Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Renault Group's Q1 2026 conference call. I remind you that this call is broadcast live and will be available in replay version on our website. This presentation will be done by Duncan Minto, the Group Chief Financial Officer, and will be followed by a Q&A session. Duncan, the floor is yours.
Thanks, Florent. Good morning, everybody, or good afternoon, depending on where you're connecting. It's pleased to be with you this morning to present our Q1 revenue and sales performance. Let's go straight ahead. In Q1, group revenue increased by 7.3% compared to last year and stood at EUR 12.5 billion. At constant exchange rates, it was up 8.8%. As you know, in 2026, mobility services revenue has been reintegrated in the automotive segment following the reorganization of these activities. This reintegration amounted to EUR 17 million in Q1 2026 and to EUR 23 million in Q1 last year. Thus, automotive revenue stood at EUR 10.8 billion this quarter compared to the EUR 10.2 billion in Q1 2025, which is an increase of 6.5% or 8% at constant exchange rates. Mobilize Financial Services revenue was up 13% to EUR 1.7 billion.
Drilling into the automotive revenue, which stood once again at EUR 10.8 billion in Q1, up 8% at constant exchange rates. The negative Forex impact was -1.5 points, mainly related to the devaluation of the Turkish lira and to a lesser extent, the Argentine peso. A strong sales increase in Turkey implied a more negative impact of the Turkish lira on revenue. However, it should be partly offset, in terms of margin, by the positive effect on production costs. The volume effect, the second slot, was negative by -2.1 points in the quarter, mainly due to the -3.3% decrease in group registrations. In addition, it's worth highlighting that the independent dealer network reduction in Q1 2026 versus Q1 2025 had no impact on the volume effect.
It reflected timing differences mainly related to Euro 6e-bis regulatory change, with vehicles registered and invoiced at the end of 2025, which were delivered in the Q1 of this year and thus removed from inventory at this moment in time. Looking at the registrations, worldwide sales stood at 546,000 units in the Q1, down 3.3% compared to Q1 2025. This was mainly due to one-off issues at Dacia, while Renault and Alpine sales grew. In Europe, the group confirmed its number three position in the passenger car and light commercial vehicle market. Looking by brand, we see Renault brand sales were up 2.2% globally versus last year, thanks to the growth of electrified vehicles and the full diversity availability of light commercial vehicles.
On international markets, Renault brand continues to consolidate its international footprint, supported by a renewed product lineup, notably in India, Morocco and Colombia, which were all up double digits. In Turkey, Renault maintained its leadership with total sales up 13% in a market down 4%. This trend will be reinforced throughout the year with our recent launches such as Renault Duster, sorry, in India, as well as the upcoming launch of Renault Boreal in Turkey. Dacia sales were down 16.3% versus last year. The severe weather conditions implied a 10-day closure of the Strait of Gibraltar and floods in our Tangier plant, leading to logistics and production disruptions in the first two months of the year.
Sales, however, are showing signs of recovery in March, with a 1.9% growth in Europe compared to March 2025, and Dacia can rely on a strong order book fueled by double-digit order intake year to date. The several thousand units of reduction losses should be caught up progressively in the course of the first half of the year. Alpine sales were up by 54.7%, essentially driven by A290, and I'll come back later on this. In March, the group sales started to recover in total with a 5.3% global performance year on year, outperforming the market. As illustrated in recent years, a two-leg strategy is playing out very positively for Renault Group, and we are set to continue benefiting from a strong product momentum and the right technologies to address these growing markets.
First, we are accelerating in electric vehicles in Europe. At group level, BEV sales were up 21% and the mix reached 17% of the sales in the Q1 2026, which is up four points year on year. Under the Renault brand, we now offer five electric passenger cars covering the A to C segments, securing a strong position in Europe's core market. Renault brand EV sales increased by 43% in Q1 compared to last year. Renault EV mix continued to improve and reached 24% of sales at the end of Q1 2026. The brand was number one EV in France and in the B segment EV in Europe, benefiting from the success of Renault 5, which was the number one BEV in most European markets, the progressive ramp-up of Renault 4, and the solid performance of Scenic.
This momentum will be further supported by the launch of Twingo, for which deliveries are just about to start. Beyond the Renault brand, the group's EV offer and momentum is complemented by Dacia Spring model year 2026, already a key player in affordable EVs, and by Alpine's electric offensive with the A290 already on the road, and the A390 to come soon. On the other hand, we intend to pursue the electrification of our ICE engines thanks to best-in-class hybrid technology. The group confirmed its second position in the HEV market in Europe. Hybrid mix stood at 35% for the group in Q1 2026, up strongly compared to last year. Dacia HEV sales were up 49%, driven by Duster and Bigster supporting the group's performance.
Full hybrid E-Tech also continued to perform strongly across Renault brand's core models, representing more than 40% of the total sales, confirming their key role in the brand's balanced electrification strategy. The brand stood in second place in HEV in Europe. All in all, electrified sales of the group grew 12% and represented respectively nearly 2/3 of Renault brand's sales and more than 30% of Dacia sales in Q1. Thus, at group level, electrified vehicles represented more than one out of two sales in Europe, up nine points compared to the previous year. This momentum is expected to pursue in the coming quarters with the recent launch of Twingo and the full rollout of Clio full hybrid. In Europe, Renault brand sales were up 3.8% versus last year.
Renault gained one position and was ranked number two in passenger car and light commercial vehicles, with Clio as best-selling model. The brand was also number two in LCV in Europe. Supported by the full diversity availability of the LCV range, we benefited from a 15% sales growth following a transition year in 2025.
Worldwide, LCV sales increased by almost 7% year-on-year this quarter. Dacia maintained its position in the top 10 automotive brands across all channels for passenger cars in Europe and is top three in the retail channel. The brand's performance was especially strong on the retail market, which remains at the heart of the strategy. This reached a high level of 77% of passenger car sales. Duster is number three SUV in the retail channel in Europe. We benefit from an increasingly attractive product line-up, notably thanks to the success of LPG and hybrid engines. The launch of Duster and Bigster hybrid-G 150 4x4, as well as the Sandero LPG automatic transmission, also strongly contributed to order intake momentum. This gives us good confidence in improving Dacia's sales performance in the coming months. Let's move to Alpine.
After a triple-digit growth record in 2025, Alpine confirms the upward trend in Q1 2026 with more than 3,200 registrations worldwide, which is up 55%. Alpine continues to expand sales in Europe, particularly in the U.K., which becomes its second most significant market, and also in Germany and Spain. A290 is the best-selling brand's model with almost 2,500 registrations worldwide, up 64%. The A390, the brand's first five-seat sport fastback, now being launched in most European countries, will support the brand by reaching new customers and further consolidating the sales growth. Above and beyond growth, we remain fully focused on sales quality, as we illustrate on this slide. We still run our plants at a high utilization rate of above 90%. This was supported by the improvement of Chennai utilization rate in India.
We continue to implement a strict discipline to the management of our total inventories, which stood at 554,000 units at the end of March. This level of inventory will enable us to smoothly operate during Q2, which is traditionally stronger in terms of registrations. This total level of stock is underpinned by a strong order book in Europe, which stood at two months of forward sales versus 1.5 months at the end of December 2025. It was fueled by a double-digit order intake growth since the start of the year, with a significant acceleration in electric vehicles. We continue to uphold our commercial policy, which sets residual value over volume. As an example, our group's retail channel mix was 58% of PC sales, 16 points above the market.
Renault brand reduced its exposure to short-term rental channel and grew in the retail channel by 8.5% in our five main European countries. This notably supports meaningfully higher residual values against competition. Our residual values are 4-13 points above market average, thanks to this holistic approach to a commercial policy. All this will continue to be embodied in our ongoing product offensive. On inventories, as mentioned earlier, the total stood at 554,000 units at the end of March. We expect total inventories to be slightly lower at the end of June compared to March. Let's turn now to one of the major parts of growth, which was sales to partners. The strong positive impact was 5.9 points of revenue growth in the Q1.
Driven primarily by the performance of partner programs, especially Nissan Micra. It also benefited from positive effects of scope evolution, as we'd highlighted.
The integration of RNAIPL, our Indian manufacturing site, contributed around EUR 200 million in quarter one 2026. The full year revenue for this should be around EUR 1 billion, but I remind you with a margin close to zero on this activity. Secondly, we began the ramp-up of the distribution of Geely vehicles in Brazil. It's the first phase of our agreement with Geely, with local production through the Renault do Brasil joint venture set to begin in the coming months. Let's now have a look at price, product mix, and geographical effects. Price effect was slightly positive, +1 point in the Q1. Price increases in international markets, which were there to compensate for the negative effects, were partly offset by pricing pressure in Europe. This price pressure in Europe is expected to be pursued throughout the year.
Product mix was solid, +2.6 points, mostly due to the success of electric vehicles and also the transition phase between Clio 5 and Clio 6, the ramp-up of Bigster, and to some extent, also Master. The geographical mix at -0.1 points was mainly explained by the sales increase in India. The last item, other impacted positively revenue by 0.7 points in the quarter, primarily related to solid performance of parts and accessory sales. Let's move to Mobilize Financial Services. New financing production was stable versus quarter one 2025. The average performing assets increased by 4.8% to EUR 61.9 billion, thanks mostly to the increase in the average ticket per vehicle over the last years.
All in all, Mobilize Financial Services revenues were up 13% to EUR 1.7 billion, mainly driven, as I said, by the ticket per vehicle, but also still benefiting from the growing interest rate portfolio from previous years. Having gone through the revenues, let's look towards the outlook. This morning we confirm our guidance for 2026 with a Group operating margin around 5.5% of Group revenue and an Automotive free cash flow around EUR 1 billion. As per the usual seasonal patterns, H2 operating margin is expected to be higher than H1.
I remind you that last year H1 margin stood at 6% while H2 margin stood at 6.5% of revenue. In 2026, international expansion, increasing sales to partners, the growing share of electric vehicles, and the consolidation of RNAIPL on a full year basis will drive revenue growth, although being dilutive on margins. Cost reduction remains a key priority in 2026 and beyond. As we communicated during the 2025 full year results, our 2026 guidance assumes a substantial negative impact from raw materials and inflation. For a reminder, I said it would probably be close to twice the positive impact we saw in 2025. As of Q1, our purchasing and functions performance are well-oriented. Considering the geopolitical environment, we've decided to take additional measures to mitigate the potential impact of the Middle East crisis on raw materials, energy, and logistics costs.
At this stage, we see no meaningful impact, but we are monitoring the situation very closely. There are some potential risks considering the degree of uncertainty related to this situation. As an automotive manufacturer, we must remain vigilant. 2026 automotive free cash flow will, as I remind you, include the EUR 350 million dividend from Mobilize Financial Services, and we have expected a negative change in working capital in 2026 to continue to unwind the positive change we saw at the end of 2024. To conclude, as you can see today, we delivered strong revenue growth in Q1 despite the challenging environment. It was supported by both automotive and Mobilize Financial Services, demonstrating the robustness of the operating model and as stated in futuREady.
In March, we started to recover in terms of sales performance, and we see that our order intake continues to evolve positively. This confirms the relevance of our comprehensive product lineup in the current environment, supported by a two-leg strategy, both EV and HEV. Thank you for your attention this morning, and I think we can now go over to the Q&A.
Thank you, Duncan. Yes, indeed, we will open the Q&A session. I will ask you to limit yourself to two questions at first, and we'll come back to you in a second time if you have some follow-up. The first question will come from Michael Foundoukidis from ODDO BHF. Michael, do you hear us?
Hi, do you hear me?
Loud and clear. Thank you, Michael.
Okay, cool. Hi, and congrats on the Q1 performance. I have two questions. First, on margins. You highlighted the strong BEV growth and you had a meaningful contributions from sales to partners, both of which you have previously described as margin dilutive, including this morning. Could you maybe help us better quantify the expected margin impact of these mix effects this year and how it should be factored into your 5.5% full year margin guidance? And maybe second question on the Middle East, regarding the specific cost risk on raw mats, energy, and logistics you mentioned. Do you have any estimates of the incremental gross exposure you're aiming to mitigate? And could you give us more color on the key levers you're using to offset these pressures? Thank you.
Thanks, Michael. Yes, we are seeing very strong EV growth and also sales to partners. The sales to partners were agreements that were concluded a while back, so obviously they were very clearly built into our assumptions for futuREady and also for the year. I confirm that sales to partners and EV are profitable for the group. It's just that we are dilutive compared to the average for the group. I guess the most difficult environment would be the agreement we have in India, because our margin markup is on the, what we call value added, so the actual production cost of the workforce. Therefore, that's why I highlight the very strong growth in revenue has very little margin in India. In terms of electric vehicles, you've got Twingo on the screen, which will be hitting the street soon.
We're comfortable with the margin that we're being able to do that. We're seeing some very strong demand. Renault 5 is also another good contributor and rising. A290, Philippe's on my left here, is strong. Obviously, as you know, we have improvements to come in the C segment vehicles. But, overall, it's a real confirmation that the group's strategy in terms of having highly competitive EV platforms is the right one to go with. You're also seeing that if we're seeing partner growth on these platforms, you're seeing them on maybe the Nissan Micra today. You'll see them in the future also on Ford. If people are coming to us, it's because we have a highly competitive offer. So I think we're very well-positioned to benefit from that uptick.
Yes, it is slightly margin dilutive compared to the average of the range, but increasing EV volumes will also give us a bigger portfolio to work on in terms of cost reductions going forward. All in all, this is pretty much in line with what we thought we were going to be doing, and also I see it as a positive overall for the group. In terms of Middle East raw materials, obviously, we have some hedging on this. We have some contracts on the energy side, so this is not something I'm seeing impacting first half of the year. We'll see how those come into time. It's more about, as I said, as an automotive manufacturer, we have a very volatile external environment, and we have to prepare ourselves for the future.
We have options ready in terms of obviously everything we can do internally. That's our job to manage that in terms of fixed costs, but also at looking at how we can optimize our variable costs, be it through logistics routes, be it through energy consumption within sites, be it through purchasing and sourcing. I won't call out line by line our actions, but it's more about us looking ahead, because at the moment, we're not seeing any impact short term in terms of demand. We're obviously reading all the flashes on the price of oil, and the impacts that this could have coming further down the line.
Thank you.
Thank you, Michael. Our next question will come from Pushkar Tendolkar from HSBC. Pushkar, can you open your mic, and do you hear us?
Yeah.
Great.
Good morning. Hope you all can hear me.
Morning.
Yeah. Hello, Duncan.
Hi.
Just two questions from my side. First is on pricing, positive print, and you mentioned the offset of FX in the international markets. Just wanted to check if there is also an incremental benefit that you get in Europe versus what you expected earlier from the tight supply at Dacia, and then also from the model changeover. For example, you may have lower discount on a Clio 6 versus a Clio 5. So does that also feed in into this 1% pricing number? Second is on the competition, and particularly in Europe. Where are you seeing this competition? Is it the Chinese entirely, or do you see increasing competition from your fellow European peers as well? Yeah. Those are my two questions.
Okay, Pushkar. Thanks very much. Yes, in the pricing bucket, so I confirm what I said, it was offsetting the FX negative internationally, but obviously partly impacted by the highly competitive situation in Europe. Yes, you're right. In there, you would see, in that bucket, you'd see both what we call MSRP, the sticker price increase, but also any incentives. The two are shown in the same bucket. When we talked about our outlook for 2026, we didn't have high expectations for a positive pricing environment in Europe. We knew it was going to be competitive, and competitive I can confirm. In terms of calling out competition, is it just Chinese? Is it other generalist market? I'd say it's broadly across the whole market.
You mentioned Dacia. Dacia is 77% retail-focused. It's very much we're not going to go spreading the volumes across other channels. It's very much focused on that segment alone, and it's not a discounting model. Obviously, you have colleagues with us this morning. We have our Chief Growth Officer, Fabrice. I don't know if you want to say anything. Obviously, everyone always asks us which competitor is the worst in pricing, and we never really comment. If you want to add anything.
Hello, I think we are following that month after month. Of course, in Europe, we are looking at the increase of the commercial pressure, mainly represented by higher discounts from many of our competitors. From our side, we have a lot of factors which enable you to remain quite stable and to protect our residual value. The first one is the appeal of the product. You saw the picture of our new product. We are working in a very traditional segment for us, A, B, and C. On these segments, we are capable to propose, like Clio 6, products which are very attractive and which enable us not to do discount and not to go on tactical channels.
We are monitoring that month after month, and I can tell you that we are very stable and far below average in terms of discount. The second point, which is beneficial for us now is our powertrain offer, because we can offer now for Dacia and for Renault full hybrid with very low consumption. We've also a lot of attractiveness, for instance, with the 4x4 LPG automatic transmission for Sandero, for instance or Duster or Bigster, which are very important, very appealing in terms of product. The last point, of course, is today's circumstances where people now, before they were hesitating between different powertrain, now they want to go to EV, of course, in Europe.
This lack of hesitation and this kind of determination to go to new, to shift to EV, of course, is helping us a lot to manage our price at the good level. Not only of new car prices, but also the used car prices in terms of EV now are well-oriented, and that's a good point for us. We have three factors, and we use that to keep the safest possible in terms of residual value and net pricing.
Thank you, Fabrice. Thank you, Pushkar. We'll jump to the next question, which will come from Horst Schneider from Bank of America. Horst, the floor is yours.
Yes, good morning. Hope you can hear me.
Good morning.
Yes, very well.
That's great. The first question that I have is, when we look at the progression of sales in the Q1, we were seeing this weak January and February at Dacia, and you explained the reasons well, and we understand that. I think March already was a lot better. Therefore, I want to get a feeling what's the run rate going forward? The magnitude of sales growth we have seen in March, is that something we can also expect for Q2? Can you confirm that take this India consolidation maybe aside, that the sales growth is going to be positive in 2026? That's number one. Number two is when we look at the high oil price, you commented that it doesn't impact you yet a lot. I want to get more information, mainly if it's changing already consumer behavior.
We are seeing that your BEV sales are performing well. You said it's slightly dilutive to mix, we know that. What is it going forward? Is now from here BEV demand to accelerate a lot more? Could that basically have then a more negative impact on the earnings in 2026? Thank you.
Okay, Horst, thanks for the questions. In terms of sales, yes, you said January, February was impacted on the Dacia side. March, we started to see a positive impact compared to last year. We mentioned that the order intake was up double digits. With the strong order book of two months of forward-looking sales, we will see positive sales in Q2. Now, I'm not sure we'll catch up 100% of what we lost out. Let's see, we don't push, so we'll do things in a normal way. We're not going to do any push sales. We'll see how that flows through. I remind you that we said when we published the 2025 results, that we weren't actually counting on Dacia growth this year. It was more steady control of the business model.
Even if we do catch up a bit in Q2, it's not the element that I think will be calling out for a full year sales growth on Dacia alone. Okay? Let's see how things go. However, our sales internationally and on the Renault side is forecasting a sales growth full year. I confirm that that's the outlook as we see it today. On the-
If I can just follow up, that means also group is positive in 2026.
Yes.
Not just the international sales. The group is positive, right?
Yes.
Yes. Keep in mind for the sub-question on the India effect. It will keep supporting the sales to partners, notably until the annualization, which will occur on August 1st, because we started to consolidate the RNAIPL activities on August 1st. This is something you need to keep in mind for your H2 forecasts. Okay?
Okay.
Second question was on the impact of orders. Yep, we are seeing an uptick in the EV mix in terms of order intake in April. It's quite significant. At the same time, we've got Twingo, R5, R4, A290. Is it our product attractiveness, our product portfolio, or some reaction to Middle East crisis, or is it both? Difficult to tell short-term right now. Let's just say it's a confirmation that we have the right product to be able to answer the market demand. Now, I said it was dilutive. Once again, I think we have a very competitive offer in the A and B segments. It's something that contributes in margin per unit. In percentage, it's slightly dilutive. It's not a killer.
Obviously, the drop down to margin in mass, net income in mass, that's what allows us to pay a dividend and generate cash. This is also constructing the business model for the future. We know it's something that's going to happen as time goes on. Yes, there is an acceleration in order intake in April. Let's see how it goes forward. You wanted to follow up?
Duncan, there's not a downtrending, there's more a shift to BEVs, but not that people trade down, let's say, from C to B segment. You don't see that, right?
No.
No.
No. It's really, people are coming in, and as Fabrice said earlier, some people in the past few months may have been hesitating. There was a clear move to-
In Q1, the C and above segment mix progressed year-over-year. This is something that needs factoring. Again, we already mentioned when releasing the full year results, the dilutive effect of the sales to partners and BEVs compared to group level. It doesn't mean that we don't keep progressing. We told you, during futuREady, about the roadmaps to reduce the EV costs. It remains a priority and we will notably introduce the LFP cell-to-pack batteries progressively on all of our cars in 2026.
That's great. Thank you so much. All the best.
What we see also is that the demand now is oriented on B or A segment like Twingo, R5, and that's why we are very focused on retail channel, which is not as under pressure as what we could see on the C segment with fleet, for instance. It means it's not only we don't see any downgrade, but we focus on the most profitable channels, whatever the segment type, which is good.
Again, great performance. Thank you.
Thank you, Horst. We will now take the next question from Stuart Pearson from Oxcap Analytics . Hi, Stuart. Do you hear us? Good.
Yes.
Good morning.
Thank you for taking my question. Morning, everyone. A few just remaining. On the product mix side, I just wonder, you've spoken about EVs and the impact there and the profitability there. On Clio 6, obviously that's a driver for the revenue, but presumably you're adding content to that. Just structurally, is that a much more profitable car than Clio 5 or very similar? Obviously, early in the life cycle it might be more profitable, but just structurally, do you think that's a more profitable product? Just wondering how that product mix might drop through. Then working capital, Duncan, thank you. You mentioned obviously the unwind you expect partially from last year, but I just wonder whether the H1, H2 dynamic this year could be a bit different because of this volume catch-up we're seeing in Q2.
I'm not sure how that will impact your production and obviously receivables, et cetera, in H1. It's normally a negative for you, working capital in H1, of course. I wonder whether that might be slightly less negative than we might have thought because of this catch-up effect. Just very quickly, not sure if you can say anything on the Ford LCV talks, when we might expect any update on that. Anything to report there would be interesting. Thank you.
Hey Stuart, could you just repeat the last one? On Ford. Was it Ford LCV?
The potential tie-up there. Whether there's any potential timeline when we might hear something on that. Thank you.
Okay, I'll take the last one first. It's the easiest one. Nothing new to report. We said we have discussions on the passenger car side of things that are progressing well. We have opportunities to look at LCV going forward, but the product life cycle means that it's further out in the distance. It's not something if it were to happen that is a short-term subject. Okay. On product mix, so Clio 6 to Clio 5, there's not a major difference. Yes, we have equipped the car, but I think it's also the fact the hybrid mix is so high. It's such a competitive offer. Fabrice, I don't know if you want to come back on this, but it's-
No. 89 g of- yeah. I would say with Clio we have a smooth transition, but with a big change. If you take a bigger look at Clio story, four or five years ago, Clio was really a rental car oriented, and now we are mainly retail and hybrid. Of course, when you do this kind of change, you secure a long-term profitability on solid basis. That's what we are doing with the change between Clio 5 and Clio 6 with a very competitive production base. [Foreign language] for us, it allows to have a complementary offer to R5, R4, and to have, once again, this two-leg strategy on the B segment, which is the most important in Europe.
Don't expect too many margin differences. H1, H2, yes, we will catch up a little bit of production on the Dacia side back in Q2. We are running at very high capacity. The upside, that's why we can't just turn the thing back on and catch up within a couple of weeks. The uptick is not that much. Working capital is normally a little bit negative in the first half of the year, so I don't think there'll be any major differences in the H1, H2. We obviously called out that we expect the margin to be stronger in H2 than H1, as it has been traditionally, in terms of seasonality.
Thank you.
Thanks, Stuart. The next question will come from Christian Funke from Goldman Sachs. Christian, do you hear us?
Yes. Can you hear me?
Great. Yes. Very well.
Great. Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for taking my question. The first question, on the positive side, light commercial vehicles, very strong growth, especially in Europe. I'm wondering what the visibility is you have into the rest of the year, and whether we should expect similar growth rates going forwards. Also, any comment you can make on the operating margin of light commercial vehicles, at least vis-à-vis last year, any qualitative comments you can make there. My second question is, maybe at the other end of the spectrum, if we look at Dacia, you sound more muted on the sales recovery potential, even though we saw a strong finish, at least a positive acceleration in the growth trends.
You also have a powertrain shift there in Dacia. I'm wondering what sort of operating margin impact we should expect. Again, just qualitative comments, in H2 for Dacia year-over-year, if you can just talk about that.
Yeah. LCV growth. Obviously, we're off low comparison bases. Last year, we didn't have the full availability of Master. I think that's what you're referring to. You are seeing probably easier comparison bases. But if I move off comparing one quarter to a previous quarter, if you start to look at the order book of sales going forward on LCV, it's actually a little bit stronger than the group average. I say the outlook is positive. Operating margin, as you know, is in the double-digit range. I'm not expecting a huge change this year to last year. It's a slight upside positive. Let's just see. We've got one quarter done, three to go, so solid performance. Production's going smoothly. That's part of the reason why we're seeing the utilization rates above 90%, because Batilly is producing well.
We're also producing for partners on this, so that's a positive as well. More Master in the mix is good, and in terms of product dynamic, we have Trafic E-Tech, which is at the end of the year. That's more of a bonus for next year. In terms of having a full and comprehensive lineup, I think the LCV range is a solid attribute for the group.
Maybe if I can add, just Christian, in terms of run rate, keep in mind, of course, that the comparison base is quite low. In fact, in H1, we were down 29%, 25% on the LCV in Europe. Of course, the comparison is more favorable in this start to the year, and will become less easy, I would say, in H2.
Then your second point, I'd like to personally apologize to Catherine, who's the boss of Dacia. She's here today. I didn't want to be muted in any way in looking at the performance. It was impacted, as you say, in Q1. The order take is double-digit up. Obviously, Dacia has a strong position within that group average of two months of order take. It's not a push model. If we catch up everything in Q2, brilliant. If we don't, we'll keep going at our pace, and we'll deliver in terms of a natural flow to that sales trend. Now, you pointed out, and you're quite right to point out, that we did have a powertrain update.
Euro 6e-bis was rolled out, and that is probably a slight positive in the price because we're pricing or trying to price some of it. It is a cost for us in terms of margin. That was something we called out in 2025 full year results, saying that this is going to impact us as of Q1. That's why you'll see a negative mix impact coming through that in the operating margin line. Once again, I apologize, Catherine. It's not a muted message. The performance is there, and the product's strongly desired by customers. Good job. Keep going.
Thank you. Thanks, everyone.
Just as a reminder, in terms of guidance on the margin, we said that the price mix and enrichment bucket in our margin for full year 2026 will be negative by EUR several hundred million, and notably due to the fact that there is this regulatory weight on the margin, which is difficult to pass through to the customers.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks, Christian.
The next question will come from Thomas Besson. Thomas from Kepler Cheuvreux. Hello, Thomas.
Hello, Florent. Thank you for taking my question. First, I'd like to ask you something about the trends for orders in April. I understand Q1 orders are up on the base. That was really easy, for instance, for LCVs. You mentioned the positive trends for BEVs in April, but can you comment about what you expect in terms of development for the European market in places that are directly impacted by higher oil prices, whether it's Europe or India? Well, you think we are going to see the same sustained momentum. I find it great that the orders go up from the end of December to the end of March.
Do you expect that momentum to continue in Q2, or do you expect the momentum to, at some point, reflect the change in the environment, which I think is visible for everyone? That's the first question. The second, I wanted to make sure I understood. It seems to me that, Florent, you said the C segment share is growing up. I had the impression it was down to about one-third versus about 40% last year. Just wanted to make sure about that and whether it was possibly linked with delayed shipment of Bigster and Duster that are a bit down in Q1, possibly because of the Gibraltar stuff. You mentioned the weather conditions. Just want to clarify these points.
I would like you to also maybe confirm whether there is any friction or none at all between Duster and Bigster, please. Thank you.
Hey, Thomas. Thank you for the questions. We're getting questions on a shorter and shorter time horizon. Q1 order take was strong. April order take, we had mentioned that the EV mix was certainly rising. April order take continues to be strong. Not seen anything slow down compared to what we're talking about at the stop date of March 31st. Seeing the same trend with an acceleration in the pickup of EV mix. You said, do we expect that to continue throughout the whole year? No.
I think we said certainly we don't see any impacts of the Middle East situation as we have right now, but we have to see that going forward, which is why we're trying to be prudent in terms of the decisions that we have in our hands on managing fixed costs, managing variable costs, and we will adjust production to any change in demand. Obviously, I think we have a very flexible system. We do monitor it, as Fabrice has also called out. Mix changes all the time, make sure we're playing in the right channel. Prudent at this stage, nothing seen short term, strong continuation in April, but obviously at some point the economy could be impacted.
Bigster versus Duster was impacted because, I'll hand over to Catherine, as long as she's forgiven me for my muted answer to a previous question. The close of the straits was actually impacting us shipping parts from Morocco to Romania. Maybe you want to comment on cannibalization between Duster and Bigster, Catherine.
Yeah. Thank you very much for that question also. We have assumed when we were deciding on the Bigster that there would be somehow a cannibalization. We see now the first results of customer surveys from last year, and we see it's far less cannibalization than we have assumed. Both products are very well positioned to find different customers, are in different segments, have different price points, and therefore it's a very great asset to be with the Bigster in the C segment. We have a very good cohabitation of those both models.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thomas, I take the point on the C and above, and I'll come back to you on this. We will check the data, of course.
Thank you, Florent.
Good. Our next and final question will come from [Tobias Beith] from Redburn . Hi, Tobias . Can you hear us?
I can. Hi. Thanks.
Yes. Hi.
Thanks all for your time. It seems that the composition of volumes was quite decent in the Q1. My question is this, how much upside is there to MFS' average ticket size and yield on its assets over the next 12 months?
Hi, [ Tobias] . Volumes in the Q1 to average ticket price uptick. As you can see, once again, MFS is a portfolio business. We're looking at the average of the portfolio and the impact of that. I think it will continue to show a positive trend. Mix is increasing, obviously, as you read on the auto side in terms of EUR per unit. You can see that in the product mix. Yeah, continuing positive trend. I wouldn't necessarily book 13% every single quarter, but we've seen that trend build last year and expect it to be a strong contribution this year and going forward. Because in futuREady, we did call out mid-single digit revenue growth, but coming from both auto and MFS.
Okay. The EBIT in the Q1 isn't some sort of exceptional result, is kind of where I'm getting to.
Sorry. I thought, so if your average ticket price in the Q1, if you're talking about what's in the auto, because obviously, once again, MFS is a portfolio business. The portfolio is growing year-on-year. It's not an exceptional thing, no.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, Toby. With this, we will close our today's call. Thanks a lot for your time and your attention. The team remain available, of course, if you have any follow-up questions, and speak soon. Thank you. Have a good day.