Is now being recorded.
Together with Guillaume, I am happy to present to you our first half results and an update on the outlook and strategy. I will start, as usual, with the main highlights. Guillaume will take you into our first half results, then I will come back on outlook and strategy. In terms of the main highlights, with a very strong finish to the half, we are delivering a good first half, especially with the 4.9% internal growth, which is a very good level. We sell at EUR 20.8 billion. The actual growth is 1.9%, Guillaume will go into it, mostly because of the big exchange impact. Operating profit is up 0.03% at the actual level, and plus 1.7% like-for-like.
We had a good growth in our recurring net income, 6.8%, with an even higher growth in terms of the net recurring net income per share with the reduction of the share count that took place in the first half. As expected, our net income is very significantly up, mostly thanks to a very large gain we made on the Sika transaction, which this gain being higher than I initially indicated. The debt with the investments we are doing in Sika and the acquisitions is growing but stays at a very reasonable level. These are the main figures, and they are linked with growth in all our geographies. I think we benefit from a good environment. Saint-Gobain is doing well in this environment. In Western Europe, after a difficult weather-related first quarter.
It is not that the weather was particularly bad, but we had two years in a row without any winter, so that impacted the first quarter and even April in a number of geographies. We had a good second quarter, and especially good May and June, whether it is in France, I would say despite May, which was heavily impacted by an unusual low number of days, and in the other European countries, a good return, I would say, to the normal trend that we had seen in the other quarters in 2017. North America, very strong momentum throughout the quarter, both in our industrial markets and in the construction businesses. We have posted very solid growth in the United States. Everywhere else, I would say we have had good trends with an acceleration in the second quarter, despite the strike we had in May, which impacted Brazil.
Brazil, despite that, had a good growth. I was expecting an even stronger growth, we have had a good growth in Latin America. The main highlights for this in terms of events and actions in the first half. First, as we explained in May, we have done a good transaction on the Sika situation, we have acquired 10.75% on Sika, which allows us to also post a good impact on the net income. Guillaume will come back to that. We have continued stepped up our acquisitions program, small, medium-term acquisition, with 13 acquisitions in the first half, three which are finalized in July. Our CapEx are focused on growth in emerging countries, on our productivity, as we explained before, a step up in the digitalization of our factories and productivity in all geographies.
We are on track on our cost-saving programs announced and revised last year, EUR 150 million in the first half, we have had active buyback policy in the first half, where we have acquired more shares than what we've done on the total last year in 2017. Now I'll give the floor to Guillaume, who'll go a bit more into detail.
Thank you, Pierre-André, good morning. As was just mentioned, the internal growth figure for the first half is at 4.9%. The actual sales evolution is lower at +1.9%. This is mostly due to the exchange rate effect, which is lower in magnitude than in Q1, where it was -4.7%, still substantially adverse at -4.4% in H1. The trend, however, is positive as we finish the semester with less than 3% exchange rate for the month of June. This negative effect was partially offset by the structural effect, which represents the positive consequences of our active acquisition policy. Which led us to buy 28 companies in 2017, as Pierre-André just mentioned, 13 companies more in H1 2018. I will let Pierre-André give more details about those during the strategic part of the presentation. The organic growth is almost perfectly balanced between price and volume.
Price is a satisfaction for us as we are able to post an accelerating performance during the first half, with 3% price in Q2, despite the comparison basis in 2017 becoming more difficult. Most of our markets are now accepting the fact that inflation has come back, even if obviously, the situation is different from country to country, from market to market. For example, in the same country, you can have both an excellent performance in one business, a more difficult situation in another. That has been the case, for example, in the U.S., between Interior Solutions on one hand, where we had a very good price effect, roofing on the other hand, at the beginning of the year.
Good figure on the pricing side, and this was an absolute must as we continue to see our cost of raw materials, energy, and transportation climb in parallel. Our latest expectation for the year is that the amount of cost increases we'll have to offset is in the EUR 500 million ballpark. Transportation particularly exploded in several countries, which usually plays in our favor in the long run, as we have a dense network, but forces us short-term to pass these surcharges to the market. Volume increased by 2.4% in H1 with an acceleration to 5% in Q2, driven by every sector and every geographical area. I'll come back in more details to this good performance, even though you remember that here, the comparison basis was easy because of the cyberattack last year, which cost us around 1% for the first half.
That being said, even if you restate from this, the growth remains very solid. As usual, here is a long-term perspective of our organic growth, where you can clearly see what I was talking about on the previous slide. Acceleration of pricing, record growth performance in Q2, weather impact in Q1, cyberattack in Q2 last year. One word maybe on working days to remind you that they weighed on Q1 2018 by around -2% and positively impacted Q2 by around 1%, with differences by country, however. The second half of 2018 should see a slightly positive impact from working days overall, with Q3 stable and an impact of around +1% in the fourth quarter. Operating income. As Pierre-André mentioned, the good growth overall translating to growth of operating profit, but with a subpar leverage, as you can see that the operating profit like-for-like growth is +1.7%.
This is not a surprise, as we had mentioned it in June, clearly, our performance was negatively impacted by several one-off events. For example, bad weather in Q1 followed by an acceleration of volumes in Q2 created an irregular load pattern which impacted our efficiency. Also, as we mentioned in the past, we also experienced industrial headwinds in several plants in the glass sector. Overall, our margin remains very close to last year's level, but we would have done much better if not for those factors. One word of updates, maybe on those one-off issues, to say that most of them are behind us, like the Romanian float glass repair or the Brazilian truck driver strike, or clearly the Q1 weather.
Some of them will last into Q3 but not Q4, like the Egyptian or the Polish floats, which are going through a longer repair process than the Romanian float and will both restart in September. The lines below the operating profit line deserve also some explanation. The non-operating costs are decreasing sharply, going from -EUR 166 million last year to -EUR 54 this year. This is due to the Sika transaction, a part of which is positively impacting the other expenses line. To the opposite, we accelerated the restructuring of our pipes business in Europe and in China, where we stopped one of our two plants, which led us to book charges both on the other expenses line and an impairment on the global pipes activity three lines below. In fact, excluding the exceptionals of Sika and Pipe, non-operating costs decreased year-on-year.
On the asbestos side, we charged EUR 45 million to the provision like last year. All the figures are in line with historical trends and even slightly positive if you look at H1, so not much to say here. The evolution is according to expectations. Going beyond the business income line in the P&L, the most important event remains Sika. There are two important things to mention here. First of all, as we mentioned in May, the way we account for it is to freeze the gain in P&L at day one, which means that this is the last time you will hear about it in the P&L apart from future dividends. Future variations of the Sika share price will impact directly equity Be it positive or negative, as well as a sale, partial or total, if we were one day to decide to sell our shares.
This is one important point to remember. The second point has to do with the way we account for the Sika transaction in our P&L, and we do that on two lines. One, that you already saw on the non-operating line for EUR 180 million, and a financial gain that you can see here of EUR 601 million. This is due to the fact that we separate the transaction in two parts. One is the pure execution of the initial contract with SWH, which triggers a financial gain based on the Sika share price on May 11th. The other one is what we gain in excess of that, which is the EUR 180 million, which is treated more or less as a result of a litigation on the other expenses line. I hope this is clear.
This makes the P&L a little bit more difficult than usual to read, but worth the effort, as the total impact is EUR 781 million. Significantly more than the EUR 600 million order of magnitude that we had given in May. The rest of the finance costs are down compared to last year as we continue to replace expensive debt by cheap debt. We benefit also from an improvement in financing costs for pensions, thanks to the contributions to the pension fund that we have done in recent years. Taxes are also down in rate as well as in absolute value.
In the end, as a result of all of that is a jump in net profit of 61.7% and a progression of 6.8% in recurring net profit, and substantially bigger figures when looked at on a per share basis as we were very active, as Pierre-André mentioned, buying back shares during this half. This graph on cash flow generation deserves also additional comments. As you can see, cash flow generation is broadly stable. As we mentioned at the beginning of the year, we continue to implement an ambitious CapEx plan, focusing especially on emerging markets, logistics and digital. Add to that the fact that our investment program this year is more front-end loaded than usual, and it explains why the CapEx figure is 31% above last year.
As a reminder, our criteria for all of those projects is to have quick payback and an internal rate of return north of 20%. A second reminder, for the full year, the objective announced in February remains valid at EUR 1.7 billion CapEx for the group. Working capital remains at a good level at 40 days. This level is very slightly less good than what we had last June. I wouldn't read too much into that, as you remember that last year, the half year viewpoint was right in the middle of the cyberattack, which had both accounting consequences and physical consequences, like the fact that we weren't able to pay suppliers for good reasons. We are measuring working capital after a very active month of June 2018, which is never favorable.
Overall, we are able to maintain our working capital under control at an historically excellent level. As far as other financial transactions, I mentioned Sika at length. I will just remark that the economic value of the 10.75% that we own represents almost exactly the double of what we have bought it for, which we are, from the financial perspective, very satisfied with, obviously. We continue to be very active in acquisitions with EUR 356 million spent, which is 162% up compared to last year. Pierre-André will develop that more in the strategic part, but let me just mention here again our financial threshold that are very important for us, which is to make sure that we know in our business plans how to get above the WACC of the group after three years maximum.
Finally, we spent EUR 389 million in share buybacks, which means substantially more than usual, in line with our goal of reducing the share count. In fact, the number of shares went down materially in one year from 554 to 547 million shares. Finally, let's look at the debt and equity evolutions. On the debt side, you can see that our debt increased from the same date last year by EUR 2.5 billion. In those 12 months, we spent EUR 1.8 billion in acquisitions, including Sika, EUR 1.7 billion in CapEx, and EUR 1.3 billion was returned to the shareholders in dividends or share buyback. That is EUR 4.8 billion in total spent, and we generated EUR 2.2 billion in cash. To give you a comparison point, if I do the same analysis between June 2016 and June 2017, we had spent EUR 0.4 in acquisitions, EUR 1.4 in CapEx, and EUR 0.9 returned to the shareholders.
EUR 2.7 billion in total compared to EUR 4.8 during this last 12 months. Overall, more acquisitions in line with our strategy, more CapEx as we flagged at the beginning of the year, with also H1, H2 timing effect that I talked about, and more return to shareholders. Our debt ratios remain very solid, you see that we are now closer to a range in terms of ratios we feel is a range where we should more or less stay for the future. Let me get into some more details business by business, starting with Innovative Materials. Innovative Materials had a good first half, even though it would have been much stronger without the industrial one-offs that we experienced in glass.
Nevertheless, very solid growth with 4.2% volumes accelerated between Q1 and Q2 at 5.5% in Q2, and a price effect accelerating also between the two quarters from 0.6% to 2.9%. What is interesting is that all regions contributed nicely to this volume in Q2, North America, Western Europe, Asia, and emerging countries. Innovative Materials is where you see the biggest variation in CapEx compared to last year, H1, EUR 241 million compared to EUR 161 last year. This has to do mostly with the timing of large CapEx in glass, both like the refurbishing of our plants in Poland and in Romania or the growth CapEx in automotive glass. I now turn to each of the two businesses which are part of Innovative Materials, to give you more details.
Flat Glass had a very mixed first half with a combination of, on one hand, good underlying markets and on the other hand, several one-offs operational headwinds. Organic sales were up 3.5%. Pricing was up 2.2% for the half, accelerating to 3.1% in Q2, driven by transformed glass in Europe and automotive glass. We saw good trends in automotive glass, especially in Asia and emerging countries. As discussed at Q1, the fact that we are also in the process of ramping up our industrial capability to follow the market demand for high-end solutions is temporarily putting pressure on our margins. In construction, we saw good trends overall everywhere. We were penalized, as I mentioned, by several negative industrial effects, which I'll take a moment to detail to you. At the end of April, our Egyptian float plant was hit by the serious floods which impacted the region.
We have therefore been unable to produce from the floods since then, as it is under repair until the end of Q3. You will also remember that on our Q1 results call, we discussed our need for an accelerated repair schedule in our float glass plant in Europe due to heavy use, resulting in two plants being under repair during the first half. Together with the Egyptian float, this meant that 3 out of our 30 float plants globally were impacted in the first half in a tight supply environment. The combination of these temporary issues weighed on our operating profit margin, as you can see on the graph, which contracted to 8% from 9.9% in the first half of last year. Many of those issues that I talked about are behind us. A vast majority should be solved during Q3.
High Performance Materials had a really excellent first half, with sales up 9.2%, driven by all regions, with a strong growth in Asia and emerging markets, the U.S., and in Western Europe. Pricing rose 1.3%. We are benefiting, first of all, from excellent industrial market throughout the world, be it on the investment side for refractories, on the consumable side for abrasives, or on the technological side for plastics. We are also seeing the success of our strategy based on tailored co-innovation, which is a concept which is gaining more and more traction. All of our HPM businesses grew over the first half, particularly ceramics with exceptionally strong refractories sales as we started to see in the second half of last year already. The operating margin grew significantly by 230 basis points to 17.3%, a record level benefiting from the strong volume growth and demonstrating also strong leverage.
Turning now to Construction Products, where we saw 6.8% organic growth. Operating income decreased slightly to EUR 560 million, and the operating margin tightened to 8.6%, impacted by Exterior Solutions. We spent EUR 195 million on CapEx over the six months, including on plasterboard plants in India and Vietnam. Interior Solutions grew 7.1% over the half year with an acceleration in pricing during the half to achieve a price effect of 4.4% for the second quarter and 4.1% for the six months, against a still inflationary backdrop for raw materials and energy. Western Europe regained a good rhythm in the second quarter after the tough Q1 impacted by the harsh winter weather. North America continued to trend well, both in price and in volume. Asia and emerging markets continued to grow strongly.
The operating margin remained stable at 9.9%, held back by the tough first quarter given the harsh winter weather and the continuation of the transition towards natural gypsum and away from synthetic gypsum, which is a by-product from coal plant and which is resulting in some additional costs across the industry, as we talked about last year. This was mitigated, however, by a positive spread for the first half in terms of price versus raw materials and energy costs for this sector. Exterior Solutions delivered organic growth of 6.6% in the first half, with pricing up 2.8%. Exterior products in the U.S. showed a strong increase in volumes, helped by the easier comparison base in the second quarter. After remaining stable in the first quarter, we were able to achieve increased prices at the end of the first half against the backdrop of increased inflation for asphalt and transportation.
In pipe, we succeeded in increasing prices, but volumes remained negative overall. Given the difficult profitability environment, we are continuing the restructuring of our European and Chinese factories. Mortars saw a good rebound in the second quarter, particularly in Europe, which saw a tough start to the year given the harsh winter weather, resulting in solid growth over the half. Asia and emerging markets continue to benefit from strong growth overall, despite the truck driver strike at the end of May in Brazil. The margin for Exterior Solutions overall contracted to 7% from 8.4%, impacted by the lag between pricing and raw materials and energy cost inflation in exterior products in the U.S., despite the improvement at the end of the six months. Moving to Building Distribution.
Building Distribution saw organic growth of 3.1%, driven by the rebound in the second quarter of plus 6.7%, which was partly supported by the positive working day impact and also the easier comparison basis, given the cyber attack last June. The start of the year was impacted by the harsh weather in Europe. We saw a return to good trends in the second quarter. Pricing was up 2.3% for the first half. France continued its recovery, driven by growth in both new construction and renovation. The Nordics regained dynamic growth trends in the second quarter, both in Norway and Sweden. The U.K. improved with a strong price effect and less volume erosion, which we think was probably linked to a partial catch-up effect following the poor weather at the beginning of the year. Germany grew slightly after a difficult first quarter given the harsh weather. Brazil remained weak.
The margin of Building Distribution remained stable compared to last year at 2.7%. On one hand, we benefited from good rebounding trends in Q2 after the difficult Q1, which is a clear positive, but the volatility in demand between Q1 and Q2 created inefficiencies which weighed on the overall margin. Also, we were impacted, as planned, by the operating profit effects of our accelerated investment plan in digital. Distribution mirrors the group in the overall story, a slow Q1 and a very encouraging Q2. Let's now look at the trends by region, where we saw organic growth in all four regions over the period. France grew 3.1% like-for-like in the first half, benefiting from a return to good trends in the second quarter in both the new construction and renovation markets after the tough start to the year, given the harsh weather conditions.
In the rest of Western Europe, we saw similar rebounds to good trends in the second quarter after a tough Q1, supported by the easier comparison base in Q2 given last June's cyber attack, to end the first half up 3.6% on a like-for-like basis. We saw a good rhythm of growth in the Nordics in all four countries. In the U.K., we grew slightly overall with a strong price impact, but a smaller decrease in Q2 in volumes. The environment still remains uncertain, though, in the U.K. Lastly, Germany saw slight growth. North America saw strong growth overall with sales up 9.5% like-for-like for the first half. The United States are clearly on an excellent momentum, and what is comforting is that this growth is very homogeneously spread on the two main engines of our business there, construction and industry, with all industrial businesses contributing.
Finally, Asia and emerging countries had another good half with sales up 8.2%, including an acceleration to 9.7% in the second quarter. Latin America progressed strongly in all the main countries, even including Brazil, despite the impact of the truck driver strike in May. Asia benefited from the good dynamics in India, and Eastern Europe performed well, supported by Poland. In terms of operating income by region, the operating margin in France widened to 3.3% from 2.5% in the first half of 2017, boosted by a few exceptional effects and with underlying trends positive in all businesses. In the rest of Western Europe, however, the margin contracted to 5.4% from 6% in the first half of 2017, impacted by the harsh winter weather conditions at the start of the year.
North America saw margins tighten to 11.1% against 11.8% in the first half of 2017, with the price increase achieved in exterior products in the U.S. lagging the increase in raw materials and energy costs, as I mentioned. Lastly, Asia and emerging countries saw their margin increase slightly to 10.8% from 10.7% in the first half of 2017. We finish with EBITDA and CapEx by region. Just to remark that this slide shows how we continue to focus CapEx investments in the most attractive markets and regions with a very clear emphasis on Asia and emerging markets. I will now pass over to Pierre-André, who will outline our strategic acceleration and the outlook for the rest of the year.
Thank you, Guillaume. Let me start with the outlook for the rest of the year. In terms of the economic climate, I think that after the first quarter, we return to good conditions and our underlying markets have been good in the second quarter, and I expect them to remain very solid overall for the rest of the year. I think in France, we are continuing to enjoy good economic activity in our construction market, both in new construction for the rest of the year and also on renovation. In other European countries, we expect all regions, I would say, to stay dynamic, whether it is the Nordics, Southern Europe will continue to be very good. Germany is continuing to grow, probably a bit better in the second half than the first half.
U.K. remains uncertain given the political situation, which is starting to have an impact progressively. Growth in North America should stay extremely solid in the second half, whether it is on the industrial markets or the construction market. We expect good momentum to continue in Asia and emerging countries. Overall, good economic conditions for Saint-Gobain in the second half of the year. In this context, we expect continued growth and good margin levels in Innovative Materials, with clearly an improvement in terms of margins in Flat Glass. Construction Products should have a good volume and pricing with a catch-up in our U.S. businesses where we have been lacking, but where the pricing is gathering momentum in Exterior Solutions. We are focusing on this price-cost spread. Building Distribution should benefit from what I mentioned in terms of the overall economic climate in Europe.
In these frameworks, our priorities for the second half remain very much consistent with the one we had for the first half. A focus on sales prices. I think that you have seen that there is a good momentum there, but it is absolutely key for us to continue because costs, especially in the energy side, have not gone in the last quarter in a good direction, more pressure on cost, but I think we are succeeding in our price increase. We will continue our cost-cutting program, with targeting savings for this year overall compared to the cost base of last year of around EUR 300 million. I think we are on track with that. Our CapEx program is as mentioned at the beginning of the year.
We have had this year, for reasons that Guillaume mentioned, a bigger part in the first half, but the second half should be in line with what we targeted at the beginning of the year. Same focus in terms of where we are putting our CapEx. An ongoing commitment to invest in R&D, which is helping our differentiation strategy with more high value-added products. A focus on cash flow generation in the second half from that standpoint will be better than the first half. In these frameworks, we clearly confirm our objectives for the full year, which is to increase our like-for-like operating income. I expect for the second half that this increase will be clearly above the level achieved in the first half. This is for the outlook for the second half.
I would like to talk a little bit also on our strategy. As you have seen, the first half was quite busy with the Sika transaction and with the step-up in our small acquisition strategy. I would like to step back and tell you where we are in line with that we explained at the Investor Day one year ago. At the last general shareholders meeting, I focused on one priority for the coming years, which is to increase significantly the agility of the group. I would like to talk about that a little bit more and explain what I mean in three areas. First, in terms of divestments, in terms of acquisitions, and in terms also of our organizational agility. Divestment is a topic where you will see an acceleration in the next two years.
We flagged that at our Investor Day one year ago. We are going in the next 18 months to divest at least EUR 3 billion in terms of sales of businesses before the end of 2018. I expect a positive impact of these divestments to be relative, to be around 40 basis points on our operating margins. You will want more details on that, and you know I am not going to give you more details as we consider that it is important for the good execution. I can remind you what our criteria when we look at the businesses from that standpoint. First, are the prospects good in itself for this business? Second, are the synergies, and this can vary in the long run, important enough with the group? Third, is it a good timing?
The reason why we are going to accelerate is because we think that compared to what we said one year ago, the time is right now to execute more. We will hear more about that when we do the announcement. The goal will be, of course, to have a more coherent and value-creative portfolio of activities within Saint-Gobain. Second point, which is our acquisition strategy. Let me first say that I am quite happy about what we have done in the last few years, where you see on the graph on the left that we have sped up our acquisition strategy. First half is again significant and in line with this acceleration. I am quite happy about the result of that strategy.
You see on the right what has been the kind of multiples we have acquired those business for, less than eight in terms of EBITDA multiple before synergies, and less than six after synergies. We are on track on that. We measure that, we are very disciplined on that, and we see that progressively on an impact of these acquisitions on our P&L. Three priorities, which have been quite consistent in the last few years, and we will continue in that direction. Either bolt-on acquisitions, where clearly the model is to get cost synergies relatively quickly to consolidate our positions. Enter into new geographies, which has helped the group to jump-start in that geography and give us initial platform. The third idea is adjacent technologies or business model, which complement generally in one geography, our portfolio, and then we can roll that out around the world.
Let me give you three examples in this area of what we have done in the last few months. If I start with niche and additional technologies, a small acquisition in the first half in Flat Glass, which is a company in Italy which is having accessories which are put together with glass, whether it is facades or interior glass. These companies, it's not completely extremely high-tech, but it is very quick on innovation to adjust to market needs. Clearly, when you see that with our Flat Glass, they have very network in Europe. They have strong prospects to increase the rollout of these sales of this product, which have been historically mostly in Italy.
Second example, we acquired early this year KIMMCO, which is the leader of glass wool in Kuwait, and I would say in the Gulf area, which is an area where clearly the growth prospects in terms of insulation are very significant. Third, an acquisition we have done in Norway, in the Nordics, where we have acquired a very strong position in the north of Norway. It's a very good company in itself, but we are also going to benefit from additional cost synergy, mostly combining purchasing with the rest of our activities in Norway. 3 types of acquisition, which have very good and quick return. We plan on average to do around a bit more than EUR 500 million, depending on the opportunities. The pipeline is quite strong at the moment of these acquisitions during the next 2 years.
Third point, which is about our organization. When I talk about organization, I think it's important to start by talking about strategy, which drives the organization. As I have said during the last few years, the orientation towards our customers and our markets. What are the main trends we see from that standpoint? If I take 3 main categories, which are very important for us. First, our industrial large customers, they are generally behaving more and more globally, but at the same time, they require more and more tailored innovation, focused, personalized production. Second, our contractor, which is an important customer. Our contractors, their main, in the next few years, their main objective, whether they know it or not, by the way, is to increase productivity.
I think that our solutions, be it in distribution or be it in manufacturing, are quite important, and we can bring a lot in that direction, where, by the way, the boundaries of our solutions are evolving. Third category, which is not directly our customer, but which is becoming a very important agent for us, is the end user of our product. We sell generally in all our solutions. Saint-Gobain is a B2B company, but the end user, whether it is the homeowner, whether it is the occupant of a large office, or whether it is a car driver, even the end user is becoming extremely important. I think our solutions are based on a combination on comfort and sustainability are clearly very important. We need to take that into account more and more and to use this power of prescription to increase our sales.
Starting from those premises, in line with this need for agility that I expressed at the AGM, I've launched a review of our organization, where the goal is to align more our organizations with these different customer needs. Which means that for construction-related activity, a stronger priority to their regional, their local content, you understand from what I said that the local content is quite important, while maintaining business synergies. Clearly, the digital transformation that we see in our markets, not only internally in Saint-Gobain, is also going to drive some changes in the way we present ourselves to the market. I also have in mind to simplify our decision-making process to increase efficiency, to increase agility, and also to realize some additional savings.
From that standpoint, this review will be undertaken during the next few months, I have in mind to present this new organization structure before the end of the year. The goal, again, flexibility, agility, and proximity to our market and customers. Now I'd like to finish by this slide, which is the one we presented to you at the Investor Day, to try to, after a bit more than one year, look where we are in terms of the main element of our cash allocation policy. In terms of cash generating by operations, we are above the average of the last few years. As the first half was a little bit below because of this timing of CapEx, the second half will be clearly better. On disposal, I just mentioned that we are going to accelerate. CapEx, we are in line also with the plan.
Guillaume talked to you about our return to shareholders policy. Clearly also on acquisition, I explained to you where we are. I think on this plan, we are well advanced in this roadmap, I am quite confident that we are going to deliver with this plan additional value for our customers and for our shareholders. I am very confident about that. This is what we had to present to you today, now with Guillaume, I am at your disposal for any question you may have.
Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please dial zero and one on your telephone keypad.
We'll start with the internet and the room first.
Good morning. Josep Pujal from Kepler Cheuvreux. I have two questions, please. The first one is on your operating figures. Despite seeing a very good Q2, volumes are up 4.9%, if I recall.
No, not volume, internal growth.
Yeah. Q2.
Sorry, Josep. Yes. Sorry.
Volumes are good in Q2. Despite that, operating profit on a like-for-like basis is only up 2% for the first half. Could you help us to better understand the impact of the one-offs you have mentioned, but we would appreciate very much some figures or ranges about that. What is the impact of Brazil, of Egypt, and weather, I don't know if you can measure weather, but I guess that you could give some indications about what was the profitability of the Q2 versus Q1. I don't know if this would be a way to look at that. My second question is on this reorganization.
Just to understand, when you talk about giving more power to the, I would say, region, I translate it this way, are we talking about transferring competencies from the headquarters to the regions, or are we talking about adding a new layer at the regional level? Thank you.
Guillaume will answer the first one, I will answer the second one.
I will answer the first one. I understand the question about the impact of the one-offs. You know that measuring, as you said in your question, in fact, measuring the impact of the one-offs, especially when it comes to lost sales, especially, for example, for the weather impact, is extremely difficult. We try to do that, but we have no precise figures. What I can tell you is that you remember that last year, we had a negative impact in operating profit due to the cyber attack. It's very clear that the one-off impact in H1 for us was substantially greater than this year. I won't go much beyond that, but that's what we are talking about in terms of order of magnitude.
In terms of Q2, as Pierre-André mentioned, I don't think we'll give figures in terms of profitability, but as Pierre-André mentioned, the trends are going in the right direction, both in terms of growth, especially in the last two months of Q2. In terms of price cost spread, which is improving as Q2 progressed. We are exiting H1 with a good momentum.
Concerning the second question, I will repeat the objectives of this organization, which is to be aligned more with the customers, to increase agility and speed and efficiency. Clearly, I'll expect from that to reduce cost overall. I'm not going to give you more detail at this stage. I'm launching this review. I'm going to study and work with my team during the next few months. I will present that in more detail when it is ready by the end of the year. Of course, it's not to add a new layer.
[Foreign language] Bonjour. I have two questions, more strategic. First, the main concern for investors today, and also the main challenge for Saint-Gobain, is to improve return on the capital employed of the Building Distribution, which is a bit disappointing. Can we assume a quick improvement of this number in the coming years? Secondly, you mentioned the logistic issue. Can we have more flavor on the logistic improvement in progress? Many thanks.
Okay. Well, the return on capital of distribution is slightly below the average of the group, as you know, there is a much lower capital intensity of distribution. With a slight improvement, you have a much bigger improvement in return on capital. I don't think that the fact that it is a bit lower of the group at the moment is mostly linked with the fact that the European situation is still in a recovery mode. I am not very concerned about that. Now, the improvement in the margin in distribution, which are going to drive the improvement in the return of capital, are linked with, first, volume recovery. We had, which was minor in the first half, and mostly because of a bad Q1.
It's clear that when you have high volatility in the demand with a very bad March, and so bad first half of April, and then you have a much better end, you cannot take the volume of the two parts at the same time, because we don't decrease the fixed cost as quickly when there is a drop in the sales in March. That means that we then cannot average the first two quarters and then say the leverage is not good enough. That's the first point on the short term. That's why I expect an improvement going from where we are today. Now, on your question on logistics, I think that we are quite well advanced in logistics.
The investments which are in the middle at the moment and not finished are more due to our IT transformation, that there are some significant CapEx at the level of the group. We are on a low asset capital business, but for distribution, they are significant. These CapEx have also an impact on the OpEx. I think we are now at a peak about this impact. They will continue for around, I would say, 18 months, where we are going to have still a significant OpEx linked with this IT transformation progressively, then this will reduce. This is weighing compared to the past on the margin at the moment, we think that this investment is very important. At the moment, it's more IT than logistics, where I think on logistics, our plan has been already significantly implemented.
There will be more investment, I think that's not what's weighing on the margin. Next question. We are going to the floor for Paul Roger, I understand.
The next question comes from Paul Roger, Exane BNP Paribas. Sir, please go ahead.
Hi. Good morning, gentlemen. Congratulations on the results. Just three questions from me. I think firstly, can you say a bit more about the timing of your decision to accelerate divestments? Is that just about your view on market conditions or maybe you're reacting to feedback from some stakeholders, for example? The second question is on High Performance Materials and to what extent the margin benefited in the first half from a positive mix effect, and where you see a more normalized margin going forward. The third question is on the balance sheet. What do you think is the right level of leverage for Saint-Gobain? Given the group is deleveraging very quickly, should we maybe expect even bigger buybacks in the future? Thank you.
In terms of the timing of decision, yes, clearly the market conditions are a bit better. When I'm talking about timing, it's both our internal timing in terms of the situation of the various companies that where we have identified. If I take my three criteria, I remind the three criteria. Is it a business which has a good prospect as a standalone business? Are the synergies and the link with Saint-Gobain strong enough? Historically, that may vary over a long period of time. I reminded you that when we dispose of Verallia, the main driver for me that the very important synergies which existed historically, which were linked with the fact that we have the same, I would say, very similar furnaces, was becoming less important versus what I consider are the market synergies. That was, for me, the main criteria.
I would say that the evolution of the synergies of the businesses of Saint-Gobain, one with another one, is not necessarily constant, if I take a long-term perspective. This is the second criteria, our assessment of this going forward. The third criteria, which is one where we have made an assessment on the first two, then is the timing. Timing is linked clearly with the situation of the various companies internally and second also to market conditions. That's the combination of those two, which leads us at the moment to consider that it's good time to accelerate. Of course, Paul, we always listen to our investors. A number of them have made the same assessment from outside as the one I am making from the inside. Second question, which is HPM margin.
Well, HPM margin, I have had these questions regularly for the last two years because they have been going in the right direction, and we say it's a record. We are generally cautious about a record, whether we are going to be able to maintain that level. I would say that the level we have had in the first half, I will make the same answer. I would say the level we have had in the first half is very good, very significant. There was a very good mix with some very strong high margin, good volumes in some of our businesses. I cannot promise that we will stay at this level, but I think we will continue to have good margin in HPM in the second half.
What I can say is that I expect the margins for Innovative Materials to be in the second half above where they have been in the first half. In terms of the right level, you want to answer, Pierre?
Yeah, on balance sheet. You've seen the figures. We have increased net debt because mostly of the acquisition of Sika, but not only by EUR 2.5 billion during the last 12 months. Overall, our net debt on EBITDA ratio is now at 2.2, which if I restate that to the beginning of the year, is around two, I guess. This is a level where we are comfortable with, which is consistent with our rating. You know that we look at our leverage and our balance sheet situation based on the rating situation we are in. We estimate that it's right where we want to be in the sense that it gives us room for maneuver in terms of following our ambitious strategy. It's not too aggressive from this point of view. In terms of share buybacks, can we expect more in the future?
I will restate what we have always said in terms of long-term objective, which is to say that we want to get back to 530 million shares. We have progressed in the last 12 months in this direction materially, you have seen that we are serious about this objective. We will continue to do that, but at a timing which we will decide.
Next question.
Thank you. The next question comes from Elodie Rall, JPMorgan. Madam, please go ahead.
Hello. I have three questions, if I may. First of all, can you remind us again on your differences in terms of geographic exposure between you and Owens Corning in the U.S. because there are always material differences between the trends of the two companies. Second, do you see any impact on Saint-Gobain's raw materials exposure and energy from U.S. tariff increases? Third, question on CapEx. They were up quite materially in H1, but given you confirmed your guidance for flat CapEx, can you just confirm that that means H2 CapEx should be down year-on-year? Thank you.
Geographically, Do you want me to answer for roofing? Okay. Geographical exposure of our roofing business. Yes, we have a different geographical exposure compared to Owens Corning. We are much more on the East Coast, and especially we have good market share in the Northeast. Owens Corning is stronger in the center of the country, which in some years is benefiting to Owens Corning. That's what we had said last year. In a storms year, typically, Owens Corning will benefit a little bit more from us from that. In a non-storm year, by comparison, we will probably have a slightly better market than Owens Corning. That's for the first one. The second one was the impact of the U.S. tariffs overall. I will let Pierre answer on this one maybe.
Honestly, on this. Sorry, I don't understand the question. Actually, it was on energy. On the U.S. tariff, first of all, I would say that it's not very easy to know what's going to happen. It seems that it's changing day after day, I think we have to be very cautious on what it means. Second, I would say that, as you know, most of Saint-Gobain activities are local. If I look at what our exports today from Europe to the U.S. or Asia to the U.S., it's less than 2% of Saint-Gobain sales. I don't expect a significant direct impact. We have, in a very small business, we have had an impact already from China, and we have been able to increase our prices, there is no material impact.
I would add that generally for the Saint-Gobain businesses where we have flows between continents, they are generally the most technical, niche, specified businesses where I think we have, and we are really co-developing with the customers. I think that they want to stick with us, and we try to find a way to do it. It's not an issue for Saint-Gobain. Now, if there is a war and a real war, which I don't know, on tariffs at a big scale, this will have macroeconomic impact, which I think will be negative, and Saint-Gobain will not be immune. I would say, compared to most activities, we are very little affected compared to most companies on that topic because of the particularity of our business.
On the third question, which was on CapEx. Already, we have not said that we would keep CapEx flat in 2017. We have said that we would have a level of CapEx of around EUR 1.7 billion. You remember that last year was slightly above EUR 1.5 billion. In the first half, our CapEx level increased by a little bit less than EUR 140 million, which means that the second half would see less increase but should see increase nevertheless, if we maintain things, the direction. Overall, what I said is that our CapEx program, and it was known from the beginning of the year, was front-end loaded, which was also reinforced by the fact that we had to accelerate some repairs. That's not something which changes our plan for the full year.
What is flat is the projection.
Yes, what is flat is the projection, not the CapEx level compared to 2017.
All right, that's very clear. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Arnaud Palliez, ODDO BHF.
Yes. Good morning, gentlemen. Two question for me. Firstly, you have announced some investment at Pont-à-Mousson, beginning of June. Could you elaborate on those investment? I think they were announced by Benoit Bazin. Does that mean that this division is not part of the EUR 3 billion disposal? Second one, you mentioned some impact from your Polish and Egyptian flat glass in Q3. Could you quantify?
I will answer the first question. If the answer is a trial to get me to precise what is our investment program, I will not answer this question. If the question is limited to the CapEx we are doing in pipe and that Benoit announced, I think that there is a need, like in all our businesses, to invest in productivity. As you know, we have a difficult situation with our pipe business in France. We have a plan to restructure this company, which was announced last year, which is progressing well. As part of this plan, we have to reduce our cost significantly. Some of these reductions are requesting some productivity CapEx. That's what I guess Benoit is confirming that, announced at the beginning of June.
The second question was about trying to put a figure behind the impact of the Polish and Egyptian float repairs in Q3. I think Pierre gave quite a precise guidance on what we're expecting in terms of overall operating profit evolution for the second half. I won't get much beyond that, but just to reinstate the fact that most of the industrial issues are behind us, and some of them are lagging into Q3 and should be solved in Q3, those two ones being the biggest ones.
I can go maybe a little bit further to say that the level of profitability of Flat Glass in the second half should be close to what we have had in the last few quarters. That means much close to 10%.
Okay. Thank you. Perhaps, can you quantify the CapEx on the Pont-à-Mousson segment?
Benoit.
What I read in the local newspaper for these plants in France is kind of EUR 20 million-EUR 25 million over 3 years. We are not talking about anything significant. As Pierre said, it's part of the restructuring we announced 18 months ago, which is underway with several hundreds of headcount decrease. It's a cost-saving program, including productivity modernized plans.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question comes from Will Jones, Redburn.
Morning. Thank you. 3 questions as well, if I could, please. The first was just around, given that you've been giving some margin commentary for the second half. Sorry, I'm not sure if I dropped off there. In terms of distribution, Sorry.
Can you start again your question because.
Sorry, yeah. I think my headset dropped off. Apologies. Yes, the first question on Distribution was whether you think the second half margin can improve on the second half of last year. Obviously, the first half was broadly flat. The second was, I guess, still staying in Distribution, but when we look at your cost savings, and it was last year's cost savings, but the slide 42, which breaks out the cost savings from last year, only EUR 10 million were attributed to Distribution. I understand that Industry 4.0 is more about the industrial businesses, but to what extent Why is that such a low share of the savings, and could Distribution share of cost savings increase potentially in the future? The last one was just around disposals. I think you've given us the guidance around what it means for the change in operating margin.
We can back out, but I think it means that you're selling businesses with about a 3% on average underlying operating margin. There aren't many candidates that have got such a low margin. Obviously, it would lead us to think about Distribution. Particularly, I think you've got 10% of that division that's outside of your four main kind of countries and regions. Is it fair to say that Distribution non-core is on the block? I guess probably, again, it comes back to the previous question, but it does look like pipe is a potential one as well there because there can't be many businesses in your group making as low as a 3% margin. I guess, any help there, and does it change your expectation of EUR 1 billion of proceeds, which was the previous way in which you'd communicated your hopes for disposals? Thanks.
On the first question. Guillaume, for the second one.
Yeah.
On the first question on distribution. Yeah, I expect a slight improvement in the margin in distribution in the second half compared to the second half of last year.
Okay.
Concerning the third question, once again, I will not comment on what are the businesses which are part of this program. What I can say is that a program of that size doesn't mean necessarily large businesses. It can be a collection of a number of small businesses. In any business of Saint-Gobain, you have pockets of underperformance. We have always a review of that, and there is no taboo on that. There will be assets in all our different businesses which may be considered for that. I am not going to be more precise.
The second question was about the low share of savings in distribution. You're right to ask the question. There are two reasons for that. One is the fact that we measure much more systematically in industry. We know we have a world-class manufacturing system which measures very systematically the savings that we are doing, which doesn't mean that we are not working in distribution on our cost base. The second thing is that you will see that accelerate anyway because of the efforts of distribution on two sides. First of all is what we mentioned already in terms of investments in logistics and digital, which is increasing both our customer promise but also our productivity. Overall, the ongoing effort on productivity that distribution is pushing very hard. You will probably see that share increase in the cost savings. Yes.
Okay, thank you. Sorry, just returning to the disposals. Would it be fair to say that your efforts still amount to broadly what you perceive to be about EUR 1 billion of proceeds overall?
Oh, yeah. Sorry, I forgot to answer that question.
Yeah.
The timing of the two is not the same. Yes, I can say that the two objectives are maintained, but the timing of the second is shorter than the timing of the first one. I wanted also to signal an acceleration.
Great. Thank you.
I confirm what I said last year. What I am saying this year is that there is an acceleration in terms of time, and second, that there is a focus on low-performing businesses.
Yeah. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Nabil Aboul-Sanad, Barclays. Sir, please go ahead.
Yeah, good morning. Thanks for hosting this call and taking my questions. I actually got three questions as well, if I may. Sorry, Guillaume, I didn't quote exactly everything you said about volume prices in Q2 per segment. Could you please give us the volume and prices impact by subsegment for the second quarter?
Sorry, what's that?
Sorry, do you want me to ask?
Ask your other question.
The second question is, you mentioned now estimating about EUR 500 million raw materials and energy cost inflation. I was wondering, if you take your prices at the end of July and you assume they are flat until the rest of the year, what sort of price impact you'll have in the industrial businesses? How much of that cost inflation would you cover? Do you still need a price increase in the remainder of the year? Is it fair to say that in roofing, in particular, that's where you would need more price action to cover the cost inflation? Finally, just a detail, but you got a positive EUR 4 million in intragroup adjustment in operating income. It's usually a negative number. I was wondering why you got a profit in that line, and what we should expect for the remainder of the year. Thank you.
I guess the three questions are for me. The first one is easy, about volume and price in Q2. I will start with Flat Glass. We had a growth of 6% in Flat Glass in the second quarter, with 2.9% in volume and 3.1% in price. HPM, 11.1% internal growth, with 8.4% in volume and 2.7% in price. In Interior Solutions, we had a growth in the second quarter of 9.7%, with 5.3% in volume and 4.4% in price. Exterior Solutions, 11.2% growth in Q2, with 7.9% volume and 3.3% price. Distribution, 6.7% growth in Q2, with 4.3% volume and 2.4% price. Where do we feel we are in terms of price to cost spread at the end of June? Do we need more price increases?
I think I mentioned during the call that at this stage, broadly, we are offsetting on the industrial side the cost of raw materials, energy, and transportation with the price increases. Which doesn't mean that we should stop there, and in fact, we are quite active in all of our segments, but with particular emphasis on some segments where we have been lagging in terms of price versus cost. One of the main ones is roofing, on which we have announced price increases. We have announced price increases in May, June. We have announced another price increase in August. We are pushing hard. In fact, we finished the first half with a good momentum in terms of pricing.
It doesn't limit to that, because the difficulty is that the analysis cannot be done in static, because we are, for example, seeing continued inflation in transportation, in the price of gas, in the price of fuel, which is pushing us to continue to increase pricing in not only roofing, but also other segments, which we are doing. The third question was very technical about, I guess, the operating profit contribution of the holdings. You're very precise, and you were right to note that usually it's negative, this time it's a positive. This is due to the fact I think I mentioned last year that one area on which we are working is to optimize the cost of pensions, especially in the U.S. We had done so last year.
We have continued to do so in the first half of the year, which has resulted in additional profit, which has gone to the holdings. This is also something we are going to continue to work on the pensions in general. I cannot guarantee that we have quarter after quarter a regular result on that, but we continue to work on this topic, which is a topic in which we think we have opportunities.
Okay. Maybe just to follow up on Exterior Solutions. You've been relatively precise on your margin expectations for the second half of the year for Glass and Interior Solutions. Given the comments you just made about pricing and continued effort, do you think Exterior Solutions could see an improvement in margin in H2 2018 versus H2 last year?
Benoit, you want to answer that question?
We should see some improvement because clearly in Exterior Solutions, we have the negative impact of the first quarter, partly on North America with the weather. As Guillaume mentioned, we are pushing hard on pricing in North America with some good momentum in the last few weeks. We hope that price increase of August, et cetera, will stick, and therefore will help the margin in the second half.
Okay. Thanks a lot.
Thank you. The last question comes from Arnaud Lemaire, Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Good morning. I have two questions, if I may. The first one is regarding your automotive exposure. I think you made the comment that in autos, the Flat Glass business was still doing okay. We've heard some automotive manufacturers complaining about business trends which were deteriorating somewhat unrelated to the trade war. Have you seen any impact in terms of automotive demand? I think you made some comments, can you come back on that? My second question is regarding your net debt at the end of the year. In the first half, your net debt increased, I think about EUR 2.5 billion year-on-year, considering all the spending that you detailed. Would you expect that year-end net debt to increase by a similar amount, probably accounting for working capital at year-end, put somewhere between 8 and EUR 8.5 billion?
Is that a good guidance for year-end net debt?
I will answer the first one, Arnaud, and Guillaume will answer the second one. On automotive, I think that the markets are still globally very good. The expectations about the market for the second half are a bit lower than they were in the first half, depending on the region. For us, the trends are maybe different from what you hear from one company to the next. First, I would say that, what are the big trends at the moment in automotive? They are very related to the evolution of the motorization. There are big shifts between diesel to electric or diesel to non-diesel, this has, for various companies, big impacts. Whatever the car is, whether it's a diesel engine or whether it is a normal gas, or whether it is an electric car, the windshields or the automotive glass is not affected.
I think I mentioned that last year at Investor Day, I think that the
The electric car trend is globally positive for us in terms of the value that we expect in terms of windows in the car. Globally, I think the market for us in the second half, to answer your question, is going to stay good. We have good positions and for us, what is more important is what are the new models, where we are, versus others and the geographical mix. We have good prospects in emerging countries. Automotive in Europe may flatten a little bit, but given what we have in mind in terms of our models, we expect the trend that we have seen in the first half to continue in the second half.
On the debt evolution between now and the end of the year, Arnaud, you've seen the past track record. You know it well. There is a swing due to working capital of approximately EUR 1 billion usually, and if I look at the last three years, the net debt has decreased by EUR 1 billion one year and EUR 0.8 another year. I think it's safe to assume that we're going to see the same kind of order of magnitude. Now that being said, it depends also very much on the acquisition level as well as the share buybacks level. Overall, I think the order of magnitude you're giving between EUR 8 and EUR 8.5 is the right one.
That's very clear. Thank you very much.
Next question.
Thank you. The last question comes from Eric-Alain Dumoulin, Morgan Stanley. Sir, please go ahead.
Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. Just two on my side regarding the pipe business in France. Do you see any rebound of the market along with the civil works recovery in France, in particular, are the local authorities more active on that side or not? Otherwise, on the pipe business, have you seen some return of some export contracts too in this business? A second question on flat glass. Do you think further closure for maintenance of flat glass or float are likely in the near future?
On the pipe business, the situation is a bit different between our domestic markets in Europe and exports. Maybe Benoit you want to give more color?
The French market was very strong last year. It's a bit flattish this year, but midterm, it continues to be strong. The government launched some big analyses on the water market and the structure in France. We are very optimistic for the long term on that. We have some good momentum on Northern Europe and Eastern Europe, which is very positive this year. On the large exports, the Middle East, Africa, it's not a good evolution. It's flattish also. No big change there, but clearly more upside on the eastern part of Europe, Northern Europe with a lot of infrastructure projects.
For export, I think we have some prospects, but literally.
It only takes time.
In terms of float repairs. I think what happened this first half is that we have more than usual. There are always float repairs. I would say that we had three events this first half. One was completely scheduled, but it is a big one, was in Poland. The two others that we mentioned, one with the flooding and repair that we did not have in mind that were in Romania, have waited significantly. We will have further repairs next year, but I would say more the normal thing than the Polish one. The Polish, given the importance of our Polish business, this was expected. I had that in mind, it was significant when you compare the profitability of last year versus the profitability of the first half. The second half from September, the Float Glass in Poland will be back on track.
Okay.
I would say, Patrick, we are going to go back to something more normal, there will always be one or two float repair every year.
Thank you. That's very clear. Thank you.
Thank you. We have no further question over the phone.
Questions on the internet. We have two questions from Robert Gardiner. The first one is, in Flat Glass, are you any further maintenance downtime in plants outside of Egypt, Poland or Romania? I think you just answered this one. The second one is can you please repeat the Q2 price effect in each division? Thanks. I think I also answered this one, but just to make sure. Flat Glass, +3.1% price effect in Q2, HPM +2.7%, Interior +4.4%, Exterior +3.3%, and Building Distribution +2.4%. There was one specific question of Gregor Kuglitsch from UBS, which is, can you please provide the H1 effects and M&A impact on operating profit? Can you also guide on what you expect for 2018 as a whole for both? The impact of FX and structure on operating profit is around EUR 20 million for H1 2018.
For the rest of the year, as I think I mentioned, I mentioned it on sales, the FX effect on sales is clearly improving. I said I think that we were finishing the first half with an FX effect on sales, which was less than 3%. In fact, given the momentum, we should see a substantially less negative exchange rate effect if exchange rates were to stay at the end of June, we know it's very theoretical. When it comes to operating profit, that's going to depend a little bit on the mix, obviously, on geographies, et cetera. That's all.
Very good. Well, there is one more question in the room, Christophe.
Yes.
Jean-Christophe.
Jean-Christophe. Pierre-André, coming back to France, we have a good surprise and a good improvement of the French profits in terms of EBIT. Where does it stem? Is that stemming from distribution or from industrial business lines?
All our businesses have recorded improvement in the first half profitability in France. There are also some exceptionals in terms of timing.
No, overall, there is a clear progression of operating profit-
All businesses
What I said also in my comments is that there is a little bit of one-offs linked to the tax effect, crédit d'impôt recherche, on the operating profit and the timing between H1 and H2, which is helping. Nevertheless, the picture remains the same directionally, progression of operating profit in France.
All businesses have improved. Finally. Okay, well, thank you very much. Good holidays for those who are going on holidays soon.