Getlink reports results for the first half of 2019. Jacques Gounon, you are the Chairman and CEO of Getlink. Hello.
Hello. I'm very pleased to answer to your questions.
How would you describe these half year results?
Good. Very strong results because we had revenue growth for the 10 times in a row, which is very strong, which is a clear evidence of the robustness, the resilience of our business model, despite a lot of challenges in this first half. Of course, Brexit, which was scheduled for end of March, a no Brexit, and a various crisis in France with the French custom officer strike, which obviously has impacted our results, and yellow vests crisis demonstrations, which is not really attractive for tourists. In a nutshell, I would say growth, revenue growth, and we are very pleased to say that we serve the highest level of dividends as ever with EUR 193 million of dividends. Just to explain that we focus on the total shareholder return.
Could you give us some figures for this half year?
Clear and blunt figures in order to understand that we have a very resilient and sustainable business model. Revenues are up by 2%. Net profit is up by 5%, and more importantly, free cash flow is up by 19%. This is a clear evidence of the quality of the business and the possibility we have to serve increased dividends, for instance. Despite a slight weakness of EBITDA due to the custom officer strike I mentioned, if such crisis would not happen, it means that EBITDA would be still positive, still growing. That's strong on the concession itself. I would like to pay tribute to Europorte, our railway subsidiary, which did a very good business and very strong results. Of course, they are working on a, let's say, kind of green business, which is quite good, like for the concession itself.
Definitively, we are very pleased with the first half results, even if we face some challenges. Perhaps we can explain what are such future challenges in the second half. We are focusing on the second half.
What is your guidance for the second half of 2019?
In a nutshell, we can say that this year we have two Brexit, one in March, which did not happen, and something likely to happen like a no deal in October. We have already said that in case of no deal, which is the most likely to happen presently, our guidance was EUR 560 million, I confirm we can provide such, we can deliver such level of profit. Of course, there is no problem, as I said, on dividends policy, still growing, still a strong dividend return.
Beyond 2019?
Great Britain will have a new prime minister. I don't know what is the official statements he will make, but I am sure that we are able to deal with all the new rules, whatever such rules, because we have invested in a lot in staff prepared for the Brexit, in IT tools, in infrastructure, in order to focus on what is key for us, which is fluidity and speed. We have a customer-driven strategy. We believe that this is a real way to have a very successful future. We are very confident in the capacity for the group to have a strong and reliable growth in the future midterm.
Jacques Gounon, thank you very much.
Thank you.