Dear ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the third quarter results 2026 analyst conference call of Fuchs SE. This conference will be recorded. As a reminder, all participants will be in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be opportunity for analysts of Fuchs to ask questions. May I now hand you to Andreas Schaller, Head of Investor Relations at Fuchs SE, who will start the meeting today. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thank you, Nadia, and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is Andreas Schaller speaking. On behalf of Fuchs SE, I wish you a very warm welcome to today's conference call on the results of the first nine months of 2026. We already pre-announced sales and EBIT and the change to guidance on Monday last week, and today we will run you through the full set of numbers. With me on the call today is our CEO, Stefan Fuchs, and our CFO, Esma Saglik. As always, Esma and Stefan will run you through the presentation, which is then followed by a Q&A session. All the documents for this call are available on our homepage, and we assume that you have them in front of you. Please be also aware of our disclaimer on page two of our presentation.
Now, it is my pleasure to hand over the call to our CFO. Esma, please go ahead.
Thank you very much, Andreas. Hello, and also a very warm welcome from my side to our Q3 call. Let me start with the key highlights of our nine-month performance. After a strong first half year, our business developed even better in the third quarter. Sales reached EUR 3.1 billion, an increase of 16% year-over-year. Importantly, growth was broad-based. This strong sales development translated into an even stronger earnings performance. EBIT increased by 25% to EUR 409 million, and our EBIT margin improved by 1 percentage point to 13.1%. This is a new record result and shows the strength of our earnings performance. We continue to grow profitably and efficiently. Free cash flow before acquisitions came in at EUR 92 million. The decline compared to last year was mainly due to higher working capital driven by inflation.
Overall, we delivered an excellent nine-month performance with strong growth, record earnings, and higher profitability. Now, let us have a look at our quarterly sales development. Q3 was another very strong quarter. Sales reached EUR 1.1 billion, up 25% year-over-year and 5% compared to Q2. The growth drivers changed during the year. In the first half, growth was mainly driven by volume. In Q3, volumes normalized and came out better than expected. At the same time, pricing became a stronger driver, reflecting higher raw material costs. After a very strong Q2, we continued our strong sales momentum in Q3. Let us now have a closer look to our sales development. Organic growth was clearly the strongest contributor, adding EUR 359 million, or 13%. External growth added another EUR 68 million, mainly from the full consolidation of our former joint venture in Türkiye.
Currency effects were broadly neutral over the nine months and even improved during the third quarter. In summary, this means that the majority of our growth was organic. Turning now to EBIT, our strong sales growth also led to a very strong EBIT development. EBIT in Q3 reached EUR 149 million, up 27% year-on-year and 10% compared to Q2. This is our highest quarterly EBIT we have ever achieved so far. The strong result reflects that we were able to scale our business on the existing cost base. We have had a good business performance together with effective pricing and strict cost management. Now, let us go over to the KPI summary, starting with the gross margin. Our gross margin remained solid at 34.3%, slightly below last year, and that mainly due to inflation on sales.
Other functional costs increased by 6%, which was well below our sales growth of 16%. The increase mainly came from our acquisition in Türkiye, as well as the higher freight and selling costs. Our at equity also includes a negative one-off impact for the fire in Saudi Arabia of a mid-single-digit million euro amount. Despite this effect, EBIT increased by 25% to EUR 409 million, and our EBIT margin improved to 13.1%. This is a very strong result and shows the improvement of our profitability. CapEx came in at EUR 61 million and remains in line with our full-year guidance. Our Net Operating Working Capital increased significantly. This was mainly driven by inflation and led to a higher capital commitment. As a result, free cash flow before acquisitions came in at EUR 92 million.
Considering the significant inflation-driven increase in working capital, this is still a good cash flow result. All in all, we can say that we managed the inflationary environment well and delivered a record result with higher profitability. Let us now look at the regions, starting with EMEA. Sales increased by 17%, with strong organic growth of 12%. The full consolidation of Türkiye and positive currency effects provided additional support. The positive development was broad-based, with strong contributions coming from Germany, Fuchs South Africa, the U.K., Poland, and Italy. EBIT increased by 15% to EUR 196 million, supported by the strong sales performance. EMEA therefore contributed significantly to our strong nine-month performance. Now moving over to Asia-Pacific. Sales increased by 13% with organic growth of 12%. Australia and China were the main contributors. We also saw strong relative growth across several smaller markets.
Currency effects improved during the year and were slightly positive after nine months. EBIT increased by a very strong 28% to EUR 131 million, mainly driven by Australia and China, as mentioned. The result also includes the EUR 7 million gain for the land sale in Australia, which was recorded in Q1 already. Asia Pacific therefore delivered a very good result with strong organic growth and a significant improvement in earnings. Last but not least, let's have a look to Americas. Sales increased by 14% despite negative currency effects. Organic growth was particularly strong at 17%, mainly driven by North America. South America developed well, with sales clearly above last year. EBIT increased by 42% to EUR 81 million. Both North and South America contributed to the strong improvement. The increase also reflects the weaker result last year, which was impacted by uncertainties around tariffs.
Currency effects improved during the year and turned slightly positive in Q3. Overall, Americas had a strong result with excellent organic growth and a significant improvement in earnings. Now, let's move to the net operating working capital. Our NOWC increased to over EUR 1 billion at the end of September, representing 23.1% on annualized sales. Compared with the year-end 2025, inventories increased by EUR 210 million, mainly due to higher raw material costs. Also, the balance of receivables and payables increased by another EUR 104 million, reflecting the higher price levels. In summary, higher prices have also led to higher working capital, and managing working capital remains a clear priority for us. At the same time, we need to ensure raw material availability and reliable supply to our customers. Looking to our cash flow and net liquidity, our strong earnings provided a solid contribution to cash generation.
Free cash flow before acquisitions came in at EUR 92 million. As mentioned before, the higher capital commitment in working capital had a significant impact. After dividend payment and acquisitions, net liquidity stood at EUR 41 million at the end of September. Considering the impact on inflation, this is a good cash flow result. Our balance sheet remains solid and gives us the financial flexibility we need. Before moving to the raw materials, let's have a short summary. We delivered a very strong performance in the first nine months. Sales grew by 16%, EBIT increased by 25% to a new record level, and our EBIT margin improved to 13.1%. This shows that we were successfully converting our strong sales growth into earnings. Free cash flow was impacted by higher working capital due to inflation. Still, at EUR 92 million, it remains solid in the current environment.
All in all, we are very pleased with our strong performance in the first nine months. Now, let's move to the raw material development. The market environment remains volatile. The conflict in the Gulf region continue to impact important trade routes and infrastructure. Supply remains tight. Higher crude oil prices, freight costs, and risk premiums are putting further pressure on chemicals and base oil prices. Visibility remains limited, and we believe we have not yet seen the peak. As mentioned before, we are well-positioned to manage this environment. Our broad sourcing network gives us the flexibility, and we remain in close dialogue with our customers. As also said in the prior calls, we expect supply condition to remain challenging for some time. Finally, let's move to our outlook for the full year.
For Q4, we expect sales to remain above the prior year level, mainly driven by inflation. At the same time, volume development is likely to slow due to pre-buying effects in the first half year and the usual seasonality towards year-end. Like I said, visibility remains limited. Risks around volumes, costs, and margin remain high. Therefore, we should not simply extrapolate the very strong result of Q2 into Q4. At the same time, our very strong performance in the first nine months gives us the confidence to raise our full-year outlook. For sales, we now expect around EUR 4.1 billion. For our EBIT, we now expect around EUR 500 million. And for FVA, we expect around EUR 300 million, supported by the strong earnings development. Our free cash flow outlook remains unchanged at significantly below EUR 270 million.
This reflects the strong increase in raw material costs and sales prices and the related buildup of net operating working capital. Overall, we are well on track for a strong full year. We remain focused on profitable growth and will continue to manage the current environment with the same discipline as before. With that, I hand over to Stefan for company developments.
Thank you very much, Esma, for the positive update. A few slides on further company developments, I think you have seen this week that we have bought our joint venture partners in Mozambique, in Zambia, and in Zimbabwe. We had a 50/50 joint venture in those countries. We built them up over the years out of our South African business. Fuchs South Africa does extremely well in the last couple of years. We are exceeding now over EUR 150 million in sales. We have made significant investments in the plant in Johannesburg. Out of South Africa, we go into Southern Africa, and those three joint ventures, I think, are now 100% Fuchs-owned. We had also a joint venture, or we still have, with a partner in Tanzania. We increased our share over 50%, and with the same partner, we started a little joint venture in Kenya.
All three of them come to sales of around EUR 50 million in sales and have about, per year, have about 170 employees. So, I think a really cool continent, a lot of customers around mining. It is all about logistics, being close to the customers, and having sales and application engineers on the ground. The other slide shows something we do from our heart every year since 27 years. We call it the FUCHS Sponsorship Award. We give about EUR 75,000 a year, but it is not so much the money, but we really give it to volunteers and initiatives in the city of Mannheim. Mannheim is a worker city, industrialized city, so we have a lot of people either having immigration or income-related challenges. So, I think Mannheim has got a lot of topics. It is accompanied by the city of Mannheim.
You see the second from the right is the Lord Mayor of Mannheim. What we really give all those initiatives, we give them a podium and a celebration once a year. We get about 50 applications, and we award 15 prizes, and it is always a very emotional part, and then we really like to do that, and we will continue to do so. You all remember our acquisition in North America with Nye, which was almost seven years ago, and we bought the company, which is about an hour south of Boston. At the site in Fairhaven, we run out of space, so we have now invested in a second site nearby in Taunton, Massachusetts, where we have opened our Americas Technology Center, which alongside of our R&D lab in Chicago, brings a strong foothold.
Customers there are really semicon, medical, high-end aerospace, satellites, et cetera, and we had a wonderful opening with many customers from North America. The last slide just shows, as you all know, we call that focus area in the FUCHS100 strategy, we call that customer brands. We have got many customer brand relationships with agricultural equipment, construction equipment, food bottling equipment, but also with customers like Mercedes-Benz. The nice thing about Mercedes-Benz is, if you see the bottles, it is their logo on, it is their bottle, but they also have a clear reference to Fuchs with the Fuchs logo on as the technology partner. This is Mathias Geisen. He is a board member of Mercedes, and we started in 2024, and we have now prolonged the contract by three years.
That is all Esma and I have to present, and now we really look forward to your feedback, your questions, and to a lively discussion.
Thank you so much. Dear participants, as a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star, one on your telephone keypad and wait for a name to be announced. To withdraw a question, please press star, one, and one again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. This will take a few moments. Now we are going to take our first question. The question comes line of Michael Schäfer from ODDO BHF. Your line is open. Please ask your question.
Yeah, thank you for taking my question. Hello, everyone. First one is, looking into your organic growth, which you have reported in the third quarter, and my understanding is it is largely price-driven. However, we see some regional differences. My question is on APAC, where you reported, compared to the rest of the group, only 7% organic sales growth. Any kind of color would be helpful. What is driving the APAC right now? Second question is, on your outlook, obviously, with around EUR 500 million, you have raised this. If you just take EUR 500 million, obviously, this would imply a fourth quarter of EUR 91 million. We have, over the past three years, on average, slightly more than EUR 100 million. I wonder what have you baked in there in terms of conservatism or what you really see also, maybe on negative volumes or anything like this.
This would be helpful just to get a bit of a color here. Maybe looking into 2027, I know it is early days. However, as now you talked about challenging supply condition to remain for quite some time, also looking into 2027. How are you preparing for this one, and would this be kind of more favorable or continuing favorable outcome for you? Any color on 2027 helpful. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Michael, for your questions. There were a couple of big questions involved, and I want to start with the outlook for the year 2026. First of all, really, the third quarter really showed us that we have taken the lessons learned out of the COVID period, and we were also surprised by the good development. We saw we had some pre-buying impacts in the second quarter. We saw some less buying from those customer groups, but not as bad as we have anticipated. All in all, the team has done a great job. Yes, mainly the volume increase came from the second quarter, and the third quarter was also the price increase visible. When you look at APAC, two-thirds of APAC is China for Fuchs, and the other large chunk is Australia. We are still happy with the growth in that world region.
The other smaller part is what we call India, Southeast Asia, Japan, Korea. They had an outstanding first nine months, all in. China trading is more demanding, but our Chinese colleagues are still on a growth track. We see positive development, especially to follow our Chinese customers outside of China. Also in the Australian industry, which is also mining-dominated, we were happy, but there were other regions with higher growth rates. Nothing in. For the full year, I think your calculation is right. There are two effects. The one effect is showing the 500 number. It is a big deal for us. This was the FUCHS2025 goal. Nobody anticipated a year ago that we will hit it. What it really comes out at the end of the year, we only know in the middle of January, because we have seen all kind of Decembers so far.
We have seen half Decembers, full Decembers. We have seen one and a half Decembers. Always depends really on the customers, how they finish the year. Therefore, nothing special baked in. No crisis baked in. It is all taken care of. I think the 500 is a big number. Preparing for 2027, obviously, if we can stabilize that base, it is wonderful. Then to build on, with our FUCHS100 strategy, we have clear growth projects in mind. Therefore, it is too early to talk about our budget. I have seen many comments so far, "Oh, 2026 outlook is so big," then the base for 2027. We are not afraid of the base for 2027, but it is too early to talk about a budget now. I hope I answered all your questions.
Yeah. Thank you very much. Very helpful.
Thank you. Your next question comes from the line now of Anil Shenoy from Barclays. Your line is open. Please ask a question.
Yeah. Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you so much for taking my questions. Just the two, please. The first one is on raw materials. You have said that the peak in raw material inflation has not yet been reached, and supply conditions could remain challenging into 2027 as well, even if the Middle East conflict were resolved right now. How confident are you that you would have the pricing to offset this raw material inflation, not just going into Q4, but possibly into 2027 as well? In effect, I am trying to understand, what is your guidance for the net pricing in 2027? The second question is, again, it is very interesting that you said that you are not afraid of the base for 2027.
I was just wondering if you could sort of give a little more color on this Q2 and Q3 EBIT, and how much of it do you think is sustainable? I mean, sustainable, and how much of it is driven by pre-buying or sort of, if you could break it into the temporary effects, that is the pre-buying, competitor supply constraints, and favorable pricing. Which out of those could go forward into 2027, and which out of those would unwind? Some color on that would be very helpful. Thank you.
Anil, thank you for your questions. In regards to raw material, as I said also in my presentation, honestly, the visibility is really limited. I mean, we were seeing, one day you see that the crude oils Group I, Group II, they are plateauing, but we see right now again, the Brent is going up, the prices are going up. In regards to the base oils Group III and Group IV, we know exactly that there is not enough on the market and the prices are increasing. But like Stefan just before said, I mean, we learned from our crisis at the COVID time in 2021, 2022, and we are ahead of the game with implementing our prices in the very close dialogue with our customers. What we are doing is seeing how the market is evolving, talking to our customers, and implementing accordingly the pricing changes.
If it comes to the Q2, Q3 results and what is actually sustainable or not, frankly speaking, we know we had pull-forward effects, especially in Q2. We said also in our last call, we got some orders from customers where other suppliers were not capable to deliver. I think it's an early stage to say what is sustainable or not, but we are quite confident because we have also some contracts which we were closed or which we closed on a longer term, and that we will be capable to carry over some of the gains we have taken in the second and third quarter, carrying it over into 2027.
It's too early, like Stefan said, for 2027, but as we are ahead of the game and as we are actually reacting very flexible, we believe that we can make it, and we are not afraid of the EUR 500 million, as Stefan mentioned before.
Great. Thank you so much. That's very helpful.
Thank you so much. Now we're going to take our next question. The question comes from the line of Manuela Stuerzer from Deutsche Bank. The line is open. Please ask the question.
Hi. First, congratulations on the good results. So, several questions from my side. You mentioned that you see further price increases for base oil Group III and Group IV. Are customers still accepting price increases well, or are you seeing initial signs of resistance? Next, you recently also announced a major step in your expansion across Africa. More broadly, where do you see the greatest earnings upside over the coming years and coming quarters in which region? The third one is, maybe you could provide some color on the split between volume and pricing in Q3, and also how you expect this mix to develop in Q4. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Manuela, for your questions. Obviously, there's always resistance against price increases, and not all of our customers have such a good year as we have it. It's tough for our salespeople, but we also know what we need to get, and we are in constant discussion. As we said before, availability is more important. At the moment, we are through with what we have planned so far. There are a couple of last topics to be worked off, but we are now really thinking whether at the beginning of 2027, we need some more actions. Let's wait and see. As Esma has mentioned, Group III and Group IV continue to be very tight, and looking at the Middle East and the Strait of Hormuz, that will not change.
Therefore, coupled with the availability and our customer relationships, I am sure we get what we need to get at the end of the day, but it is all work in progress. The extension of Africa is really nice. First of all, when you look at our global strategy, without arrogance, but we are one kind of a company because we are the only one with a global setup and being able to fulfill everything from robotic high-end specialties to large mining equipment. We really gained from customers on a global basis, which so far, we have not neglected, but we had so many local opportunities that we never scaled one opportunity from one world region in the other. This was, for example, from large mining houses, which we had traditionally in Australia, now into Fuchs South Africa, but also into South America.
Therefore, the investments we have done in Isando, in our hub in Johannesburg, were very important. We have also enough property for the future. Other world regions, you know, many people say Europe will go down. Well, Europe has got certain industries which are not in good shape, but Europe also has some growth areas. When you look at our business in Poland and in Eastern Europe, and you look at our Northern European business, our guys have done a really great job. Obviously, for me, U.S.A. is still a huge growth potential for us. Canada is a sleeping giant as a potential for us because we are rather small there. Mexico develops very well. South America, we have good plans. What I am really happy of is the entire region of Asia, including Japan and Korea. They develop very, very nice.
Also in China, we have good plans moving forward. I do not see a problem region, and we have growth plans for all our regions. With regard to volume pricing mix, I think I give back to Esma.
Yeah. Thank you, Stefan. Look, in the half-year one call, we already said actually the pricing did not come through. It is a timing. We see right now majority volume, but we will see the pricing. This is also what I tried to explain during my presentation for Q3. The pattern of the setup of the growth is changing. We are growing in the volume, but the majority of the growth is coming from the pricing. Understand that we are never declaring exactly how much the volume growth and how much the price growth is, but we expect for Q4 a similar pattern. So, more coming from the pricing because the implementation took place, it takes time until we are seeing it visible in our P&L. But we still expect also volumes to be strong enough.
Thank you. Very helpful.
Thank you. Now we are going to take our next question, and it comes from line of Sebastian Bray from Berenberg. Your line is open. Please ask your question.
Hello. Good afternoon, and thank you for taking my questions. I have just one, please, which is on the sustainability of market share gains by end industries. My understanding is that Shell has said that it expects to finish repairs on the Qatar Train 2, which was responsible for a great deal of the base oil production that has been lost by the end of the first quarter next year. I am trying to understand how sustainable the market share gains at Fuchs are. Is most of this just engine oil? Can you give a percentage terms of where the market share gain has come from? Is it primarily automotive, or is it primarily other markets? Thank you.
Thank you, Sebastian, for your question. I think for those who are not aware, GTL, Gas-to-Liquid base oil is when we would want to copy that base oil, we mix a Group III base oil with a PAO, and then we get a similar product. Those products go into automotive and industrial applications. One of the Shell refineries was hit in Qatar, and we see it more to the second half of next year to come back on the scene. If you look on all that material has to go through the Strait of Hormuz, which runs at probably half capacity at the time and is much more expensive. From the additional customers we took was only a very minor part from those customers affected from that impact. Then normally, if we got additional customers, we secured them with a multi-year contract.
We do not see that as such a big impact to us, but we are happy for every material which comes back to the market of Group III and Group IV, because also Shell being a big company, when their GTL unit is down, they are a competitive buyer for PAO and Group III, and therefore, once the GTL plant comes back, we are also happy.
That is helpful. Thank you.
Thank you, Sebastian.
Thank you. Your next question comes from line of Martin Rödiger from Kepler Cheuvreux. Your line is open. Please ask your question.
Yes. Thanks for taking my three questions. Good afternoon. I would like to ask them one by one. Just coming back to the last question, when you look at the period beginning of March until today, you obviously gained some market share from this because of the Middle East conflict, either from competitors who are not able to deliver products to customers, or because some customers switch from single sourcing to double sourcing to be safe. In which categories, I mean, product categories, just automotive, or other, let's say, more specific industrial categories, did you benefit the most, and which countries did you benefit most from that market share gains?
Thank you, Martin, for the question. First of all, Group III and Group IV have got longer transportation in the world. We use, for example, Group III materials from Canada, also in Europe partly. We ship it from Korea into North America partly. Therefore, you can't say that this was the one or the other country. The other part of your question, you find those products mainly in automotive and industrial oils. So, either industrial gear oils, industrial hydraulic oils on the specialty side, or in automotive products. So, there is not one specific application or one specific country. I hope that answered your question.
Okay, thank you. The second question is to Esma Saglik. The EBIT in the reconciliation line was a positive figure with EUR 8 million in Q3 this year, while it was EUR-4 million in Q3 last year. Can you explain that rebound?
The holding did very well. Only a joke.
Yeah. That's an answer to the question. Thank you, Martin, for asking that. If you look to the change, questions can come up. There are two elements. Number one, we have, of course, intercompany profit elimination, which we do on the holding level, and that's mainly a timing effect. It had an effect in Q3, but it's a minor effect. The majority of the effect you are asking is the license fees we are having right now on the group level. Our license is based on sales, and we are getting actually license from our regions, countries, et cetera, on a certain percentage of sales. Sales is inflated higher, and that's the reason why we are having now higher license income in the holding.
If you look from a complete group perspective, it is a wash, and it doesn't have an impact at the total result at all.
Okay, super. Then the final question. At group level, you suffered from squeezing gross profit margin in the first nine months because of increased raw material costs. However, in Asia, it is the opposite. You have increased the gross profit margin in the first nine months, according to your handout. How was that possible?
I can answer maybe half of your answer. The raw material impact in Europe was bigger than in North America and in China. That, I think, would answer probably half of it. The other half probably is also a mix upgrade, what we have seen in China over the last couple of months. I think both of that should cater for your question.
Super. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Martin.
Thank you. Now we will go and take our next question, and it comes line of Julia Winckelmann from Bank of America. Your line is open. Please ask your question. Excuse me, Julia, your line is open. Please ask your question. We will proceed with the next question.
Sorry. I think you could not hear me, right? Can you hear me now?
No.
Yeah, now we can hear you.
Okay, perfect. I wanted to follow up on what you see across the different end markets. I think 55% is still around automotive, and the other 45% is industrial mining, greases, and specialty. I think there was already a question on where you saw the most pre-buying, or I think customer wins. Could you maybe also talk a bit about the underlying volume growth across these different businesses, how this is developing, and where you see most growth, where it's maybe a bit more muted? That would be helpful. My second question would be on current trading. Maybe on what you have seen so far in the first 30 days of the fourth quarter, and how the current order book looks like. Also here, how this is different across automotive and industrial. Thank you.
Thank you, Julia. We don't have an order book, so to say, because we are consumable, so we don't track open orders. What we see is an uptick in industrial. What you also read in the newspaper from the economy is going a little bit better. We also see the impact of this pre-buying, which was mainly in automotive aftermarket. That is the current trading. I would say October, we have not seen a change to the third quarter so far. We don't have the figures yet. When you go to the end markets, you refer to 55% automotive. Remember, this is our product portfolio definition. 55% automotive also includes agriculture and mining automotive products. Therefore, you can't say that the auto is the one or the other. It's really different end markets.
From the pre-buying part, we talk about our own automotive aftermarket business. Our own automotive aftermarket business is probably one-quarter of the total sales, and there you have mainly family-owned distributors, and they normally do pre-buying. Most of our large industrial or B2B customers don't have space because either they receive bulk material, don't have large tanks, or they have limited warehouse capacity. The most pre-buying we saw in the automotive aftermarket.
And on the underlying volume growth across automotive aftermarket and outside of automotive aftermarket and in the different industrial businesses, is there any trends you can point to?
No. As I said before, our specialty business is doing well. The industrial business is picking up again. But this is with different light and shadows in the different world regions. I mean, if you go to Western Europe, the car industry is not in such a good shape, so there you see a downward trend. But then if you go to medical, to semicon, to those type of customers, it looks much better. Automotive aftermarket, I explained already. Our OEM business is also to a large extent aftermarket because when we go to customer brands, our OEMs serve the so-called aftermarket. Mining business runs okay, so not one real big one up or down. I mean, it is so fragmented, our business, from applications and world regions, that it really shows that we have a very resilient business model now.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you, Julia.
Thank you so much. Dear participants, as a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone keypad. Now we are going to take our next question. The question comes line of Constantin Hesse from Jefferies. The line is open, please ask the question.
Thank you very much. Can you hear me okay?
Yep.
Yep.
Thanks, guys. I have been having issues [audio distortion] I do apologize if this has been asked, but I just wanted to understand, [audio distortion] into 2027, right? If I think about the building blocks going into next year, you had some [audio distortion] share gains, which means if market share is normalized next year, you could see some pressure on volumes, i.e. volume growth. That is why you said that we probably have not seen pricing peak yet, [audio distortion] price. Would it be fair to say, excluding effects, which at the moment seems to be a positive impact, excluding effects, would it be fair to say that a flattish outcome is realistic at this point?
I mean, Constantin, thanks for your question. We probably understood 70% of your question because we had some issues in the line. But I think whatever was special in the year 2026 should be compensated by year-end. So all pre-buying, which we had in the second quarter, if somebody pre-buys, he has six months in order to use that what he pre-bought. So I think all of that, we start from a clean sheet. Then the other question is, how much new business do we expect? We would see 2027 based as of today, and we have not seen a consolidated budget, that we should go back to normal growth rates, we had in the past, and we gave you guidance.
Constantin, that was also the reason always for why we said we have to remember in half year two, we said we have to look at the full year and not just by quarters. Like Stefan said, all the pre-buying effects we expect to normalize for the full year.
[audio distortion] would be a point where we could see market shares normalizing, and as an impact, [audio distortion] potential a bit of volume adjustment. So you still expect, despite all this, volumes to grow next year over the 2026 base?
As of today, I would say so, in the normal rates again.
Yep.
Understood. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Dear participants, just a final reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone keypad. Dear speakers, we will just give a moment for our analysts.
If there are no more questions.
There are no further questions.
Maybe a final statement from us. We are really proud of that result, and we are very happy. It just shows that our team has done an outstanding job because it is very demanding. We send raw materials from one plant to the other. We live hand to mouth. We had the second quarter with a massive volume increase, and we did all of that, I think, in a very good manner. We were much earlier on the pricing compared to the COVID period. I think still the visibility is very low. I know we have guided differently in the half year. We are as happy as hopefully you are happy, so it came out different. It is really difficult to guide properly because the visibility is low.
What I can say is nobody from our team has expected six or 12 months ago that we hit the FUCHS2025 target of EUR 500 million, and that would be a big deal this year, and we are confident to hit that, and we are very proud of that.
Okay, very good. Then thank you very much for your interest in today's call. If you have further questions, please do not hesitate to contact the Investor Relations team. Otherwise, we wish you a nice weekend, and thanks a lot, Nadia, for helping us with the call today.
You are more than welcome. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating, and we now all disconnect. Have a nice day.
Bye-bye. Thank you.