K+S Aktiengesellschaft (ETR:SDF)
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Earnings Call: Q1 2021
May 11, 2021
Welcome to the K Plus S Conference Call regarding the publication of the Quarterly Report Q1 'twenty one, hosted by Doctor. Burkhard Lohr, CEO and Torsten Becker, CFO. For the duration of the call, you will be on listen only. However, the end of the call, you will have the opportunity to ask questions. And you'll be connected to an operator.
Please note on Page 2 of the presentation, you will find the disclaimer. I am now handing the call over to Doctor. Berhard Lohr to present the figures. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our Q1 call. Before we start with the Q1 results, I would like to comment on our latest achievements. Contrary to the expectations of some observers, we completed the sale of our North and South American salt business to on April 30. Kitla's Edge has implemented the most decisive component of the package of measures announced in December 2019.
This is an important milestone in the planned reduction of debt. The net proceeds of around €2,600,000,000 will be entirely used to reduce debt. Accordingly, the level of indebtedness will improve significantly. The enterprise value amounts to US3.2 billion dollars corresponding to a 13.4x 2020 EBITDA, and the amount was paid entirely on the closing date. Mark Roberts left the company with closing.
We would like to thank Mark for his significant contribution during the course of his 29 years career with K Plus S. As a dedicated leader, he plays a decisive role in shaping K plus S and we wish him success in the future endeavors And all the best personally. Since April 1, Holger Rinsperger has been responsible in the function of COO. We welcome Holger and look forward to working together with him. And now, ladies and gentlemen, let's turn to Slide 4 for the Looking at the results of the continuing operations, we achieved higher revenues and a higher EBITDA year on year.
Although we have seen strong price increases on MOP especially Since the beginning of this year, our average selling price in agriculture was slightly below the level of last year's Q1. Due to the favorable winter weather, we achieved a strong increase in de icing volumes by 1,100,000 tons to 1,300,000 tonnes in the Q1. Strong demand and higher product availability also resulted in increased sales volumes by 100,000 tonnes in the agriculture segment. Higher freight rates and energy prices could be more than offset by strict cost discipline and positive effects from currency hedging. Following our impairment on potash assets last year, we will see value flopburations on the assets quarter by quarter.
Because of higher potash prices, we increased the value of our potash assets by €180,000,000 This was the reason for a strongly increased adjusted net profit. Q1 free cash flow was burdened by higher Funds tied in working capital as well as the cash out for the SG and A restructuring project after being boosted by the sale and leaseback of the office building in Kassel in Q1 last year. Accordingly, it amounted to minus €15,000,000 Now please turn to Slide 5 for a closer look at the agriculture market. Since summer 2020, we have observed significantly rising prices for the main crop commodities. This was due to poor global harvest last year, notably in China.
Consequently, falling stock to use ratios, mainly on corn and soybean, have triggered this price development. With higher agriculture prices, farmers' income and their prospects have risen significantly. Although with strong demand, farmers switch from a cost minimized to a volume optimized mindset with very good affordability. Please turn to Slide 6. Following the very good market conditions in agriculture, we have seen a continue to see strong demand for potash fertilizer in more or less all global markets.
We now expect global potash sales In 2021, including 5,000,000 tonnes of specialties to reach a record level of between 74,000,000 76,000,000 tonnes, Especially the price for granulated MOP in Brazil has risen by more than US100 dollars per tonne since the beginning of the year. The Indian contract price of US2.47 dollars per tonne agreed at the end of January was adjusted to US280 dollars per tonne only 2 months later. This adjustment was made after the announcement by the main potash producers to refrain from supplying at the initially low contract price, which didn't reflect the market situation. Because of the new India contract, prices in the other Southeast Asian markets also increased. With further increasing product availability from our Bethune mine, we can also benefit from the high price level in the U.
S. Therefore, our flexibility as only potash producer with production sites in 2 continents is paying off. We started with a strong performance of our de icing salt businesses in Q1. Already in January, the winter weather in Europe was above average and especially in February was a record month in terms of de icing sales volumes. Even at the beginning of April, we had cold days with snow and night frost.
We are therefore confident to see a good early field business We saw COVID-nineteen related lower demand in Q1 compared to a normal year without pandemic impact. At the same time, the chemical industry recovered strongly, and we benefited from higher sales volume, which further increases the consumer products executed the already strong business from last year's Q1. Now please move to Slide number 8. We now come to our outlook for the current year 2021. I already described the positive market environment for fertilizers.
We are therefore optimistic of achieving moderately, not only slightly, Higher average prices for our agriculture product portfolio year on year. We continue to expect Sales volumes in agriculture to rise. After a good winter, we expect more than 2,600,000 tons of de icing salt sales for the year as a whole. And the notable savings of the SG and A restructuring cannot fully compensate for the overall rising costs, especially for freight and energy. Currency effect will also have a negative impact.
Overall, we expect EBITDA from continuing operations to increase to range of €500,000,000 to €600,000,000 in the current year, which is €16,000,000 more than in our last guidance. This continues to include the one off book gain of around €200,000,000 generated at the closing of the REX joint venture. Our adjusted free cash flow including the cash in from the sales of the Americas operating unit will be significantly above €2,000,000,000 Now our free cash flow without these proceeds for 2021 is still expected to be negative. Please turn to Slide 9 for our all new strategy. We revised our vision and mission including our mission statements.
On this basis, the ongoing strategy process has been launched. Our aim is to complete it by late summer of this year. Today, I will therefore focus on the key aspects of our strategic work guiding us. Our new mission statement is, we enrich life 4 generations. This clearly demonstrates our commitment to making the great resources of nature available in an environmentally responsible way to create value and help for people.
Our range of products and services will be developed for generation to come. The following five principles reflect our approach and therefore please turn to Slide 10. We ensure nutrition, health and safety. We enable the success of our customers. We are committed to sustainable mining.
We leverage our unique infrastructure for economic efficiency and we act as a partner with our communities. In developing our new strategy, we are focusing on the following 4 key aspects. 1st, we will make our existing business even more robust. By 2023 at the latest, we want to be capable of generating a positive free cash flow at each of our production sites even at low potash prices. We are not only focusing on cost efficiency, but also on optimizing our product and regional mix.
First method will already have been implemented by 2022. From 2023 on, our capital expenditures will also stabilize again. This year and next, however, will be once again have to face high environmental expenditures, mainly due to tailings pulp style expansion. 2nd, we will continue to further develop our existing business, for example, in the fertigation business. 3rd, we will tap into new business areas.
For this purpose, we want to leverage our unique infrastructure in particular. Our future joint venture X is already impressively demonstrating the potential of this approach. And 4th, our climate strategy. Over the past 30 years, we have succeeded in reducing our CO2 emissions by around 80%. By 2,030, we have set ourselves the target of reducing our CO2 emissions by a further 10% using our own resources.
At the same time, production is set to rise. Technically, we are able to reduce CO2 emissions to 0, but this requires a competitive price for green energy. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes my presentation and we are now happy to take Your questions as usual, 1 by 1, please. Operator, please open the line for our Q and A session.
1. Once answered, we will move on to
your next question. And you will be advised when to ask your question. Our first question this morning comes from the line of Christian Faitz from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Yes. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. I have a couple of questions. I'll ask them 1 by 1.
First, With the Brazilian echo market expected to be very dynamic heading into the new season, will you shift some of your vacuum capacity from China to Brazil? And what is the volume development at this point pertaining to shipments into North America?
Yes. Thank you, Mr. Pfitz. Yes, we are of course trying to optimize values and that means we ship whatever we can in areas with a high netbacks and of course, respecting our customer relationships. Bottleneck is the capacity of our granulation in Bethune, which is still in the ramp up.
And that's why we are already shipping all we have into the Brazilian market. And we will double the volume into the U. S. Coming from close to 100,000 tonnes and we'll end up this year with something Slightly more than 200,000 tonnes. But that's the maximum we can do for the time being.
Then another question. Would you please elucidate the latest legal proceedings pertaining to the mining based prosecutors? Thank you.
Yes. That is easy, Although it doesn't look like that in the press, the Prosecutor Office has closed the investigation against our deep well injections of the past. And that's the full story. Unfortunately, the press has made much more out of it. And it looks like the whole story will start again, Which is not the case.
It's closed, finally closed.
Okay. Great.
Perfect. Thanks for the question.
All right. 3rd and final question, please. Now that you have the year roughly €2,600,000,000 cash in from Americas, Can you give us an update on your discussions with creditors about a potential early retirement of some of your outstanding debts? Thank you.
Yes. Kristian, it's Toff here. We have already paid back The outstanding amounts of the or the drawn amounts of the RCF of the term loans we had, we have Also paid back the matured Schuldschein Darling. And we are currently in the process of giving back, let's call it giving back, canceling the KFW line, which was never drawn. And we are also in the process of contemplating of how to use How to make best use of the remainder of the proceeds.
But I don't want to go into details what instruments we will or will not use. That's something we need to analyze in detail and we will be we will do in the next couple of months.
Okay, great. Thank you very much. Thanks.
Thank you very much. Our next question comes from the line of Lisa Denis from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning everyone. So my first question and I will ask them sequentially relates to the EBITDA building blocks for 2021 and I'm most interested and an update on the raw material inflation component. So last time you've guided to $70,000,000 for freight and energy. Is that does that still stand? That's 1.
And 2, does
it mean Can we please answer 1 by 1?
It's still the first question. I'm sorry, guys.
Okay, then go ahead.
An update on the raw Inflation and how that fits into the EBITDA bridge and on the EBITDA bridge, whether there could be more upside to that if potash prices continue to be trending upwards? That's the first question. Thanks.
Yes, Lisa, when it comes to raw material, This is not the position where we saw the most inflation. The most inflation when you look at Q1 over Q1 was in freight and energy Price related and material it's less a question of cost inflation. It's more a question of availability of products. I would never thought or you would probably never thought that lack of wood in Europe would affect us, but it does when it comes to The usage of pellets, for example, yes. So our procurement organization is currently managing the Product flows and support materials flows at best.
But this is more Actually, more an issue for us right now than the sheer cost inflation. We see a normal cost inflation for now.
Okay. That's super helpful. And can you just also explain why your European policy were sequentially lower? I mean, what's driving that? Is it product mix or it's something else?
No, it's indeed product mix. When you look into the details of The Q4, we had a lot of specialties, higher priced Specialties were shipped into overseas markets. And this turned around in the Q1, so less specialties into overseas markets, A little bit more specialties in the European markets, but this is where the difference between the Q4 price and the Q1 price comes from mainly.
Okay, great. Thanks. And then last question and I'll jump back into the queue. Can you give us an update on the wastewater permits and to which extent You will require 1 in 2022. Thank you.
Yes. As you might know, the EPEL injection will run off by the end of this year. And we are working on the new solution to handle with this water, Actually the production waters to deposit them in an old mine called Springen. The door is wide open because the necessary regulation between Thuringer and Hessi were made in December last year. And now we are working intensively with the authorities in Hesse and Thuringia to get the permissions.
And we are very optimistic that this is going to happen soon and that we are then be able To start deposit the water into Springen, the mine old mine Springen from 2022 on. And it's not even required by January, February, March. Usually, we did not even use the DIPEL injections In the 1st quarters of the year. So if we get the permission by May, we are still very fine. But it's all green.
Okay, great. Thanks so much.
You're welcome.
Thank you. We now have a question from the line of Markus Mayer from Baadera. Please go ahead.
Good morning, gentlemen. I also have 3 questions. I also will welcome 1 by 1. First one is again on the EBITDA guidance bridge. On the freight rates, can you give us Some help how your assumption for the freight rates for the full year has changed if there was any change?
So we are expecting I think it's easier to give you a full picture. We are expecting Roughly €40,000,000 higher freight costs in total, only price related Then in 2020. So that is the biggest cost And there is no change against what we said in the past.
Okay, okay. The second question would be on this €100,000,000 Value fluctuations in plant, property and equipment. I think it's hard to for analysts to assess how this Could fluctuate this then and most likely also the potash price and the demand environment. But is there a chance that you can give us a sensitivity analysis for such value fluctuations?
Markus, I wish I could. And I can tell you we are as fluent as you are with this volatility on our balance sheet below the EBITDA line. We have to make when we did the impairment, we cut into PPE because there was not much Goodwill from the CGU Polish and magnesium available, so we cut into PPE. And according to the IFRS rule, we have to do the testing every quarter. And unfortunately, we will indeed see Volatility, moving along with many, many input factors, pricing is only 1.
Price is what drove Now the Q1 development, but also FX developments and costs and CapEx and you name it, we change it. So we have to get used to this unfortunately and it's really sorry for now it's not possible for me to give any guidance on this. We have to follow this IFRS rule, and we will, and but we cannot give you any guidance on that for now.
Maybe as Adam mentioned, there's also no chance that you can change its reporting or there's obligations to do so?
Only if we change IFRS rules, and that's not enough.
Okay.
Then the last Question is, again, on, yes, guidance. If I remember correctly, you have now €2,000,000 From year higher, that potash demand guidance or assumption, is this €2,000,000 higher demand coming from MOP solely or is it also coming for SOP as well? And from also from which region is
decided on coming from? Yes, thanks for the question. So we are very happy to see the development of the market and the Tumor. I think we are In line with our competitors expecting a higher market development or higher market demand than And last year was already strong. And this comes mostly from MOP, mostly from South America and Asia.
And yes, that leads to the fact that all producers are very busy and have high utilization rates.
Okay. Thank you so much.
Welcome.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Alex Jones from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much for taking my questions. 2, if I may. The first one is around CapEx. You mentioned in the prepared remarks that environmental CapEx will still be high in 2022. Will it come down at all compared to 2021?
Or should we be expecting a similar level of environmental spending as this year?
Alex, for this year, we will remain on approximately last year's level, which was A bit more than €400,000,000 It will go down over time. We will see the 1st decline certainly in 2022 and another step down in 2023 then. But for this year, it remains at last year's level.
Thank you. And second question, a little bit more longer term. I know BHP is Scheduled to make a decision on the Janssen project in the middle of 2021. So I'd be interested in your thoughts around that decision and what impact a project approval in your view would have on the market longer term?
Yes, that's an interesting topic and it pops up Felt every time this year. But first of all, I would like to stress that This shows that the market where we are already in and with a very good position is obviously a very attractive market. And I of course cannot judge on how the decision would look like, but we are quite relaxed because even if they would decide to continue That would not lead to significant additional volumes before, well, let's say, 2027. And then they should not even then they would not face a significant delay and you know how big projects could look like. So it's quite a while ago or it's still a couple of years to go.
And if you see how the market has developed Over the years, let's take the step up from last year to this year. This is one full Bethune mine
that
we have seen as additional demand. So the world will look differently than today in 2027.
Thank you. Welcome.
Thank you. We now have a question from the line of Michael Baum from Sona, please go ahead.
A few questions from me. Firstly, can I just confirm that no income has yet been booked from the REX JV? When will that take place?
Yes. I can hear myself. Can you please Mute, mute for a second? Sure. Yes.
Okay. So there are no earnings recognized from the REX transaction. And here we are again dependent on external offices, in this case, the EU antitrust offices. But we expect the close to see in summer this year, unchanged.
Okay. My second question, you haven't broken out the EBITDA by segment, Industry and Agriculture. Can you give me that split, please?
Yes, Michael, that's also a change with Q1 reporting because we do not look at EBITDA any longer. The company is now much smaller after the sale of the OU Americas and only OU Europe is left. And Given the nature of our business and the production setup, we do not scale the company on this basis anymore. So we won't have these numbers In future, neither internally nor externally available.
Surely, they're internally available. You must know what you're making In terms of profitability in the agricultural side?
Yes, we do, but not necessarily on a GAAP basis.
Okay. And then in terms of your guidance, which again appears low given the pricing environment, Can you share with us what your assumptions are for pricing in terms of your guidance? I mean, I come up with a number Pre reqs of around €450,000,000 of EBITDA for this year. And I'm just wondering if I'm missing something or are you just continuing to be very conservative?
Yes. That is always difficult to assume a development of pricing for a couple of months. You have seen the high volatility, and I believe the volatility will continue. But what I can tell you is we have We are expecting moderately increases of the prices, and we expect that the prices will continue to increase For the full year. So no stop of this increase.
If you call it Conservative or not, we will see at the end of the year, but that is now our assumption. And yes, We are not so far away with our midpoint from what the market has expected.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Welcome. Welcome.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Oliver Schwarz from Warburg Research.
Firstly, two questions from my side. Firstly, I heard you say that there was no income from this REX joint venture recognized In Q1, that's obviously correct because REX is not yet an entity. However, the assets You are, as I said, low form part of the Eurexor interventional. Obviously, you will have come up with the result in Q1. Could you please disclose sales and earnings for these activities?
Yes. The business that we are running now is the business that we rent in the past And the only indication that we were giving were that we are having annual EBITDA of roughly €20,000,000 out of that business. And it's in that ballpark for the Q1. Of course, a portion of Q1 is in that ballpark. We wouldn't like to disclose more than this.
Maybe we think about Doing more in the future when the joint venture is effective.
Excellent. Thank you. Second question, I heard you say that part of your plan of your mission statement or your new strategy is that all sites are planned to be profitable even in a low price environment. Could you firstly specify what you mean by a low price environment? And secondly, is that Profitable on an EBITDA basis, EBIT1 or EBIT basis or on a net income basis, please?
Yes. Thanks for that question. When we talk about the low price environment, we think about a year like 2020. So that was really a very stressed year, and we want to be able to have a free cash flow positive situation on all sides. And of course, The entire group has to be free cash flow positive and we are working on measures to get there and we are very convinced to get this to achieve this latest by 2023.
And if you translate that into earnings, all our mines are EBITDA positive and this is also the case for our EBIT. This year will Bethune will be Achieving the breakeven on an EBIT base. So that is not our problem. Problem is the high amount of CapEx, especially on the Verra side. And we will find a way to be positive even on a free cash flow level.
Understood. I was just more thinking along the lines, this is a strategy. So it's obviously not just attuned to 1 year, In that case, 2023, but also in the years in other years to come beyond that. And given that your mines, especially your German mines, not so much, Obviously, the Canadian mines are aging. Some mines in the future, obviously, will have it harder and harder To reach that target, that was my line
of thinking. Yes, of course, this is not only an achievement for 2023. We want to be ready for all downturns and we will see some cycles in the market to be able to achieve that. Yes, our mines are aging, but that means we will have Continuous optimization program on all mines. And there are always opportunities to work against cost inflation.
And we are very optimistic to achieve that.
Thank you very much. I will come to the later IPO.
Thank you. We now have a question from the line of Andreas Heine from Stifel. Please go ahead.
Yes. Thanks for the opportunity to ask you, Ursula. It's basically only 1. I'd like to understand a little bit more the Price trends you see and you expect for Europe, that is usually the region where the volatility in prices is least. And that means then when prices are pretty low, then Europe stands up being higher.
But now they are quite considerably lagging what we see in the U. S. Market and Latin American market. As you have quite a strong share in Europe and are probably price leader, I would like to learn more how you see the European pricing and also the specialty pricing going forward. Thanks.
Yes. Thanks for the question. Parag, of the answer you have given by yourself already, Volatility is much lower here and when the prices went down, especially in Brazil and Southeast Asian areas, We saw quite a stability in the European prices and frankly we expected to see weaker prices in Q1 in Europe, which was not the case. And that makes us optimistic that with a bit of delay, but still in this year, we will see increasing prices in Europe as well, Not on the level that we see overseas, but on a very nice sustainable level.
And let's say, by the end of this year, if you take current prices in Brazil and translate them into Europe, is that too positive for a European MOP price
Thank you. We now have a question from the line of Adrian Samagna from Berenberg. Please go ahead.
Hello. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. The first one relates to previous question around the restructuring of the German mines. So we think restructuring, closing of mines, is it some opportunities coming with the JV with RECs Or some digital mining improvement there?
Yes. So We are not seeing to close one of our mines earlier than expected because there's still a lot of potential. And you know that with all our Specialties are produced here in Germany. Yes, REX is a big game changer because We will release costs as we expected in the future due to the obligation to cover the tailings piles With a business model and we can even gain money from doing this and that's a big game changer for us and that Changes the perspective of our German minds as well. But we also have a lot of ideas not only short term, but mid and long term to optimize things and to improve the free cash flow strength of our German mines.
Again, we have no Earnings problem, we have a free cash flow problem and not on all minds. And we believe that we will be able to handle situation To be very profitable and very cash rich and to avoid any closing which comes earlier than expected.
Okay. With regards to your EBITDA guidance,
it Seems
not to imply a renegotiation of the Chinese contract. So why would this not be the case?
Yes, I'm not sure if I got the question right, but I tried to answer what I understood. So other than the Indian contract, We are not seeing the Chinese contract to be renegotiated. They are in a completely different situation. They are A bigger importer, they have higher industries, not Very high, but high enough to at least use it For the rest of this year, but we expect a new contract in China not only in 2022, maybe even at the end of this year And that then should show a higher price than the current one.
Okay. That was the question. So that's
Okay. Thanks.
And the last one is on the leverage. What sort of leverage would you be comfortable with from 2022 onwards for the new CapEx?
Yes. I mean, with the Proceeds now and paying down gross debt, we fall for 2020 Well below the 2x net debt net financial debt to EBITDA. And we will do our utmost to achieve a neutral to positive free cash flow in 2022. So we should see a leverage around that.
Thank you.
Thanks.
Thank you very much. Our next question comes from the line of Thomas Svoboda from Societe Generale. Please go ahead.
Yes. Good morning all. I have two questions, please, and hopefully short. First, a clarification On your on the headwind from the freight costs, you said around about €40,000,000 headwind this year. I'm interested whether you are protected partially from the increasing prices by contracts, visa versa.
If those high freight costs continue, would there be a negative base effect for next year?
Yes. Thank you, Mr. Zborn. You asked for short answers. The answer is yes, we are protected.
And the number would Have been much higher without these protections and these not long term, but mid term contracts on freight. But on the other hand, we're not expecting to see that situation to significantly escalate further and to last forever. So this is obviously that World economies are restarting and that has an impact on freight and hopefully we are fine with this €40,000,000 for this year.
Thank you. The second question is on the factoring of your receivables. Given the improvement in your leverage post the sales of the Americas, Is your strategy here changing here? Could you give us any indication whether you're keeping the factoring stable, increasing or decreasing going forward?
Yes, Thomas, it's for us a nice instrument to manage working capital and we have not introduced working capital measures and factoring last year Just to cancel it this year again, so we will certainly hold it on a certain level. But This is also part of my earlier answer. We are still in the process of analyzing what's the best use of cash. And this is certainly a review of this is certainly part of it.
Okay. That's fair enough. Thank you so much.
Thank you. We now have a question from the line of Stephanie Vincent from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Hi. Just a couple of housekeeping questions, if I may. The first one is on the use of proceeds. You talked about paying back the Schuldschein syndicated RBCS as well. Can you just tell the amounts, respectively, that you've repaid with the prices of the Americas sale?
The May maturities were €220,000,000 and Another €190,000,000 from further maturity this year and in the next year. So it was about €400,000,000 in total. Yes, sure, Chad.
Okay. That's great. And then more cash flow questions, if I may. Just your outlook For this year, can you discuss your view about working capital as well as Severance, if those items have been updated at all from the last call?
Yes. With regard to I think it's relatively clear. We set aside €40,000,000
for the
SG and A restructuring program. And part of this has been paid in the Q1 and parts will or most of the rest will be paid in the Q2. So this is a negative for this year, but then not recurring, of course. And with regard to working capital, well, we're still actively managing it, of course. We have done, I think the main part in the last 2 years, especially last year, we will see a negative impact on working capital this But this has to do with the higher volumes we see and especially with the increasing prices.
So you will see a negative effect on receivables That will reduce the cash flow.
Okay. That's great. And then finally, What with the sale of the Americas unit, what is your view on minimum cash and liquidity that you need to hold on balance sheet?
Yes. It's they haven't changed much, I would say. So the number of €100,000,000 Approximately should be on our balance sheet in order to finance the operating business on a day to day basis.
Thank you. I'll get back in queue.
Thank you. We now have a question Jim from Andrew Stott from UBS.
I'll start with the first one. Do you have any hard guidance for the marketing and general costs? It was down about 10% Year on year, I guess some of that's the benefits of the restructuring. Is there an annual guidance you can provide for that? Just Staying with costs, it's the same question, Ritu?
Andrew, can you repeat that? Yes. So in the P and L,
Your marketing costs, your marketing and general costs are down just over 10%, dollars 45,000,000 Is there any hard guidance for the full year?
Yes. It's mainly related to the SG and A restructuring, right? And we have seen also the number of FTEs going down. So we expect For this year, let me phrase it differently. We expect on a steady state basis £1,000,000 in savings from the SG and A program, and this will be reported in that line.
And we will see the majority of this benefiting the EBITDA Already this year. And this is the main reason for the decline.
Okay. So I should expect that To come down more year on year in the coming quarters. That's the message, yes?
Yes, gradually.
Yes. So and then on energy costs, go back to Sorry if I missed this. There were some problems with the audio. On the slide where you're talking about costs, You thought that you said that freight was €40,000,000 unchanged. I heard that clearly.
Can you talk about energy costs, which I think you'd said back in March was going to be €30,000,000 higher?
Now we are expecting and this is only the price effect. We are expecting to see a €20,000,000 higher Energy cost than last year. And here, the amount of or the portion which is already locked in is higher than In the freight. That is one reason why energy inflation is much lower than the freight.
Okay. Got it. Thank you. My next question is the pension provision. We've seen many companies' pension provision coming down.
Sequentially, yours is sort of unchanged. Why is that?
Our pension provisions are on a very low level anyway because we have CTAs in place and the most Obligations are in the CTAs and that creates this, of course, but we want to keep it on that low level. It's not a really Meaningful position in our balance sheet.
Yes. And sorry, I also it's a clumsy question. I meant the pension and mining obligations, so both of them. Would a higher interest rate not impact the mining ops as well?
Okay. The mining obligation, of course, that is another annual. That is a big portion. Yes. And that will decrease with higher interest rates.
Good portion of this obligation is boosted by this long time low interest rates. And we have very long lasting obligations that have a significant impact. So if interest rates would go up that would Reduce our mining obligations significantly.
Okay. And my final question, sorry. CapEx for 2022, Thorsten, I heard you say your ambition is to be neutral to positive for free cash flow for next year. What's the CapEx number you're working with for that?
Yes. I also said that For 2021, we expect about the same level as last year, but we Already a small progress here in 2021. But 2022, yes. So We will see CapEx going down by, let's say, GBP 50,000,000 in 2022 year over year.
Great. Thank you. Thanks for taking all the questions.
You're welcome.
Thank you very much. We now have a follow-up question from the line of So, Danive from Morgan Stanley.
Just a small one for me. On the tensiveax, some of your peers have noted Quite strong order book all the way into September. And I'm just wondering if you have any sort of level of order book or what you're seeing on sort of volume commitments from distributors and consumers being farmers into the season? That's my one. Any comments here that would be helpful.
Thanks.
We have almost no order book. The business is more or less a spot business. And even where we have contracts for half a year or 6 months, it's always only the price is set, but the volumes are not So long story short, we have no order book which could be Interpreted in this all that way.
Okay. So actually, any increase in the pricing you're going to see in the market will be should be positive I mean, it should be something that's positive for you in the coming EBITDA quarters.
Yes. The price development you can read out of capacities in the The crop price development and some other indicators, but not out of our current Order situation.
We also have a follow-up question from the line of Oliver Schartz from Warburg Research. Please go ahead.
Yes, gentlemen. Two questions from my side remaining. You can relax there, more of an esoteric Going to your mission statement, the 5 Paradigm you stated there. What needs to change from how you did business Up to now to fulfill all those 5 points. Or to rephrase that, is there something new in there that You didn't do before that you need to do in the future differently.
Yes, that's
a very actually a very good question. And I think what this company needs to learn is that we are no longer a DACH company, a global with a global set of minds and activities All over the world. We are a midsized company with a clear focus on agriculture and Smaller industry business and that is a change of mindset that we need to transform over the management into the heads of all our employees. And the second part of your question was new out of the 5 bullets. Some of course are not new, but we want to remember that we are Focusing on we are a mining company.
We have to work sustainably, and we are working for generations. That is an Information to the market sustainability, but to our employees as well. We have many families who have been working in generations Okay. Plus, yes, and absolutely, they will do so in the future. What's really new in the mission statement is that we are recognizing our incredible infrastructure as a potential source for future new businesses.
Rex is an example, but there will be much more, especially around renewable energies. We are the last meaningful active mining company in Germany. And you know what's required for some ideas around energy. I think we can deliver a lot to that. That is something we are working on, and don't be surprised if this will be an important part of our new strategy.
So we will see solar panels in the mines. But you've already tapped into my second question because that was focused on strategy. I was wondering if you Could you expand on further developing growth options and tapping into new business areas? But I think you already teased that You wanted to expand more into renewable energy activities. Is there any other topic You would like to share with us that you're also considering tapping into or expanding into?
We are working on a lot of ideas, but please give me the chance To tell you something new in late summer this year, if I would now elaborate on all our I think it's premature because now we have vision and mission, but we do not have the full fledged strategy and that It requires still some time.
Fair enough. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, everybody. That was our last question for today. So I'd now like to hand back to Doctor. Burkhard Lohr for the conclusion of the call. Please go ahead.
Yes. Thank you everybody for joining us today. We are looking forward to seeing you soon again. Maybe you have the chance to look into our AGM tomorrow would be highly appreciated. Bye bye.
Thank you very much for joining today's call. You may now disconnect. This concludes the call.