The systems will be in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be a questions and answers session for analysts covering the Belysse share. Today, we have with us James Neuling, Chief Executive Officer, Andy Rogiest, Chief Financial Officer, and Ruben Pattheeuws, Group Director of Sustainability and Strategic Projects. Gentlemen, the floor is yours.
Hello and good morning, and thank you to you, Linh. This is James Neuling, CEO. Welcome to our Belysse Group's First Half Results Call. If you have not already done so, you can download the press release from this presentation in the Investor Relations section on belysse.com. I need to start with bringing your attention to the disclaimer on slide two. I will not read it out, but please do make sure you have read it. I will first talk about the financial summary on our first half of 2025, and then Andy, our CFO, will take us through the financial review. Finally, Ruben Pattheeuws, the Director of Sustainability and Strategic Projects, will give a short update on our Beyond program. I will make a conclusion. We will end this call with a Q&A session with the analysts following our stock.
Could we now look at slide four for the first half 2025 financial summary? From a financial viewpoint, we saw first half consolidated revenue at a total of EUR 134.6 million, which represents a decrease of 7% year-on-year. Revenue of our U.S. businesses was stable, while our European business faced a decline of close to 15% at 14.7%. In terms of profitability, the first half result adjusted EBITDA was 17.3%, which represents a decrease of 19.6% year-on-year. Our net debt at the end of the period was EUR 126.8 million, including €21.8 million of impact from the IFRS 16 lease liabilities, which results in a leverage of 3.5, a multiple of 3.5. Andy will go more in depth in the financials, so across to you.
Thank you, James. Good day, good morning to everybody who has dialed in and is also following our presentation. First, let's have a short update on the Q2, the second quarter performance, especially on the group revenue. We saw that the consolidated revenue for the second quarter was slightly above €67 million, representing a decrease of 9.5% year- over- year. Important to mention as well is that we had a -2.5% unfavorable effects impact. In the U.S., the revenue decreased by 4.4% to EUR 40.9 million compared to last year. The €1.9 million decrease is fully driven by the unfavorable evolution of the U.S. dollar. In Europe, revenues decreased by 16.3% compared to last year to a level of EUR 26.6 million. This is mainly due to lower volumes, especially or primarily in the residential business line.
We will now move to the first semester, the first half year of 2025, talking a bit more about the group revenue and the divisional revenues. In the first six months of 2025, we saw consolidated revenue close to EUR 135 million, EUR 134.6 million to be exact. This represents a 7% year-over-year decline, of which the unfavorable U.S. dollar effect is about 4.5%. In the U.S., our overall volume and revenue were stable in the first half year when compared to the first half year of 2024. This outcome was supported by solid performance in the corporate, education, and healthcare segments. In Europe, revenues decreased by close to 15% compared to last year to EUR 58.7 million. The H1 volumes were in line with the second half of 2024, but clearly below the first half of 2024.
This is mainly due to the continued market softness we see in the residential business, as well as a strategic phase-out of low profitability offerings in the residential market. In the project-driven commercial business, volumes in the first six months were also below the first six months of 2024, albeit to a lesser extent. Now moving on to the adjusted EBITDA and the group adjusted EBITDA for the first six months. The Belysse Group consolidated adjusted EBITDA for the first half of 2025 was EUR 17.3 million, representing a decline of 19.6% year over year. The adjusted EBITDA margin came to a level of 12.8%. This was 14.8% in the first half of 2024. The consolidated group adjusted EBITDA for the first half year was impacted by the lower volumes in Europe, as well as a weaker U.S. dollar, while profitability further increased in the U.S.
Our US business realized an adjusted EBITDA of EUR 15.6 million in the first half of 2025. This is 8.2% higher than the first six months of 2024. The adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin improved in the first year half compared to the first year half of last year as a result of the higher realized product unitary margins. In Europe, the adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin for the six months of 2025 reflects the negative volume effect we are experiencing on sales and unitary product costs, and that were partially offset by reduction in the fixed costs. I will now deep dive into the cash flow, starting from the cash position at the end of 2024, at the 31st of December.
We ended with a reported cash position of EUR 36.4 million at the end of June, which is EUR 1.9 million, almost fully related to unfavorable exchange rates, so the fluctuations of our cash balances, which explains EUR 1.9 million unfavorable. Excluding for this effect, the cash flow was EUR 0.3 million negative. We see on the slide that the generated adjusted EBITDA and the reduced trade working capital got consumed by debt repayments, interest payments, but also changes in other working capital and our capital expenditures, which brings us to the slide on our leverage. The net debt at the end of the period was EUR 105 million if we don't take in consideration the EUR 21.8 million of the IFRS 16 lease liabilities, which with an adjusted cash EBITDA of EUR 30 million brings us to a leverage that is 3.5x .
This is an increase compared to the 3.1x we reported at the end of 2024. Our total available liquidity, which includes also the headroom under our RCF, amounted to EUR 48.7 million at the end of June 2025. We were at EUR 52.7 million at the end of 2024. Needless to say that both debt and cash movements were strongly influenced by offsetting US dollar translation effects. I will now hand over the floor to Ruben. Ruben Pattheeuws, our Group Director of Sustainability and Strategic Projects, for an update on the Beyond program.
Thank you, Andy. We can move to slide 12 for the results of our Lean program. If we look at our Lean program, it has delivered EUR 0.8 million savings in the first half of 2025 versus last year. If we measure from the starting point of the Beyond program in January 2022, the program has delivered EUR 8.4 million of savings against a target of EUR 7.3 million. This means that with six months to go, we have already exceeded the four-year cumulative savings target of the program. If we look at the initiatives that drove the savings this year so far, we had more than 40 initiatives running, contributing to these results, with the key focus being on quality, material, energy, and labor efficiency. With this, I would like to give the floor back to James for closing thoughts.
Thank you, Ruben. Please turn to slide 13 for the conclusion of this presentation. Our first half consolidated revenue was EUR 134.6 million and adjusted EBITDA was EUR 17.3 million, resulting in an adjusted EBITDA margin of 12.8%. In the U.S., adjusted EBITDA and associated adjusted EBITDA margin improved with overall volume and revenues remaining stable. In Europe, the reported adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin reflect mainly the negative volume effect on revenues and unitary product costs of the continued market softness in the residential business. Our leverage increased to 3.5, and our total available liquidity was EUR 48.7 million as of June 30th, 2025. I'll now go back. I will hand back to Lynn for the Q&A.
Thank you. We will now begin our question and answer session for analysts covering the Belysse share. If you have a question, please raise your hand by pushing the button on your screen. If you are dialing in via your phone, please press star nine to raise your hand. Once your name has been announced, you can ask your question. We have a question from Wim Hoste. Yes, you can ask your question.
Yes, thank you. Good morning, Wim Hoste, KBC Securities. Do you hear me well?
Loud and clear.
Okay, thank you. I have a couple of questions. Maybe first on Europe. Can you quantify the impact of the phase-out of the lower value-added product lines on revenue in the first half? Also, maybe elaborate on whether that effect will continue to be a bit of a drag in the second half of the year. That's the first question. Maybe I'll let you answer that one first.
One moment. Wim, James Neuling speaking. It's not something I can precisely quantify. We have in previous calls with me, as CEO, and also previously when Cyril Rebusy was in this chair, talked about our intention to phase out low-margin activities. You'd say we're near the end of that. I hope that answers your question. There was quite an amount of it during 2022 and 2023, and to a lesser extent in 2024 and 2025. I think now we're more in the stage of a normal ongoing business, tuning in and out of bits and pieces as and when they become profitable or not, as compared with two years ago when it was really a massive structural change in what we were doing as we separated from what was the old Boulter, now owned by the Victoria Group.
I know it doesn't precisely answer your question, but probably better we could add into that just saying, look, it's not something that should be significantly affecting us going forward. There might be some lingering carryover effects into the second half, but it's not going to be a major topic. I do not expect at this stage that would be a major topic next year.
Okay, understood. Maybe what is the current breakdown of the business in Europe? I mean the split between residential and commercial. Obviously, I think most of the pain was in residential. I'm wondering what is the current split of the business? Also, following up on Europe, you had double-digit EBITDA margins in the past. I think in 2021, it was even 12%. Even as recent as last year's first half, it was a 10% or around 10% EBITDA margin. What is the margin potential you're seeing for the European business? Also, to what would you need to get to much better margins? Is that just volume effect, or are there other measures or initiatives that are needed to go back to decent profitability in Europe?
You've got multiple questions within the one question there.
Yeah, I know. Sorry.
Yeah, it's okay. It's hard for me to give a, as you know, we don't give a target price on our stock, and we therefore don't give a target margin or target EBITDA as such a guidance. It's difficult, therefore, for me to say what should our target percentage be within a certain period of time. The double-digit margin that we saw in the first half last year, the primary driver behind that was we saw in quarter one last year an uplift in volumes that didn't really repeat itself. That was across the flooring segment. You can see when you look at the results of other flooring companies, you also see this unusual, particularly quarter one, to a lesser extent, first half last year effect. Something happened in the market there that lifted the volumes.
More importantly, what that shows is when the volume comes, the margins move up very quickly. Our view is we're in a continued kind of downward, we think the cycle is down. We know it's a lengthy down cycle. Our strong belief, this is not a structural situation in the market. The volumes will come back, but I'm not willing to make a prediction exactly when the volumes will come back. We all know the important factors that are happening in the market with interest rate discussions, which go on with the Fed in the U.S., which obviously influences Europe. The raise in 30-year rates that we see on mortgages at the moment, you know, all those things have an effect. The overall market situation in our view is flat, but I'm not willing to give a prediction when it comes back.
The first half results of last year definitely show a little lift in volume shows a quick improvement in EBITDA margins.
Okay, understood. Those were my questions. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Wim.
Are there any other questions? Any other questions? I think we have no further questions.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for attending our call and listening to our results. As I mentioned at the beginning of the call, our results are published on our website at belysse.com under the Investor Relations section. Thank you all for attending, and I wish you all a good Friday and weekend. Bye.