Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Rheinmetall's Q1 2023 conference call.
Before I start on page three, I would kindly raise your attention to our legal disclaimer on the following page. Now let's start with page number three. Q1 was in line with our expectations. Operational sales performance benefited from the overall positive trend in our security businesses, and we reported the best operating free cash flow ever in a starting quarter. We are again expecting a very pronounced seasonality in the year 2023, largely driven by the growing sales share of the Weapon and Ammunition business. At equity contributions made the difference in both starting quarters. While the operating result in the Q1 2022 included a positive At equity effect, the Q1 2023 was quite the opposite.
Summarized, a negative deviation of minus EUR 29 million and in addition, the burden of the inflation compensation payment. We reported an IT incident at the end of April with an isolated effect on our civil businesses. There was at no time any danger that the incident was transmitted to the defense network, and we are currently in the process of bringing all systems back to normal. Last but not least, we confirm our full year guidance. Once we have closed the Expal Systems deal, we will provide an updated guidance.
Please turn to page number four for an overview on the market. The new Minister of Defense, Boris Pistorius, had a strong start. He is clearly trying to make change happen in his domain. Things in Germany start to happen.
After the Puma issue was final, finally resolved by mid-January, we have booked the Puma upgrade contract in the Q1. We are awaiting a decision on the second lot in the course of the second half. We have made really good progress with the ammunition framework contracts for tank and artillery and some vehicle programs, like the airborne platform Caracal. In addition, the government to government deal with Australia for the Heavy Weapon Carrier is now taking shape. Lockheed and Rheinmetall have recently signed an MoU regarding the cooperation on a rocket artillery system for the German forces. This opens a completely new field for Rheinmetall.
Please move on to page five for the presentation of our Ukraine business. The support of the Ukrainian people remains a top priority for the European Union and the German government.
As you can see on this slide, Rheinmetall is trying to support with all available resources. Order intake for Ukraine reached year to date around EUR 700 million. This includes the delivery of the first 20 Marder from our own inventories until the end of March. More demand for tactical vehicles is expected. Ammunition is clearly in focus, and we have signed contracts for medium caliber, tank and artillery rounds, together with additional service components such as field hospitals and automated surveillance systems.
We are expecting to receive further orders because the financial funding from Germany and the European Union to further support Ukraine has already been committed. Please continue on page 7. Sales grew operationally by 7.7% to almost EUR 1.4 billion. Currency and mergers and acquisitions did not have any material effect in the Q1.
All divisions, but Weapon and Ammunition, were able to improve year-over-year. The decline of the operating result by EUR 19 million to EUR 73 million was mostly attributable to negative at equity contributions from our Chinese joint ventures and the Hungarian joint venture for IG. Our German employees received an inflation compensation payment in the Q1. This was an additional burden to the P&L, and we are expecting a similar payment for the Q1, 2024. Special items have a supportive effect and reside from positive market to market valuation effects of our liquidity reserve. Basic earnings per share for the continued business rose from EUR 1.08 to EUR 1.15. In accordance with IAS 33, we report the diluted earnings per share of as well EUR 1.15 due to anti-dilutive effects.
Please turn to page 8 for a more detailed analysis of Rheinmetall's seasonality. Quarter 4 is a quarter with the highest business impact for Rheinmetall. We realized on average over the last three
years, 1/3 of our sales and more than 50% of our operating result in the last quarter. The second half is representing more than 50% of sales and almost 3/4 of the total operating result. We are expecting that Weapon and Ammunition will continue to be a growth driver for the group, and combined with the spending behavior of our governmental customers, the trend to expense at the end of the budget year will most likely continue. Therefore, we recommend to anticipate this back-end loaded pattern again for the year 2023. Let me move on to page 9 for the details of the At Equity results.
If we compare the operating performance of the group excluding the At Equity results, we would report an improvement of more than 12% to EUR 85 million year-over-year. The Q1, 2022 reported a positive contribution from At Equity in the amount of EUR 17 million, including a high single digit positive effect in the division Weapon & Ammunition, as well as positive contributions from the China joint venture. China flipped from positive into negative territory in the Q1, 2023, and we had a negative At Equity contribution from our 25% stake in 4iG in Hungary. 4iG reported a net loss for 2022 and the Q1, 2023, driven by non-cash write-offs, which in total accounted for around EUR 12 million.
We are assuming that the 2022 business development of 4iG will basically continue in the year 2023. The Metalworkers Union negotiated an inflation compensation bonus, this first impact in the Q1 2023 accounted for a high single-digit amount. Please turn to page 10. The Q1 2023 was in fact the best operating free cash flow ever of a starting quarter and came in at -EUR 105 million, after -EUR 463 million in the previous year quarter. Due to a delay into April of one payment, we missed the targeted break-even.
We were able to collect a lot of receivables in the Q4 2022, and received as well first prepayments from our international customers. Inventory buildup continued, but at a much lower level than in the previous year.
Moving on to page 11. The successful placement of the EUR 1 billion convertible bond had a structural effect on our balance sheet. It is still liquidity neutral in the Q1, but the accounting treatment of the convertible has an impact on the equity and debt positions. We book the option value of the convertible in equity and treat the difference to the received cash as debt. This explains why equity increases to EUR 3.2 billion and the equity ratio drops to 34.7%. Let's have a look at the divisional performance on page 12.
Vehicle Systems reported a strong quarter with sales improvement of more than 15% to EUR 462 million. Higher leverage and a strong performance of tactical vehicles drove the operating result to EUR 42 million after EUR 29 million in the previous year's quarter.
Result, margin improved to 9.1%. Operating free cash flow rose by EUR 31 million to minus EUR 94 million, mainly on prepayments, which were partly offset by inventory buildup. Weapon & Ammunition sales declined from EUR 258 million to EUR 238 million, as increasing orders from the German customers were not sizable enough to compensate the effect of missing Expal licenses in South Africa. The previous year included a favorable at equity contribution, as already mentioned.
Adjusted for this effect, margin would have improved and reached an excellent result improvement of 10%. Cash collection and carefully managed working capital led to the best operating free cash flow in the Q1 ever. The operating free cash flow was clearly a highlight and a result of the high cash collection of Q4 receivables.
Electronic Solutions reported a 20% sales growth to EUR 201 million and more than doubled the operating result to EUR 10 million. This generated an operating margin of 5%. This very positive development was largely driven by the ramp-up of the Hungarian Lynx and high volumes for personal equipment. The division successfully reduced their receivables and improved operating free cash flow by EUR 36 million to -EUR 71 million. Sensors and Actuators grew sales by 4.5% to EUR 363 million, suffered a decline in operating results of 50% to EUR 13 million. Sales growth stayed behind comparable overall global production growth of 8.3%. The operating result was hit by additional raw material cost increases that have not yet been passed on to customers.
Materials and Trade increased sales by 4% to EUR 198 million. This sales increase was mostly volume driven.
The drop of the at equity contribution from our Chinese joint venture was a major driver behind the decline of the operating result from EUR 60 million to EUR 12 million. The currently sluggish light vehicle demand in China is mainly affecting higher priced luxury cars of Western origin, which happen to be our main customers. Before IG at equity contribution is reported in the line non-divisional and consolidation and is a reason for the decline of EUR 13 million. Please move on to page 13. Rheinmetall nomination declined by 8% to EUR 3.1 billion and booked business and frame nominations remained on previous year's level. The order intake was EUR 278 million below last year.
Please bear in mind that we reported the single biggest ammunition order for Hungary with a volume of around EUR 850 million in the Q1, 2022. Compared to an adjusted 2022, the order intake looks much better and is composed of quite a few orders across the divisions. Rheinmetall order backlog has crossed the EUR 28 billion level and we are expecting to see further growth. This takes me to my last presentation slide, number page 15. We have presented the above guidance only seven weeks ago. At this stage, we don't see anything that poses a threat to our guidance, and once we have closed the Expal, we will have a closer look at the guidance and provide you with an update.
Thank you for your attention and now I'm available for your questions.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press nine star on your telephone keypad.
If you would like to withdraw your question, press nine star again. In order to have a clearly structured question and answer session, we would like you to ask one question at a time. Once you receive an answer to your question, you may move to a second question. Please refrain yourself from asking multiple questions at once.
Thank you.
The first questioner is Mr. Christoph Laskawy of Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, and thank you for taking my questions.
The first one before I continue with others would be, very publicly, the German MoD, was making statements to speed up procurement, has implemented changes, safeguard that, as well. Do you actually already see the benefits of that? And as a result, could we expect sizable order intake from Germany before the summer break? Or is it more likely that we'll get press announcements after the summer break?
Thank you for your question, Mr. Laskawi. We expect for the full year 2023, a high order intake and, of course, we are working on getting orders in the Q2 and compared with the previous year's quarter it would be significantly more.
Thank you.
The second question is on the at equity result, thinking how that should turn into Q2. Should we expect another negative as we've seen it in Q1 from your 4iG contribution? Or is that basically done now and it should be more normalized going forward?
Well, in the Q1, 2023, we have an impact of 4iG from the Q4, 2022 and the Q1, 2023. In the coming quarters, the at equity result, which we expect to stay negative, is a lower single-digit number.
Thank you.
The last question would be on the Autos business. Sensors & Actuators clearly dropped in earnings, year-over-year because of, as you highlighted, inflationary pressure. Do you see any improvement in the negotiations with the OEMs? Do you get pass-throughs already in Q2, or should we expect that largely being back end loaded? Thank you.
I would expect that largely more back end loaded, due to the fact, of course, that we had our IT incident, in April, end of April and of course that affects somehow the whole organization, and therefore we see it more in the second half of the year.
Thank you.
Yes, thank you.
The next questioner is Mr. Sven Weier of UBS. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. Hello, Ms. Steinert.
The first one is, would be a follow-up on Christopher's question on order intake, and you just kindly said, it will be substantially higher than Q2 last year. Now, my question really is, given that you differentiate between frame nominations and order intake, I think in Q2 there's a lot of ammunition framework agreements coming from Germany, in particular, a couple of billion EUR. What about the core order intake, so outside the frame nominations, what are you expecting there?
Regarding my question to the order intake in Q2, compared with previous years' level, of course a significant increase, that includes these bigger ammunition orders which we expect to come in the 2nd quarter, but some of course as well in the 2nd half of the year. Overall, the order intake should remain on a high level.
Understood. Thanks for the clarification. Maybe if I may, can you just help me understand the booking of the order intake regarding the Leopard tanks for Ukraine? Because I guess that was not yet booked in the Q1. Is that all coming in Q two, or how should we think about that?
It's not yet booked. That's right. We are expecting it in the months to come.
That was a fairly significant number as well, right?
Right.
Understood. I was just wondering, as a quick follow-up to the IT issues that you've mentioned. Is the incident that's only affecting the Sensors & Actuators business, and what's the kind of cost you would expect it to relate to that incident?
The IT incident affected our whole civil business, that includes not only Sensors and Actuators, as well as Materials and Trade. Of course, we will have some additional cost to set it all up again. If you think back in 2019, we had an attack as well on our civil business. Overall, the additional cost which we had to spend was middle single digit number. Therefore, we are very confident that this IT incident will not substantially affect our performance.
Understood. The final one from me, is just on the push outs you had in Q4. I remember you had around, I think, EUR 300 million push outs from Q4 that we were normally expecting in Q1. Is that revenue level related to South Africa, where you're still missing the Expal approvals? Or am I right, or it's something else?
No. It has been several, yeah, orders or sales and it's not related with these South African ones.
Those delays have not been booked in Q1 yet?
South Africa, no, there's no Expal.
The other delays that we were expecting for Q1, the EUR 300 million, is that still to come or?
Well, partly it came in in the Q1 and some of them are expected to come during the rest of the year. For instance, the tactical vehicles.
Very clear. Thank you very much, Ms. Steinert.
One more questioner is Ms. Virginia Montorsi of Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon. Thank you for taking my questions. Two for me.
The first one would be, you've kind of touched on this, but on Weapon and Ammunition, could you give us a little bit more color on exactly what drove the lower or weaker operating performance and anything you can tell us in terms of how to think about the phasing for the full year? Thank you.
Overall operational, we have better performance in the Q1 because it's all linked to at equity contributions which are negative in the Q1 2023, plus these higher single-digit number of inflation compensation, which we had to pay in the Q1 due to the agreements of the unions. Therefore, within our fully consolidated businesses, the operational performance is much better compared with previous years' quarter.
Okay, thank you.
That's really clear. Maybe last question from me. We've seen Australia publishing their defense spending review, they've significantly lowered the number of vehicles for the Lynx contract that I think you mentioned a few times you were confident you could sign. How should we think about order index for this year, given that, I guess, Australia's numbers of tanks are changing a little bit?
Well, the number of tanks in Australia, yes, it is reduced. About the timing of the order, I'm not going to mention any quarter or any month because it took us already a long time where we expected the order income and, as you know, we didn't got it so far.
Okay, thank you very much. Very clear.
Yes, thank you.
The next questioner is Mr. Christian Cohrs of Warburg Research. Your line is open.
Yes, good afternoon.
Thanks for taking my questions. First on the Ukraine, you mentioned the support and the business you've made with Ukraine. A couple of weeks ago, CEO Papperger was in the press stating negotiations with the Ukraine government about a potential manufacturing site for the Panther. Can you maybe elaborate how this potential project or idea has developed in the meantime?
Well, there is no decision as of today, but of course, we are in negotiations and talks with the government and Mr. Papperger mentioned, yeah, 7 weeks ago that he expects a decision within the next, like, two months or 10 weeks. Therefore, we hopefully have an update within the next month.
Okay. Thank you.
Second question relates to your group minorities. These were actually positive, +EUR 3 million versus -EUR 13 million 1 year ago. Despite the fact that if you strip out the equity, if you strip out the equity earnings, that the fully consolidated businesses have achieved higher earnings this year, and especially this is also true for Vehicle Systems. Maybe can you shed some light on the minority side, which Actually, what are the moving parts to explain this massive deviation versus last year?
Well, of course, if you look at the minorities, it's the number of minorities which are part of our fully consolidated companies. One company, for instance, is a South African company, Denel Munition, where you see a difference in performance. Then we have, of course, our. Hold on, let me just look it up. We see truck business where we have a swing, a little bit swing in the performance, and then there are several other smaller companies. That all ends up in the reported numbers.
Okay. It's a mixture of a broad mixture.
Yeah.
I'm surprised, to be honest, by the magnitude of the swing.
It's, I just would like to remind you on the seasonality of our business and, it's just the Q1. Don't, put too much, like, effort on the Q1.
Okay, understood. Thank you.
I have one more questioner.
It's Sash Tusa of Agency Partners. The floor is yours.
Okay, thank you and good afternoon.
I just wanted to check whether there had been any change to your expectations for the closing date for Expal or indeed the antitrust issues or financial issues associated with that transaction.
Well, we expect to close this acquisition in the beginning of July and we are quite confident that it will take place there or then.
Good. Thank you. There are no questions at the moment, therefore I will repeat.
Ladies and gentlemen, if you still have a question to pose, please press nine star. There seems to be no further questions in the queue.
If there are no more questions, I would like to thank you very much for your kind interest, and I would like to close the call with a brief summary. The Q1 was absolutely within our expectations. Our operational performance improved further in the Q1, and operating free cash flow made a significant move in the right direction. Finally, we confirm the current guidance with an outlook that we will provide an update once we closed the Expal deal. Looking forward to meet you on the road. Goodbye. Thank you for your interest.