Elisa Oyj (HEL:ELISA)
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Earnings Call: Q3 2022

Oct 19, 2022

Vesa Sahivirta
Head of Investor Relations, Elisa

Good morning everyone, and welcome to Elisa's third quarter 2022 analyst meeting and conference call. My name is Vesa Sahivirta. I'm Head of Investor Relations, and here together with me is again a very familiar team, CEO Veli-Matti Mattila and CFO Jari Kinnunen. We have also some audience here and a couple of my colleagues. We start this meeting with a presentation followed by Q&A. In Q&A, we take first questions from the audience and then from the conference call lines. Now I think we are ready to start, so I give word to Veli-Matti, please.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Thank you, Vesa, and welcome to the Elisa Interim Report Q3 2022 on my behalf as well. Let's get started from the highlights from the quarter. Our revenue was growing by 7.6%, while EBITDA was growing 4.2%. Mobile service revenue was growing 6.9%, and in Finland we saw some increase in postpaid churn. As we know, during the summer all operators we had some strikes with which was decreasing activities a little bit, but now it was back again the intensive competition within all channels and with full force. We saw some increase in churn. Elisa's competitiveness pays off, however very well in this more intensive quarters, as well.

Postpaid subscriptions grew by 35,400 and actually it is very much about machine-to-machine and IoT subscription base growth, and those were growing 37,200. In the fixed broadband base, we saw some decline 1,700. The fixed line broadband business is quite stable. There is some reduction, especially due to the fact that we are disconnecting the copper-based ADSL subscriptions, and some of those are substituted by mobile subscriptions. 5G continues very well. Momentum is good. Our network now covers 83% of the population in over 300 towns and cities.

Elisa runs business for the long term, and our systematic, long-term way of operating is also paying off during the times when we may have dynamics like the energy price increases we have seen. For us, the energy price decreases have not been such a big problem. We have mitigated early on those kind of potential risks. That's why the situation in the energy sector hasn't disturbed and inflation overall too much of our progress. Revenue increase came very much from the mobile and fixed services side, but also due from the digital services which were growing around 12%.

Equipment sales was also very strong, not only due to iPhone release, but also in B2B side, there was equipment purchases increasing. Mobile service revenue growth continues with our upselling of higher speeds, including also 5G. We also have made some product changes, including price increases contributing to the growth. In EBITDA, of course, the growth is coming from the revenue growth, but also our continuous improvement in productivity. We saw 5% revenue growth in the consumer segment and EBITDA was also growing by 5%. Mobile digital equipment sales, mobile service digital services, equipment sales was growing for the segment.

We had some interconnection price decreasing the interconnection revenues and also traditional fixed line services continued their slight decline that we have seen over the many years. In corporate side, the revenue was growing by 12%, EBITDA by 3%. We saw mobile and fixed services growing in the corporate side. Of course, also digital services where especially the international digital services had higher growth rates. Also, equipment sales was growing and the same things were basically creating negative impact to the revenues in the corporate side that we saw in the consumer side. We continue to execute our familiar three focus area strategy.

We have made some results on executing the strategy, but we saw very good potential in each of the three focus areas for our business, and we continue very determinedly. In the mobile development side, we see that the transformation to data bundles from the usage-based subscriptions is almost done now, but our speed upgrade business model continues to work very well. 93% of customers have today a smartphone and 33% of smartphones are 5G devices. In 5G, like I said, coverage is expanding.

We have the widest network coverage in 5G in Finland, and we reached over 200 locations and over 84% of the population. Average billing increase is more than EUR 3 for 5G upgrades and the increase of customers continues really well. We will be phasing out our 3G network by the end of 2023 as earlier indicated. The preparatory measures have taken place already a couple of years. There is, for example, many things that needs to be done on the customer device side, for example. 900 and 2100 MHz frequencies will be freed up for other services. Of course, we will have better customer experience and service quality with 5G and 4G to the customers.

This change and transformation improves our energy efficiency and saves electricity. We have an auction in Estonia for the 3.5 GHz spectrum that was ended in May 2022, and now 700 MHz spectrum auction is scheduled to be beginning eighth of November. In the digital service businesses on the domestic side, our entertaining video business continued strongly. The environment is very competitive with a lot of streaming services, especially. Our original series are having a good success. Our original series, All the Sins, have been sold to more than 60 countries, making it currently the best-selling Elisa series internationally.

Also, our new original series, Next of Kin, has been sold to Hulu in the U.S., making it available to over 40 million subscribers. This is underlining the differentiation of our entertainment video services in Finland and Estonia. IT services continues also momentum. The current uncertainties in the geopolitics have increased demand for cyber services, especially in the end-user-focused attacks. We have got new customers for digital workplace and hybrid cloud services in finance, energy, and manufacturing sectors. In the international domain, Elisa IndustrIq has made one major deals by setting up the Tenforce and CalcoQuelt in steel production and electronics manufacturing. Sizable deals and Camline also had a Camline forum which showcased Elisa's international digital services in Dresden.

We had over 40 international companies from various industries in 17 countries participating in this event, where we introduced the whole portfolio of Elisa IndustrIq services to customers. Elisa Polystar continues the Cardinality integration, and business is proceeding really well. We have a very strong order backlog for Elisa Polystar as well. Elisa Video continues also to support the enterprises, organizations to move to hybrid working, which means reinvesting in spaces and related video meeting rooms. In Q3, Elisa Video was delivering over 100 solutions to 27 countries across Europe, Africa, Asia, and North America. Our mission, a sustainable future through digitalization, is something that is really creating purpose for Elisians and it makes excitement to our daily work.

As you know, in the four areas of sustainable future, digital, social, economic, and environmental, we have set ourselves targets that we report on a quarterly basis. For mobile network energy efficiency in Finland, the change in energy consumption is -4.7%. The population coverage for more than 100 Mbps connections in Finland is 84.2. Proportion of female supervisors, including the diversity from that aspect, also continues to be improved at 29.7. Our patent portfolio development continues as well. The size of active patent portfolio is now 321. Number of first applications in the third quarter was eight. We of course continue in many ways, for creating sustainable future, make choices and activities.

For example, waste heat from Elisa data center is used for district heating in Helsinki area. In the cooperation with the energy company Helen, which is mostly in Helsinki, the Elisa energy efficiency in our data center will improve and become environmentally positive. That means that the data center will actually reduce global emissions. Elisa participates in energy-saving measures in many ways in Finland and Estonia. For example, in optimizing our mobile network. Elisa was recognized as one of the top-performing digital companies in the Greening Digital Companies: Monitoring Emissions and Climate Commitments report. We have upgraded our outlook and guidance for 2022. We see that the growth in Finnish economy is expected to slow down to some extent.

Increasing levels of uncertainty relating to Russia's war in Ukraine, such as inflation, energy prices, and global supply chains will continue, and competition remains keen. Our upgraded outlook is that the revenue will be slightly higher this year than in 2021. Comparable EBITDA will be slightly higher than 2021, and CapEx will be maximum 12% of revenue. I guess Jari will continue.

Jari Kinnunen
CFO, Elisa

Thank you. Let's start with profit and loss. Q3 continued with strong good trends, growth in revenue and earnings. Revenue growth EUR 38 million or 7.6%, and behind this, EUR 38 million,EUR 1 million negative change coming from interconnection and visitor roaming. Equipment sales was growing EUR 7 million. Service revenues in corporate segment increasing EUR 20 million driven by digital services, mobile and fixed services, and negative impact from fixed voice. Service revenues in consumer segment increased EUR 12 million, mobile and digital services growing, a negative impact from fixed voice. In terms of OpEx developments, materials and services increased EUR 20 million, approximately 75% of that relates to higher equipment sales besides mobile and fixed equipments.

There are increases in corporate network, local area network equipments, IT equipments, and video conferencing equipments. Employee expenses increased EUR 8.6 million, relating to increased number of employees, also including acquisitions impact. Other impacts from salary increases and higher accruals relating to long-term incentive plans. Other operating expenses are pretty much at the same level as last year. EBITDA growth was above 3%. The midterm financial targets growth rate at 4.2%, and increase was around EUR 8 million. Depreciations fairly much same level as last year, and EBIT growth was 6.1%.

Net profit and EPS growth 4.4%, and there was change in financial expenses, - EUR 1 million, almost completely coming from temporary foreign exchange change, unrealized temporary foreign exchange, which will be at least partly gained back later on. Taxes change was EUR 2.2 million. Half of that relates to higher profit before taxes, and the other half relates to losses in some subsidiaries, and we will be booking tax receivables relating to those later on, so this will eliminate the impact going forward.

We have past weeks and past months received questions regarding energy and electricity prices and inflation impacts. It is so that we have a systematic way to operate and focus on earnings development and also here. Regarding electricity, we have many years hedging policy what we followed, and for this year we have almost completely hedged own electricity purchases, and for the next year, more than 60% of the own purchases are hedged. Additionally, in the spring, in Q2, a new wind power agreement starts.

It's a 10-year agreement at a fixed price, and this will further increase the hedge rate for next year and of course impacts for coming 10 years. The price level was agreed and set in 2021. Additionally, we have already long time improved our network energy efficiency and utilizing and using our own Elisa Polystar software and new technologies developments. Of course, we'll continue that work going forward. Regarding inflation, the latest consensus estimates for Finland for this year around 7% and Estonia much higher, 17%. Very much driven by energy prices. Wage inflation is much lower level.

We agreed in the summer collective labor agreement was done at 2% average salary increase. New negotiations regarding collective labor agreements will take place early next year. Regarding customer behavior changes in this environment, we haven't seen until now any material change in both segments in customer behavior. However, of course, we are not fully immune to these changes, inflation and energy price changes, but we have with cost efficiency measures and also with price changes and price increases mitigated pretty much the negative impacts. Of course, going forward, we continue with those measures.

Moving to Estonia, business good, trends continued, revenue growing almost 9%, driven by equipment sales, mobile, and fixed services. EBITDA growth was 3%. Mobile post-paid subscription base was almost flat. Prepaid was increasing 4,200. Churn continued at fairly low level, 9.5%. CapEx, reported CapEx in Q3 was EUR 67 million, and guided CapEx excluding licenses, lease agreements and acquisitions was EUR 63 million. Last year, EUR 60 million. Consumer segment EUR 45 million, and corporate segment EUR 22 million. Main investments relate to 5G network rollout, and other network and IT investments. Full year guidance, 12% CapEx to sales remains intact.

Cash flow Q3 reported cash flow was EUR 79 million, comparable cash flow EUR 87 million. Last year, EUR 89 million. There was positive impact coming from higher EBITDA, negative impact through higher paid taxes and net working capital change or more negative net working capital change compared to last year. This relates to lower payables and higher inventories. In order to mitigate the possible supply chain challenges, inventories are somewhat higher. Operating cash flow was growing from EUR 126 million- EUR 131 million, and EBITDA cash conversion remains high at 68%.

Capital structure, which is in line with the midterm targets, net debt to EBITDA decreased slightly to 1.9, equity ratio 38.6%. Average interest expense to interest-bearing debt is approximately 1%. Return ratios remained at good level. Return on equity 31.1%, and return on investments 17.8%. Now I will give word to Vesa, please.

Vesa Sahivirta
Head of Investor Relations, Elisa

Thank you, Jari. Now we move on to Q&A part, and we start, first question from the audience.

Kimmo Stenvall
Equity Analyst, OP Markets

Yeah, it's Kimmo Stenvall from OP Markets. Couple of questions. First on the service revenues. It's growing quite nicely. How much of the growth was organic in Q3?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You mean the total revenue at Elisa?

Kimmo Stenvall
Equity Analyst, OP Markets

Yes.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Well, Jari can fulfill with more details, but the acquisitions we've done didn't bring that much of revenue increase. Of course, then equipment sales was also quite strong.

Jari Kinnunen
CFO, Elisa

Yes. Acquisitions impact was EUR 2 million.

Kimmo Stenvall
Equity Analyst, OP Markets

On Q4 and for the next quarters, how do you see that the Mobile service revenue and all the other is kind of service revenue parts are growing? Is there any kind of hint that you can give on that side?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Well, we expect the Mobile service revenue continue good growth, maybe slightly below the level of Q3, what we saw. We expect a good momentum continue there in the mobile side. Overall, we do not disclose the kind of expectations for quarterly revenue development, but we would expect relatively good development also in the other side.

Kimmo Stenvall
Equity Analyst, OP Markets

Okay. Thank you. On the cost side, I think it's everybody is kind of speculating what kind of OpEx development we will see in the next quarters or next winter that. What are your main concerns? Is it the energy prices or the personnel cost or what are the main cost items that keeps you awake at night?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Well, if we think about Elisa, as Jari explained, we have been hedging pretty well the energy cost. Of course, we have other overall inflation that is for any business, it's always a bit concern. But we believe that we can mitigate with productivity improvements and our even strength and focus for cost efficiency quite well. Then indirectly, of course, the inflation is something that we watch very carefully because that, of course, is impacting to our customers, not only in the domestic markets, but internationally. Even if we haven't seen that much of any negative reactions by customers or impact so far, of course, there is a lot of uncertainty and certainly we are looking at that development also very carefully.

Kimmo Stenvall
Equity Analyst, OP Markets

Okay. Thank you. That's all for me.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Thank you.

Vesa Sahivirta
Head of Investor Relations, Elisa

Thank you, Kimmo. Any other questions from the audience at the moment? No, there are none at the moment. We ask first question from the conference call lines, please.

Operator

Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question or make a contribution on today's call, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Now we will take our first question. Please state your name and company before your question. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Andrew Lee
VP of Workforce Analytics and Hiring Strategy, Goldman Sachs

Okay. If this is my line, it's Andrew Lee from Goldman Sachs here. The question from us, the main question was on your working capital outflow, which you highlighted clearly, Jari. Is accentuated versus previous third quarters. You mentioned why that is, but I wondered if you could just talk about the rebalancing, whether you should see an inflow in Q4 to wash out that, you know, accentuated working capital outflow in Q3. So that's question number one. Second question is just on some comments that you and we really appreciate your detail on your cost inflation headwinds. You mentioned that you think your price efforts and cost efficiencies can offset those cost inflation headwinds or mitigate them, as you said.

Could you just give us an insight into what timeline you mean for that? Do you mean that the price rises you've put through so far this year, and I note the kind of the 4G price rises you put through last week? Do you think all of those price rises are enough to mitigate, along with the hedging and wind power you've signed up for? Is that all enough to mitigate the cost headwinds as you see them right now from inflation in 2023 specifically? Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

All right. Thank you, Andrew. I'll let Jari to respond to the working capital question. In regards to the cost efficiency and the development, just to reiterate that, we are looking at very much overall the business kind of steering based on our financial targets, where we have EBITDA growth target more than 3%, which we have been executing and implementing and achieving. That's the target we have.

On the other hand, we have a target for improving our competitiveness, but also improving our capabilities in the new businesses and those also need certain investments in terms of cost that we will do and continue to do also with a good balance taking into account the targets that we have for EBITDA development. When we talk about the potential additional cost increases due to inflation, of course, there we have many activities by which we believe we can also have a very strong impact to mitigate. Like Jari explained, we have made hedging for the energy.

There are many kind of ways to improve productivity as we do with our long-term development of productivity improvement, automating our processes, also discontinuing some of the old technologies, taking new technologies, increasing, for example, energy-saving solutions, and also having even more focus on general cost efficiency in the company. But basically, we have a culture and way of working practices for continuous improvement. And of course, that's the main drive for us to be able to provide good results over the long term as well. Jari, if you go for the working capital.

Jari Kinnunen
CFO, Elisa

Sure. Yeah, typically Q4 is somewhat better. There is certain seasonality relating to last quarter of the year. As I mentioned, inventories are now somewhat higher and sort of preparing for possible challenges in supply chain and as we go for a busy season towards year-end. I mean, we expect the inventories to be some slightly going to be lower than what they were end of Q3.

Andrew Lee
VP of Workforce Analytics and Hiring Strategy, Goldman Sachs

Okay. It kind of normalized across the whole year, even though you had an accentuated outflow in Q3?

Jari Kinnunen
CFO, Elisa

Yeah. I was comparing Q4 to Q3. I believe that was the question, no?

Andrew Lee
VP of Workforce Analytics and Hiring Strategy, Goldman Sachs

Yeah. Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. We will now take our next question. Please state your name and company before posing your question. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Louis Guyot
Analyst, Credit Suisse

Hi. It's Louis Guyot from Credit Suisse. I have two questions, please. The first one is on CapEx. You are running year to date on CapEx excluding Spectrum at slightly below 11% versus your guidance of 12%. Can we get a little bit more color on how we should be thinking about Q4 CapEx? If you could give us some color into 2023 dynamics, considering that you are already at 83% population coverage in terms of 5G. Any color on the dynamics when the 5G rollout will phase out will be helpful. The second one is on competitive dynamics in mobile in Finland. You were flagging that you saw an increase in competition after the summer.

As we are already one month into Q4, could you give us some color on how competitive dynamics in mobile are evolving? Specifically considering that one of your competitors was flagging over the past two quarters that they were willing to shift to a more value approach rather than volume. Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

All right. Thank you for the questions. In terms of the CapEx, I believe that the total year of 2022 is going pretty much towards 12%, max 12% CapEx. It might mean that if the run rate so far year to date is below, we will probably have then pretty good investments in the fourth quarter so that the max 12% will be held. The 5G rollout in 2023 will continue and other investments. But as you may know, we are balancing the investment based on demands quite dynamically. However, the 12%, max 12% CapEx is valid for next year as well.

In terms of the competitive dynamics, during the fourth quarter, we see quite intensive competition and campaigning with gift cards and quite low pricings in the market. We have made some price increases ourselves in the 4G domain. We haven't seen too much of a follow-up of that or reactions in the marketplace from the competitors. We see that there is value that we provide for the customers enough that we could have some price increases also in the 4G domain. Of course, we will behave so that we don't lose any markets either, so we are not compromising our markets with our kind of pricing things.

In terms of, let's say, competitors to follow, we haven't seen too much of that, at least for the time being.

Louis Guyot
Analyst, Credit Suisse

Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. We'll now take our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Maurice Patrick
Managing Director, Barclays

Oh, hello. It's Maurice Patrick.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Cannot hear anything.

Operator

Hello, Patrick. Are you able to hear us? Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Maurice Patrick
Managing Director, Barclays

Yeah. Hi there. It's Maurice from Barclays. Sorry about that. Some telephone issues on my end. So a couple of questions from my side, please. The first one, I don't know if you said it earlier in the call, I was a bit late dialing in. Can you talk a bit about the returning of roaming traffic and revenues in the quarter to the extent to which that was a headwind or tailwind? Apologies if you mentioned it earlier. Then just a bigger picture question. You talk about the savings from 3G switch off. I'm just curious as to how much of a saving that will be from an energy outputs perspective when you finally get round to turning off the 3G network. Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Okay. In terms of the roaming, we have seen, of course, improvement from the worst situation of COVID, but we could say that we have slightly more than 50% return, or the level of roaming is slightly more than 50% compared to the pre-COVID situation. We still have China very much closed and partly also other parts in Asia, where the traveling is not yet returned. We expect that once COVID is solved in China and some other parts of Asia, we will see a bit more roaming return.

In terms of savings in 3G switch off, we are not really detailing how much we are kind of saving there, but of course it is significant and enough to kind of do those kind of transformations.

Maurice Patrick
Managing Director, Barclays

The 3G side?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Sorry, I didn't hear. What did you say?

Maurice Patrick
Managing Director, Barclays

Yeah, sorry. The savings from the 3G switch off?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

3G switch off. Like I said, we are not detailing how much we are saving on particular projects, but it is significant enough, this kind of transformation from 3G out, that we perform such transformations.

Maurice Patrick
Managing Director, Barclays

Okay. Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. We'll now take our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Terence Tsui
VP, Morgan Stanley

Hello. It's Terence Tsui from Morgan Stanley. Can you hear me okay?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Yes.

Terence Tsui
VP, Morgan Stanley

Hello. Good afternoon, everyone. I just wanted to go back on the net working capital again, and sorry if I missed some of your answers. I just wondered if you can just explain to us in a bit more detail why it was so negative and why you're running so much more negative in 2022 versus 2021. I think in the nine months, the change in net working capital is down like minus EUR 55 million, which is offsetting all the improvement that you're seeing in EBITDA. Maybe you can give us an indication of when you see this net working capital unwinding. Is it gonna be similarly, you know, quite volatile and you see quite a rapid recovery, or do you think it'll be more of a gradual recovery on that front?

Secondly, just on the staff costs again, you know, you mentioned that you've got an agreement of 2% salary increases for 2022, but with you know, inflation forecast to be 7% in Finland and 17% in Estonia, are we thinking more likely that mid-single digits or high single digits salary increases will be necessary next year? Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

All right. If I start from the salary side and then Jari continues on the working capital question. In the salary increase side, we haven't yet started the negotiations for the next collective agreement, so I wouldn't say anything for that. There are, of course, pressures from the employee side for higher salary increases. On the other hand, there are very disturbing factors also in the economy overall that work in the other direction for the capacity to pay higher salaries. I don't take any position on that. We will see then early next year how things will evolve. Jari, please.

Jari Kinnunen
CFO, Elisa

Yes, regarding working capital, as said now, in Q3, the change difference in working capital was -EUR 7 million, compared to last year.

This is mainly coming from inventories and we are preparing. Of course, there is busy season coming towards year-end and preparing for possible challenges in supply chain. As said earlier, we expect Q4 inventory situation to improve. Overall, typically Q4 is seasonality-wise better than other quarters. Then to your question about improvement, so it is rather sort of steady than sort of big change type of change in working capital.

Terence Tsui
VP, Morgan Stanley

Okay. Thanks, Jari.

Operator

Thank you. We'll now take our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Hello there. We are not able to hear you. Are you able to unmute yourselves? Hello there. Your line is open. Please go ahead. I'm sorry. We will move on to the next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Stefan Kufahl
Analyst, DNB

Yes. Hello. This is, Stefan Kufahl, DNB. Can you hear me?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Yes, I hear you again.

Stefan Kufahl
Analyst, DNB

Yes. A couple of questions. First of all, the growth in materials and services expenses, you mentioned that you had equipment sales also in the corporate segment. Can you say how much of the increase is explained by equipment sales? And then secondly, there is an acceleration of growth in fixed service revenues. What is explaining this? Is this due to price increases, or what is explaining this development?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

The growth in the mobile services increase, actually, we are not detailing how much is coming from which kind of line items in that. Of course, the increased equipment sales, which did happen, both in the consumer side for end devices, but also for the corporate business, for example, for LAN and video conferencing, had a significant role in that. We are not disclosing item by item and line by line these costs. That's not our process. The fixed service revenue increase, we have seen, of course, good development on the corporate networking side, also cybersecurity services and overall, a good development there, on the fixed services sales.

Also including equipment sales to some of the, for example, corporate networking solutions.

Stefan Kufahl
Analyst, DNB

Okay. Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one. We will now take our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Hello there. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Speaker 16

Hello?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Hello? Cannot hear anything.

Operator

I'm sorry. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one again. We will move on to our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Hans Arkemius
Analyst, Danske Bank

Hi. It's Hans Arkemius from Danske Bank. Can you hear me?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Yeah. Yes, now we can.

Hans Arkemius
Analyst, Danske Bank

I have a question on the MSR growth, which continued at a high 7% rate also in the third quarter even though your earlier comments would have suggested lower growth rates in the second half of the year. What continues to surprise you on the upside here?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Well, there's no big surprises. These quarters are somewhat different in that even if we expect something, there might be minor changes. It's just that the upselling continues to continue very well. 5G is moving up. No big surprises, but slightly more positive than we expected.

Hans Arkemius
Analyst, Danske Bank

Okay. Thanks. I would still go back to this equipment sales question. Would it be possible to get an approximate level for total equipment sales? You're re-reporting this separately under mobile revenues, but how much is there also on the fixed side?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Like I said, we are not detailing line by line the cost items. Unfortunately, we are not disclosing those.

Hans Arkemius
Analyst, Danske Bank

Yeah. Could you comment on the sort of level at the fixed side at the moment? Is that, you know, somehow elevated relative to previous levels?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

It is somewhat elevated, yes, for the previous levels.

Hans Arkemius
Analyst, Danske Bank

Oh. Okay, very helpful. Thanks.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. We will now take our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Hi there. Please go ahead. Your line is open. We will move on to our next question. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one. Hello there. Please state your name and company before posing your question. Hi there. Are you able to hear us? I'm sorry. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one. We'll move on to our next question. Hello there. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Hello there. We will move on to our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Kindly state your name and company before posing your question.

Ondrej Cabejsek
Executive Director of Telecoms Equity Research, UBS

Hello?

Operator

Hello. Yes, we can hear you. Please go ahead.

Ondrej Cabejsek
Executive Director of Telecoms Equity Research, UBS

Hi. Thank you. It's Ondrej Cabejsek from UBS. I have a follow-up on the cost side, please. You mentioned in terms of energy specifically that next year the hedge ratio goes down to 60%, but starting April you have some PPAs kicking in. I was wondering what does that do to the hedge ratio starting 2Q 2023? You know, just looking at the kind of one quarter exposure and then taking into account that the further nine months are secured for this PPA, what kind of year-over-year increase would you expect in terms of energy costs? Then also you know, you've been flagging to us to watch on the bottom line for operating leverage.

I think up until now, basically the equation has held that the bottom line has been growing at a faster pace than the top line. This quarter it is not true. It dips, I think, to around 60%-70% of the top line growth on the bottom line. Can you explain why that is and at what stage could we expect the operating leverage on the bottom line to show up again? And then maybe final question from me, please, in terms of just, you mentioned already some promotional activity in the fourth quarter. I think we've seen in some other markets, especially around the back-to-school period, that this year, perhaps due to inflationary pressures, is not as intense as in the previous years.

If you have any insight into you know how any kind of promotional activity could shape in the fourth quarter? Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

All right. If we start from your first question related to cost, Jari maybe can shed light on that, please.

Jari Kinnunen
CFO, Elisa

Yes. We will give next year guidance in Q4 report, and then we will give guidance for revenue and EBITDA. At this point of time, we will not give any guidance for individual cost items. As said earlier, we have policy of hedging energy. We have measures relating to cost efficiency and plans for price changes and price increases going forward. These, they all impact. As said, we will come back to next year guidance with the Q4 report. You had question regarding Ondrej Cabejsek, if I understood or heard correctly, and relating to net profit change, if heard correctly.

As said earlier, we had.

After EBIT, we had in financial items approximately EUR 1 million unrealized temporary foreign exchange difference negative. This will be gained back at a later phase. Taxes all together were EUR 2.2 million negative change. Half of that relates to higher pre-tax profit, and the other half relates to losses in some foreign subsidiaries, where we will later on book tax receivable. Again, this will be eliminated. This impact will be then eliminated at a later phase. Excluding those sort of temporary or sort of one-off impacts in this quarter, EPS and net profit change would have been higher, even higher than EBIT change.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You were asking then about fourth quarter and promotions there. I didn't quite capture what your question was. Could you repeat the third one, please?

Ondrej Cabejsek
Executive Director of Telecoms Equity Research, UBS

Sure. Thank you. I think in Finland in general, the promotional activity in the fourth quarter is probably the main season. I was wondering, because we've seen in some other markets around the back-to-school period, which in those respective markets is usually the main season, that perhaps because of inflation, the promotional activity hasn't been as pronounced as in the previous years. I was just wondering, what do you make of, you know, the upcoming, you know, period in Finland. Whether you think that maybe this time around the competitive situation could be better perhaps than last year or the year before because of inflation. Thank you.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Now, I got your question. Thanks. I don't expect, or we don't expect any major changes, even if we have some inflationary situations developed here. We are expecting pretty much the same kind of promotional activity, competitive intensity as earlier for the fourth quarter.

Ondrej Cabejsek
Executive Director of Telecoms Equity Research, UBS

Thank you. Maybe could you one more last question, sir. Can you clarify in terms of the 4G competition that you mentioned in your press release? Is that retention acquisition? Is that it's some kind of special segment? Can you just clarify that a bit, please?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Well, we see relatively rational market in the 5G domain. In terms of 4G, we see quite much of campaign-based competition. Also usage of gift cards, really using quite much promotional money for any different kind of customer acquisitions. We have seen that especially focused on 4G. No particular domain of 4G, but in overall 4G and maybe the, let's say, of course then focusing on the more cost-effective customer bases.

Ondrej Cabejsek
Executive Director of Telecoms Equity Research, UBS

Thank you very much.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. We'll now take our next question. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Hi there.

Adam Fox-Rumley
Director of European and U.S. Telecoms Equity Research, HSBC

Hello?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Hello?

Operator

Hello. Yes, we can hear you.

Adam Fox-Rumley
Director of European and U.S. Telecoms Equity Research, HSBC

Oh, hi. It's Adam Fox-Rumley here from HSBC. I had two questions, please. Firstly, just following up on the couple of questions around corporate equipment spend. Asking it in a slightly different way, I was wondering, is there a change in which corporates are paying for their equipment? Or is this reflecting a change in the product set that you're selling to them? You did mention a couple of things there which maybe come with more equipment on your side. The second question, kind of look at the broadband base. It's fallen maybe 4% since the beginning of 2021. You did mention the fact that some people are switching old copper connections to fixed wireless access. I wondered if I could just ask you to make either an ARPU or a gross margin comparison between those two services.

That would be very helpful. Thanks.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Okay. The main reason for increase in corporate equipment sales has been that we have been selling more services with equipment as well. There's no change in how the customers are paying or no particular change in our products. Of course, we are further developing always the kind of services and products, but no major changes that have impacted. It is just that we have sold now especially networking and video services more, including also more equipment. In terms of the broadband, we are not giving kind of margin differentiation between the different product lines, unfortunately. I cannot really comment on those.

We can say that we have quite comparable margin also on the mobile side compared to the fixed broadband side.

Adam Fox-Rumley
Director of European and U.S. Telecoms Equity Research, HSBC

Okay. Comparable. Thank you very much.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Looks like there are no further questions from my end. I will now hand over for any additional closing remarks. Oh, I'm sorry. There are a few questions on the line. We'll take the question now. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Felix Henriksson
Associate Director of Equity Research, Nordea

Hello, can you hear me?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Yes.

Felix Henriksson
Associate Director of Equity Research, Nordea

Hi, it's Felix Henriksson from Nordea. I have a couple of quick ones. First, question is relating to MSR growth. Could you disclose the exact contribution of 5G as you've done in previous quarters? If I recall correctly, it was 2 percentage points in Q2. The second question relates to digital services and the momentum there in terms of margins. Because looking at your group operation and the leverage, it did not really improve from Q2, and you're facing cost inflationary pressures. Just wondering if you can help us out with any color on when will these businesses start to contribute to profitability more positively. Thanks.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

In terms of the MSR, it is slightly more than 2%. We can say the 5G contribution to the MSR, slightly more than 2% is poised. In digital services business, the margin development, we of course have quite a few different digital service businesses in the domestic side, IT and then enterprise video. We have in the international side video conferencing, Videra, as well as the Elisa IndustrIQ and Elisa Polystar. They have a bit different margin profiles. Of course, in due time, we will expect ourselves to be able to disclose more, but also the continuous improvement is happening there for margins. Unfortunately, this is all I can say at the moment with our disclosure policy.

Felix Henriksson
Associate Director of Equity Research, Nordea

Thank you. That's helpful.

Operator

Thanks. Thank you. We'll now take our next question. Please state your name and company before posing your question.

Peter Klein
Equity Research Analyst, Bank of America

Hi, this is Peter Klein from Bank of America. Can you hear me?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Not that well, so if you can be very clear, please.

Peter Klein
Equity Research Analyst, Bank of America

Hi. Peter Klein from Bank of America.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Okay.

Felix Henriksson
Associate Director of Equity Research, Nordea

Thanks very much for taking my questions. Two very quick ones, in the end, if I may. First one, just a quick clarification on the PPA agreement you have, the power contract. It's quite helpful that you already say that it's covering half of the Finnish mobile network energy. Just is there any way to disclose how much that is of the group energy consumption you're using? And then the second quick question on the mobile business. Just in terms of the mobile ARPU trends which you report in consumer compared to corporate, it seems that consumer is growing nicely in ARPU with the mid-single digits, whereas the corporate segment is slowing down a bit. Is there any specific reason why this is the case?

Peter Klein
Equity Research Analyst, Bank of America

Is this delay to some extent due to roaming? Should we expect this to continue?

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

To the consumption of our energy levels, we are not disclosing how much energy we are consuming. Secondly, to the mobile ARPU, in the corporate side, we have quite a few machine-to-machine IoT subscriptions that is basically drawing down the ARPU. ARPU is a bit difficult indicator since it includes all kinds of subscriptions, which all are good to have and good to sell to customers. We rather utilize this mobile service revenue as an indication how well we have mobile services sold to our customers.

Peter Klein
Equity Research Analyst, Bank of America

Thank you very much.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. Looks like we have no other questions on the queue. I will hand over to you for any additional or closing remarks.

Veli-Matti Mattila
CEO, Elisa

Okay. Thank you for the questions. We heard that there was some technical issues with the conference call lines. If you were not able to get through and ask your questions, we are all here available for your questions and discussions afterwards. Now we'd like to thank you all participants, and wish you a nice rest of the week. Thank you.

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