Hello everybody, thank you for joining us today and welcome to this Airbus Pre-Q3 2025 call. This call is planned to last around 10 minutes and it does not include Q&A. It will remain accessible on our investor website until our 9-month 2025 earnings are released. Throughout this call, I will be making forward-looking statements. I invite you to refer to our Safe Harbor statement that appears in our most recent disclosure presentation slides published on July 30th. That Safe Harbor statement applies to this call as well. Please read it carefully. The purpose of this call is to assist you in the financial modeling of the Airbus Q3 2025 financial performance. Our quarterly closing and audit processes are underway, and as such, we will only refer to information that has already been disclosed or is otherwise publicly available in the market.
Any updates to our guidance or forecast would be communicated through a formal announcement. Our Quiet Period begins on October 16th, 2025, and our 9-month 2025 earnings release is scheduled on October 29th, 2025, after market closing. Let's now start with the mechanical elements impacting our profitability on a year-on-year comparison for the quarter. To make it clear, all the statements I will be making refer to Q3 2025 versus Q3 2024. Starting with our commercial aircraft business and with the usual building blocks. On volume mix, we delivered 201 aircraft in Q3 2025 versus 174 in Q3 2024, meaning plus 27 aircraft versus the previous year Q3. Thereof, +4 A220, +25 A320, -3 A350, and +1 A330. The higher volume of commercial aircraft deliveries and the favorable mix should be reflected in our performance.
Moving on to FX and as per the H1 2025 disclosure on slide 18. A roughly two cent improvement was forecast in the average blended rates for forwards and euro conversions for Q3 2025: 1.18 in Q3 2025 versus 1.20 in Q3 2024. As a reminder, the rule of thumb to a one cent change in hedge rates results in a ± EUR 150 million for the full year at present delivery rates depending on the portfolio volume and direction of the rate movement in the quarter. In light of the volume of the third quarter of the year, we expect it to result in a mid to high double-digit positive impact quarter- on- quarter. Nevertheless, the Euro-D ollar average spot rate has not been favorable in Q3 2025 as compared to Q3 2024.
When it comes to inflation, and as previously mentioned, we still assume a low triple-digit negative impact in 2025, but probably slightly less than in 2024, which for the record was around EUR 200 million negative. This headwind is expected to be in line with the delivery profile. Moving on to the "LEAD!" initiative, and as mentioned during the full year 2024 earnings call, our initial assessment was EUR 200 million impact, which largely materialized in our R&D expenses in the first half of the year. In Q3 2025, we expect to still slightly benefit from the prioritization of our activities, partly offsetting the expected acceleration of R&D spend. Last but not least, we did not record any non-recurring elements for our commercial aircraft business in Q3 2024.
Overall, and in line with our previous communications, we expect the result for this quarter to reflect the higher volume of commercial deliveries. Let's now have a look at the performance in the divisions. Starting with Defence and Space, we expect the division to contribute positively to EBIT Adjusted in Q3 2025 in a similar manner to Q3 2024 and in line with the divisional trajectory presented during the business update in June 2025. With regards to Airbus Helicopters, we observed an improvement on deliveries as compared to Q3 last year. Now I will briefly address some elements of the Free Cash Flow before customer financing. As with EBIT Adjusted, Free Cash Flow should reflect the increase of commercial aircraft deliveries, also resulting in a decreased number of gliders.
On the other end, the company continues to ramp up across all programs, resulting in a mechanical impact on inventory buildup while the delivery profile is backloaded. With this, I would like to end this pre-Q3 call. Starting from Thursday morning, we enter into a quiet period, and therefore we will not be able to answer any questions concerning the Q3 2025 performance before our results are announced on October 29th, 2025, which, as you recall, will be in the evening. Thank you again, and speak to you soon.