 2025.
Of course, speak to the guidance for 2026 towards the end of my prepared remarks. I'll start with the income statement and key performance indicators. As Nicolas said, the opening slide, we have delivered a solid financial performance in 2025 and ended the year within the guidance range communicated as part of our Q3 results. I'll start at the top and work my way down. The Total Transaction Value, or TTV, was EUR 8.2 billion, up 8% on a constant currency compared to the prior year. Almost twice the market growth. Growth was strongest in the first half, as we know, during a more stable economic environment. In the third and fourth quarters, growth decelerated, reflecting the change in consumer trends and exacerbated by our less favorable positioning on short-term bookings and domestic travel corridors, as we spoke a bit about on our third quarter call.
Revenue was EUR 720 million, up 5% on the prior year constant currency levels. This implies a take rate of 8.8%, 20 basis points lower than last year. Modest reduction in take rate reflected the mix of activity and increased commercial actions as we looked to balance the market share with profitability. That is something that we will be returning to as we talk to our guidance on those particular points. Around half of our revenue and TTV is US dollar denominated, which is important for your modeling. Currency was around 1% tailwind in the first half, but it was around 1% headwind for the full year with an average rate of $1.10 to the euro in 2025. Our adjusted EBITDA was EUR 431 million, up 10% again on a constant currency basis.
Our margin was 59.9%, so clipping 60, really good achievement, up 2.7 percentage points on the prior year, helped by the solid top-line growth and a strong control over operating costs, partially offset by higher other costs included in gross profit. The increase in our costs was largely due to a swing in one-offs with a EUR 10 million bad debt during the course of the year and some favorable elements in the 2024 P&L of EUR 12 million that principally related to sales tax benefits during that period. We reported operating profit of EUR 129 million, which included EUR 202 million of non-underlying and non-recurring charges, mostly related, of course, to the IPO. Net finance costs of EUR 180 million reflected our IPO debt structure and included EUR 88 million of non-underlying finance charges relating to pre-IPO debt and refinancing charges.
Future finance costs will be materially less, as you would expect, due to our lower net debt and refinancing that was completed in March on much more favorable terms. Indeed, as we continue to pay down debt, we have positive ratchets that will move in our direction. The tax charge of EUR 17 million compared to the prior period credit of EUR 24 million with an underlying effective tax rate of 26%, again, very much in line with the mid-20s that we indicated at the IPO. Adjusting for the non-underlying and non-recurring charges, as well as the portion of the interest charged related to the pre-IPO debt structure and PPA amortization, adjusted earnings were EUR 258 million, up 48%. You can see at the bottom of the slide there, year over year. Adjusted earnings per share was EUR 1.16, not terribly comparative to the prior year because of different share count numbers.
A good number to think about as a starting point for how we will be thinking about our earnings per share on a go-forward basis. Moving then to slide eight, where we look at a bit more of our geographical segmentation. In Europe, our largest region, where we generate around half our TTV, we grew revenue by 4% at constant currency with 9% growth in Spain and 3% growth in the rest of Europe. TTV increased 6%. We saw good growth in France, helped by easy comparatives from the prior year due to the Paris Olympics, of course, as well as in Switzerland and Malta. On the other hand, growth in Germany, Turkey, and Portugal was less strong with fewer international arrivals. In Germany, true comparatives from obviously the European 2024 Football Cup that was held there in that period.
In the Americas, the group's second largest region at around 30%. TTV, revenue grew by 4% and TTV grew by 9% in constant currency. Revenue in our other Americas grew more strongly than in the U.S. with 5% and 3% growth, respectively. Regional and domestic travel showed relatively strong growth, especially in the Latin America countries, which benefited from the new preferential agreement with Despegar that Nicolas referenced in his opening comments. Arrivals into Americas from Europe and MEAPAC were less resilient, both slowing materially from the second quarter as a consequence of some of the geopolitical turmoil that we talked about earlier on as well. Thirdly, MEAPAC, the strongest growing region in the group, contributing around 20% of TTV. Revenue was up 10% and TTV was up 13% on a constant currency basis again.
Long-haul arrivals were consistently strong, but regional travel softened in the second half of the year. I think just a word to note that there's obviously a little bit of disparity between the percentage growth rates when you're looking at TTV or revenue. At this level, just to give you an idea of it, there are some elements of kind of one-off pieces that happen, particularly on the revenue line, that aren't as closely related to trading. We have given you more detail on a trading perspective from a TTV perspective to reflect more closely to what we would call a trading view of our performance year over year.
Moving on to slide nine now, I think an area of particular focus for us as an organization and of particular strength, and an area we want to continue to see as a particular strength going forward, which is, of course, our operating costs and particularly our cost control. We're really focused on cost discipline and efficiency, and that has helped us to deliver an absolute cost reduction to deliver adjusted EBITDA within our guidance. Our cost base is largely fixed with 81% of our total costs not directly related to trading volumes. In fact, while the volumes increased, we actually lowered our headcount during the year, so really showing that leverage, of course. Starting at the top, the total operating costs are down 7%. This includes a material one-off reduction in variable pay adjusted for this.
Adjusting for this, I should say, operating costs would have increased by no more than 1%, well below the pace of top-line growth. Our largest cost in our commercial is our commercial function. This is the frontline team that builds relationships with our suppliers and distribution partners, so critical to our growth and delivery of our value proposition. Reorganization of our sourcing teams and a focus on increased efficiency kept cost growth at just 2% year on year. Next is operations. We achieved 2% reduction in operations cost year over year. This was enabled by using AI to become more efficient and improve productivity with increased automation and award-winning AI-based training and real-time voice translations. Technology increased 5%, which was mostly volume related, as you would expect the increase here. Data and technology are pillars on which our business is built.
Maintaining investment in reliability, functionality, and security is paramount to our value proposition. Nicolas, obviously, referenced at the opening comments, very, very strong performance in the business from a functionality of our platform perspective. Central costs are up just 1%, including the one-off step up, reflecting the higher costs associated with being a listed company and investing in some of our corporate functions. Finally, non-functional costs have almost halved, 49% lower. This is where you see the 71% reduction in variable pay, which was circa EUR 24 million lower than the prior year, as we lowered the accruals as a result of not achieving the financial targets for bonuses. If variable pay had remained in line with prior year, the underlying cost increase would still have only been EUR 1 million.
As I mentioned at the outset of this slide, I think this has been a particular focus area for us. You can see that we're tough managers, to be frank. We keep a very close eye on the cost base. When we talk about paying for performance, we really mean it as well. I think you can see that from the numbers that we have here. Not only should I say on this, that's the piece in 2025. It will continue to be the piece in 2026. We continue to see our margin targets in that context as very, very achievable. Moving on to slide 10, a real highlight for the business, I think, during the course of this year, which is, of course, our structure of our debt and our debt positions as we move through the course of the year.
As you can see on the slide, our adjusted net debt has improved from EUR 1.3 billion in September 2024 to EUR 639 million in September 2025. This 50% drop in debt, along with the growth in profitability, took our leverage down very meaningfully to 1.5 times from 3.2 times adjusted EBITDA last September. Our reported net debt, which includes seasonally high levels of working capital, is even lower at EUR 397 million, equating to 0.9 times leverage. You know, guys, that we do not really talk to that number terribly. I did want to include it here because I think it really just does show the really strong financial performance of the company over the course of the year. This deleveraging last year was a two-part journey.
Firstly, the change resulting from the IPO, of course, which contributes EUR 423 million to the deleveraging, comprising the proceeds, net of legacy incentives and refinancing costs, of course. Secondly, we had the inflows of EUR 251 million from operating cash flows, interest, and CapEx, as well as exchange rate and cost and other items. This shows our strong cash generation with 0.7 turn of leverage reduction from the reduction, sorry, coming from the underlying business performance. Again, as I said, this has been a particular strong case for us. We talk about, and I'll talk about it in the next slide as well. We've seen no degradation in our commercial terms. It still seems like a very strong element of our business.
We really think that this is a really solid platform to continue on and continue in this vein in 2011 and gives us a lot of optionality in terms of our ability to use our balance sheet constructively to support the company as we go forward. Slide 11 then, the components of our operating free cash flow. Our adjusted EBITDA to operating free cash flow conversion was 101%. This shows the benefits of our favorable working capital cycle, which grows as we expand the business. This is broadly matched by the ongoing capital investments we need to develop and build in class, the best-in-class technology functionality that supports our long-term growth and gives us our competitive edge. Working capital inflows of EUR 51 million was lower than the EUR 110 million in the prior year.
The year-on-year reduction reflected slower growth, specifically over the summer months, targeted uses of capital to support commercial actions and a reduced accrual for variable pay. As I mentioned previously, we maintained our favorable differential with around 25 days of DSO and DPO, the difference between the two, of course. This is a structural difference due to the standard payment terms in the industry. We see no degradation to that, and we think that is very viable as we go forward. We spent EUR 45 million on CapEx, three more than the prior year. Nearly all our CapEx is related to technology, as you would expect. Our platforms and systems are a core element of our value proposition. We spent 12% of revenue on technology, CapEx and OpEx combined in the year, around half of which was capitalized.
That is very in line with other tech providers and something that we keep a close eye to to make sure that we continue to invest well in our core organic business. M&A and investment in non-core or, sorry, non-current assets fall below operating free cash flow, but it is included in cash from operations and the net debt walk on the previous slide. In FY 2025, we invested EUR 56 million in growth investments, including a large multi-year commercial agreement, which will bring substantial additional income and growth over the coming years, as well as the acquisition, of course, of Civitfun. On slide 12 then, we talk about our capital allocation priorities.
This has not radically changed from where we were at the IPO, but of course, given the context of the last number of months and given our strong cash profiles, we have amended it slightly to take account of those particular pieces. As we said at the time of our IPO, our first priority is investing in organic growth. We are continuing to invest in our platforms and our products as an organization and to ensure we are really focused on continuing organic growth, which is the core strategy of the organization. The second is to make sure that we are seizing the wider opportunities to grow. We have been really successful at doing this over the years with a long track record of value accretive acquisitions and investments.
We will continue to seek joint ventures, relationships, and M&A opportunities as we go forward, augmenting our growth with breadth, scale, and technology that drives differentiation and value creation. Still very much a focus for us as an organization. Thirdly, we will maintain appropriate leverage. In the current market, we see a sitting between one and two times adjusted net debt to adjusted EBITDA. We've made fantastic progress, obviously, in 2025, as I've referenced. Finishing right in the middle of that range, this gives us the firepower to invest as we go forward and think about our balance sheet, as I said, as a real strength and an ability to help us really structure the organization well as we go forward. Finally, the shareholders' return. As we talked about before, we are planning an annual dividend of 20% of statutory net profits, which we expect to start paying from 2027.
You recall that was off the back of our 2026 numbers as it was based on a GAAP net income. In addition, surplus cash will be actively evaluated by the board for shareholder distribution. I suppose that is a change of tone from what you've heard from us before on that particular point, but I think it does very much reflect the strong balance sheet position that we find ourselves in and the ability to both be able to serve our M&A ambitions, but also have the cash ability to make sure that we're getting those really good cash returns back to our shareholders also. This is the last slide from me before handing back to Nicolas. We want to talk more about our who obviously will talk more about our strategic priorities and current trends.
This obviously is to look then more at our upcoming positions for 2026 and for our midterm from a guidance perspective. The challenging macroeconomic environment we experienced last year has started to ease. Consumer spending on travel has always been resilient. As with previous cycles, confidence is returning with signs of more stable trading conditions. Our bookings for the first and second quarter of FY 2026 give us confidence in the year ahead, helped by targeted promotions, which have been yielding encouraging results. As a result, constant currency guidance for the year is for TTV growth between 12%-18% in FY 2026, continuing our trend of outperformance compared to the estimated accommodation market growth of around 4%-5%. Revenue growth is expected to be 2%-7%. This implies take rate decline in the revenue mix and targeted commercial actions having an impact.
I think one of the very important pieces that we have learned during the course of 2025, and that Nicolas referenced, is that we do need commercial flexibility to be a really active competitor in this marketplace and be able to both be competitive from a commercial perspective, but also to be able to shift our mix of business to really go after the market where the market is. That is very much part of our plan for 2026. It is early days, but our Q1 book is building nicely. We expect double-digit TTV growth and mid-single-digit revenue growth in constant currency terms. That is very much in line with the overall guidance proposal for the full year at this point. An encouraging inflection point from where we have been in the fourth quarter of 2025. In relation to FX, it is worthy of mention.
Our average dollar rate in FY 2025 was $1.10, which I mentioned earlier on, while our guidance is based on about $1.17. We see the dollar is moving a little bit at the moment. It's probably more like $1.15 today, but we'll keep a close eye and update you on that as we go through the course of the year, with almost all that headwind in FY 2026 happening in the first half, of course, as we know. While we expect solid growth in constant currency, the reported headline growth will be lower, specifically in H1. We will be talking about constant currency throughout the course of the year. Just so people are very clear, our guidance is in constant currency as well. We will be giving you that very clearly indicated. We'll continue to focus on cost control and efficiencies for the full year.
Adjusted EBITDA is expected to also grow in the range of 2%-7%, equivalent to 7%-12% if we normalize for the one-off reduction to lower variable pay in 2025. This is very much part of our strategy as an organization to really maintain the good progress we've seen on our EBITDA expansion during 2025. Certainly, there were one-off elements there. We obviously pulled back a little bit on discretional pay in 2025. There were other elements that probably popped up our cost base that were unusual to 2025. We still have very good visibility as an organization to maintaining our 60% EBITDA target that we achieved during the course of 2025. Operating free cash flow conversion is to be 100% with strong conversion due to the favorable working capital dynamics mentioned already and the continued capital discipline.
Again, as I said, we were looking to that to really be a strength as an organization as we go forward and something we can really leverage. Looking beyond 2026, of course, our ambition for the medium term is unchanged. We believe we can deliver organic constant service growth in the low double-digit % for TTV, high single-digit % for revenue, and on an annual basis, along with an adjusted EBITDA percentage mark in the low 60%, as we talked about before. We hit that mark sooner than we thought we would. We expect to stay there and indeed move up over time. We also aim for cash conversion of circa 100%, continuing on our track record for our market outperformance and value creation.
From a personal perspective, I should say, my first year as the CFO of the organization, I've been extremely pleased and happy with our ability to convert cash. There has been no change structurally to how we do that. I think that's a very strong signal. Even in a year where we didn't do as much as we would have liked, it was still a very strong signal and something I have a very confident vent for the future. The guidance is built on strong foundations underpinned by the long-term industry growth and clear strategic actions for growth, which Nicolas will now speak about some of those changes we've made and how we hope to implement that strategy as we move forward.
Thank you, Brendan. 2026 now. We have a very clear strategy. This hasn't changed. We know how to grow our business ahead of the market.
We've done that in 2025. We have strong foundations, and we need to differentiate even more at our partner and distribution level. If I start maybe with accommodation, top left of the slide, what we have here in mind is that we will be achieving that by adding new partners from a supply, but also from a distribution perspective. I insisted on that earlier. I said that 2025 was very good from an acquisition perspective. You know the way it works. I mean, we explained that again and again. You have new partners, and then you have a two-times factor in the following year, and it keeps increasing until year three. It is very good news for this year. We have insisted, you remember, into entering or gaining share in selected markets that would be very important for the future. We keep this strong focus.
We keep the commercial opportunities. This is not changing. The second bucket here is around the ecosystem. It is key to our growth, actually. It is more and more important. Last year, we progressed very well with our fintech and insurance initiatives. We built new partnerships. We increased the use of virtual credit cards, helped us to deliver profit growth that was very substantial, very strong for fintech. A very good year again for our hotel tech activity. I keep saying that year on year, but it is a very good delivery. From a mobility and experiences perspective, it has not been a bad year from a number of perspectives, but I am convinced that we can and we should do much better in 2026. We have this action plan to drive improvements. Brendan insisted on the drive to profitability, the investment also in technology, data, and AI.
What we want to do more of is to leverage our scale, leverage our operational efficiencies to maximize conversion and revenue growth transfer to the bottom line. I'll keep on with the priorities that we have now in terms of strategic priorities for 2026. I mean, we need to be excellent execution. That's why we have reorganized a few weeks ago our business into verticals. The intention there is to get closer to our partners, to enable our teams to be even more agile. The go-to-market in terms of product and functionality needs to keep improving. We want to, as we've always done, keep our customers at the center of our decisions. We will focus, I just say that again and again, on the ecosystem.
I think we're very well positioned there to be more and more a one-stop shop provider for our partners. We have this first-mover advantage, and we need to leverage that even better. We need to drive higher attachment rates and create a 360-degree service that captures a share of wallet. The third priority is AI. I will come back to that in a few minutes, but for us, it's a big opportunity for HBX, but also for our industry. We can see that the consumer behavior is changing. We want to help our partners capturing this opportunity. It's definitely a sourcing opportunity. I mean, we're a segment agnostic player, and we see that as a very important opportunity. We will come back to that certainly in the question and answers. None of these players have flagged any intention to become the merchant of record.
We have a very good relationship with all of them, and we are absolutely convinced that we will be part of their plan, as we have seen in the past. In AI, we have made a very strong step in automation, but I also wanted to update you on what we're doing behind the scene in other activities. We have this enormous amount of proprietary data, which is very important and very differentiated. It positions us very well. I mean, Brendan mentioned some of these. We know that we can do even better in terms of expanding scales and capabilities. We have this very long track record of successful add-on of new capabilities and scale through partnership and acquisitions, and we will continue to look forward to that. Maybe a word on our organization to explain how we're moving to that and what we plan to achieve.
If I'll start with that, I mean, I told you over the summer and beginning of the summer, probably, we had this very hard look at how we operate, how we serve our customers, and how we respond to market dynamics, which led us to the conclusion that we have to evolve our business. We do it constantly, but this probably accelerated this evolution. I accelerated the transformation, as I was saying. We have this very good business model, and we realized that to deliver, we needed to accelerate the adaptability, to elevate customer focus, to unlock sustainable growth opportunities, but also to position ourselves to lead in this dynamic market. This is what we had in mind as we went through the target operating model redesign and the implementation.
You have heard me saying that we have now, as you can see here on the screen, these dedicated cross-functional verticals. Each one of them is empowered with own decisions and accountability. The points of frictions we already see that have been reduced, enabling us to respond faster to market trends, but also changing customer needs. If we start by that, you see that you know that sourcing is now being led by Javi. I will come back to that and distribution by David. I also wanted to take a minute maybe to thank Carlos, which many of you know, our Chief Commercial Officer, and Paula, used to run technology as they both moved away from their roles. I think that they leave behind them a very good legacy.
I'm personally, and I know the board is delighted by the fact that Carlos will remain with us, a part of our future. Bring his experience was in WTM two or three weeks ago in Focusrite last week. Clearly, we will keep on benefiting of his experience. Also, you have seen Richard's intention to retire from our board. I just wanted to take 30 seconds to give a huge thank for the constant support to our company. I think from a company perspective first, because Richard was really essential in tough times. I mean, he took over before COVID, so he was really key in helping us to adapt in this very complicated moment. Then in the rethinking and the acceleration of our business, and also personally, I had a strong support, but also mentoring from him.
I'm convinced that James, our new chair, will really help us with his tech expertise, which I think is very important to us. Looking at the verticals now, I'll start maybe by sourcing that it's something which is very important for us. We have this strong track record. Javi has really been with us for a decade now. He has consistently driven execution. He was instrumental in the last big integration that we did, the Tourico and GT A integration. It has been incredibly efficient in our ops management. You know that we have this best ranking in terms of ops solutions. From an AI perspective, he's been one of the key drivers at company level. On top of sourcing, he will, of course, continue leading operations. Maybe a few words on what he will be focusing on.
First of all, you know that we have these high-value distribution networks bringing to the hotel the clients that they like. It's our bread and butter. It's central to all the role that we have as a major B2B player. What Javi is now focusing on is actually taking this one step further by implementing flatter structures that will drive speed, accountability, and consistency. He's very focused on leveraging our unique direct supply demands relationship, which is a network effect, as you know. We are also accelerating our investment in strategic supply agreements that provide tailored distribution agreements, expanding also our focus on high-potential sourcing corridors, having teams on the ground in the right location, getting closer to our partners, but also really focusing on execution, being accurate, being reliable, and being fast in what we need. Sourcing is very important.
On distribution now, I think David has a very different profile and is relatively new to the group. You remember that he became part of the group with this luxurious joint venture that we did with him. He has really a deep experience in travel and tourism. He has an impressive track record as an entrepreneur, and specifically in BS creation and ramp-up. He has also a very good drive in technology and innovation, and also in AI as a VC investor. I am very impressed personally by his drive and his commitment to building the distribution success. Maybe a few words on, as you can see on the screen, what he will be focusing on. You know that we have in distribution, I will remind that to everyone, these two big buckets and businesses. One is wholesale and one is retail. Let's start by wholesale.
It's a big part of our business. This is where our tech-driven approach gives us a competitive advantage. These are typically larger businesses with API connections. They need us to fulfill their high-volume demands for hotel rooms. They need fast, reliable, and accurate products. They have a need for high-volume, frictionless connectivity, and creating global portfolio. When we look at it, the way we connect with them is really important. We have this offer of plug-and-play market hub that helps them processing their huge volume of data in fractions of seconds. You know that. We commented on that. We have this AI-driven to enhance conversion personalization and efficiency. We have targeting campaigns that we have created for them in our new marketing as a service capability. We monitor this with real-time data tracking. This wholesale activity actually has been really resilient last year.
That's a very important point for us. We have this flywheel effect where we have the growth in supply that fits the growth in distribution. In wholesale, I think the key words for us to win in 2026 are strategic expansion, data-driven competitiveness, and we see really also a good momentum with these alternative distribution channels that we mentioned earlier on, the airlines, the loyalty program. Retail, I mean, it's a very different business, actually. It's a massive network of travel agents and travel advisors. They connect mostly through our Bedsonline web-based front ends. Here, it's all about simplicity and power and automation and capabilities. It's a digital enablement for a very fragmented market, platform, robust with safety, competitive rate optimization, ancillary sales very important in retail. We combine hotels, mobility, and experiences, as we've been saying.
We need to be able, despite doing all of this, to keep on having a higher personalization and a customer-centric approach. The team is really focused on AI-driven personalization. It is a scalable inventory. It is a seamless UX that really makes a difference there. We know that we will grow through specialization, through data insight. We are exploring subsectors like groups, for instance, which is something that we were not doing. A lot on their plate. Talking about ancillary services and product, I said earlier on we have done a lot on the fintech side and the tech side. They have been both performing very well. We will keep on delivering products and functionality. In mobility and experiences, as I said earlier on, we are certain that we can do a number of actions to drive better performance in 2026.
First, we are more targeted with our commercial actions. We implemented that a few months ago. We are also increasing our focus on cross-selling, but also on the acquisition of new customers to keep evolving the company. It's been a good year on that side also. While direct contracting, I mean, continues to be a key focus for us on the sourcing side, you have so many activities, et cetera, we also think that we can also improve our productivity by leveraging third-party supply, which is new to us. We should keep an eye on that. A word on AI now. You have on the left the three pillars that we're looking at. We are an AI company. We use it constantly, but I think that we are maturing and launching and focusing on a lot of things.
What I will do, if it's fine with you, I will go through the overall pillars, and then I will give you a certain number of examples at different stages of maturity so that you have in mind what we're doing in a concrete way, hopefully. First is automation. I mean, automation really, it's about making sure that we simplify everyday tasks. We've been doing quite a lot of progress on this part. Then comes acceleration. It's all about agility. It's about prediction. It's about accuracy and complex decision-making, as you can see here. The intention is to reduce the time to market. This is where we're investing a lot for the past month. We see great potential for our application.
Maybe the more advanced level, we've been doing that for quite some time, increase our productivity in ops, for instance, dramatically, like double digits as we're doing that, moving to a different stage of maturity through languages in AI service for ops. This is the last part that I'm focusing on. Maybe four tangible areas of focus so that you can have in mind as we keep on discussing through the year. Business intelligence, obviously. You need to know commercial algorithm to anticipate market trends, automated growth opportunities for our partners mostly. By definition, algorithmic pricing is an area of focus for us. We want to deploy new dynamic models. That's the thing that we're focusing on for 2026. Organization productivity won't come back to that. I've said that again and again, but conversational AI, for instance, is something that we are implementing. It's proof of concept.
It's working well. We will go into the next phase. Of course, distribution expansion with the LLMs just to make sure that we are part of what they do, and we have encouraging discussion there. Not that I can share examples and names with you. Maybe two or three concrete examples. For instance, in the luxuries, we have already deployed AI package personalization through natural languages, which is very important. We have launched an AI-enabled voice agents from a customer service perspective. Later this year in hotel tech, we will be launching AI-powered segmentation to enhance in hotel work for the hotel to enhance the customer journey there.
We actually have this proof of concept that we're very happy with in terms of result, in terms of a very important topic for us, AI content room mapping and optimization, and maximizes the accuracy of the room inventory, the images, the descriptions. A lot of work in 2025, very positive results. I could go on forever, but I think the idea here is that we are very excited about the opportunity. I said that, you remember, when we introduced the company to you before IPO. I see this as a market-enabling factor, and we will be very happy to support our partners in this AI evolution. Okay. This slide is about the strategic focus on scale and capabilities. I will keep it short. Brendan told you already about capital allocation earlier on. Continue to invest in our organic growth.
Sometimes it's more effective to take a look at partnerships. If this gives us a step up in the market, it brings new customers or competitive advantages, as we did with GTA and Tourico, for instance, brings new talents or technology, as we did with PerfectStay and Civitfun. That's something that we will keep exploring. We want to be smart in our investment to scale up and to capture the growth trends that I was mentioning on. Okay. Last slide, I hear it's about the conclusion. I think what we have tried to provide and insisted a lot on is the fact that we feel very confident about our future. We're excited about the year ahead of us. We have a great business. We have a strong financial profile. We delivered a good performance in 2025. We should have done better.
I said that, and I'm personally responsible for that. The growth was good. The EBITDA was good. The cash conversion was good. We're absolutely focused on operational performance and execution for 2026. We know that we have strong foundations for this growth exercise, and we're constantly looking on opportunities to accelerate our growth. As we stand in front of you, the outlook for the year ahead is good. We see that markets have stabilized. We still see that the consumer demand for leisure travel is good. We also see an evolution in different behaviors, but that's what we do for a living. I mean, we've seen that for two decades now, and we've always adapted. We have met the changes. We have the momentum, and we're in motion to deliver. Thank you very much. I think it's time to open to Q&A.
Probably we'll start with the room before asking if we have questions on the phone. Finally, Isabel, if we have questions from the webcast.
Yes. Nicolas David, ODDO BHF here. First question would be, how would you characterize the visibility for Q1 if you compare notably it to the upcoming quarter visibility you had in Q3 and in Q2 a few months ago? Do you think that you have better visibility or not in your ability to deliver your kind of soft guidance for Q1?
Yeah, I think it's a very different story. Brendan will say that. I will just give you the headlines, but it's a very different story. We entered Q3 with the best book ever. You remember I said that when we were going through the H1 roadshow and discussions.
But then we had a big drop in the new bookings, and it took some time to move back into positive territory. I think the visibility that we have for Q1 is good, actually.
Yeah, absolutely. I'd add to that just to say that we usually, as we come into the specifically as we're coming into the first quarter of 2026, we do have an element of visibility. We do have good visibility. Usually, that three months to less than the six months, second half of the year is still work to be done, obviously. Good visibility. And we've seen the I think the important point was the one I made when I was doing my comments, good inflection point.
We have already seen that, and that is why we want to communicate that to you guys, that we have seen that inflection point coming in Q1 to very much align with what we are seeing now from our overall guidance for a 2026 outlook perspective, but obviously at quite a significant shift from where we were in Q4.
My follow-up question is regarding the profitability. We have seen the variable pay going down significantly given the result. How should we think about 2026? Should we expect a reversal potentially implying a sharp OpEx growth for this year if you deliver on the results, or is it more a baseline level that is sustainable?
Yeah, no, I think it is sustainable. When you look at 2025 in isolation, there were certainly elements that went the opposite direction as well. We called out a couple of those as I went through my materials.
There was a one-off bad debt, which was sizable. It was around EUR 10 million. We do not expect to see that kind of quantum again. We certainly feel that is very one-off in nature. There were other credits that favored 2024, 2025 comparatively. We do feel that we do, and Nicolas made the point, we are very ambitious about our future growth from an EBITDA perspective. That is something that we do see as we normalize our bonuses. We have the ability to use technology. We have the ability to differentiate and leverage our organization to still see that growth level have a positive EBITDA impact. We certainly think that even though we were harsh regarding bonuses this year and appropriately, we definitely can accrue for those and still make our margin targets as we go forward.
Thank you.
Thank you. Morning. It is Leo Carrington from Citi.
Could I just follow up on the demand outlook in terms of the TTV growth? Do you have something in mind in terms of underlying market growth and market share that you can share with us that explains how you got to the TTV growth? Secondly, would you mind elaborating on the points you were making about your take rate that's embedded in the guidance for 2026? Point taken on commercial flexibility, but is there anything there specifically to flag? Is there an element of caution built in? Lastly, more strategically, you've obviously had a lot of success with holiday offers from the airlines. How much white space is there there? How much future growth do you think there is with the existing partners that you have? Thank you.
Sure. I'll start off with market. I think the market perspective hasn't changed dramatically.
I mean, last year was lower than what everyone expected. I mean, when we entered the year by definition, we see a back-to-normal position with a different structure. We never mentioned it, but for instance, the average daily rates were relatively stable last year. Everything that we do from a top-line perspective, and we still see that, is really increasing the number of room nights or bookings, etc. That is something which is very important. I think our rebound recovery in terms of growth, I think we owe it to ourselves in the sense that, as I said again and again, it took us some time to react to a different market environment, analyze, understand what we should have to do.
You moved into a stepped recovery because from the moment you start implementing, you test, you learn, you adjust, etc., and you see your bookings increasing. You remember that we have this long early time. It takes longer than for some of the others until these bookings are retransformed into the reality of the arrivals. That is the way it works.
On the take rate piece, maybe I'll talk to that one. I think one of the things we really noticed during the course of the summer, and you saw it, it was very easy to identify in our numbers. We really kind of maintained take rate at quite high levels. It did have a restrictive ability on our ability to grow in the marketplace. We need to have the flexibility commercially to go where the market growth is.
That does not mean we are throwing out the concepts of differentiation from our take rate perspective, but it does mean that we need more flexibility to have different mixes of business and to be—and I never apologize for it—to be a very sharp competitor in the marketplace. We need that. We have this scale. We should be. I think it is a shift from the mindset of where we were coming from as a private equity company to a public company and doing what we talked about, the rebalancing of revenue growth and margin profile performance. Yes, I think as we look forward, it will be certainly an element of being commercially sharp, being a pricing—somebody who looks at pricing in the marketplace. It will be around possibly the mix of business that we have, whether it is the direct or the TPS elements.
We will look to where the market is going to grow, and we will move to it to make sure that we're optimizing. That is really what we want to focus on in terms of that piece, optimizing our growth potential in the marketplace with delivering that strongly into revenue and EBITDA growth as we go forward. Yes, I think that what we've talked about in the guidance range gives us the flexibility to do that.
Airline, it's a big potential market. I think both from a penetration perspective, but also from getting many of the airlines to some of the best airlines' levels. In the U.K., for instance, some of the airlines are very advanced. They publish numbers in terms of profitability per seat in terms when they deliver an additional product.
I think that many of the airlines in the U.S., it's the same, but around the world, many of the airlines are just starting this. We see a focused interest in partnering long-term, building the ability, the capability, making sure that they fully embed that. That's clearly the case with Turkish at the highest level, but many other airlines also, yeah, obviously.
Thank you.
Thank you. Sarah Roberts from Barclays. Just a couple from me. Firstly, following on from Leo's question on the take rate, just wanted to understand that 80 basis points compression implied in the guidance. What exactly are the commercial strategies that you're specifically investing in that is pressurizing take rate? When do you expect to see a payback on those levels of investments?
I suppose as a follow-on, what gives you confidence that this is a cyclical temporary impact on take rate versus something that's a little bit more structural? Secondly, on the AI commentary, talking around the LLMs, appreciate the color there. Just wanted to understand to the extent that you can share how you see this evolving over time. Do you think that one LLM will partner with kind of one intermediary, or do you think there will be multiple partnerships, etc.? Do you think there will need to be additional investments in your own tech capabilities to respond to this?
I'll start off with the take rate and I'll let Nicolas maybe speak to the AI question.
I mean, when we look at the proportional change from year over to year and we see kind of when we look at certainly there are elements, yes, that are probably more reflective of the current market. We have talked about it quite a bit in terms of 2025 versus what we saw in the more post-COVID period. Less of the experiential travel, more of the short-term decision-making, more domestic routes being stronger than international routes. Obviously they have an impact upon the average daily rates that are hitting the hotels. Obviously then it has an ecosystem impact in terms of the overall take rate available in the marketplace. We have to obviously that is then reflected in the mix of business that we have as an organization.
We also have to be commercially, as I said, strong from the perspective of being competitive in those markets as well to make sure that we are being scale relevant in our marketplace. That is extremely important, not only from our perspective, but also in terms of the relationships with the hotel groups to make sure that they feel that you are playing with a partner who can really fill the rooms and on the distribution side that they have access to the places that they need to be. Scale is really important, not just purely as a financial math piece, but really a big, big differential from what we see in the marketplace. It is important for us then to have the right mix of business from that perspective and to be able to shift to the market.
I think your point is not a bad one from the perspective of it is cyclical. We will see, I mean, the big long-term trend as we've saw in particularly the younger generation is they do want the experiential travel. They do want to have a broader travel experience, and they do want to go to those more remote destinations and have more travel during the course of the year as well. We do think that the overall trend will keep going in the right direction, which might give us a bit more opportunity. Obviously, as the ecosystem plays in as well. We do have to reflect on the market that we're in and be a, I wouldn't say fierce competitor, but a very active competitor in that marketplace to make sure that from a scale perspective, we're really still very, very strong and continuing to grow.
AI, I mean, there is a lot to cover in your questions, of course, because it's a key question. I'll try to keep it simple. The way I look at it is threefold. The first fold is when it comes to building your itinerary or even having some support while you're on the road, it's incredibly efficient. I mean, everyone knows that. We just were just testing yesterday or I think or the day before a pilot of a conversational AI for a big airline. It's very natural. It's very fluid. We all see that. The second aspect is how is it going to connect into distribution? Because for the moment, this connection, it's still to be done and to be proven. Our view for that is for us, I said that earlier on, that's why I insisted on we're a segment agnostic player.
We've seen this evolution again and again. We had the tour operators and the travel agencies. This moved into OTAs. The OTAs themselves have started to be disrupted by new players. You saw some interest of new segments like loyalty or airlines that we've just mentioned. Our answer is that we serve everyone. We do not compete with anyone. Therefore, I think we're a natural player for that. The third pillar is, of course, sourcing. What everyone says from our industry perspective, and everyone has been very consistent in the last set of results to say that when it comes to sourcing, I mean, it's clearly an opportunity for every one of us.
We do believe that because of the merchant of record that I have mentioned earlier on and the experience, the ability, the complexity that it is to deal with such a fragmented world. Us personally, I think that it is a great opportunity for us. In the past, we have demonstrated that key players were coming to us when they wanted to launch things. We see that as a very actually positive trend for us from a midterm point of view.
Absolutely.
Great. Nizla Naizer from Deutsche Bank. I have a couple of questions as well. Hello. The first is on the guidance range for 2026. The range is wide. Could you maybe tell us what needs to happen to reach the upper end versus what is baked into the lower end of the range?
Second, on Q4, correct me if I'm wrong, but it looked like on a regional perspective, Americas returned to growth, but MEAPAC and the rest of Europe was down year over year. That's what I understand. Can you please take us through what happened there? When you think of Q1, is that a continuation of what you saw in Q4 where Americas is strong? Maybe some color on where the growth is now coming from in terms of that inflection point would be great. Thank you.
Yeah, what we saw, I'll start with the regions and then move on to the second part of the question, which was here, I think what we see is that Q4 was different. We saw some encouraging signs of growth in the US, which I think continue. It's very good news for us. You remember that it's our first market.
The U.S. impacted us last year. MEAPAC, it's a consolidation of two different regions, APAC, which is growing well and keeps growing very well. Middle East, that as Brendan was explaining, has been struggling from our perspective for geopolitical reasons. That's the key point.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. On the range and the size of the ranges that we've put up there, I mean, I think as we come into 2026, we obviously looked at how we're expecting our growth. There is a kind of a first half, second half pattern to our business, as you guys know. The first half, we have more visibility on. We've got work to do to get to the second half. Now, Nicolas made a lot of really good strategic points about how we're rebasing the organization, how we're moving forward, how that focus is going to come in.
Certainly, we need those pieces to work well in order to be at that top end of the range. We need to have some of the pieces that we talked around in terms of the sourcing elements of our business really kicking in, the additional development of some of that direct relationship part of our business really hitting home well to make sure that we've got the acquired acquisition from a distribution and supply side so we can make sure that we can push to the top end of that range. We wanted to be a little cautious as well in terms of the breadth of the range. I'll be very honest about that in the first instance. We want to make sure that we're coming back to you on a quarterly basis and doing what we say on the can. It's very important to us.
Had a rocky start. We want to make sure that we're now moving sequentially in the right direction. That probably gives you a bit of context around the range itself. We do feel it's a very doable range, and we have a lot of confidence in it and the visibility that we have at this point.
Hello. [Fran Javi] from Alantra. Thank you very much for the presentation. I have three questions, please. First, you're guiding to the mid-teens TTV growth next year. You said it was mostly volume-driven. Can you break down a little bit between new clients and existing clients? I mean, getting increasing the share of wallet of existing clients and new clients. By new clients, I mean both new suppliers and new distribution partners. Also linked to this, how do you expect the mix of TTV coming from direct connections?
How do you expect this to evolve also? I think you have always commented on this that more than 85% of the TTV comes from it. I do not know if you expect a changing the mix. Second question, sorry, a bit long ones. Based on your EBITDA and operating cash flow conversion outlook, we can easily get to around EUR 440 million of operating cash flow for next year, around that. We only have to deduct interest and taxes. Basically, we can, I do not know, is it reasonable to estimate around EUR 300 million free cash flow because that is around 20% of yield? Within that, and should we interpret that as the order of magnitude for potential shareholder remuneration for next year? Last, you maintain, as you said, Brendan, days of DOPs, broadly unchanged at around 45 days.
Could you use this, I mean, can you improve the payment terms for hoteliers in exchange of greater share of wallet? I do not know if you can use this to speed up revenues. Thank you.
Do you want me to start with TPS and acquisition?
Sure.
Maybe and then because the rest is on you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Okay, I'll take the first one because probably the burden is on Brendan for the two others. Starting by acquisition and then direct contracting, I think we do remember we explained that we started to put some focus on acquisition back in 2024 because when we recovered in 2020, started to recover in 2022 from COVID, we wanted to be certain that we would dedicate all of our focus and attention to our existing partners and help them recovering. Probably a lag in the acquisition of new clients.
We accelerated the focus on that in 2025. It was a very strong year, not giving any numbers because otherwise it would be public in the same instance. Usually what we see is that, as I was saying, the ramp-up lasts on year two with a two-time factor and then also on year three. It takes almost three years before a client would be fully up to speed, a new client or a new hotel. There is a form of a ramp-up. That is why we are very encouraged by the follow-up this year because we know that there is a pipe which is already built and which is also certainly contributing to our results. When it comes to direct contracting versus third-party supply, I think we have been very clear. We had a change of perspective in this. We want to go and grab opportunities where they are.
We feel that third-party supplies is a good way to access the market at a lower cost probably and with a high automation and good results. If there are some opportunities, as Brendan was saying, we will go and grab them.
Yeah. I'll start with your question on your cash flows perspective because I think that's a really good point. It's a point that I made during the presentation. One of the real strengths of this organization is its ability to get the EBITDA converted into cash and bank. We saw that very demonstrably in 2025. Obviously, we use that predominantly to get us back into a much more comfortable leverage range. At 1.5 times , we're very comfortable with that level. I don't think there's a, we've said one to two is the right range for us.
There is no need to go galloping down from a debt reduction perspective from our perspective. I do think that gives us a lot of optionality and ability to use that balance sheet for the developments of the strategic objectives that we are going after as an organization. Yes, they are twofold. We will continue, to Nicolas's point, to look at the marketplace to make sure that we have the right breadth of services and when we can and it makes sense, bringing that into acquisition. I do think your math is not incorrect. You said, I think you were speaking broadly, percent of about 20% and EUR 300 million. I think those numbers are not off the mark in fairness.
I do think that gives us a lot of opportunity then to be very active in terms of how do we make sure our shareholders are benefiting from that good cash generation. That is something we are very focused on. The board are actively looking at that at the moment. We hope to be back to you in short order, relatively speaking, probably in the new year with plans and actions around that particular point. I am not going to commit to a number right now, but you should be very confident that we are actively looking at that and we will definitely be back to you. Sorry, you had one other question. My apologies, which I did not answer.
The one on the results, yeah, the EBITDA.
Oh, for the commercial, yes. I mean, it is something that we certainly look at.
Can we use the strength of our balance sheet to be more as a commercial term? Can we use that from a strength perspective, I think, was the question. It is something that we look at and have looked at actually what are the best ways to do that that create efficiency for us, but also give more flexibility and optionality. We look at that from a financing partnership perspective as well. Not just in terms of impacting our own working capital cycle, but how can we partner with third parties that can extend credit if need be at very competitive rates. We look at that as part of our fintech solutions also.
Maybe we have some questions.
Hi, Victor Cheng from Bank of America.
To FYI, maybe following up on the previous AI question, if I think about maybe agentic AI specifically, how do you see that potentially disrupting the distribution space? I mean, we've seen some large AI players partnering direct with hotels. How should we think about the mix of direct versus indirect going forward specifically on this? Secondly, can you give us some more color on mobility experience? What's the current growth rate and is it still realistic to expect kind of double-digit growth? What's your assumption on this segment in your 2026 guidance?
Okay, I'll do the first one, probably. The way we look at it is if you look at it from a hotel perspective and a distribution perspective, clearly it's an opportunity. It's also a threat for some of the players, but I truly believe in natural market adjustments.
The hotels have been focusing on developing direct channels for many years now. Some of them have been very efficient in doing that. We should expect them to keep on streamlining and improving. For us, we're good with that because I insisted on that we're an enabler. We're here to help them sell more, whether through hotel tech directly or through our B2B activities. We like the fact that there are more opportunities. I see it as a way to grow the pie. I maybe would do the analogy in payment with contactless, for instance. If you keep on growing the pie, then everyone benefits from that. That's a very clear point. Is there a threat to agentic AI, a threat to some players in distribution? Certainly, but all of this still has to be converted into a reality.
We are focused on it. We have been seeing many changes over the years. We've been always at the forefront of adaptability and technology. We are convinced that it will play in our favor.
On the M&E business specifically and how it's embedded into our guidance, but also how it's performing, we still see solid TTV growth in our M&E business. The cross-sell and having it as part of a broader package is still a very positive thing from kind of a total ecosystem sales perspective. We do see it having a really strong profile in terms of its ability to continue to grow as part of our offering as we go forward.
I would say that you have seen during the course of 2025, and it probably persists, some pretty sharp commercial practices in that particular part of the marketplace around transfers and other elements of that particular business. That's been an area where, again, I think some of the pieces that I referenced at the start very much apply in the same way to our core accommodation business as it is M&E. We've had a commercial mindset of trying to maximize take rates and that, and probably having a negative impact from our own revenue perspective. That shift of mindset, I think, is important in M&E as well and moving that in the right direction. That's certainly something we see as doable as we go forward.
I wouldn't say it's probably not dissimilar from a growth perspective in terms of the guidance that we put up on the screen today. Maybe I'd like to see a little bit more from M&E actually in a bit of a more resurgence and recovery from where we saw it in 2025 versus 2026.
Do you want to go to the fun questions?
There's one more.
One more, sorry.
Hi, Chris from UBS. Maybe just a really quick one. When I think about the revenue growth guidance, and 1Q curing trading has been quite good. Obviously, second half has much easier comps. How should I think about the phasing of revenue growth? Is it going to be second half weighted? Thank you.
Obviously, there's always bigger numbers. In percentage terms, it's actually relatively stable during the H1, H2 period.
That is very much as a consequence of, as well, just bear in mind what I mentioned about FX. If you recall, obviously, our 1st of April changes from a tariff perspective hit on the exact point at which we move from H1 to H2. I think what you will see is that on a constant currency basis, we will have a level that will give a level of stability year over year. As I said, we will call out that very clearly when we go through our reporting on a quarter-by-quarter basis. Yes, we do kind of expect to see a relatively low level of consistency. Maybe some ups and downs, of course. You will have that in any quarter, but that is our expectation. It will be on a constant currency basis. That is the way to think about it.
Do you want to go through the phone maybe? I'm conscious of time.
Yeah, phone next.
Okay, phone. Do we have some questions on the phone?
Yes, we do have our first question from Guilherme Sampaio of Caixa Bank. Your line is now open.
Hello, thank you for taking my question. Three, if I'm right, around TTV and the take rates. Marketing is stabilizing according to what you mentioned to me. On top of the market recovery, you're guiding for take rate dilution over next year as you look into more volumes. How do you expect to find the market in terms of competitiveness next year versus this year? I know that the market is competitive, but how do you expect this to change into next year?
Second question, if you can be a bit more precise, how much of the TTV growth acceleration is coming from third-party supply? If you could provide us some guidance in terms of regions where you expect to grab this additional TTV growth. The third question, in terms of take rate, how should we see take rates over the medium term? Should we still expect some degradation from these lower levels of 2026, fiscal year 2026 going forward? Is there some rebound that we could expect going forward? Thank you.
Market, regions, and take rates. Do you want me to take markets first?
Sure, yeah. Yeah.
From a market perspective, I think last year has been, which is still happening in terms of calendar year, it's been a very competitive year.
What we saw is that the price attention came from, of course, the travelers, which then reflected on the hotels and therefore on the distribution. I always say that it's a very competitive world when it comes to distribution. There is always someone doing a promotion.
There is always some element of our business wasn't materially different. It was service contracts in the kind of mid-teens, around that 15%. And so 85% still came from direct contracting. I think one of the things that we look to is, as I mentioned, is moving to where the market is and making sure we're capitalizing on elements of the marketplace. We haven't been, I suppose, from our perspective, we'll look at where those volumes flow during the course of the year.
We will update you as we go through the course of the year in terms of when we see a shift in that perspective. It is one of the elements that we think there is ability for us to do more TPS, for example, if the market demands that. Likewise, we can wax and wane and come back to more direct contracting. Having that flexibility and not being stuck on one particular percentage is important to us. It does give us a bit more variation in take rate. That is built into our numbers. We have some internal methodology around what proportions we expect at this point.
What I think we'll do is actually give you some updates as we go through the quarters to let you know what we're seeing in that from a proportional perspective, which I think will give good color to how that is playing out during the course of the year.
We're not guiding by regions, no?
No, no. We never really guide by regions. Yeah, yeah. We never really guide. Albeit, I think the trends that we saw last year will probably continue into this year.
Your next question comes from the line of Miguel González Toquero of JB Capital. Your line is now open.
Yes. Hi, good morning. Sorry if I'm repeating some question. I lost connection for some time. I got two follow-ups. First, on the take rate, is there any threshold in the take rate or a mid-term target we could stick to?
Some of your peers have said that six and a half target for the long run. I am curious about your view on the take rate for the long term. Secondly, about your performance in Europe. We have seen TTV growth in Europe has underperformed most of your peers. I guess you could be losing some market share in a key region. Maybe you can comment on your situation here and your strategy to be more competitive in this geography next year. Thank you.
You want to start with the take rate and the region?
Yeah, as we talked about, obviously, you have seen our plans for 2026 now in terms of take rate. We always implied that we wanted to see a bit more flexibility in take rate as we go forward.
I don't think we have today a percentage that we can pin to in terms of where we think in the midterm take rate will go. Albeit, we do realize it is a big step from 2025 to 2026. We think that, as I mentioned in an earlier answer, there is also opportunity for us to see improvement in take rate with shifts in travel departments, which we think, again, are kind of economic and cyclical. There is opportunity there as we go forward. Our general thesis is that we will continue to look at where the market is and flex towards it and be responsive to it on an annual basis.
Y eah, and cross-sell, obviously, is a key component. When it comes to Europe, I think you were referring to 2025. By definition, Europe is 40%+ of our volume.
It is by far our biggest region. Of course, some of the trends that we have experienced were also visible in Europe. We have tackled that. As I was saying, we are now back to very good top-line growth, very consistent in the different regions. We are happy with that. Taking on time, we still have time for one question or?
I do not know if you can hear me on the mic. We have just a couple more questions online. Actually, there are not any on the webcast. If we can just take the ones that have already registered on the conference call, then we will close at the end of that. Back over to the operator. Thank you.
Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Carlos J. Treviño of Banco Santander. Your line is now open.
Yes, good morning.
Thank you for taking my question. Just a quick follow-up on your previous answer on seasonality in 2026. You are talking about a more consistent performance across the year. If you're expecting this performance to be consistent with easy comparisons in the second half, we should expect higher growth levels in the second half than in the third half. Is this a fair assumption or do you see anything else that could avoid this situation? Thank you.
Second half growth higher than first half. Is that a fair assumption or something else that could avoid being?
Sorry, yeah. I think I tried to answer this earlier on. In constant currency terms, we see the growth being relatively stable over the course of the year, albeit the first half is the quarter half that's more impacted by that currency impact than the second half.
You're quite right in terms of obviously the normal seasonality of the business. Obviously, the second half is always our biggest season. If you look at what we've talked about even for our first quarter, it's very much in line with some of the kind of the midpoints of our ranges that we talked about from our guidance perspective. We do see that pattern playing out in the first half and second half. I mean, obviously, our comparative in the second half is a little easier because our performance was unfortunately not as good in the 2025 perspective. Of course, if we can outgrow, we absolutely will. Obviously, that's what we want to try to do.
From the line of Thomas Poutrieux of BNP Paribas, your line is now open.
Yes, hello. Thanks for taking the question. I've got a few, please.
Starting with the U.S., maybe, Nicolas, you alluded to the U.S. improved performance in. At the end of the year, I think if my estimates are correct, revenue in the U.S. indeed was a double digit. Can you give us color on what was the driver of that? I mean, is it just an improvement in the market in the U.S., or is it the change of strategy maybe or pursuing in that market is leading to this better growth? Secondly, I was also wondering how to think about supplier preferential agreements in the TTV mix next year, because if I recall well, you were quite constructive about the pipeline of partnership in HBA in H2. Does that mean HBAs could increase in the TTV mix in FY 2026? Lastly, you talked about kind of revamping maybe the go-to-market and getting closer to partners.
I just wanted to clarify. Does that mean that you will hire more account managers or salespeople maybe, or is it more of a quality issue here? Thank you.
Okay. I will start by the last one, which is, I think, easy. We are really looking at strengthening our investment with key partners. Therefore, every time that makes sense, and we are considering a certain number of that, have done a certain number of that, we hire people. Our productivity as a company has increased dramatically versus pre-COVID. It is almost twice the productivity per employee in terms of booking. I think it is 2.5 or 2.6 in terms of profitability. We always say that we want to have people when they really add value and seniority, and we are doing that.
We are actually hiring quite a lot of key people in key roles, etc., data, product, in some of the regional aspects. Investment in person is important. When it comes to the U.S., actually, we did a lot of work. The drop in the U.S., remember that? It seems almost a different world, but the drop in the U.S. was very abrupt back in March last year. Therefore, we realized that it was also a good opportunity for us to strengthen our relationship with the hotels, to build stronger and better agreements. This takes some time, and then it starts to pay off. I think that's probably what we're seeing on the sourcing side. We have also taken very important agreements on the distribution side, which are now ramping up and paying off. It's very positive.
The last one was on the one in the middle. Sorry, help me with the one in the middle. You asked about the U.S. You asked about investing in people. There was a question around acquisition ramp-up, if I remember well. Apologies. Yeah. I think it's a fair comment. We have been very focused for many years in growing our shelf wallet with some of our existing customers. For the past almost two years, we really invested into acquisition. There is like a snowball effect. It's taking some time. We know that by definition, it's paying off the year after. That's something very important to us. Great. We're done? Okay. Very good. I was waiting for Isabel to lower us. Thank you very much for your attention and all of the very interesting questions. Thank you.
Thank you.