Earnings Call: Q3 2020

Sep 30, 2020

Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to this conference call on Veolia's Q3 2020 results. I will present these results with Estelle Brachlianoff, our COO Claude Larabelle, our CFO and Olivier Bruce, our Head of Strategy. During this call, I will, of course, give you an update on our project to buy SUEZ, and we will then present our very good Q3 results, which show the strong capabilities of our group to bounce back quickly. These very good Q3 results enable us to confirm our 2020 objective, which is a Q4 2020 performance equivalent to Q4 2019. And we will then take all your questions. I am moving on Slide 5. On October 6, we acquired from ENGIE a 29.9% stake in SUEZ, with the intention of launching of the tender offer on SUE's remaining share capital as quickly as possible in order to create the world champion for the green transformation. As I explained at the end of August, when we made our offer to ENGIE, This project to create the world champion for the green transformation is a unique opportunity because the climate emergency have never been more pressing and because the stimulus packages in Europe and elsewhere all focus on the urban element. There is no more time for debating climate change. Now is the time for action and quick action in order to save our planet. This planned team up with SUEZ is a great answer to the environmental emergency by bringing timely solutions to all our clients. The complementarity of our 2 groups is compelling in terms of assets, geographies, know how, technologies, human resources and clients. Our values and corporate cultures are also very close. We want to carry out this project together with SUEZ teams, all of them who are all top quality professionals as Aurelia's team, be they field operators, managers, heads of businesses or Suez top management. As you know, the growth of service businesses relies on the diversity of talents, IDs and competencies. From this point of view, the opportunity to combine Veolia and SUEZ will accelerate our development. Our strategic plans are also very much aligned. Sharing common resources will enable us to accelerate the execution of both group strategies and reach our objectives earlier. This combination will therefore be strongly value creating for all stakeholders. Our clients will benefit from a larger and more innovative offering, which will address their increasing needs. The employees of both groups will have expanded new career opportunities and the transaction is also very much accretive to EPS and value creating for our shareholders. I move to Slide 6. Our project is progressing as planned. On July 31, ENGIE announced its intention to sell its minority stake in SUEZ. On August 30, we proposed to ENGIE to acquire a 29.9% stake of SUEZ, in other words, most of its stake. We have succeeded in this first step of the transaction and have acquired from ENGIE on October 6, a 29.9% stake in SUEZ at EUR 18 per share. We began the preparatory and interest work as soon as we announced our interest in SUEZ. This process is continuing and progressing normally. We intend to pre file to the antitrust authorities by the end of November. Meanwhile, the management of SUEZ has started a certain number of legal proceedings, which we are addressing with great determination and we will succeed in the result being done. They are not delaying the implementation of our project as the longest process is the antitrust approval, which we have taken and which is progressing normally. As I said, there is a plus for everyone without exception in this project. Our intention is inclusive and designed to build a winning Veolia plus stress by joining forces. We aim for our projects to be accepted by SUEZ Board of Directors or by its shareholders. As soon as we have obtained this report, we will launch a voluntary tender offer to buy the remaining 70.1% of Suez shares. I move to Slide 7. The financing of the transaction is secured. On October 14, we took advantage of very favorable market conditions and issued a €2,000,000,000 hybrid bond split in 2 parts, €850,000,000 at 2.25 percent for 4.5 years and €1,150,000,000 at 2.5 percent for 8th and half years. This insurance already enabled us to secure our investment rate rating. The financing of the total offer will come from a British loan, which will be refinanced by the proceeds of the antitrust asset divestments and complemented by an equity issue, which is targeted below 20% of the existing market value of SUEZ. This will enable us to keep the group's net debt EBITDA ratio at around 3 times and to bring significant EPS accretion. On Slide 8 now, at Veolia, we are convinced that this project is value creating for all stakeholders. It is good for our shareholders, our clients, the planet, the communities in which we operate and good for the employees of both groups, I'm certain that all together we will quickly achieve our ambition of becoming the world champion for the Green Transformation. On Slide 9, let's now move to our very strong Q3 results. I have to say that I am really very proud of Veolia's capacity to bounce back and by the extraordinary work and energy of all our employees, which made such a swift recovery possible. On Slide 10, we have managed to adapt very quickly to this incredibly sudden and severe sanitary crisis. As you can see, we were negatively impacted by the crisis for only 3 months from March through May, and we recovered our 2019 global activity rate as early as Q3 with an even higher level of profitability. Our Q3 revenue reached 99.9% of Q3 twenty nineteen at constant scope and perimeter. Our published revenue represents 97.7% of the Q3 2019 as ForEx and the divestment of our municipal energy assets in the U. S. In late 20 19 impacted revenue by 2.1%. EBITDA and current EBIT are above Q3 2019. Q3 EBITDA reached 102.5 percent of Q3 2019 levels at constant scope and ForEx and 100.1% at current. We have therefore completely compensated for COVID FX, ForEx and Group. Q3 current EBIT reached 104.3 percent of Q3 2019 at constant scope and ForEx and 100.3% at current. We have of course benefited from the strong resilience of most of our businesses. The recovery of the most impacted activities began in June and was then confirmed and amplified throughout the Q3. Our field teams have been particularly reactive and efficient and the additional cutting program, which we quickly launched in late March called Recover and Adapt has perfectly fulfilled its objectives. In total, €395,000,000 of savings have been achieved in the 1st 9 months, including €195,000,000 from our recurring APAC program and €200,000,000 from the additional recover and adapt plan. In order to secure our dynamic growth path for the months and years ahead, we have chosen to maintain all our development and innovation projects. These projects will fuel the future growth of the group in 2021 and beyond. These very good results allow us to confirm our guidance, which is Q4 performance equivalent to Q4 2019. On Slide 11, you can see our detailed quarterly figures for 2020. They show you how quickly we were able to recover with Q3 2020 revenue at the level of Q3 2019, EBITDA up 2.5 percent, current EBIT up 4.3 percent and current net income up 6.2% at current scope and forex and for the net income plus 10.6% at constant scope and forex to €142,000,000 Moving now to Slide 12. As I mentioned earlier, we have decided to maintain our growth and innovation projects in order to consolidate our rebound and to secure our growth next year. And our sales team in the field has maintained a strong level of commercial activity despite the sanitary crisis. No project have been canceled and very few delayed. We have thus concluded several transactions in Central and Eastern Europe, mainly in Energy. We have pursued our development in Azamu's West in Asia with 4 plants under commissioning in China and 1 in Singapore. We have also boosted our investments in recycling. We have accelerated in a very promising activity, the recycling of lithium batteries by partnering with Solvay. We have won a BOT for recycled PET plastics with Mitsui and 711 in Japan. We expect from that annual revenue of €40,000,000 as of 2024 for a 20 year period. Finally, in terms of innovation, we are progressing in key strategic areas such as the green foundation of agriculture or the digitalizations of our activities. I now hand over to Stan Racquetoff, who will give you details on the specific dynamics of our main activities and our achievements in terms of efficiency. Estelle, the floor is yours. Thank you, Antoine. I'm extremely happy about our Q3 operational results which are ahead of 2019 performance both in EBITDA and EBIT term. It means we've managed to compensate both the COVID impact and the sale of our district energy business in the U. S. In our results in only a matter of months. And there is only 1 rig to businesses, back to essentials and strong and quick adaptation. Back to what's essential means maintaining all our services for our customer while answering the safety of our employees as well as focusing on margin and cash. And let me emphasize that the sales opportunity doesn't change, it's focused in any way. Strong and quick acquisitions. Our cost cutting has been doubled this year to €500,000,000 which is an unprecedented performance for Veolia. We've designed and launched our recovery and adapt plan early in April and already delivered 80% of the annual target, while delivering on our annual efficiency plan as planned. So you can understand why I'm so pleased with this performance and our team's ability to adapt. Beyond this quarter, some of this transformation, as Asaf mentioned, is here to stay and will level us to deal with the 2nd wave of the virus. I'm thinking, of course, of many digital tools whose usage has been seen massive boost in the last few months. We now, just to give you one example, have 33 upgrades, which monitor live operational and onvendal performance of our customers' assets around the world. Live data combined with artificial intelligence help us to deliver efficiency and productivity, thanks to those upgrades. But can also be transferred into remote control if needed, which we understand how it can be so important nowadays. Our customer hub has helped us enormously to share data with our customers on a daily basis as well. In a nutshell, the very good results of Veolia in the Q3 show that we are able to adapt quickly and strongly. I would like now to walk you through our very specific and their acting back in the last few months. We have municipal water on Slide 14. Volumes were very strong except in the future cities and we enjoyed favorable weather conditions. Cash collection, which we monitor closely, has held us as well. On Slide 15 now. The more impressive advancing back has certainly been seen in our construction activities. After almost a total halt in the spring, construction works have resumed and we even have been seen some catching up with frankly summer in France. Our focus now is with the backlog for 2021 with newly elected French municipalities. Coming to solid waste now on Slide 16. Our municipal collection and energy from waste have been quite resilient. On the other hand, commercial waste volumes were directly and almost immediately impacted by lockdown measures. And you have a direct reading on the graph of reopening dates in France, Germany and the U. K. With even some temporary destocking effect at the start of the summer. In September, we were still missing around 5% to 10% of volumes, typically shops and restaurants, which have not reopened fully. But our decision measures as well as price increase have helped us to recover our pre COVID-nineteen performance. Moving now to Health and Sways on Slide 17. Our balanced portfolio of customers, which includes major pharmaceutical companies, for instance, has helped us navigate through the crisis, and we are pleased to see volumes available in Europe and the U. S. China is even running at a higher speed than we anticipated at the beginning of the year. And we have anticipated some new capacity opening. A very resilient business altogether when you consider it deals exclusively with industrial customers. On Slide 18 now. As I mentioned earlier, our Adaptation plan encapsulates increased savings as well as new ways of working. When it comes to cost cutting, the year is really exceptional. Our initial efficiency plan of €250,000,000 has been confirmed and is delivered, but we have doubled the target to €500,000,000 with an additional recover and adaptation plan launched in early April to compensate for the COVID impact. At the end of September, we are well on target with 80% already delivered. This is really a great achievement and a key pillar to our Q3 results. Looking ahead now on Slide 19, I would like to share some color on the way I see Q4. The Southern Hemisphere is entering into summer and we can enjoy Australia, for instance, reopening progressively all commercial activities. North America is following pretty much the same trend as this summer. As far as Asia is concerned, now our activities are pretty much back to normal in most countries, which is quite impressive. In Africa and the Middle East, I'm pleased to see construction work at full speed and our order book being filled. The situation is quite different in Europe, obviously, with the very recent announcement in France and several European countries back into lockdown mode. Although we don't have the full picture yet, we anticipate the impact to be overall much more limited than in the spring. With all activities fully working as normal. Water distribution as well as district heating are barely impacted at all. Production sites open, which means we are enjoying good volumes of hazardous waste. The same applies for construction works. We anticipate though that the volume of waste, both collected and treating on behalf of our tertiary and commercial customers, will be reduced to some degree. Moving on to Slide 20 now. In October, before the recent work seen in Europe, we were quite confident we would beat our guidance given the advance we had seen in our Q3 results and recovery. Now and given those recent covenantal measures, we should be able to compensate for the impact, thanks to our mix of geographies and activities, which allows me to confirm our guidance and recover an operational performance in Q4 equivalent to that of Q4 2019. Beyond this year, our strategic choices and the activities we want to develop remain fully valid, among which have, of course, plastic recycling, has the SWAYCE, digitalization of water and heating services as well as water technologies. I have to say, the last few months have confirmed those were absolutely the right choices and priorities of developments with confirmed, if not reinforced, customer demand for those services and very good performance. The combination with SUEZ fits perfectly with this strategy, thanks to a very complementary geofixel footprint outside France, undisputed synergies and a similar approach to the future of our business. Our determination to be the world champion for transformation has never been stronger, as it's never been more needed and urgent to deploy solutions for our customer. Now I can hand over to you, Claude. Thank you, Estelle, and good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm on Slide 22. It's a little bit special this time as we are going to review during the presentation Q3 numbers and 9 months numbers. As Antoine told you at the beginning of the presentation, the very strong Q3 performance more than confirmed the June, July trend that we talked about during the last presentation. We have a revenue of €6,300,000,000 in Q3 comparable with last year at constant scope and ForEx, a good operating leverage leading to an EBITDA of €890 €3,000,000 plus 2.5 percent at constant scope and ForEx and EBIT at €333,000,000 plus 4.3 percent leading to a current net income of €142,000,000 for Q3 plus 10.6 percent. The net financial debt is well under control with a reduction of more than €700,000,000 compared to Q3 last year at €11,700,000,000 thanks to a good management of cash collection and CapEx. On the slide, you can also see the 9 months figures, which of course are improving compared to H1, roughly reducing the negative trend of H1 by 1 third for all metrics. ForEx continues to impact our numbers for 9 months, mostly in Central Europe and Latin. I'm now moving to Slide 23, where you can clearly see the rebound of Q3 in revenue in almost all geographies. France has a sharp rebound in Q3 plus 0.8 percent with a dry summer for French water and a lot of local tourism. French waste was also very strong, thanks to improved volumes and discipline on pricing. The rest of Europe, plus 0.8 percent, is benefiting from a very resilient Central and Eastern Europe and waste recovery in many countries. The rest of the world, minus 6%, is mainly due to the disposal of the district heating in the U. S. For more than half of it. And we will see later in the presentation, China remains well oriented. Regarding Construction in our Global Business segment, Q3 was a very good quarter with a significant rebound for both SAD and VWT and even much higher activity than last year. I'm on Slide 24. How do we compare Q3 revenue this year with last year? You can see on the slide that the main effects are: 1st, ForEx for minus 1.7%. For Q3 is LatAm, U. S. And Central Europe and a little bit of UK. 2nd, volumes with a slight minus 0.8% better than expected as the economy has not fully recovered everywhere and much better than H1. In H1, we had minus 6.1 3rd, pricing for plus 63% or plus 1% of revenue, which is really a significant marker since the beginning of the crisis and the strong pricing discipline that we continue to apply to all our businesses. Moving to Slide 25. You have the 9 months revenue bridge with almost all the negative effects on volumes for minus €862,000,000 occurring in Q2 and the same pricing discipline throughout the 9 months, as I mentioned, for Q3 with a positive effect of €206,000,000 for 9 months. I'm now on Slide 26, where you can see a lot of improvement for waste activity in Q3. Starting by recycled prices, they have improved during the year from minus 2.5 percent to minus 0.9% in Q3. This is due to the rebound of paper prices due to the lack of volumes collected and sorted in Q2 and a good trend in Q3 and by the strong PET market, which is still driven by the increasing demand. Regarding wet volumes, as we told you, we were expecting a strong recovery in Q3, but not a full recovery in all geographies. In a nutshell, France and Asia are back to last year's volumes, whereas the UK and Pacific are in between 90% 98% depending on the business lines, as Estelle told you. One last comment on hazardous waste. Europe is back to its nominal activity in China and China is sharply growing with 2 new facilities already commissioned in Jinning and Changsha. Globally, hazardous waste and hazardous waste revenue increased by 3.8% in Q3. Again, the pricing trend is very strong in Q3, plus 1.6%, thanks to the strong discipline of our commercial teams. Moving to Slide 27. What are the main variation of Q3 EBITDA compared to last year? ForEx and scope oriented like the revenue, respectively, minus 1.6% and minus 0.8%. What I'd like to highlight is a minus €2,000,000 effect for volume and commercial in the middle of the bridge. This is a lack of volume impact totally offset by the recover and adapt plan. This is exactly what we projected to do, compensate our lack of volumes by our recovery and adapt plan that Estelle described earlier to come back to a normalized level of performance. Finally, our usual and continuous cost cutting plan is contributing significantly to the performance of Q3 at €64,000,000 almost twice the negative prices squeeze of minus €34,000,000 On Slide 28, you have the EBITDA bridge for 9 months. The main difference with the previous one is the volume and commercial part at minus €432,000,000 which is mostly coming from the lockdown in Q2 as we explained for the revenue bridge. The usual cost cutting plans remain strong with €195,000,000 achieved over the last 9 months and I confirm that we are fully on track with our €250,000,000 goal for the year. What do we see in our different geographies? I'll start by France on Page 29 with French water, as I said, with a dry summer and a hot August, leading to volume increase and a total of plus 0.8% year to date. Same trend as H1 on tariffs, plus 1.5% unchanged and a good rebound on works and the lockdown. French waste had also a strong Q3 with very good treatment volumes in both incineration and landfills, good C and I recovery and less municipal collection due to contract selectivity. The pricing discipline in France continues to be very strong with plus 2% year to date. The EBITDA of France in Q3 is slightly above last year, thanks to waste recovery, good water volumes and our cost cutting plan. Let's move to the rest of Europe on Slide 13. As I told you, Central Europe is very resilient and had a strong Q3, both on energy, thanks to good volumes and prices. As a reminder, in Q3, we sold mostly electricity in this region and prices were hedged last year. And a good momentum on our water business with overall good volumes and tariff increases despite the lower consumption in Prague. Q3 in the UK is only slightly down, minus 1.3 percent with strong PSI performance and a record high availability of 93%. But as Estelle told you, C and I collection is still below last year at around 90% activity. German has recovered normal waste volumes in Q3 and Southern Europe, which is essentially energy activities in Spain and Italy, has recovered well. EBITDA of the segment is slightly above last year, thanks to the strong recovery, the resilience of Central Europe and cost cutting. Moving to Slide 31, what about the rest of the world with a couple of highlights. In Asia, we have a contrasted situation with a strong recovery of water business in China, plus 50% increase of our hazardous waste revenue in China in Q3 and on the other side, lower works with low margin in Japan and Hong Kong, some contract evolution in Korea and the disposal of low tech waste collection business in Singapore. Thanks to the development of our hazardous waste business in China with higher margins, the Asia EBITDA is up 4% despite the drop of revenue. In Latin America, despite the crisis and the long lockdown, the region is growing in Q3 at constant ForEx, thanks to good tariff indexation in Argentina and tuck ins, including hazardous waste management in Chile. North America is down minus 5.6% in Q3 at constant scope and ForEx. This is due to the lower refinery activities leading to lower volumes on our recycling business. Municipal Water is performing well as a very stable business. EBITDA of the segment is slightly down in Q3 linked to the volume drop in various geographies, almost compensated by our cost cutting plan. I'm moving to Slide 32. We experienced a double digit revenue increase in our construction activities in Q3 with a significant pickup since Q2 lockdown. For VWT, first, Q3 was strong with our 3 main desalination projects in the Middle East performing very well. On top of that, we continue to sell cutting edge and digital solutions with a total revenue of €318,000,000 for our TechNote delivery business line since the beginning of the year. For SAD, our network business was almost was also marked with a very active August and a strong September leading to a +10.1 percent increase in revenue, but bookings remain a concern with the lack of tenders in September. Hazardous rate is back to its 2019 revenue with pricing offsetting a slight decrease in volumes due to the industry activity varying by sector. Thanks to the strong performance of construction and the recovery of hazardous waste, the EBITDA of this segment is sharply up in Q3. On Slide 33, you have the translation of EBITDA into EBIT. Depreciation and amortization is down, helped by the ForEx and improved asset management. We continue to have a negative minus €14,000,000 at provision level, including higher insurance provision. And in line with what we told you in July, the JV contribution is a little bit down after the lower contribution of our Chinese JVs in Q1 and Q2. I'm moving to Slide 34, where you have the detailed bridge from current EBIT to current net income. Q3 was favorable for the cost of net financial debt, €99,000,000 compared to €111,000,000 last year with two main effects: the lower cost of our euro debt, which is coming from the continuous refinancing of our debt. It's now at 2.19%. And regarding interest rates in foreign countries, they have declined a lot compared to the same period last year. For example, in the UK, that's been divided by 2 in the U. S, divided by 3 and in Poland, divided by 2 as well. This is impacting positively the swap of our euro debt into foreign currency. This leads to a current net income group share of €149,000,000 for 9 months, €7,000,000 for H1 and €142,000,000 for Q3, Q3 being higher than Q3 last year by €9,000,000 I'm now on Slide 45. You can notice that the CapEx are well under control, especially the maintenance CapEx. As you can see and as Antoine told you, we have maintained a significant level of discretionary CapEx with EUR 211,000,000 for 9 months to continue to fuel the growth for 2021. The 9 months free cash flow is impacted by the low EBITDA in Q2, but the working capital improved by €79,000,000 in Q3, despite the rebound in revenue, thanks to a strong focus on cash by all our management and financial teams. Compared to September last year, the net financial debt is down by €742,000,000 with two main reasons: the net financial divestiture of €461,000,000 and positive ForEx impact of €244,000,000 On Slide 36, you have the main variation of the net financial debt over the 1st 9 months of the year with the effects I have just mentioned. I'm on Slide 37. We keep a very strong cash position and a robust balance sheet with €9,000,000,000 of cash at the end of Q3. As you know, we have partially refinanced, as Antoine produced, the €3,400,000,000 of stress share acquisition by the issuance of EUR 2,000,000,000 hybrid debt on October 14. All refinancing for Q4 and Q1 2021 is done as we speak. On Slide 38, Antoine and Estelle told you. After this very good Q3, where our performance was above Q3 last year, we can confirm our guidance for Q4. Thank you for your attention. Thank you, Claude. And ladies and gentlemen, we are now ready for the Q and A session. Please ask your questions. Ladies and gentlemen, we are now taking We have the first question from Olivier Van Dus Fare from Exane BNP Paribas. Yes, good morning. I hope you can hear me well. Thank you for taking our questions this morning and congratulations on the good quarter. I have two questions, if I may. The first one on your results. So yes, probably Q3 was better than expected. And you can reiterate your Q4 outlook despite the new restrictions linked to COVID-nineteen. I was wondering if you could give us maybe already an initial feel, maybe just qualitatively on what you think those trends might mean for 2021 and how you're thinking today of how 2021 might play out versus 2019 and how significantly you think you might be up versus 2019? Or if you think there's still some degree of caution that we should keep in mind? And then the second question is actually on the situation with SUEZ. So you have indicated that you would exercise your right to vote if it had to go that route and you would need other SUEZ shareholders to actually vote on a potential replacement of the Board of SUEZ. Now I'm wondering, today, I understand that you cannot use your voting rights because of the litigation around the consultation of the SUEZ employees relating to the acquisition of the shares owned by ENGIE in SUEZ. How do you see the risk that actually that situation in terms of the litigation lingers on for many months and effectively prevents you from exercising your right to vote if it would come down to a vote on the sugarcane circuit? That will be my 2 questions. Thank you. Okay. Olivier, thank you first for your congratulations. On your first question Claude will answer. Good morning, Olivier. Even if it's a little bit early to talk about 2021, giving the very good Q3 and despite the 2nd wave of COVID in Europe. You know that we have confirmed our objective to recover our 29 level of operational performance as early as Q4. So there is no reason not to recover our full underlying performance in 2021 with the same trend next year, which will be comparable to 2019. About your second question, Olivier, as I told at the beginning, the longest process for our project is antitrust approval. We will need between 12 and perhaps 18 months, but rather 12 months to get these approvals. And all the other issues will be treated parallelly. So there is no delay for the implementation of our project. And even the social dispute will be solved before we got we will get the approval of antitrust before 12 months. Thank you very much. The next question is from Emmanuel Turpin from Societe Good morning, everybody. My first question would be a bit of a trading update in addition to the comments you made earlier in the call. I would like to focus on waste volumes. Please, if you could just tell us what the status is on your main waste businesses regarding volumes. France was already good in Q3, but there were other parts of the world where overall in Q3 volumes were down. What is the situation now? And I'd love a comment also for your backlog activity, so essentially constructions on the likes of Saad. Where does the backlog stand today? My second question is on the short term outlook on considering the fact we're going back we've gone back into lockdown or confinement, partial confinement in some geographies. I'd love to do the exercise with you, if we may, to compare where we stand today versus where we stand at the start of wave 1, where the name of the game was trying to estimate what the impact of a lockdown would be on your business. We know the answer to that in wave 1. The situation is that today we've got a lockdown, which is less severe. The industry is at work, as you said. And you've been able to adapt the way you are conducting your business. So the question is, we don't know how long this new confinement is going to last, imagining that it could last beyond the 1 month set by most with the authorities in France, for instance. What would be the likely impact on your business in terms of impact on EBITDA per extra week or extra month? Not an easy exercise. I would appreciate your help. And lastly, rebounding on the answer by Claude on the previous question. You were kind enough to answer the question about full year 2021 outlook. I understand that you mentioned that there was no reason that why full year 2021 wouldn't be at the level of full year 2019. I can't help feeling that it's a note below what I had in mind from previous statements that there was no reason why full year 2021 wouldn't be somewhere between full year 2019 and full year on where full year 2021 should have been without the COVID. I'm wondering whether this is the message that you wanted to carry through, I. E, that it may not be as good as you thought you would have thought a few weeks or a few months ago? Thank you very much. Thank you, Emmanuel. Estelle will answer the first question about waste volume. She will also answer the second question about the second lockdown, which have nothing to do with the first one that you will see. And about your third question, you understand that for next year, 2021, we are very comfortable with what Claude told you. And of course, it is not impossible to do better as usual. Estelle, please. Thank you, Antoine. Good morning, Emmanuel. On your first question on waste, I guess I would go into the various bricks, which constitute the answer to that one. So there is volume, price and economical performance, which are the 3 bricks. If I start with price, we've been able to go on with price increase in Q3 as we've had in Q2 and Q1, which I'm super happy about because given the circumstances, we haven't been chasing volume, but we've been going on with protecting price and even price increase. So plus 1.6% of price increase in Q3 in the volume in the price, sorry, in the quarter. With regards volume, which is the second part of the Jigsaw, it's been decreasing by 2.6% in Q3. But I would like to compare it to the minus almost 15% we had seen in Q2. So the bouncing back is really, really impressive. It's not full and complete. As you've seen on the Page 16, typically in C and I collection, where we have still a 5% to 10% in some geographies missing. But the start part of the JCSO is the economical performance, where basically we've been able despite this minus in volume to recover our EBITDA level. So thanks to our recovery and adapt plan. So in a nutshell, this part of the business has been impacted hard by the lockdown and the COVID, has bounced back very sharply, although not fully yet, but has already fully recovered its economical performance, thanks to price increase and recover. If you want me to dig a little bit into the volume bit, so the minus 2.6% in Q3, it's really a mixed picture as Claude already highlighted in the presentation. On the plus side, we have a plus 1% in France. We have a plus something like almost 9% in China, in particular, it has this waste, which is on the plus side. On the minus side, we are still lagging a bit behind in Pacific in Q3 and a bit as well in our refinery all combined effect is a minus 2.6%. So again, the bouncing back of the results has been quite impressive. In terms of the Wave 2, so how is Wave 2 in Europe at least so different from Wave 1 in many ways? First things first, because everything in terms of our operation is still working as normal. So all our plants are open, our management activities are going on, the works and the construction works are still open, which is very different from the situation we were in the spring. As you can see by just walking in the various cities in Europe, it's nothing to do with last April. So altogether, our activities are up and running almost as normal. The only impact we anticipate is on our volume of our customer, so the volume of activities of our customer and pretty much only the commercial and tertiary ones. So yes, we have said there will be a little bit of a minus something in just these commercial volumes, which impact mainly the commercial waste treatment and collection. So very big difference, plus we've already adapted a lot. So our teams have adapted to new ways of working, including with digital and remotely when it's needed. So wave 2 should be very different from wave 1. And outside Europe. And outside Europe, you're right, Antoine. I tell you Europe, the Wave 2 is a little bit of different concept. But I guess there is a big part of the world where the question is more of the reopening and the loosening of some restriction rather than the opposite way around. I'm thinking of Australia, for instance. In South America, it's progressively exiting the most difficult months we've seen precisely this summer. So I guess outside Europe, we're either stable compared to what we've seen in the last 3 months or even improving in some geographies. Thank you, Estelle. Next question? The next question is from Juan Pablo Verdejo from CERO Capital. Hello. Thank you very much for the opportunity to make a question. So just to come back again to the transaction with Veolia. So I think it's raised the extending the offer to minorities. But the question is more on the superior level. So I understand there is one superior of SUEZ, which Agua San Linas, the largest water company in Chile. And my understanding is that the Chilean regulation, the capital market law there mandates back a long rise where there are changes in control. And here, we're effectively seeing a change in control from NT to you guys. So how are you analyzing the legal front at this subsidiary level like in the case like this? Thank you. Excuse me, sir. The connection is not good. Could you please repeat your question? Sure. So the question is, please regard the transaction with SUEZ. So one of the SUEZ subsidiaries is Agua Andina in Chile. It's an open it's a public company that trades in the Chilean stock market. It's the largest water utility in the country. So the Chilean regulation mandates tag along rights, the capital market law tag along rights when there is a change in control. So here effectively, we're going to see a change in control from NT to you guys. So the question is, how are you analyzing the legal front at this subsidiary level? Because we have only here about a minority extension to minorities at the higher level, not at the subsidiary level when there is a law We call Wim Bak. Yes, we understand with this bad connection that you are talking about the Chilean SUEZ water activities and how we will analyze the new political decision about these activities? No, I'm asking about start alone rights. So because there is a change in control, right? So the Chilean subsidiary will go from engine control to Veolia control. So there is a change in control. And Tagalong right. I'm asking about the Tagalong right. Estelle will answer. So I guess thank you very much for your question. Just the first comment on the fact that amongst the very good assets Suez has in its portfolio, we talked a lot Gabriel talks a lot about ADBAR in Spain, but it's right that the Chilean activities are very good as well. They're part of the key assets we've identified in the portfolio for certain and we I guess we like a lot. And altogether, although I'm not a specialist of the Chilean constitution so far. We could say that we have no intention of changing in any way, shape or form the actual structure of Aguas and Dinesh, which is a subsidiary of the subsidiary of ADBAR. So the intention is to say exactly as it is, which is very embedded in Chilean type of activities, including some minority shareholders, I guess, you know, SED being minority shareholder. So the idea is not to change this situation as it is today. Thank you. Next question? The next question is from Andreas Cichard from Berenberg. Hi, good morning. Can you hear me? Sorry, it's Andrew. Yes. Yes, yes. All good. Sorry, sorry. Okay. Thanks very much for taking the question. And good morning, everyone. Just you've obviously covered what you're seeing in terms of volume effects and the trends that we're seeing in Q3 versus Q2. I'm just wondering if you could also maybe expand a bit on what you're seeing from your industrial clients in terms of decision making on new projects, in particular, say, on things like future industrial water projects, for example. Are you seeing any improvement in terms of those companies opening up their budgets again to spend money on new projects? And also maybe if you could perhaps give us a little insight into sort of what sort of trends you're seeing across the different key sectors that you're addressing such as oil and gas, pharmaceutical, power, food and beverages, etcetera, please? Okay. Thank you for your question, Andrew. Basically, the short answer to that one is we are super happy with our industrial customer base altogether. And I will expand a base altogether. And I will expand a little bit on that. But that could have been a question when the crisis has risen and it has proven been super resilient. As you can see, typically on the graph I've just shown on the hazardous waste business. If I expand a little bit on your first part of the question, which was on the backlog and the order book, We are very happy with it. We have seen in our Veolia Water Technology as activities, the order book is really has as it is in this part of as it was last year and is super full. So we haven't seen any drop. I guess there was 1 month or 2 in the middle of the spring, which were a little bit less, but it's been catching us since then. So industrial customers are still spending money as far as we can see or intending to spend some money in infrastructure such as water treatment typically. In China, it's been even more than that. I guess we're even above the normal type of level of activity in the industrial customer base with a bit of a catch up effect of the construction work which were delayed 1st part of the year. So no signal of worrying at all. In terms of the backlog, the only, I guess, attention points Claude mentioned was more on the municipalities order book in France, which is a very specific point linked with the said activities. Apart from that on the industrial side, everything is really good and pretty much everywhere. Next. Great. Thank you. We have no further question at this time. The next question is from Juan Rodriguez from Kepler. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for taking our questions and congratulations on the strong performance due to the current situation. A quick question on my side. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, yes. Thank you. Faiza, on the dividend side, given that there is better visibility on what would be your performance on the Q4, if we could perhaps value a bit more color on what you expect to be on the dividend level, should we see 2019 reviewed level as a basis or maybe a return on a payout ratio or a little bit more color on this side should be appreciated? Thank you. 1, it is a bit early to tell you about dividend and to give you some color about it. But of course, more the results will be good, more we will pay dividend as you could imagine. So for sure, it is a bit early in November to tell you about that. Okay. Excellent. One moment. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from Eddy Popasian from ODDO BH. BH. Yes, good morning. My question is mainly to the SUEZ situation. In your last press conference, you mentioned that all the financing of the remaining 70% was secured by a group of banks. And this morning, we have some information that one of the firm, which is shareholder of SUEZ, the SIAM Fund, was trying to reorganize an extraordinary joint meeting starting from now in order to attend this meeting somewhere in January. And my question was, if they are succeeding, means by forcing the stress board to 1, cancel the foundation and 2, allowing you to launch the takeover bid just after, as you mentioned, the 3 November. Is this accelerated process change something about the antitrust inquiries? It means that are we going to still continue to bet on the 12 months or there is some possible change because your process will be accelerated by the fact that you will be in a position to launch the takeover bid? Many thanks. Okay. So it's just a question about the financing, but about the antitrust delay. So will a supportive Board of Suez on our project, we will be more comfortable and we will be able to go probably quicker for solving the antitrust demand. And so it could cut the delay. But as you know, the global antitrust analysis and what they will say finally will take, I would say, at least 12 months from the beginning. But it will be easier to go quicker with a Board which will approve our project because we will get the help. Help. In fact, my question is, is there any change in terms of antitrust? If you are launching the takeover bid, are the antitrust are going to move from a Phase 1 to a Phase 2, just to be clear and clear in terms of timing too? Not at all. It will not change. And you know that as we told in the press conference last Tuesday, but we hope that we will serve the province in Phase 1 and we will do the rest in parallel. Thank you very much. Thank you. We have no further question at this time. So if there is no more question, we have to thank you all of you for your presence on this call. Thank you for your interest for Veolia and have a good day. Goodbye.