Good evening, all, and welcome to this webinar, where we'll be commenting on the turnover for the third quarter. Good evening, all. We're gonna make a fairly short presentation, so you have plenty of time to ask your questions on the chat section. Chat to say hello. Question, Questions tab, both in English and in French, on the Questions tab. Those for our English speakers. It's available in English, and Neil is translating for us. It's a real human being that's doing translation for us today. Just a few words about headcount. You see that that's stable. It continues to be stable. We're going through a difficult time in terms of turnover, so our subsidiaries are maintaining their employee levels.
But we also, of course, need them to be ready to start up again when the recovery comes. Just a quick look at the price effect. You know that this is something that we've been looking at over the past webinars, and it's been quite striking over the last four years. And you can see on this slide on the price effect since twenty twenty-one. So twenty twenty-one, 4.3% inflation in orange. In brown, organic growth or development in turnover, and in gray, average change in volumes. So you can see very good development in twenty twenty-one, and then twenty twenty-two, a lot of inflation, very unusual levels of price increases with a drastic reduction in volumes, or at least volume progression.
And from 2023, we see a reduction in volumes, outbalanced by the increase in prices, which helped us, of course. And over this period, there was a period of 2021 to 2023, there was an increase of 22%, price increases. We've now got the opposite situation, with a drop in prices of 2.6% after nine months of activity, end of the third quarter. And this leads to a reduction in volume of 11.5 in terms of volumes and a reduction in turnover of 14.1%. So if we now look at our customers' activities through COÉDIS, so there's a sanitary and heating wholesalers association. You see that July was a little better. We had more days in July, that helped.
However, August was very bad, and we're in a very difficult period for that side of the business. Now, a look at new housing starts in France. So this continues to be very poor, both in terms of planning permission applications, which remains very low, around three hundred and fifty thousand. We'd really need four hundred and fifty to five hundred thousand housing applications, and we're well below that, of course. And in terms of housing starts, well below three hundred thousand, and that's a situation we've never seen before, certainly since the financial crisis, two thousand and eight. And the lowest point during that was three hundred and thirty thousand new housing starts, and you could say that we're actually you can see they're actually lower than that now.
Now we're gonna look at DIY stores, and these are all Inoha groups together, all the actors on that market. You see that the situation has been negative since August 2023, with a slight improvement over the past four months, and we hope that that will stabilize soon. That will help our subsidiaries who are active on that market, and we'll talk about that later. A look at our industrial activities. We use the PMI index. For France, you see it's below 50%, as has been over a long period. That means that the month-to-month activity is lower than the month before. In Europe, there's exactly the same trend, approximately the same trend with this contraction of the market.
We are a low market share actor in Europe. Over to Patricia now, who's gonna talk about figures from this context on the markets, which are the result of that situation. We'll talk about turnover per distribution channel. So we'll start with retail, and that's two entities in terms, Mecafer and Domac. They make large tools, and Odréa who operates on watering pumps, fittings and pipes, and bathroom taps. So we've got a 50% drop compared to last year on this retail market. There's an effect, a price effect, but not only. Positive elements, we'll start with that. Mecafer Domac, for the first quarter, we've seen growth compared to the third quarter of last year of 3%. So that's a return to growth. That's positive.
Odréa, on the other hand, they are obviously involved in the watering market, like Jetly, in the pro channel. We've just not had a watering season, because of the rainy spring and summer seasons, so that's affects their sales. And so that's had an impact on their business, of course, for Odréa. That's Odréa. So a reminder, the retail activity represents 18% of our overall turnover. So we're gonna look at the subsidiaries who are on the pro channel. So industry, construction, and new housing. So we see that this channel has also lost turnover 'cause we're at minus 30.9%. The major element to be highlighted is Thermador and Isocel, who are in the energy renovation market.
These subsidiaries who brought a lot of growth over the last three years, and now they are facing a plateaued market. And of course, that's affected by the MaPrimeRénov' mechanism that Guillaume will talk about later. So in terms of new housing, two subsidiaries impacted by this and the drop in this activity, that's PBtub and Thermacôme. And they've got reduction in turnover at the end of September, as was the case for the first two quarters as well. Then we've got DPI. They're on public works with their plastic piping equipment. They're affected by two things: a drop in volumes, so fewer projects, and also a drop in price, so a double whammy for them.
This subsidiary is directly impacted by the drops in prices in raw materials, of course, so turnover total of EUR 390 million. Important to note that the two additional businesses that have been added to the group, Alto Metering, a subsidiary that groups together three companies. They represent turnover about EUR 400,000. And also the business of Vina-Contracta , which is bought by Sodeco in industrial valves, and that's a little bit of turnover of EUR 35,000. And so that would need to be added in the future to those totals. Now, over to next, on to the next to our latest news. We talked about the end of July, we communicated to you about the finalization of an acquisition of a company called Comptage Énergies.
So this is a company, there are two other companies that are within that scope that we're calling Alto Metering. The three companies will be grouped into one at the end of October, and that's gonna be called Alto Metering. I think you'll see the logo come up behind me at some point. So it's a company which brings 1.4 million turnover and seven people, seven employees. So that's an acquisition was purchased for 3.5, nearly 3.5 million. In August, we also had the acquisition of Vina-Contracta in Belgium by Sodeco. And this business was paid from equity, from Sodeco's equity, and they're in industrial valves. The total of that acquisition was EUR 1 million. That was in, on the ninth of August.
And then we'll be taking over that goodwill, with the manager will be staying with the company, and will be staying with the group for two years. So they'll bring us new suppliers, new products, new product ranges, and new customers, of course, that we may be able to attract to our other subsidiaries. So that's the second piece of news. Third piece of news was, again, in August, we talked about our intention to buy shares, and we set up a mandate for the purchase of our own shares. And we started the operation on July the third, and the idea was to purchase 30,000 shares on the market. And that happened over July and August.
We gave ourselves longer, but it was finished by the end of August, at an average price of EUR 77.80 per share. And so the total use of equity, again, we paid EUR 2.3 million to purchase those shares. Two major objectives is to reward service from our employees, and potentially a means of payment for a part of a future acquisition in any new subsidiaries, which we've done in the group once before. We did an increase in capital in 2015 to purchase Mecafer. The last piece of news concerns the signing of a Dutreil Pact. We worked on it during July and August, and it was signed on October the second.
It's with the death of Guy Vincent in April 2024, we were contacted by his children and grandchildren with the objective of putting together a Dutreil Pact. The objective is. The conditions are, there has to be 20% of the shares of Thermador Groupe within the pact, and we were able to bring together that number, in fact, a little more. Rentrop family office, the company Rentrop Investment, they purchased who hold 9%. They entered the pact as well, plus the founders of the group, Hubert Fournier and Marc de Sereys, and some executives and retired resigned executives. The commitment is important thing because it's for two years, you can't sell your shares if you're as part of that pact for a period of two years.
But it shows a commitment, and especially from Norman Rentrop, because there's no real advantage to them in terms of the French tax rules. So it's a real demonstration of commitment. So financial structure, we talk about value of stock normally, but we've extended that this time to complete this information, this financial information, by talking about our cash position and our debt situation. So to give you more clearer position on the outlook, and to show that we are maintaining our cash position, for example, which allows us to operate. So the absolute value of stocks has fallen about €175 million, and that reflects, of course, the drop in purchasing prices and the volumes that we're purchasing.
In terms of a number of days of stock, we consider we count the number of days of stock. And we've got that down to 194 days, compared to 195 at the end of 2023. So if we took the effect on. We look at the effect on the cash position, if I can just get back to the previous slide. The cash position, we've got EUR 46.8 million, and that's stable compared to the end of June. Of course, the cash position was affected by those purchases that we talked about earlier, EUR 3.5 million for Comptage Énergies, EUR 1 million for Vina-Contracta , and EUR 2.3 million for the purchase of our own shares.
So that's, that's a total of EUR 6.8 million, which was paid from our cash. So mechanically, that shows that because our working capital requirement has been well controlled, and in the sense that we've been able to take out that EUR 6.8 million from our cash. And if we look at debt, 32.6 million, we've continued to reimburse our debt in terms of relationship between cash position and debt. You can see that it's a stable amount compared to June thirtieth, 2024. Now, I'm going to move on to cash position. This slide shows the fact that we've got an improvement in our cash position, which was noted compared to December 20, 2023.
At the end of March, we were at plus 43, and so now at the end of September, we're at plus 46.8. It's important here that the subsidiaries are remunerated on their actual cash position, so they are motivated to join in that effort. So next slide, investments. So we talk about cash. We've obviously got the working capital requirement, and of course, our cash position helps us to finance our investments. We talked about €9.3 million at the end of the year, and we reduced that to €7.3 million at the end of June. And we're on target with €7.3 million, and that obviously includes the acquisitions and the activity in Belgium.
The 3.2 million for the property investments is maintained, and that's actions which will be taking place in November. I'm gonna talk about outlooks, outlook next. And we're interested to know what's obviously gonna be happening in the months ahead. It's very complicated to see clearly in the current foggy situation, but we have got some indicators. First of all, looking backwards, on this slide, you can see the progression, the organic progression quarter by quarter over a period of nearly five years. You see that the second quarter of 2023 was down, and it reached a really low point at the first quarter at Q1 2024.
But the situation seems to be stabilizing a little, and you see a slight improvement towards Q3. But it's important to understand that this is not what we were imagining at the beginning of the year, even though we are moving towards maybe a more stable situation. A word about MaPrimeRénov'. This is a state subsidies, pardon, which allows us to finance the energy renovation program for the nation. This was really successful for us in 2021, 2022. 2023 and 2024, it's fallen down a bit 'cause the rules have changed, and we lost a lot of turnover for Isocel and Thermador. And today, the new government, of course, we were keen to see what they were gonna say about the energy renovation program, MaPrimeRénov'.
The Prime Minister talked about it during his general policy presentation of the budget, saying it was a priority for France. The Finance Minister of the Budget stated that the budget will be maintained compared to 2024, so that's fairly vague. The Housing Minister also said that single gesture operations will be continued in 2025. A single gesture operation means, for example, replacing an old boiler with a heat pump without doing any other work, so that's what they call a single gesture operation. And that this is positive for Thermador, who work in the heat pump market, so I think we're not gonna...
We're not expecting anything magical in twenty twenty-five, but the policy to continue to accompany the energy renovation program is positive over the very long term. So I'm thinking for fifteen years from now, we'll still be working on those sorts of products, heat pumps, heat pump accessories, and solar boilers, for example. New homes, so new housing starts. As I said, the situation is very critical. It's the worst that we've seen since two thousand and eight, two thousand and nine, and yet, we can't see any improvement on the horizon as we move ahead month by month. We did think we'd reached the bottom of the curve, and we look forward to an uptick, but we can't. We've got no certainty about that. But whatever happened, whatever happens, we're expecting...
Not expecting a positive impact for the group. So for companies like PBtub and Thermacôme, we're involved in second works in buildings. That won't come until the end of the second half of twenty twenty-five. We're expecting an uptick in October, but it's a challenging time for us. No real change in the situation. And that means that we expect the situation to continue until the end of the year. For us, the water cycle market is a promising market because we provide equipment for the recovery, harvesting of rainwater, and also promising because the public authorities are looking at grey water, the use of grey water, that can be used after initial use, for example, watering... or in toilets or for washing machines, or indeed, filling up swimming pools.
This is a source of saving of water resources, and the group can be, and will be positioned in the future on those markets. Jetly, DPI, connections and valves, but also Aello, who are specialists on the swimming pool market, and in particular low water consumption swimming pools. Where the swimming pools can be transformed into water capture tanks during summer storms. In terms of trends next year, we're expecting prices to stabilize or even increase slightly. Those are the first information, the initial information we've got from our suppliers. But beware, raw material prices are very volatile, and it's unstable, so it's an estimate, and it's just me saying that. That's nothing official.
We've got a number of acquisition projects, two projects in Europe, so in European countries, and one in France, with turnovers of between 12 and 20 million EUR for those three companies. So looking at our long-term growth targets, it's clear that 2024 is gonna be a turnover where we lose turnover, more than 10%, I would think. But it's important to remember, it's not catastrophic because of the fact that we're well ahead of our targets in the post-COVID years. And now the performance of the Thermador share. These figures from October, and you see that the return is very comfortable at 11.8% per year, higher than the national French stock exchange, which is at +9.7% per year.
So we've finished that, and then for the moment, I'm surprised to see that we've got no questions on the chat.
Two questions on the chat. So please, please ask your questions on the questions tab, not on the chat. So what actions are you planning that is for this difficult situation that is certainly going to last? So, you know, Thermador Groupe is highly decentralized, and it's important to say that all our subsidiaries are mobilized. They're making efforts in these difficult markets and difficult times, thinking BTP, for example, but I can guarantee that those subsidiaries are making all the efforts they can commercially to overcome these temporary difficulties. So that's certain from a commercial point of view. No delay in commercial activity, but in terms of headcount, that follows. And in terms of working capital requirement, they need...
They're making every effort to control their stocks, their relationships with their suppliers, and they are all working hard on those subjects. Another important point is receivables and payables, and that's important to... In difficult times, it's very important to have strong relationships with our suppliers, and we work a lot on that. So do you use your roofs to produce photovoltaic electricity, and if not, are you planning to do so? Patricia? Yeah, our Belgian subsidiary has photovoltaic panels, which covers 40% of their electricity needs. We've got... We've installed photovoltaic panels in France, too. Another solution that is in place in Sectoriel and PBtub are trackers.
They're called trackers, and they are panels, solar panels, which move to follow the sun. It's a sort of sunflower of electricity generation. And that allows us to cover about 40%, again, of electricity needs. And then we're working on projects for at least four sites, which have roofs that can receive either photovoltaic panels or trackers. So let's say, often a decision for the subsidiaries to take in terms of financial impact and the coverage of their consumption. So we'll continue to work on those subjects and increase our photovoltaic stock. So about... Aldo is talking about the acquisitions that you are preparing. I would say not preparing, but studying. What activity sector are they in? They are distribution companies.
I can't tell you much more because we can't reveal anything on this subject, of course, because it would be considered as insider trading. So we need to be careful, of course, but I can come back to our theoretical posture about these external growth operations. We want to develop our turnover in Europe, particularly today, because our overexposure in France is too strong in the view of our investors, so that's a priority for us. So we always take the example of our acquisition in two thousand and seventeen, when we purchased Sodeco. Fantastic company, which is now perfectly integrated into Thermador Groupe, even though it's maintained its original personality, its original characteristics. Well integrated and it's working very well, good results, even though turnover is not as good this year.
But we know they're working on the long term, and it's a very positive thing for the future. Do you think you'll be able to use Thermador shares recently acquired for financing future financial external growth operations? That's a question from Xavier. Yeah. We have said in our newsletter that we would use those funds either to... Those shares, sorry, either to reward long terms, long service, or to contribute to acquisitions, as you say, in the future. So for us, it's important that the managers who are in place in the subsidiaries, that they themselves buy shares in the group.
So when we're acquiring new companies, then it's often a good option for us to transfer shares to the seller as part of the price, 'cause that gets buy-in from them. This is a question from François Xavier. "Good evening. Given your very solid balance sheet, wouldn't it be a good idea to profit from a low share price at the bottom of a cycle to buy back your own shares with a view to canceling them?" This is not something we've ever done. We're not on a. We're sitting on a cash mountain, and it's probable that we will need our cash in the future, in the months and years ahead, for development projects.
So indeed, if we've made acquisitions of these shares, it was for the two reasons we quoted before, and there's no question of canceling existing shares. The most important thing for our long-term investors is to look at their overall return on investment, and that's the main, really, the priority for them. "So with 10% reduction of turnover in 2024-
But we are at fourteen point-
... Will Thermador resist the challenge better than its competitors? It's difficult to say, because we've got a lot of competitors, of course, in Thermador Groupe. Each subsidiary has between 10 and 20 major competitors. So I consider indeed, that in these, because of our devolved organization and the mobilization of our teams, it means that those teams are competent and stable, and we are looking to gain market share. So we would tend to resist better than the competitors. Of course, our competitors are in difficulty, too.
Question from Rémy.
Ah, the development of photovoltaic in France, will that have prospects for Thermador, and particularly in the production of hot water in houses and services for the photovoltaic panels? We're talking about photovoltaic panels, where Thermador in 2021, 2022, 2023 really got a lot of market share. In terms of the photovoltaic problem, panels, we're a long way off having a strong position on the market in terms of market share. But sales to the general public by Mecafer and a small activity within Thermador is giving us great hopes for the future. As you say, it's a high development sector. So no major investment in 2025 in these markets, except at Mecafer, where we're working on this topic for the retail market.
When we talk about photovoltaic panels, we have to think about storage of electricity. At Mecafer, we're developing stock storage solutions so that the electricity that's collected during the day can be used at night, in the evening and at night.
There's a question from Aldo.... [Foreign language]
Assists to react-
[Foreign language]
The colossal investments to be made in pipework to reduce leaks. How can you explain the poor sales of DPI? Unfortunately, in France, investments are not colossal, as you used the word colossal.
... [Foreign language]
There, we should be investing.
... [Foreign language] .
Billions in France. It's just there's just a very low level of a few million euros in France. So it's...
[Foreign language]
It requires a lot of, obviously, investment, but more in terms of salaries than equipment. 'Cause the trenches have to be dug, the new pipes have to be laid, and that's where the high cost is, and the prospects in terms of budget available for that kind of thing in France is not really encouraging for this market to save drinking water.
[Foreign language]
Another question on the chat side.
[Foreign language]
A question from Claude.
[Foreign language] .
Do you have contacts with Veolia or Suez for water? I think one of our subsidiaries is in contact with Veolia.
[Foreign language]
Which is Sferaco.
... [Foreign language]
And they are both in construction and building, but also in water. And they've been recently developing products for water processing. So Veolia is one of their-
[Foreign language]
Of the targets or potential customers for them.
[Foreign language] .
So the water cycle department in Sferaco is developing, because we're currently a small player on the market, but we are have good business with Saur, a small team in Sferaco working on that specifically to progress. But also, Alain is asking us whether we are signatories of the Dutreil Pact. Yes, we both are, Patricia and I. You can see in our documents. So I did it to help Guy Vincent's family, because I don't have any intention other intention than to help. And Patricia is also in the Dutreil Pact for a vast majority of the shares she has.
So for Guillaume, for the pact, for the Dutreil Pact to be operational, an executive from Thermador Groupe had to be a member of the pact. So it was an obligation.
Not very complicated, sorry, 'cause I had no intention to sell any shares, so it doesn't change anything for me. But just some minor legal formalities to follow and signing a few documents. But of course, this allows us to maintain the capital within the group, a family holding, which of course is sentimentally attached to the group. It was really moving to see the presence of Guy Vincent's family and the founder's family present at the annual general meeting. It's very important to us.
[Foreign language] ...
So the collection of photos is really good. I think we can-
Photos [Foreign language]
Really enjoy the photos in the background. Thank you to the team. They are our communications team.
[Foreign language]
And of course, we try to show the whole range of the products of our subsidiaries.
[Foreign language]
[Foreign language] A question the possibility of influencer the provided publics on the MaPrimeRénov' program. So we're a member of an association which works towards that, lobbying, of course, but sincerely, I think our prime minister, our dear prime minister, is receiving. Has probably got four or five hundred e-mails on his desk during this very difficult period, asking for the very same things. So once again, I think the most important thing for the Thermador Groupe is to be ready, to be reactive, to be agile, and that's what we're good at, I think. And of course, lobbying exists, but we are a relatively small company, and one of our major customers has a influence on the public authorities.
I won't mention the name of that customer.
[Foreign language]
It's a big company, listed on the stock exchange, and they have an influence on the public authorities, and they are in the insulation, the insulation market in particular. Of course, that's not our case. We're not of that size. Je pense que on a répondu à toutes les questions. I think we've answered all the questions that have come in so far.
Do you have any questions on the webinar in English?
[Foreign language] .
Now, on the English side, any questions? No.
[Foreign language] .
[Foreign language] .
It's possible there's a slight time difference, time lag with our, for our foreign investors.
[Foreign language] .
For the shareholders pact, just to say that employees and the executives of the group, we had the opportunity to buy on the market. I'd remind you that we have two possible windows of opportunity to buy after the publication of the results, and that shows the commitment of the executives and employees in Thermador Groupe. As it just shows that we are a long-term company. We have a comment from Regis about the visibility of our stand at Batimat. Sorry. That was two weeks ago, so we had a number of subsidiaries who were present. We shared a stand for the building industry.
I think there was not just Batimat, but I think we were also in a retail section, which helped show off Domac and Odréa. So it was an opportunity for us, lots of visitors, and that shows that there is commercial contacts. It's an opportunity for commercial contacts, and because it's important to be present at those sort of events, especially I would say, when our turnover is down to encourage a recovery in our activity. So these remarks will touch the employees who have been really committed during those trade shows, the long days and often followed by long evenings to continue to keep contacts with the customers, with the prospects, and so forth. Batimat also Interclima.
Thanks to those teams, employees who worked hard for those stands to be of great quality and ensure the best possible commercial contacts during those fairs. It's 6:45 P.M. We had no more questions.
[Foreign language]
Oh, yes.
Alors, Adrien, il a raison.
Adrien is right.
[Foreign language] .
That we will be present on the twenty-sixth of November at the Carrousel du Louvre for the Investir Day trade fair. For our shareholders who are based in Paris, you'll be welcome to join us, and we'll be present for that day at that show, Investir Day. So it'll be Guillaume, myself, Adrien, too, who's behind the camera. Other people, particularly Caroline Maury , who's one of our private shareholders. So it's an important event because we have the Actionaria trade show, which seems to have dropped off the cliff. And this is an opportunity, of course, for us to talk to those who invest and even potentially those new potential shareholders. So an evening animated by Nextwise.
Nextwise is a startup which is helping us to help young people to learn more about the financial markets. They've created a game, and Thermador Groupe as a partner of Nextwise. So if there's any young people watching today, I would encourage you to come and join us at that evening. Download the Nextwise application to play the investor game or fund manager game. It's really well done, it's a really good teaching tool.
[Foreign language] .
C'est possible.
Point.
Yeah. Somebody who managed it was there at the event last year, the same event last year. So I think we're not gonna stay here just for staying here. We thank you for your attending tonight. It's nice to have so many people attending the webinar. Thank you for your loyalty. Thank you for your patience. I'm hoping that in the future, we'll be able to talk about better quarters.
[Foreign language] .
So thank you very much to all, and good evening. Good evening from me, too.