Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome, and thank you for joining the HeidelbergCement's first quarter 2022 results conference call. Throughout today's recorded presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. The presentation will be followed by a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, you may press star followed by one on your touch-tone telephone. Press the star key followed by zero for operator assistance. I would now like to turn the conference over to Christoph Beumelburg. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to our analyst and investor call on the results of the first quarter 2022. Before we start, let me give you just a short explanation why we moved the call to today, one day ahead of the initial planned date. As you know, we will hold our annual general meeting tomorrow, and based on the experience of last year, the event might take longer than planned. To avoid any timing conflicts with the analyst call, we decided to publish our Q1 results already this afternoon and hold the call now. We ask for your understanding. Today with us, Dominik von Achten, as always, our CEO, René Aldach, our CFO, and the colleagues from the IR team. Dominik and René will go through some prepared remarks before we start with the Q&A. Over to you, Dominik.
Chris, thanks a lot. Welcome everybody on the phone. Thanks for joining us later in the evening in Europe, and hopefully the timing works for you guys in the US. I would suggest we've sent you the presentation and also the press release. In that respect, let me just very quickly go through the key points, and then I think we should take the time for Q&A. I think that's a better use of your time. I'll go to the first page on the key messages, summarizing the Q1 from our perspective. You remember last year, October, we very much discussed with you the question, is there pricing dynamic that Heidelberg Materials can realize? I would say the proof is there, plus 13% like for like without any acquisitions.
I think that is a very strong performance on the top line, and I am very honest with you, that for me was the clear core focus to get the pricing moving. We'll maybe go into some possible details later on. On the operational EBITDA, we go against a very strong comp that is also somewhat with our energy forward buying policy. That's why we'll come to that later on. René Aldach will show you the decision change that we have made in that respect. Overall, obviously, the cost pressure continues in all commodities, freight, CO2. I think everything is going continues to go in the wrong direction in that respect, but with a good top-line growth, we are able to cope with it.
We have significantly upgraded our commercial excellence program, which I think was exactly the right thing to do last year. Also, the timing was good because we started already in the second half of 2021 to get into a good entry point for Q1. Otherwise, this top-line development would never have been possible because remember, the industry was normally going for price increases March, April of each year. The upgrade is steep. We know that, EUR 350 million-EUR 2 billion. So that is a very steep increase. We feel confident about this. We feel very confident about it. We just came out of our quarterly management meetings and the around EUR 2 billion target, I think is very much what we want to achieve.
We will change, on the back of that, our energy forward buying policy, not overnight, but René Aldach will share with you the decision and then also the way we will implement it going forward. Key idea is to take out the volatility that I think has occurred because the top line development is fantastic, but I think the bottom line is too much impacted by ups and downs volatility on commodity pricing, and I think that's not what we would like to have going forward. On CO2, very good progress. We now have monthly and quarterly figures that we would also like to share with you. We are very satisfied with our Q1 development, even slightly ahead of our ambitious internal roadmap target.
Also on CO2, we feel very comfortable. Last but not least, also critical, we confirm our outlook with a strong like-for-like increase in revenues and a slight increase in like-for-like operating EBITDA and RCO. Last but not least, we are very much looking forward to see many of you either in person or virtually on the Capital Markets Day on May twenty-fourth, that we will dedicate to the topic of sustainability. I'll now go very quickly through the other pages. Page 3, you see the development from revenue all the way down to RCO. You clearly see that a big jump on like-for-like development on the revenue side basically balance itself out then on the EBITDA and RCO line.
Clearly down from last year, which was by far an exceptional one-off year for us, but very much in line with 2020 and also 2019. Remember also, Q1 is a fairly small quarter for us. You know, EUR 91 million is a low percentage figure of our total RCO of EUR 2.4 billion-EUR 2.5 billion. So the 91 million is a very small figure compared to that. So from our perspective, I think we are set in the right direction. If you go to the different areas, I think it's fair to say that the quarter was a special one in North America. Why?
Because we have a robust pricing development on the one hand, that differs also between the business lines a little bit. The volumes on our end were quite significantly impacted by heavy winter weather, compared especially to prior year, in the Northeast. You know that we have a footprint that is very much also tweaked to the North and Northeast. We did have some significant energy and freight cost inflation in Q1, but we also took a deliberate decision to get our plants up and running. You know that winter repair and also aggregates plant ramp up is always an important piece in Q1, and we decided to put an extra effort into this in order to really be fully prepared for a hopefully strong Q2, three and four.
That's why I think the North American result is maybe a little bit below your expectation. These are the, I think, very straightforward reasons for it. Europe, on the flip side, very strong pricing. That was also the discussion last year. You know, do we have the pricing power in Europe? I can only say absolutely yes, with three exclamation marks. The top line moves very well, and it continues to move very well in Europe. We are very satisfied with that development. Asia is coming back from big lockdown scenarios in basically all countries, Thailand, India, Malaysia, also Indonesia was heavily impacted. China, you know, there is still a zero-COVID situation, so volumes were a little bit under pressure.
Australia had some flooding, very unusual amounts of flooding, especially in the east. In that respect, a little bit of an impact there. Pricing momentum is building, but is it yet on the levels of Europe? Not. I think we are continuing to move as the volumes come back. Africa, very strong. Just, you know, we talk a lot about portfolio. Look at this, Africa is now the strongest, in absolute terms, the strongest result contributor in Q1. I think in that respect, it maybe also helps you to understand why for us, the African business is quite a valuable contribution. Strong development in Sub-Saharan. Also Egypt now clearly turned around.
You remember that was RCO losing business and also Morocco moving in the right direction. If you look at the price over cost, we always guided that, you know, the first half of this year will be difficult. Second half of the year should then go into positive territory. I think, you know, the Ukraine-Russia war that we didn't have when we talked last pays a little bit its toll again, because the energy costs since then obviously went through the roof. And pricing also did move, but it's not yet good enough to cover the full delta. But the trend continues to be positive. Also now we check the latest figures for April as far as we already have them.
I think the trend moves clearly in the right direction. We are very confident that we will be able to close this price over cost gap throughout the year. Operating EBITDA margin, I think, as I said, with a low quarter, this fluctuates a lot, so I would not spend too much time on this point. I think page seven is more interesting. You see the commercial excellence program with the dynamics on pricing. We talk about domestic cement price increase and without giving too much away, this line will continue to rise. If you look at our April figures, this will continuously creep up by quite a significant steepness.
In that respect, we feel very comfortable to raise the target of the commercial excellence programs up to EUR 2 billion. The operational side with EUR 150 million, we are also confident to reach. René, you wanna take over on the new energy policy?
Thanks a lot, Dominik. Hello to everyone. Just to explain to you what we have changed and why we have changed this. As you know, in the past, we had a rigid policy that we only go 12 months out with our electricity forward buying policy. You see the green bar, that was a little bit the minimum what we could have done for the next 12 months. The new policy will go further out, up to 4 years. You see that the old maximum will be now the new minimum for the front year.
What we want to do with this, obviously we want to take clearly volatility out, because now with this huge energy volatility, it's obviously difficult to plan and to guide properly and to manage the customers. How do we do this? Obviously, we will not lock in now with EUR 250 for this year or for Q1 2023. Year three, year four. Now there are numbers which you can lock in, which are, example for Germany, below EUR 100, or we have locked in already volumes which are below EUR 100, which is 50-60% below what we have right now. We start that very smooth.
We lock in every quarter a little bit to get a proper average cost for the respective years. For now, what we said, for Q2, Q3, we stay on spot for the open volume, because the spot rates are clearly cheaper than the forwards for this year. I guess that's a good change into the right direction to take the whole volatility out and to allow a proper guidance.
Okay, we go to the portfolio page nine. We continue to optimize. We always said this never ends. You know, we have added an acquisition in the U.S., in the Atlanta region. We've also tightened the net in Czech Republic, which is a very important market for us. We increased the vertical integration, both acquisitions should help also to push the sustainability offering into key markets. Both the Czech Republic and Atlanta are also very strong on that. Lastly, you saw the announcement on Giatec this morning or yesterday afternoon, actually, where we bought a significant minority stake in the Giatec Scientific company that really will drive our sustainability and digital efforts and complement our offering not only internally, but also externally in link also with Command Alkon.
Last but not least, we stick to our guidance for 2022. As I said before, strong increase in revenue, slight increase in operating EBITDA and RCO. We will keep our CapEx net below EUR 1.2 billion as guided. We will target to get to the ROIC around 9%, and we'll keep our leverage between 1.5 and 2 times. Just a sneak preview to the Capital Markets Day, it is clear, and we've always made it clear that we are fully committed to our sustainability agenda in case. I think it's clear that especially also with the hiring of Nicola Kimm, we have clearly put an additional focus on this topic.
I think after she had now about nine months to ramp up, we will basically then also give you a full picture of our strategy update going forward that will center around sustainability, but that will also talk about the offerings to the customer, that will talk about the technologies, including carbon capture, and that will also talk about our R&D efforts as well as our financial story, how do we make this happen for both our customers, but obviously, very importantly, also for our shareholders. I think that should be an exciting event in a couple of weeks time, and we are very much looking forward to seeing many of you following that event. With that, Chris, I would hand back and then we'll go into Q&A.
Thanks. Operator, you wanna start the Q&A, please?
Ladies and gentlemen, we are starting now the Q&A session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star followed by one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star followed by two. If you're using speaker equipment today, please lift the handset before making your selections. Anyone who has a question may press star followed by one at this time.
All right. First in line is Elodie Rall from JP Morgan.
Hi, Elodie.
Hello. Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. My first one would be on your guidance. You seem quite confident that you can actually post still some like-for-like improvement in EBITDA for the year. I'd like to understand what gives you that confidence, given the slow start, okay, Q1 is small, but nevertheless, and given that concentration is still ramping up. That would be my first question. My second question is on price-cost. You said, you expect the price-cost gap to close over the year. Can you give us a bit more granularity about when you think that will start showing? Do you expect that to be already the case in Q2?
Should we expect price cost to be flat in Q2, or is this more back-end loaded in your model? My last question would be on what would be the impact on your sales and on your numbers, basically, if natural gas supplies from Russia were to stop?
Thanks a lot, Elodie. I would say, let me take the first two, and then I'll do René on the gas supply for Russia because he covers obviously the energy buying. On the guidance confidence, Elodie, absolutely, we are confident on the guidance, and I think it's very much linked to the ability to move the top line. Yes, you are right. The cost increases are still coming through, and that will also be true for Q2, because remember, Q1 and Q2 last year was still with very much subdued energy costs. But the price increases are moving. We are very confident to deliver the EUR 2 billion that we shared with you. You remember that's above 2% average inflation.
The real increase is even. The nominal increase is even higher. In that respect, I think it's important to understand that that is where we take the confidence. Is there a slim remaining risk that the cost increase will still be higher if something unprecedented happens? Absolutely. We all know there's no guarantee on that. As much as we can influence it for now, we are absolutely confident that we can deliver on the current guidance. Price over cost, I indicated to you as we always said, H2, we are very confident because if you do the calculations, it needs to turn, otherwise, you know, the guidance wouldn't work.
Absolutely, in the second half, it needs to turn. How much it already turned in Q2, it's very difficult to predict. Again, we go against a strong Q2 last year. April was super strong. May was also okay. June was a little bit lower. You know, to predict this on an exact month, Elodie, difficult to say, but clearly for H2, we expect this to turn positive. Okay. Elodie, I'll come to your last question, impact on sales if gas supply stops from Russia. As our exposure to Russian gas in our European business is very low, so there is no direct impact. But what will happen is if the gas supply stops, obviously you will have an impact on the gas supply power plants.
To be honest, I cannot give you a professional answer what will happen, yeah. Obviously then pricing of electricity will go up, but as I said, we don't use gas a lot in our plants, so there's not a material impact, a direct impact, but electricity to be seen. That's crystal ball, what will happen then.
Thanks, Elodie, for your questions. Since we have many questioners on the line, can I ask, please, everybody to limit his or her question to two at a time. The next question come from Gregor Kuglitsch.
Thank you.
Yes.
Hey, Gregor.
Gregor.
Hi. Good evening. Thanks for taking my question. Maybe two. Going back to your hedging slide, can you just, and forgive me, maybe you have mentioned this. Those ranges, can you just give us a sense like what's the range, essentially the new minimum effectively, say, by December? Is it, I don't know, 60%, 60%-80% or whatever, just so we can sort of roughly size the hedging. Then the second one is sort of on the demand outlook. You've talked a lot about price cost. I think that's clear. What are you thinking on demand? I mean, we're starting to see, particularly for example, in Germany, the developers and REITs and, you know, are starting to pull back a little bit because of, you know, higher costs.
I think there was one home builder that just profit warned now. Can you just give us a sense what you think is gonna happen, what you're seeing, and any color? Doesn't have to be Germany, maybe sort of anecdotes around the globe after your management update with your various country heads. Thank you.
Hi, Gregor. I take the first one. The ranges for the front year to come, I'll give you a range. We should be around, let's say 50%-70%, which we target.
Okay. Thank you.
On the demand side, Gregor, I think it's a valid question. I would say that's a little bit crystal ball. We do not see a drop-off in demand. It's also, remember now, April, May is difficult because there's a lot of holidays. There's Ramadan. You know, it goes back and forth here and there. There is also some shift between the months. To have clear visibility, I think it takes a couple of months before that has balanced out. From what we hear from the countries, there is no significant drop-off in demand at this point. Now, is there anecdotally here and there a point where a project has been put on hold or postponed to start? Yes.
That, I think, that's fair to say. More so, maybe in one area versus others. I think that's not from what we can see right now. There is no significant impact on demand at this point. Now how this plays out with volumes and pricing, Gregor, very difficult to predict.
Okay. Appreciate it. See you soon, hopefully in two weeks.
Yeah.
See you soon.
See you there.
See you soon, Gregor. Looking forward to that. Next question comes from Luis Prieto from Kepler Cheuvreux.
Hey, Luis.
Hi, Luis.
Good evening. Thanks for taking my questions, two from me. The first one is with the new target in the Commercial Excellence Programme you're aiming for, if my calculations are correct, for about 13% overall pricing growth. If I'm looking at it on a full year basis, I mean, if this is achieved in 2022, which I assume is what you're implying. In this context, and also combined with Elodie's question about when you would turn positive in terms of price over cost, what sort of cost inflation are you factoring in for the year in terms of percentage? And my second question, and then coming back to Gregor's question, you mentioned demand increase in all business lines in 2022.
Are you concerned about interest rate and wage rate trends damaging residential demand at some point? Isn't that something that keeps you awake at night? In this context, where would you place your residential exposure at present? I'm trying to figure out if residential demand falters, what could be the impact on Heidelberg Materials. Thank you.
Yeah. Luis, thanks a lot. Maybe, René, you wanna take the first one on cost inflation, or should I do the one on the interest rate first?
We can do. Hi, Luis. Let me talk about the cost inflation. What we assume, I give you the one for energy and then a little bit of guidance for the rest. Yeah. As for the energy cost inflation, we see roughly 50%-60% for the full year. If you assume and you know the number roughly we spent last year €2 billion, and you put that on top, there's €1 billion energy cost inflation on top, yeah, which we will cover through the €2 billion Commercial Excellence.
The other billion is just across the others, raw materials, logistics, freight, whatever, staff cost, whatever you can imagine. Yeah, it's EUR 1 billion energy. The other billion is other costs, which we will cover via the EUR 2 billion price increase.
On the interest rate, Luis, remember for us residential, and that's the global picture. It's the global split of the pie, about one third residential. It's only if you wish to say so, one third of the cake. Now, I would say in the U.S. for the time being, we receive quite resilient demand despite increase in interest rates. Let's wait and see how this plays out. It also depends a little bit how quickly the interest rates will move up. I think also in Europe, the residential sector is still quite resilient.
Remember interest rates are clearly below inflation right now, so there is quite a also a good incentive to lock in interest rates for now also for the residential side and continue to build. I we do not see yet a significant fall off. In the other markets, Africa and APAC, there is very limited residential impact at this point. Interest rates are still fairly subdued because the volume is also not really coming in that respect, as I said earlier. The interest rates at this point do not keep me awake at night. May that change? Yes, but right now I think we are still in safe waters.
Thanks for the question, Luis.
That's perfect. Thank you.
The next question comes from Brijesh Siya from HSBC.
Hey there.
Hi.
Hi, it's good afternoon. Good afternoon. I had two as well. The first one is on the pricing. If I look at the pricing, you reported in December was around 13.3% increase, and now for Q1, you talk about 13.5%. Just wondering if you could give a little more color how the kind of the momentum is building up as we move towards April, May. The next question is around Egypt, and there I believe the agreement with government is up to June 2022. Have you seen any change or any talk with the government at this point in time to extend that production kind of gap to further out into 2023 or 2024?
You were talking about Egypt, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yes.
Listen, on the pricing, as I said earlier, you're right about your December number that we just closed in the last call. The trend goes in the right direction. If you look at the month, May that you mentioned, March, April, it's above, obviously. Otherwise, we would not end up at the EUR 2 billion. It's above the 13%, so we continue to move in the right direction. On Egypt, the negotiations continue. This is the typical normal cycle. At this point, we remain confident that their agreement will be prolonged, but there is no final decision to the best of my knowledge at this point. But obviously the negotiations continue. As I said, we remain confident that this will be prolonged.
Thank you. The next question comes from, Yuri Serov from Redburn.
Hey, Yuri.
Hi, Yuri.
Yes. Hi. Hi. Can I ask my questions one by one, please? The first one, the topic that we don't really talk about that often, but it will come. CO2, you're still not spending any money on buying any permits. When is that gonna change? When will you have to start buying permits for your CO2 emissions?
Yeah, Yuri, if you don't mind, let's park that question for the next 10 days, and we'll come back to that 'cause I know it's on everybody's minds. I don't wanna spend now 30 minutes taking also a little bit the thunder from the Capital Markets Day. We have understood that this is on everybody's mind. You know, the question around how many certificates do we still have? How do we play it out with our investments that drive down the CO2, including carbon capture? What is the CapEx amount? What does that mean for the total business model? We know that's on your mind, and we will address that question diligently in the Capital Markets Day.
If I may ask you to just be patient for another 10 days, that would be fantastic on that one.
Okay. Another one. I don't know whether it's qualifies as a question or a comment, but your energy forward buying policy, the change, I'm just wondering, aren't you too late? 'Cause the prices for energy are astronomical, and everybody expects them to start falling whenever next year or year after and normalize over time. You know, if you start forward buying now, you will actually lock in high costs rather than low costs.
Let me make one general remark and then. You're right with your remark. If we would do that could be stupid, and that's why we don't do that. Maybe if that was misunderstood, then, René, maybe you clarify again, because that's exactly what we want to avoid, huh?
Yuri, yeah, your comment is absolutely right, and that's why I said we start with the outer years where pricing is significantly down, yeah. The move to these limits, yeah, will not happen now overnight. We don't start now in Q3 buying 60% of our exposure for 2023 now with these elevated prices. This is clearly what we are not doing. The move to that policy to come to the limits that I have shown in the chart, that takes a little while, yeah. Because as I said, we will lock in quarter by quarter over the next months and years percentages to get a proper average cost for the outer years, yeah.
As I said, we don't start now locking in for EUR 250 per MWh. That would be stupid, I would agree with you.
Yuri, if I may add, the orientation point is always the long-term average. You know, we are not buying on peak rates. That's one point. Then I would say there is a life beyond forward buying because, you know, if you look at the spot rates, there are parts of the year where the spot rates are clearly cheaper than forward buying rates. I think this is becoming a quite an art, a very sophisticated setup. We changed the general rules for, we've done a very diligent analysis over the past months. We do this without any haste. What we still clearly will not do is to do stupid things in terms of buying at completely elevated levels.
Okay.
Thank you.
Since you didn't answer my first question, can I chip in with another one, please?
Okay. You are clever.
Exceptional, yes.
Yeah, yeah.
Yes.
Okay.
Go ahead.
Okay. You had a very strong performance in Africa, Mediterranean, and you mentioned a few places were strong. Can we talk in a bit more detail what you think the outlook for that region is? Do you think that you can deliver +13% growth in EBITDA for the full year? And if so, why? From which places?
Sure. Yuri Serov, I know that, you know, we don't talk a lot about Africa in too much detail. I think maybe at some point we should also do a deep dive on some of our emerging markets. I think it's clear we've also shifted the portfolio in Africa for a good reason. You know, we were at very, very many places. We have divested out of a couple of places. Sierra Leone, for example, we divested. So we are, even within Africa, focusing on some core markets that are driving both the top line growth and the bottom line impact. We strongly believe that Africa, mid and long term, has a good growth trajectory. Remember, it's a growing population. It's the cement per capita consumption is the lowest in the world.
The return on invested capital goes through the roof. If we would just operate in Africa, we would never talk to you again about our ROIC performance, because it is very, very attractive. There are good reasons to be in Africa. Is it easy to operate in Africa? No. I think we have figured out how to do it over many years. It's a strong management team set up, and I think the core markets we have always shared with you. I think it's clearly Morocco. It is Egypt. It is Ghana, Tanzania and Sub-Saharan, also Togo, Burkina Faso. You know, I think those are probably the key markets for us that we will continue to build out.
We have made our strides in Tanzania. We'll continue to do some more. We should also not underestimate the sustainability impact that Africa may have. Stay tuned on this. There's more to come because, you know, I always internally tell the story about the mobile phones. You know, nobody has a fixed telephone line in Africa because they have spared billions of investments by just going into the mobile phones. I think there is some quite nice potential also when it comes both to sustainability and digitalization in Africa. We should not underestimate that continent. We feel very comfortable with our position in Africa.
No, I agree with you. Are you saying that it so happens that all the key markets where you are growing very fast right now?
At this point, that's the case. Will that stay? You know, Africa remains also a little bit volatile. Some markets will outperform others. I think, you know, you saw Egypt, you know. We need to fix it then at some point, and then you enjoy the situation again. There may be also bumps in the road here and there that may happen. You know, you need the management excellence to cope with these things in order to make the overall performance work. As I said, for us, it's very much also contributing to the top line growth. I think this quarter again shows that the Africans can absolutely deliver on that.
Okay. I understand from your answer that you're not really suggesting that you can deliver double-digit growth in EBITDA for the full year. It's too early to sell. Is that right?
It's too early to say, but I would also say no.
Okay, thanks.
You sneaked in five questions. Very clever, Yuri. The next in line is Sven Edelfelt from ODDO BHF.
Hey, Sven.
Hi, Sven.
Yes. Good evening, gentlemen. Thank you for taking my question. Can you share with us your hedging for H2? I believe you 100% hedge for Q2, especially in Europe. Can you share a little bit in H2 if it has changed compared to your previous release? That would be the first question. On the second one, can we have an update on the Command Alkon investment? Where do you stand, and is there some new element important to share with us? I think it was a substantial investment that you did back in September last year.
Hi, Sven. I take the first one. I give you a rough forward buying percentage. What we have for Europe for the second half of the year, we are sitting roughly about 40%-55% for electricity for H2.
Sven on Command Alkon. The transaction has just closed end of April. There was a slight delay on that. That was on the one hand we were a little bit surprised. On the other hand, it shows us that there was quite some interest on this investment because the European Commission for EUR 7 million I think turnover in Holland went into the details. That took some time to clarify. No issue, but only closed now by end of April. You know, we have one board member focused on the topic of digitalization.
He's now also residing in the U.S., so we take it very serious and they have gotten operational 24 hours after the deal closed. They have already made the necessary management changes that were targeted for a long time. So we really get going now. Early days, but we are very confident that this will be exactly the right investment going forward. You know, we will focus the Capital Markets Day now on sustainability, but the next one will then be focused on digitalization to bring some more color on the whole setup. You know, you also saw the announcement on Giatec that will also contribute a piece of the puzzle to the whole exercise.
We remain very confident that we are on the right track there.
Okay. Thanks, Sven. Next one comes from Nabil Ahmed from Barclays.
Yeah, good evening. Thanks for taking my questions. The first one is on North America. I know it's a small quarter, and I understand volumes were impacted by weather, but some of your peers seems to have managed better price cost in the region. Is there anything specific holding back your pricing here? And maybe if you could elaborate a bit on whether this is primarily a U.S. cement problem or if it includes other materials and Canadian cement as well. And my second question, actually, sorry for that, but I can't resist the temptation to talk about the Capital Markets Day on the 24th, which I understand will focus on sustainability, which is, of course, a key topic.
Should we also expect some update in financial targets and maybe strategy, or visibility is simply too limited now to discuss midterm targets?
Yeah, Nabil. First of all, let me answer the two questions. I think in North America, we've also obviously followed the results of the competitors. We cannot comment because we don't know the details. We can only look at our own feet in that respect. The picture is a little bit scattered. You know, the North American footprint is all the way going from Canada over the Midwest to the North East and then to the South. Remember, our Southern footprint is less pronounced, very much tweaked also to aggregates, less so cement. So I think there is a footprint element on our end, combined with the weather. You know, we are following the pricing and the cost development very diligently in each of the different regions.
As I said, I think pricing, we are quite on our right move in cement. In other materials, I think here and there is still something to be had. I think that's fair to say. You know, we remain also very ambitious on that end. On the cost side, you have to be very careful because there is obviously then also a large inventory play always in the first quarter combined with weather. There is the whole winter repair element, which is obviously tweaked very much towards cement, but also to aggregate.
I think if you put all of that together, as I said earlier, Nabil, you know, could this all put together have been a little bit better from our perspective? I would say yes. I think we should be fair, but is this way out what we think the whole year can then deliver? No. I think that's that one. Then on the Capital Markets Day, yes, the focus will be sustainability, but yes, you should also expect an upgrade or an update to, not to take away too much thunder, an update on the financial targets. That will then also obviously be part of the Capital Markets Day on May 24th.
We will also give an update on the strategic direction in some elements. It will be the combination of the three that will comprise the story. Obviously, that's why it shouldn't be a surprise to you know, we always said sustainability is the core of the strategy going forward. That's why I think you also deserve to understand how we combine this with our financial targets and our other targets that we are chasing.
Thanks, Nabil.
All right. Thanks.
Next is Cedar Ekblom from Morgan Stanley.
Hey, Cedar.
Cedar.
Hello. Two questions. Can you give us what your group pricing was across all products and all regions in the first quarter? I know that you got 13.5% in cement, but clearly your price cost development was negative. You're guiding to 13% for the full year, effectively. I'm just wondering how far you are off that mark in the first quarter. Secondly, again, on price costs, how much of your negative cost impact in the first quarter could we think about being linked to some of the points around extended maintenance in the U.S., just to get a better understanding of what maybe the underlying price cost development was in Q1? 'Cause it looks pretty weak versus some of your peers that have reported.
I just wanna see if we can sort of back out how you see your underlying performance. Thank you.
Yeah. Let me make maybe a general remark on your second point. I think, Cedar, I think as we said, for us, the core focus was getting the top line going, and I think in our key markets, I think the top line is absolutely moving in the right direction. I'm not quite sure whether I understood your first question exactly right. In terms of average pricing, I think the pricing on the group level is as we disclose, and that obviously differs region by region. I'm not sure whether that's what you all were asking, but
No, I'm not. The pricing that you've disclosed, I think, relates to cement, or is that across? If I look at slide 7, it says here domestic cement price increases, but I'm wondering what it is across all products, if we include aggregates and ready-mix, because clearly you delivered 13.5% in cement, which is below the sort of 13% that you get if you look at your Commercial Excellence Program for 2022. Even with that 13.5%, you had negative price costs. I'm just wondering what's the average-
Yeah, yeah.
The blended number across products. Thank you.
Yeah. Yeah, I understood. The cement price increase is indeed leading a little bit compared to the other products into ready-mix that makes a lot of sense because there is only, you know, not all products necessarily are increasing at that rate. Cement is one of the key ingredients. I think on aggregate, as I said earlier, I think there is clear progress, but there's also a footprint issue in this one, so René will maybe add something to that. René?
Cedar, the aggregates number is not far off the 13%. We are talking there, roughly 11%. For ready-mix, as Dominik alluded to, there's a little bit footprint here and there, which is, ready-mix is just below 10%.
On the extended maintenance figure, Cedar, I think it is not so easy to peel out because it's not only the extended maintenance, it is also then an inventory impact that you have to put against it. I think the price over cost element, as I said, it's the first quarter for us. You know, don't forget what René was sharing with you earlier. It is for us not a surprise that there is now also you know in the competitive comparison quite a tweak in the numbers because that very much depends on your forward buying policy and the way you have locked in quarter-over-quarter different commodities.
I'm quite honestly long enough in the business. This is for me now a quarter-over-quarter fluctuation, which I understand from your capital markets perspective is not so easy to follow. From my perspective, in the end, everybody has a fairly similar cost if you take it in the long run on commodities, but it does differ now quarter-over-quarter. That's also why we have decided to change our forward buying policy because as much as you have a hard time to follow this now, we want to take that volatility out. I think this will now take a couple of quarters to do that.
I think it's a more level playing field.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks, Cedar. Next question comes from Bank of America, Arnaud Lehmann.
Hey, Arnaud.
Hi, Arnaud.
Hello, good evening. Thank you for taking my questions. I guess the first question is on Spain. I appreciate you have sold already those assets, but there was an article about some capacity closure in Spain due to the high cost of energy. It's something that you have experienced in March in many other places beyond Spain, and have these Spanish plants been reopened? Secondly, I'm just trying to link your new energy forward buying policy, which is, as I understand it, aiming to reduce the volatility in the cost base. That makes sense. How do we link that with your new pricing policy in Europe, which was actually potentially implying more volatility in your selling prices in Europe?
Does that mean that this pricing policy eventually will not be needed anymore and you can, let's say, progressively increase your cost and progressively increase your pricing? Or am I misunderstanding it?
Arnaud, let me start and then René may add on, especially on the second piece. I mean, on Spain, the capacity closure, that's for us, Spain is not a core market. To the best of my knowledge, there is not a broad closure of capacities here and there may be some smaller pieces. That's not what we have seen beyond the example you mentioned from Spain. On the energy forward buying policy, I think I said it earlier. For me, it is the forward buying policy to take out the volatility on the bottom line, not on the top line. Because the top line is only partly driven by this energy piece.
You know, I said it very clearly from our perspective, with the transformational step change that the industry has to do, my personal conviction for Heidelberg Materials, but that's only my view, is that from our perspective, the price point for a ton of cement that comes from Heidelberg Materials and the price point for a ton of aggregates, but especially also the price point for cubic meter of concrete, will need to materially change, because the product gets much better. You know, if society wants a carbon-free product in the end, this will not come at the same price point. From our perspective, that must change, and that's why for me, this price development here is only partially driven by energy price increases.
It is driven by the necessity that our customer base and their customers need to understand that the price point will change. We will make a competitive edge out of this. That's why I think we are also very convinced that we will convince our customers that eventually, if they want to get these superior products, they will also be willing to pay the increased prices. We've also not tied our pricing to promises, you know, if the energy prices come down, the prices will come down again. There may be volatility, but there is no link to 100% on this end, exactly for the reason that I've shared with you.
Thank you very much.
Thanks, Arnaud. Next one comes from Tobias Woerner from Stifel.
Hey, Tobias.
Hi, Tobias.
Yeah. Hi, thanks for taking my questions. Two from my side. You've alluded to one of them actually just now, which is that you won't give back pricing if costs come down. I understand in the industry across numerous countries, in Germany in particular, price increases have been sent out as an energy surcharge. Is that incorrect or is that right? That's the first question.
Tobias, I think as I said to, you know, that's why I said not to 100%. I think there are different elements that deliver on the pricing side and markets by markets. Please understand that I cannot comment, also for competitive reasons, I cannot comment on single markets. There are different elements that lead to this price increase, but I can only talk for Heidelberg Materials. For us, the large majority are real price increases. Are there energy surcharges here and there? Yes. The vast majority are price increases that are not energy cost related in their argumentation, at least not to 100%. That's what I said earlier. Are there surcharges in some markets? Yes.
They may fluctuate, but we don't talk about the majority of these increases.
Just secondly, with regard to your energy cost hedging, I mean, I might not have gotten this correctly here, but you talk about electricity and gas. What about your coal buying across the world and your petcoke buying?
Okay. Tobias, yes, we talk about electricity and now coal. As you know, for petcoke, you can't do financial hedges, yeah? That's not possible. That's just availability, physical availability. For the others, it's where you have API2, API4, that's difficult to do. Therefore it's about physical availability. If you look at India or Indonesia, yeah, that's local markets where you can't do much with forward buying, let's say. Same for Eastern Europe, yeah? There's a little bit opportunity what you can do for Germany and Benelux, yeah? But that's in the whole scheme of things, it's limited, yeah?
That's the answer to this. There's no such, let's say, view on okay, we can now lock in 20% of coal for Q4 for country X. That's not how it works, and that's for everyone the same.
Yeah. Maybe just two additional thoughts on this one, Tobias. I think North America, keep in mind that's longer term contracts in coal, huh? I think so you don't buy typically spot, that's longer term contracts. So that's not an important market. And secondly, you know, I think there is a link with alternative fuel rate push, you know, that we have increased substantially our alternative fuel rate target, and especially in some markets that René was sharing with you, that has a significant impact on our total coal and petcoke bill. So I think, you know, that is one reason why we accelerate our agenda on alternative fuels in order to also reduce the exposure on fossil fuels.
Right. In essence, very little of your fossil fuel bill is hedged.
The hedge is as well for us, yeah, if we have a long-term contract in North America, yeah, that you can call as hedged because the pricing is fixed. Yeah. We have as well in some other countries. What you can't do, you can't do for all the countries, let's say for all the deregulated markets, let's say like in electricity, you can't do the same hedging policy or hedging process like you can do for electricity. That's clearly not possible.
Tobias, I think just to give you an indication, you know, for 2022, around 60% are covered. In your words, hedged. It's not like we sit here,
With spot.
With book on coal. That's not the case. Okay?
Okay. Excellent. Thanks a lot, and looking forward to seeing you all at CMD. Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you. We have two more questions, one from Yassine Touahri from On Field Investment Research.
Yassine.
Hi, Yassine.
Yes, good evening. So a couple of questions. My first question would be on the volume. I think in the first quarter of 2022, your volumes were up a couple of %. Have you seen any change in the month of April? Is it around the same? Is it a bit better, a bit worse? And then my second question also around volume, when you're guiding for a small like-for-like increase in EBITDA, what kind of volume contribution do you have in mind in your guidance?
We have to do the second piece. I think we have been, you know, we didn't split this in volume and pricing because that's still, you know, the guidance anyway, is a guidance. It's difficult to do the exact split on volume and pricing. To answer your first question, on the volume side, you know, the numbers have been disclosed for Q1. As I said, April is difficult to judge because you have to take out, there is a lot of, there is a big shift in working days between last year April and this year April. There is also the Ramadan shift. There is Easter moving around. So I think very careful with these numbers.
If you try to do a like for like comparison, we are still confident that we are on the track that we target for the full year. Thanks very much.
Thanks. Lastly, Harry Goad from Berenberg.
Hey, Harry.
Harry.
Hi, good evening, and thanks for taking my question. I've got two unrelated questions, please. The first one is, regarding, I guess the price inflation we're seeing in cement everywhere. I'm particularly focusing here on emerging markets. Are you concerned at all that at some point we might see some level of, whether it's government or state intervention to put some form of price caps in place to contain sort of local build cost inflation in some of those emerging countries? The second question unrelated is, can you just give us an update on your thoughts on the buyback program? Because it looks, I think from what you were saying this evening that the second tranche will be finished by the end of August.
I guess the question is will the final third be completed this year, please? Thank you.
Harry, let me answer your two questions. One on the price inflation state intervention. That's not what we see at this point. You know, we very much watch also the cost development for other construction materials in each of the core markets. Although our price increases may seem high from a historical perspective, concerning our products, compared to other products on the construction site, they are minimal. If there would be an intervention, clearly we are not the first ones to target from our perspective. That's at least if you look at the facts, and that's also not what we've seen so far, that there are broad state interventions on the pricing side.
On the buyback, Harry, I understand your impatience. That's very much welcome. We are all impatient, but let's first do the second tranche. Again now, we have some time, I think, and we'll take the decision as we go along. That's what we've done with the first one. You know, then we are a couple of months further down the road. One step after the other, and then we'll continue to move as we have concluded once we have concluded the second tranche, huh?
Fantastic. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. That concludes our call just within the hour. Thank you very much for dialing in. May I remind you of the Capital Markets Day again, twenty-fourth of May. For those who haven't registered, please do so for the virtual part, and there are still a couple of slots open for physical attendance. In case you change your mind, wanna come to lovely Heidelberg, more than welcome here. See you all in a fortnight.
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