Good evening. This is the conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Louis Hachette Group and Lagardère 2025 full year results conference call and webcast. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Rapin, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.
Yes, thank you. Good evening, everyone. This conference call will be hosted by Jean-Christophe Thiery, Chairman and CEO of Louis Hachette Group. Grégoire Castaing, Deputy CEO of Louis Hachette Group and Deputy CEO in charge of finance for Lagardère. And joining us for this presentation, we have Pauline Hauwel , our Group Secretary General. Mr. Dag Rasmussen, Chairman and CEO of Lagardère Travel Retail. Frédéric Chevalier, CEO of Lagardère Travel Retail. All these participants will share their insight and key highlights. This presentation will be followed by a Q&A session. I now leave the floor to Jean-Christophe Thiery.
Thank you, Emmanuel. Good evening, everyone. I am delighted to present the results of Louis Hachette Group. Driven by the strength and complementarity of all our businesses, our international footprint, and the commitment of our teams, we delivered revenue of EUR 9.6 billion and a record adjusted EBIT of EUR 551 million. This strong momentum also allowed us to continue reducing our debt at a rapid pace. Grégoire will tell you more about the figures in a moment. Lagardère Publishing delivered strong performances in 2025, both in France and in English-speaking markets. A few highlights include, in the United States, Hachette Book Group became the number three publisher in the market. Along with a strong release schedule, our efforts to enhance the value of our catalog paid off with the successful re-release of Twilight, for example.
In Europe, the new Astérix adventure was a tremendous success across several markets. In 2026, we will celebrate the 200th anniversary of Hachette, the world's third largest publisher. The bicentennial is an opportunity to reaffirm our mission, making reading and culture accessible to as many people as possible. To mark the occasion, we will host a free literary festival in Paris next month. Lagardère Travel Retail also had a very strong year in 2025, driven by profitable growth as air traffic normalized. A key milestone was the seamless takeover of one of the largest travel retail contracts in history at Schiphol Airport. Within Lagardère Live, 2025 saw the best audience performance in six years for Europe 1, now reaching 2.9 million daily listeners and record attendance at our Arkéa Arena in Bordeaux.
Finally, for Prisma Media, 2026 will be a year focused on strengthening our core activities in a rapidly evolving market. In summary, one year after the creation of our new company, we have demonstrated the solidity of our strategy as a diversified leader in publishing, travel retail, and media. We are confident in our future and our development prospects. Thank you very much, all. I will now hand over to Grégoire.
Thank you, Jean-Christophe, and good evening, everyone. I'm also very pleased to share with you the strong results delivered by Louis Hachette Group this year, the first full year as a listed company. Let me start with the key figures on the slide four, and as you can see, like Louis Hachette Group's revenues reached EUR 9.6 billion compared to EUR 9.2 billion last year. This confirms the continuation of a solid growth trend in a rather challenging economic environment, with an increase of 4% on a reported basis and 3% on a like-for-like basis. Our operating performance was equally robust. Adjusted EBIT rose 8% to more than EUR 550 million. This reflects the quality of our businesses and the discipline execution of our operational strategy.... Cash flow generation was also very strong.
You know that this was our priority for this year. I will come back to this point later, but you can already see its positive impact on the balance sheet. In 2025, we significantly reduced our net debt by EUR 236 million, and this brings the net debt just below EUR 1.6 billion, with a leverage ratio now under 2x, a level that the group has not reached in a long time. Let us now take a closer look at the performance of our different businesses. Starting with the slide seven, with the Lagardère Publishing activity, which delivered another year of very solid results. Despite a market environment that has generally been trending downward this year, Lagardère Publishing continues to deliver solid growth, supported by its diversified portfolio of activities and geographies.
Revenues was up 3% like-for-like basis this year and crossed the EUR 3 billion threshold. The division delivered solid growth across all markets, as you can see. More specifically, in France, revenue was up 2% in a market down by 1.5%. The illustrated segment benefited from continued demand for coloring books, as well as from the strong performance of the new Astérix album, Astérix in Lutetia, which sold over 2 million copies as of today. In general literature, sales were driven by strong new releases, including Dan Brown's The Secret of Secrets, Atlantes, the third part of Pierre Lemaitre's saga, Un avenir radieux , at Calmann-Lévy. The Adélaïde de Clermont-Tonnerre novel, winner of the Renaudot Prize, published by Grasset, and the President Sarkozy's Journal d'un prisonnier at Fayard.
The education segment also benefited from the reform of the sixth grade curriculum, as well as the primary level titles. Regarding the U.S., we are seeing revenue up 3% in a market that was actually down by close to 0.5%. The business benefited from a very strong slate of new releases. Among the top sellers in 2025, we had Callie Hart , Quicksilver Brimstone, Gone Before Goodbye by Reese Witherspoon and Harlan Coben, as well as the anniversary reissues of Twilight. In the U.K., growth reached a solid 3% in a slightly declining market, supported by the strong performance of several fiction titles, including Onyx Storm by Rebecca Yarros, The Hallmarked Man by Robert Galbraith, and Circle of Days by Ken Follett, as well as the continued momentum from Freida McFadden, the Housemaid series.
The business also benefited from the new distribution partnership with Bloomsbury, initiated in 2024. In Spain, in Spanish-speaking countries, Spain and Mexico, revenue was down 6%, mainly due to the curriculum reform in Spain that has started in 2022, and that end in at the end of 2024. Revenue in partworks was up 6%, a remarkable performance given the trend of this market. This was driven in particular by the successful launches of Warhammer Combat Patrol and Disney Novels. Finally, board games continue to support our other revenue segment and our diversification with a strong 10% growth on a like-for-like basis, supported by the carryover sales of schedule, with 2 million units sold in 2025, along with the successful launch of the new game, Flip 7. Now let's have a look to the operating margin of the publishing branch.
On Slide eight, EBITDA reached EUR 308 million compared to EUR 289 million in 2024, maintaining publishing's operating margin at a very high level. The high level of margin was driven by the top line growth, of course, and by the favorable sales mix and improvements for the SG&A costs. EBITDA also include the contribution from equity accounted companies, which came to EUR 6 million in 2025, compared to EUR 1 million in 2024. These favorable effects were partially offset by restructuring costs of EUR 14 million, mainly in the U.S. and in Mexico. Next slide, on cash flow. Our strong operating performance translates into steady cash generation. What we show here is the CFFO, the cash generated from the operation, including CapEx, before interest and taxes.
CFFO came in at a very high level of EUR 361 million, compared to EUR 330 million at the end of 2024, a solid increase of 9%, considering that 2024 was already a record year for the cash generation at publishing level. This year, this amount included EUR 44 million related to the proceeds from the sale of the real estate asset in Paris, through Assas, and the sale of a domain name, moon.com, moon.com in the U.S. Let's now move on to travel retail on the slide 11. 2025 marks another record-breaking year for travel, Lagardère Travel Retail. First, revenue reached EUR 6.1 billion on a like-for-like basis, revenue increased by 4.4%, driven by a significant number of openings and concession wins across Europe, Africa, and the Pacific region.
In France, revenue grew 3%, supported by higher air traffic, new concession, and strong commercial initiatives in duty-free businesses. In the EMEA, excluding France, revenue was up 7%, with solid growth in the U.K., Spain, Poland, Italy, and Albania, driven by traffic growth and network expansion. Africa posted strong momentum as well, up 25%, thanks to recent opening in Benin, Cameroon, or Rwanda. In the Americas, revenue was up 3%. In North America, activity was supported by network expansion and strong commercial performance in travel, essential, and dining, despite stable air traffic. South America delivered a strong growth of 28%, driven by the rebound in tourism and the opening of the new Lima airport in Peru. Last but not least, in Asia Pacific, revenue declined by 12%, mainly due to North America, which turnaround, by the way, is well on track.
This turnaround impacted the group revenue by close to 2% of growth. Long story short, excluding North Asia, travel retail revenue grew by 6.5% on a like-for-like basis. Let's now turn to profitability on the next slide. We are also pleased to share this record EBITDA of EUR 312 million in 2025, up 17% year-over-year. As a result, our operating margin reached 5.1% of revenues compared to 4.6% in 2024. Travel retail achieved this strong performance, supported by the top line growth in Americas and EMEA, and also, with the China restructuring benefits and of course, a strict discipline regarding the cost.
EBITDA in 2025 also includes EUR 23 million in restructuring charges and EUR 18 million in asset impairments, mainly in Asia and Iceland, related to closure operation in order to preserve the profitability going forward. Going to the cash flow generation on the next slide. The CFFO of our travel retail business stood at EUR 224 million, again, record level. This amount, in this amount, we had an unfavorable impact on working capital from the numerous new duty-free concession openings in Amsterdam, Auckland, and Cambodia this year. But, and from an increase in inventories in France lead to the opening of a new warehouse. It's also worth noting that CapEx were slightly lower in 2025, EUR 35 million lower this year compared to last year. This is not because we intended to slow down our investments. Quite the opposite, actually.
It's rather linked to the very high level reached in 2024 and derives from the project phasing of the new concessions. Let's now move on to Lagardère Live on slide 15. As you know, this branch brings together our radio channels, news magazine, and licensees, Live venues, and artists production business. In 2025, Lagardère Live generated EUR 219 million in revenue, excluding the impact of Paris Match disposal in November 2024. Revenues did continue to grow, up 1% year-on-year. The news and radio segment delivered a slight increase, 0.3% compared to last year. The continued expansion of Europe 1's audience helped offset softer trends in music radio and regarding the advertising market.
The press business also performed well, supported by the launch of JDNews , and by strong contribution from Elle International licensing, and by the ongoing momentum of our diversification strategy. Our Live Entertainment activities had a particularly strong year, posting 6% growth, driven by successful concert tour organized by L Productions, and a record year at the Arkéa Arena in Bordeaux. Going to slide 16. Lagardère Live, as you can see, strongly had its operating losses in 2025, delivering EUR 37 million year-on-year improvement, supported, of course, by significant cost-saving measures. The year 2025 was still impacted by around EUR 10 million in restructuring costs. These costs relate to reduction of staffing costs, as well as efforts to streamline the real estate portfolio, inherited from a time when Lagardère Media perimeter was significantly larger than it is today.
So as you can see, we are fully committed to continuously reducing operating costs within this new division. Excluding these restructuring charges, EBITDA would therefore be closer to a loss of around EUR 10 million. We are not yet breakeven, but as you can see, we are getting closer. The cash flow also improved sharply with cash burn reduced threshold. CFFO came in at -EUR 11 million compared to -EUR 43 million the previous year. Before wrapping up our review of the group performance, let me share a few comments on Prisma Media. For the full year 2025, Prisma Media delivered revenue of EUR 266 million, down 9% on a reported basis. This reflects both the ongoing contraction of the print press market, the consumption patterns, and the shift in digital advertising markets.
To respond and adapt to these challenging market conditions, we launched two restructuring plans, one in June and another one in December 2025, covering around 300 employees, more than 1/3 of the total workforce. The aim of this is to, of course, safeguard profitability. Prisma is still profitable. I will come back to this later in 2025, this beside the restructuring cost. These certain changes in governance were also put in place, and the new leadership team initiated several other strategic actions. First, we strengthened our people magazine portfolio with the acquisition of Ici Paris and France Dimanche in December 2025, two magazines which are profitable today and less impacted by the market changes that I've just mentioned. Second, we decided to refocus on our core businesses and flagship brands with the planned divestment of our luxury magazines.
Third, at the same time, Vivendi is expected to take 14% minority stake, which, with a cash consideration. These last two transactions are currently under review by the staff representative bodies and are expected to be finalized by the end of this semester. Let's now move to the next slide with a focus on Prisma Media profitability. As you can see, Prisma's EBITDA stood at -EUR 43 million in 2025, a decrease mainly reflected in the decline in the top line and the impact of the restructuring cost of EUR 49 million. Let me point out again that excluding this cost, this restructuring cost, EBITDA remained positive at EUR 6 million for 2025. Of course, our aim is definitely to keep Prisma EBITDA in this positive territory.
Now that we covered the group, the performance for each division, let me walk you through the financials at group level, starting with revenues on slide 21. The total group revenue, which again, EUR 9.6 billion in 2025. As you can see, reported revenue growth was 4%, as I already mentioned it, representing EUR 400, almost EUR 400 million additional revenue in absolute terms. This year, again, organic growth remain the main driver, contributing EUR 310 million across all our businesses. The main scope effects came from the start of the duty-free operation at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in May 2025, as well as the acquisition of Sterling Publishing at the end of 2024, and 999 Games at the beginning of 2025, offsetting the sale of Paris Match in November 2024.
Regarding Amsterdam duty-free, the tender we won in December 2024 led to the acquisition of a 70% stake in a new joint venture, with Amsterdam Airport retaining the remaining 30%. So to be clear, this new concession has been accounted for as an acquisition and therefore is not included in our like-for-like growth. On the negative side, foreign exchange had an adverse impact this year, quite a strong impact, with the U.S. dollar being the main currency affecting our revenue, reflecting our strong presence in the U.S., both for travel retail and publishing. Despite this effects impact, adverse impacts, as you can see, the growth is still very strong. Let's move on to EBITDA on the next slide, slide 22. As shown on this slide, we had a solid and steady improvement in 2024 and 2025.
EBITDA was from EUR 490 million in 2023 to EUR 551 million in 2025, representing a EUR 60 million, more than EUR 60 million increase. We are particularly pleased to see that this high level of EBITDA continues to be almost evenly supported by our two core activities, with again, EUR 312 million contributed by travel retail and EUR 308 million by publishing. Overall, this reflects a strong and balanced performance across the group's key businesses. Let's have a look now at the rest of the P&L below EBITDA, after deducting amortization of intangible assets related to M&A and the positive adjustment linked to the IFRS 16, profit before interest and tax reached EUR 429 million, representing a 7% increase year-on-year.
Below this line, the finance costs, the finance costs improved by EUR 21 million in 2025, driven by a reduction of the gross debt and a lower average cost of debt. Interest expense on lease liability increased by 8%, reflecting new, renew and amended lease contracts, particularly in the U.S.-United States, Auckland, Warsaw or Prague. Income tax decreased to EUR 73 million compared to EUR 93 million in 2024, mainly due to exceptional items recorded last year. And as a result, net profit rose to EUR 112 million, an improvement of EUR 50 million, supported by lower finance costs and reduced tax burden.
The level of minority interest is explained by the, the increase of Lagardère earnings, of which, as you know, Louis Hachette captures only 66%, also impacted by the decrease of the loss in Asia that are shared with minorities, and the fact that Prisma's losses, significant this year due to restructuring, are fully borne by Louis Hachette Group. Despite that, as you can see, net results group share significantly increased from EUR 13 million to EUR 22 million. On the next slide, you can see the improvement again, in terms of cash flow generation. Our CFFO increased from EUR 357 million in 2023 to EUR 558 million in 2025, a sharp uplift of EUR 155 million in two years. This reflects, again, the solid operational momentum across the group.
This section on cash flow naturally leads us to the balance sheet, and more specifically to the evolution of our net debt on the slide 25. On this slide, you can see our usual net debt bridge over the last 12 months. Beyond the CFFO that I mentioned, our outflows includes EUR 100 million of tax paid and EUR 96 million in financial interests. Altogether, our CFAIT, that is the cash flow after tax and interest, amounted to EUR 363 million. On the M&A front, the group remain active but reasonable this year, in line with our strategy, with the acquisition, as I already mentioned, of 999 Games, Sterling Publishing, Union Square Publishing, Le Routard in France by Lagardère Publishing.
The first installment payment for the acquisition of the 70% stake in the joint venture operating the Schiphol travel retail concession that I already mentioned, and also the acquisition of Ici Paris and France Dimanche for Prisma. In the opposite direction, we received also around EUR 40 million from the repayment of a vendor loan granted to SPORTFIVE, following the disposal of Lagardère Sport in 2020. In May, we also paid a EUR 0.06 dividend per share, representing a total of EUR 59 million. We also distributed EUR 85 million to minority shareholders, including EUR 32 million to minority shareholders of Lagardère itself, and EUR 53 million to minorities at publishing and travel retail level. All in all, these movements bring net debt just below EUR 1.6 billion at the end of this year.
At this point, I would like to make a brief remark for those monitoring net debt at Lagardère level. Just like Louis Hachette Group, Lagardère net debt also improved, ending this year at exactly EUR 1.6 billion, which represents a EUR 255 million reduction year-on-year. As a result, Lagardère net debt ratio fell also below 2x, 1.96x to be accurate, at the end of 2025, compared to 2.4x a year earlier. We are currently on track and even a little bit in advance with our deleveraging strategy, of course, we remain fully focused on continuing this effort. To continue on this topic, let's move on the next slide. As you know, in 2025, the Lagardère Group successfully issued a EUR 500 million, five-year bond.
The transaction was more than 3x oversubscribed by the market, demonstrating investors' confidence in the group's solid performance. Lagardère also raised EUR 300 million through a private placement structured in euro, with a mix of maturity up to five years, and six and floating rates. After these two refinancing operations for EUR 800 million, our net debt, as you can see, is now well diversified and well balanced between bank loans, private holders, and bonds. The maturities are also well spread until 2030, as you can see on this slide, and the weighted average maturity is 2.9 years. Let's now move to the conclusion, and to sum up the key message for 2026.
So, first, I would then say that we will continue to consolidate our leading position, by staying fully focused on the solid execution of our strategy across all the businesses. This includes, promising scheduling for Lagardère Publishing. Lagardère Travel Retail will also capitalize on major openings completed in 2025, and growing air traffic, which will support growth momentum going forward. Our aim is still to deliver growth, to increase margin with a strict, cost discipline. And, second, we also want to continue to deleverage the group, but we will invest to fuel the future growth. And we will remain attentive to, bolt-on acquisition opportunities when they could make, strategic sense.
Third, regarding the dividend, fiscal year 2025, we will propose an ordinary dividend of EUR 0.06 per share to be submitted to the AGM in May. The ex-dividend date will be May 7, with this payment starting on May 11. So 2026 priorities reflect, again, a balanced approach, reinforcing our strategic position, continuing to reduce debt, and maintaining discipline and predictable shareholder returns, supported by strong operational momentum in both publishing and travel retail. Thanks a lot for your attention, and we are now available to answer the questions that you may have.
Thank you. This is the operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star and two. We will pause for a moment as participants are joining the queue. First question is from Eric Ravary, CIC Market Solutions.
Yes, good evening. Thank you for taking my questions. First question on, could we have a comment on the outlook for full year 2026 for both book publishing and travel retail, especially at the margin levels? Do you consider, especially for travel retail, that there is still room for margin improvement following the restructuring in China? Also, well, a brief comment on the operating trends for the two businesses since the beginning of the year. Second question on Prisma. Do you expect further restructuring costs in 2026? Do you expect that Prisma could post positive EBIT, excluding restructuring in 2026, following the staff reduction? Last question is on the debt structure.
You deleveraged the company in 2025. Is it a priority for you to continue to reduce leverage in 2026? And could you give us an indication of the kind of leverage that you could target at end 2026?
Thank you, Eric. I think, I will hand over the, the answers to first, Jean-Christophe.
Okay, for Hachette. So as Grégoire explained, we had a very strong year in 2025 for Hachette. And for 2026, we expect stable revenue, despite FX potential headwinds with a weak U.S. dollar. Concerning France, we will not benefit from an Astérix release in an even year. And we will face a risk of erosion in coloring sales after outstanding sales in 2025. But on the other hand, we have a very promising publishing program, including new novels by Pierre Lemaitre and Guillaume Musso. For Guillaume Musso, including a new novel, Le Crime du paradis , and the trade paperback release of his previous title. We will have the second year of middle school reform with Maths, French, LV1, LV2.
In the U.K. and in the U.S., activity should remain relatively high after a record year in 2025, driven by a strong publishing program, among which a new title by Callie Hart in the U.S. and in the U.K., or Liza Minnelli's memoir in both countries. We will have Heartstopper number six by Alice Oseman in the U.K., a release by John Grisham in the U.K., a new novel by Abby Jimenez in the U.S. In the U.S., the result should also benefit from the full impact of the synergies realized by Union Square, acquired at the end of 2024. Concerning the EBITDA, we hope to be able to deliver EBITDA roughly in line with 2025, and to maintain a high level of margin ratio.
Good evening. Regarding Lagardère Travel Retail, we believe the year 2026, we hope the year 2026 will be materially in the continuity of the last quarter of last year. What we see is a continuous slight increase on the traffic side, and we hope, and we believe it will, it will remain like that, for the next 10 months. We will continue to benefit a positive effect, in comparison to last year, of the Amsterdam integration that Grégoire highlighted, started in May 1, last year. This will help us. Counterpart of that, we continue the restructuring of China.
That should continue on the same speed, at the same speed along the year, and most of the restructuring should be done by the end of 2026, by the end of this year. This is in the context of a very challenging macroeconomic environment, and in particular, FX environment. The evolution of the dollar and the dollar-pegged currencies is something we look at very, very carefully, but for the time being, we're in the range of, let's say, mid-single-digit sales evolution. And regarding margin, EBITDA, we expect in absolute value should grow relatively substantially.
In terms of percentage, we believe there is still a little bit of room for slight improvement in the rate, marginal one, result of slowing reduction of the losses in China, as highlighted in the question. But also all the efficiency efforts we're going throughout the world, we're delivering throughout the world to improve the overall profitability.
Maybe I can take the question regarding the Live branch and Prisma for the Q4 and Q1 trend. Regarding the Q4, supported by the Europe 1 strong audience performance, Lagardère News , advertising revenues held up well within a challenging advertising environment, as you know, declining only by 6%. For Prisma, the decline in digital advertising revenue for this last quarter is broadly in line with the market trends, close to 10% in Q4. Regarding the beginning of this year for January, quite soon to say, but January trends are correct at this stage.
For radio, still driven by the European audience, however, the trend for Prisma is, unfortunately aligned with what we saw in Q4 2025. Then you had a question regarding the restructuring at, Prisma. I can also take this, this question. As I already mentioned, our target is to keep Prisma EBITDA in the positive territory. It's the case, apart the restructuring cost in 2025. This is clearly a challenge for 2026, but this is our target. The restructuring initiated at the end of 2025 will of course generate savings, as early as 2026 on personnel costs .... as well as in support and marketing functions, for a global amount estimated at this stage between EUR 15 million and EUR 20 million full year effect.
But let's be cautious with that numbers because we are to be very accurate for 2026 impact, since again, it's still under the review of the staff representative, and we are not completely sure about the timing. These two restructuring plans are already very large, as I mentioned it, more than 1/3 of the workforce. So at this stage, we don't contemplate other strong restructuring costs for 2026, but we could have other costs in a lower magnitude. But again, today, we are focusing on the last restructuring launch in December. So this is for Prisma, and then you had a question about, I think, the debt and the potential target regarding the leverage. As you know, since 2024, we have been executing a very disciplined deleveraging strategy .
You saw the results. Our leverage ratio improved very strongly from 3x at the end of 2023 to less than 2x at year end 2025. And again, in 2026, deleveraging will remain a key strategic priority for the group. We'll continue to apply the same disciplined financial approach with a strong focus on EBITDA, working capital control, prioritize investment that supports future growth. And in the same time, we also want to continue our policy of investment, of disciplined bolt-on M&A, and a reasonable level of dividends. So, long story short, too soon to give you a precise target for 2026. But again, we want to consider the cash generation as a key priority for the group for the next year.
Thank you very much.
Next question is from Jérôme Bodin , Oddo BHF.
Yes, good evening. A few questions on my side. The first one, it's on China restructuring for Lagardère Travel Retail. Where are you exactly, from the starting point? Is it 1/3, 2/3 , half of the efforts? When do you plan to be breakeven for this business, if you plan to be breakeven? That's my first question. My second one is on the Vivendi deal regarding Prisma. If I have understood well, you are selling some titles to Vivendi. Does that mean a cashing for you? Vivendi is buying a stake in Prisma. If you could detail a bit the cash impact and what's the valuation of Prisma that has been used. Last question on free cash flow.
So the CapEx are down this year, should we consider this level based on the revenues as the new normal? And also second question, so based on the EUR 90 million of restructuring in 2025, what has been included in the free cash flow for 2025, especially for the Prisma? Thank you.
I'll take the Chinese one. First, maybe one point to highlight or to remember for all, to all of you, the situation in China is a very atypical situation because what we operate in China is mostly fashion, predominantly, 90% of the business is fashion in domestic airports. It's a very, somehow, atypical market in which we operate. Despite all the efforts we did in the recent past, we do not see a clear turnaround of market trends, so we are in the process of restructuring. Depending on the way you measure it, I would say, if you count in terms of number of store closing, we are more than halfway. If you count in terms of reduction of the losses, it's higher than the number of store shrink or decline.
As I said earlier, most of the restructuring should be achieved by the end of this year. We're still in the red this year, but next year, we can consider we are in the range of zero, zero over everything, including bottom line.
Thank you, Frédéric. Coming back to the Vivendi deal regarding Prisma, again, this is under the review of the all the bodies. So, in a nutshell, in December 2025, Prisma finalized, as you know, the acquisition of the magazine, Ici Paris and France Dimanche, and then we launched the two restructuring. The transaction will again enable Prisma to refocus on its core businesses in a more challenging economic environment. The impact are not very strong regarding the business of Prisma, since the luxury branch represents close to EUR 20 million in term of revenue and is close to breakeven in 2025.
Regarding the cash consideration and the cash impact, the consideration is regarding the sale of the luxury division, around EUR 10 million in cash. And regarding the other part of the transaction, since concurrently with the transaction regarding the luxury branch, Vivendi will acquire a minority stake of around 14% in Prisma Media share capital. The transaction will contribute to around EUR 30 million in cash for LHG coming from Vivendi. So this is for the Prisma Vivendi deal. You also had a question regarding the CapEx for 2026, and is the 2025 level the new normal? Actually hard to say. Again, the CapEx in 2025 was a little bit lower than expected.
So I will tend to say that the target is between 2024 and 2025. I think it's better to consider the level of CapEx compared to the turnover and particularly regarding travel retail. I think that we should have a level between, let's say, 3.5% and 4% of the total revenue. I think this is roughly in the long term what we should target. And then you had a question about the cash impact. What was exactly the question? The impact for the restructuring regarding Prisma.
During the year 2025, we had roughly EUR 7 million already cash out for the restructuring plan launch for Prisma, mainly the one launch at the beginning of the year. The main part of the restructuring costs in terms of cash will impact year 2026 and maybe a little bit year 2027, depending again on the timing linked to the review which is under process.
Thank you very much.
Next question is from Julien Roch , Barclays.
Yes, good evening. Thank you for taking my questions. The first one is, can you give us some colors on Q1 trends by division? That's number one. Number two, is there any assets in the Live division that you consider non-core? I know in terms of the last thing is profitable, but maybe you could get a good price and deliver some more, or the venues, so anything in there that potentially could be a non-core? And then last question is, can you give us some indication on cash flow, either cash flow conversion from EBITDA or yeah, some indication, whatever you can say on cash flow generation in 2026. That's it.
So we start again, I think, a little bit to summarize what's the trend for publishing with Jean-Christophe.
Thank you, Emmanuel. So the Q1 of 2026 should be roughly in line with 2025. Despite the unfavorable comparison base effect with the first quarter of 2025, which had benefited from the huge success of Onyx Storm in the U.K. We will have a solid publishing program for the first quarter of 2026. Additionally, we will publish Judge Stone in the U.S. in March, which is a collaboration between James Patterson and the actress Viola Davis. The activity for the first quarter in France will be driven by the success of Pierre Lemaitre, La Belle Promise, which is the fourth title in the series he began in 2022.
And we will have the return of Guillaume Musso, who will publish a new novel, Le Crime du paradis , I mentioned earlier at the beginning of March, along with the simultaneous release of Quelqu'un d'autre in trade paperback.
I guess this is my turn. So for Lagardère Travel Retail, the month of January was somehow in the continuity of the last quarter of last year that we find a pretty good result, especially in the context of very adverse weather conditions in Northern Europe. I have in mind Brussels and then Amsterdam Airport, in particular, that were badly impacted by the snow, the snow wave, and also in North America, it was an extreme weather event that affected traffic and therefore our sales. Having said that, despite this very adverse effect, we maintain a good momentum in the continuity of last quarter, so mid-single-digit sales growth.
We continue to be supported by the Amsterdam effect, because I said earlier, until end of April, this will be helping our growth. And this is despite a quite painful FX effect in January, and that's why I said earlier, for the full year, that's something we're going to monitor. But all in all, we're on track with what we were expecting, mid-single digit in January. Well, that being said, be careful extrapolating, January is the slowest, smallest month of the year. We believe the first quarter should be equal or slightly better than the month of January.
I think that I already answered regarding the Prisma and Live trend for the beginning of this year. Coming back to the question that you had, Julien, regarding the assets that you named non-core assets for the Live branch. As you know, these assets are definitely not for sale. It's not our plan. We clearly love these assets. It's a very strong portfolio of brand. They are all profitable, apart the news activities, and as I mentioned it, we targeting to be close to zero for this News branch. And this is clearly the priority for us.
I prefer essentially to focus on generation cash through operational improvement, instead of planning any sale for good asset of the groups. Regarding the cash flow conversion for 2026, of course, we will try to increase again the cash flow generation for 2026 for the next year. I think, of course, the main driver will be the profit and the EBITDA generated next year and the increase of the EBITDA. But just keep in mind that for 2025, as I mentioned it, we have few exceptional items that positively impacted the CFFO. The first one is the sale again of our real estate asset with Assas, and the sale of the moon.com domain name.
Both represent together close to EUR 40 million. We also have, as I mentioned it, the credit loan for reimbursement for Lagardère Sports from SPORTFIVE for also EUR 40 million. So all in all, we had close to EUR 80 million exceptional impact this year. It was not so easy to deliver these exceptional items to again sell, particularly the Rue d'Assas at this level. But this is down, and I'm not sure that we will have so big exceptional items in 2026. So the main driver again for the cash generation should be the operating result for 2026.
Fabien, merci.
Next question is from Christophe Cherblanc, Bernstein.
Yes, good evening. I had three question. The first one was on minority interest. I think in the release you mentioned that the improvement is coming from the lower level of losses in Asia, which seems to be essentially due to the lower losses in Asia. Is that the right way to look at it? And if that is the case, EUR 20 million, EUR 19 million increase suggest very, very strong improvement of the net contribution of Travel Retail Asia. Is that a fair assumption? The second question is just a confirmation. I had in mind that the share of operating profit generated in dollar was about 40%. Just wanted to have an update on that order of magnitude.
Finally, on Live, I think, Grégoire, you just said that you were targeting for News to be at zero. Is that an assumption which we can take for all of 2026, for the whole of the division Live, Live plus News? Thank you.
Regarding the minority interest, I just mentioned that this has a positive impact regarding the minority interest at the group level, since we share the loss with minorities, and since the losses are lower this year, we have, let's say, lower negative impact for the minority shareholders in the results. As you know, it's always quite difficult to explain in details all the impact for the earning group per share, particularly if you are at the Louis Hachette level. But if you have detailed question about this, do not hesitate to outside this call have a discussion with the IR.
They have all the sheets and the figures that helps you to go from the net results from Lagardère to the net result from LHG, and with this clear split between the group level and the minority level. Then you also have a question regarding the result coming from the U.S., and with the assumption of 40%. I think it's quite good assumption for the this year. Again, the U.S. is clearly today our first market. So, if you -- beside your question, the question is: could we be also impacted by any FX change? Of course, we could. We already mentioned it.
But keep in mind also that we have a part of our debt, which is in dollar. So if we could have a negative impact regarding the FX for the revenue and the operating results, we could also have a positive impact balancing this for the net debt. And then you mentioned the target regarding Live. As I mentioned it, we are close to breakeven, not yet there. I think it's feasible to be breakeven in 2026. It of course depends a lot on the market and the advertising market, so I again prefer to be cautious. But I already mentioned this target one year ago, and we clearly want to achieve this level.
I hope this is feasible in 2026, but if it's not the case, this will be for 2027. We want to reduce the cost, and the loss, at this level. We are completely focused on this target.
Yeah, Hachette level, it was at Lagardère level, where you've got that EUR 19 million increase, so, you have 23% share of minorities. So, you know, if you do the math, that's a massive improvement of the net profit of Asia. So I do know that last year you had reorganization, but-
Yeah, yeah. If you just have a look to the net result at Lagardère level, you have a very significant improvement regarding the net result group share at Lagardère level. Then we have just to walk you through the net result from Lagardère to Louis Hachette. And again, this is something that we can do outside this call. No problem to give you all the details.
Okay.
But you're right. The net result at Lagardère level improved a lot in 2025.
Thank you.
Gentlemen, there are no more questions registered at this time.
Thank you. Thank you all, and we conclude this conference call, and we hope to hear from you for the Q1 2026 in April. Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over. You may disconnect your telephones.