Good morning, and welcome everyone to Kemira's Q1 result webcast. My name is Kiira Fröberg, and I'm the head of investor relations at Kemira. We published our Q1 interim report today. Both revenue and profitability declined year-on-year in a weak market. Here with me today, I have our President and CEO, Antti Salminen, and our new CFO, Tuomas Mäkipeska. Before we start the actual presentation, just a kind reminder that the presentation today includes forward-looking statements.
Next, Antti will cover the group level performance, and will also discuss the Q1 highlights. After that, Tuomas will go into a bit more detail with the financials and will also cover the business unit level performance. In the end of the event, we will have Q&A as usual, and you can ask questions through the webcast chat or by phone. I guess now it's time to hand over to you, Antti. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Kiira. Good morning on my behalf as well. As mentioned, I will be presenting Kemira's quarter one 2026 results. After me, Tuomas will have his first moment in spotlight in his current role as CFO of Kemira, and Tuomas will go a bit deeper into the financials of the quarter. The quarter was really kind of described or dominated by the really weak global economy, and towards the end of the quarter with the even increased geopolitical tensions and turbulence. That was the name of the game, and that caused really strong headwinds for our business. As we stand here today, the Brent oil trades at $105. The consumer confidence index on our main markets has been steadily below 100 points for the quarter. Very tough environment to execute the business. Maybe better with the slides.
As a result, our revenue declined, so there was a clear decline. Organic growth as well, -3%. The profitability was declining as well, 17.3% operative EBITDA performance, which is still a profitable business. Basically, I have to thank the Kemira organization for making and keeping this business profitable despite the really strong headwinds and the tough market that we are competing in at the moment. The profitability decline was most clear in Packaging & Hygiene Solutions, but also Water Solutions, especially the industrial side, suffered from the weak demand. As a consequence of the weak demand, our pricing power is weakened. Basically capability to execute was difficult in this quarter. Whereas we saw improvement in the Fiber Essentials part. That's maybe the highlight of the quarter in terms of profitability.
As a result of weaker than anticipated or weaker quarter than we wanted to have, we have decided to accelerate our performance improvement actions and do some further cost cuttings as well as we have done thus far. We want to constantly improve and adapt the cost structure to the weaker top line. That's our responsibility and that's what we are doing. The increased raw material cost that of course was visible towards the end of the quarter, and especially the transportation cost that come through very quickly from these kind of crises had an impact already on this quarter. We started promptly to implement price increases to mitigate the impact of these cost increases.
The result of those increases will be visible a bit later in the year, and I will actually later in my part talk a little bit more about the impacts of the Iran war to Kemira's business and how do we mitigate it. Balance sheet continues to be strong and the combination of strong balance sheet and good profitability means that we continue to execute on our growth strategy. We continue to build the future Kemira, so that we are ready when the markets are better. We executed two acquisitions in the Water Solutions area during the first quarter. First, the AquaBlue in U.S., a small bolt-on acquisition to build on the industrial water services platform that we created by acquiring the Water Engineering business late last year. Secondly, we signed the deal on the SIDRA Wasserchemie in Germany.
This is strengthening our core in the profitable urban water treatment coagulants area in Europe. Basically investing both to strengthening the core and to the higher growth Water Solutions market in the industrial water services in U.S. We also announced our plans to build a activated carbon reactivation facility at our existing site in Tarragona, Spain. That's another growth area that we have in our strategy and have clearly communicated the emerging fast-growing micropollutants removal market. This when finalized will complement nicely our European network of the reactivation facilities. All in all, strong balance sheet and a profitable business enable us to continue executing on the growth strategy despite of the weaknesses of the market that we saw in the quarter one. I look a bit more on the revenue development. Revenue clearly declined, as mentioned.
There was, of course, the mentioned market weakness as the main driver, but also there was a quite significant exchange rate impact on the revenues in the first quarter. Revenue declined in Packaging & Hygiene Solutions and Fiber Essentials. Those are the markets that get the most direct hit from the weak economy, as we have been talking about earlier as well, whereas the Water Solutions revenue stayed pretty close to the previous year level. It has to be mentioned as well that quarter-on-quarter, so the quarter four 2025 compared to this first quarter of 2026, both the sales volumes and prices actually increased. Looking at the profitability, again, EBITDA percentage declined. Main drivers, again, being the weaker demand and the impact of that in the pricing.
The biggest hit we took in the Packaging & Hygiene Solutions were clearly the profitability was far below our targets and expectations. As you remember, we have been progressing quite well in our profitability improvement actions in the Packaging & Hygiene Solutions area. This was a clear setback, but we are still on the course with that program. There was a non-recurring item of quite significant inventory write-offs during the first quarter, which partly explains the shortfall there, but not completely, of course. Also, the Water Solutions profitability declined but is still very healthy. Again, as a bright moment, as mentioned, Fiber Essentials profitability actually improved to 26.7%. As a result of this, on group level, of course, then the earnings per share also declined, earnings per share being EUR 0.29 per share.
If we look at the long-term financial targets, and it's good to remember, these are long-term financial targets. We are still constantly, because of the soft market environment, tracking below our growth target. That's clear. We are still, last 12 months, within our long-term targets of profitability, despite the first quarter being below. Again, we've been communicating early as well that there will be worse quarters, there will be better quarters. This is the long-term target that we have, and with the actions that we are taking, we are confident that we will be returning back to that bracket. As mentioned, let's talk a little bit about the war in Iran and its impacts to Kemira business. The direct impacts of the Iran war to our business are very limited.
We don't really have meaningful business on that area, nor are there meaningful trade flows, I mean, end products that we would ship via the Strait of Hormuz. The direct impact is very limited. It's good to bear in mind that one-third of our raw material base is oil derivatives, and that part of the raw material pool will get the impact from these increased oil prices. That impact will come in some material groups faster, in some material groups slower through. That is an additional headwind for our business. Of course, the logistics cost impacted by this. Everybody has seen the gas prices going up and diesel prices going up. Those come through really quickly, and we saw that already in the Q1. As mentioned, we have started firm price increase actions to mitigate those impacts.
We executed very well during the couple of last crises. We have very capable organization, both during COVID and then the Russia's attack to Ukraine. We could mitigate the inflation in those situations very well. I'm confident that we can do it this time as well. Of course, this time the market environment is softer, so it will not be as easy and as straightforward. With the good customer relationships we have and the way we run the business, I think we will be able to mitigate largely the increased cost impact. It's good to bear in mind that the price increase impact typically is visible in our P&L with the delay of one to two quarters, depending on part of the business. Finally, outlook. We retain our outlook.
The full year revenue is expected to be between EUR 2.6 billion and EUR 3 billion, and the operative EBITDA between EUR 470 million and EUR 570 million. However, we sharpened a bit or changed a bit the assumptions behind this due to the situation now in quarter one. The end market demand has weakened and is expected to stay weak this year. Basically this weakening is very clear, particularly in the packaging and pulp markets, which take the hit typically most quickly, but also as mentioned in the industrial part of the Water Solutions business, clear volatility in the markets is seen.
We, as mentioned, expect to be largely capable to mitigate the raw material cost increases. Of course, the assumptions don't include any major shock or disruption into any meaning from important material flows. These may be good to highlight a bit, the assumptions behind the outlook as well. With this, I will hand it over to Tuomas, who will walk you through in more detail the financials for the quarter. Go ahead, Tuomas.
All right. Thank you very much, Antti. This is essentially my first webcast as Kemira's CFO, and I am naturally happy to have started in the position in April now. I'm also pleased to meet some of the new analysts and all the familiar ones in this session as well. Hello, everybody there. I will add a bit of more financial data to Antti's overall summary of the quarter's development, and cover also the business unit performance here in this section. Let's start with the Q1 revenue and EBITDA development there. Revenue declined altogether EUR 32 million, most of which was caused by the negative currency effect of EUR 26 million, primarily in the USD. Revenue was, on the other hand, supported by EUR 40 million from the completed acquisitions. The organic revenue growth was -3%, driven by the lower prices and volumes.
In the profitability bridge, it's visible that the impact of cost inflation was limited in Q1, and in fact, we were able to partly absorb it in variable costs. Instead, the lower prices and volumes came through to operative EBITDA. The operative EBITDA margin was 17.3%, which is obviously a disappointment. While the market continues uncertain and volatile, we are taking actions related to our cost base to ensure that it is aligned with the current market environment. This is something that we continually do in the company and decided to accelerate these measures as we announced this morning. We have now entered an environment where cost inflation has accelerated following the war in Iran. We are increasing prices accordingly, but the delta is now negative, as you can see in the graph.
In the past, we have been fairly successful in passing on the effects to our sales prices, and also this time we are taking determined measures on it. As Antti already explained, in our case, it usually takes up to two quarters before the customer price increases are fully visible in our financials. There is most likely some headwind from this time lag in Q2. Next, moving forward to the business unit financials. Let's start with Water Solutions. The demand environment is impacted by the economic uncertainty, and it's more visible in the industrial side of the business, whereas the urban market continues stable. There is also some seasonality in the Water Solutions business, and Q1 is usually a weaker quarter compared to the Q2 and Q3.
This is driven by, for example, the weather conditions, as in the summer months there is in general more need for water treatment versus wintertime. Excluding FX impact there in Q1, the total revenue remained stable and organic revenue declined 2% against the good comparison period. The operative EBITDA was 18.4%, which was below previous year's level, and the decline was mainly driven by pricing and higher costs. The costs included also a couple of one-off items that happened to take place in Q1. Let's have a look at the Packaging and Hygiene Solutions next. Packaging and Hygiene Solutions continued to be impacted by the economic uncertainty and low consumer confidence. On the positive side, the market did not weaken further from the previous quarters. Our volumes remained stable and sales prices declined only slightly quarter-on-quarter.
Year-over-year, volumes were flat, but the prices were lower. APAC, and there especially China, continued weak in Q1, mainly driven by very competitive environment and overcapacity in the region. EBITDA declined to 10.1%, mainly driven by pricing. Our profitability improvement initiative continues, and the implementation of the new operating model progresses as planned. We have already achieved cost savings from them, but in Q1, the negative top-line development more than offset their impact. We haven't completed all the identified profitability improvement measures yet. As we stated also earlier, this is more of a gradual process and we continue to drive improvement also going forward. Finally covering Fiber Essentials business. Market environment continued soft in the pulp industry, although there was sequential improvement driven by the cold winter and related high electricity prices in the Nordics.
Despite the better Q1, overall visibility to the market development remains low and the market continues subdued. Market prices for some base chemicals like caustic and sulfur continued low. Organic revenue declined 3% versus a strong comparison period. The decline was driven by volumes, partly offset by positive pricing development in our bleaching business. Sequentially, volumes and prices actually increased. Operative EBITDA margin improved to 26.7%, as Antti already mentioned, driven by the higher prices. Let's then return to group level and look at the balance sheet a bit. As Antti said, we continue to have a strong balance sheet, which enables investments in long-term profitable growth. As you can see, there was basically no change in the net debt versus the Q4. Year-on-year, the net debt has increased to its current level due to the completed share buybacks and acquisitions.
During the Q1, we bought back almost EUR 38 million worth of shares, and we started the buyback program in February and have progressed as planned. The current program is limited to maximum five million shares or EUR 100 million. Return on capital employed has come down a little bit with lower EBIT, as profitability has been impacted by the challenging market environment. Also, the acquisitions have impacted the capital employed. That explains part of the development there. The net working capital continues stable. It increased slightly both year-over-year and sequentially, but at the same time, we were able to manage our inventories well and reduce the levels during the period. Cash flow from the operations was EUR 92 million during the quarter, a significant improvement over the last year's Q1.
Also, the last 12 months cash flow from the operations increased clearly from Q4 last year, being now at the level of EUR 450 million. What then comes to the CapEx spend, there is no change to our guidance, so we will still expect our CapEx to increase slightly over the last year's level. Finally, to conclude the key points from the Q1, although the market environment continues to be challenging, there was really no sequential decline in demand in any of our business units. Our demand continued stable.
Cost inflation has increased, but its impact on our Q1 results was still quite limited, and we started immediately to implement price increases to mitigate the impact of the increased costs, but it takes some time before the price increases impact is visible in our P&L. Finally, we are taking measures to lower our cost base to ensure it is aligned with the current market environment. We have today announced also that we start cooperative negotiations and aim to reduce some 150 roles globally. This concludes our presentations, and, Kiira, I would hand it over to you.
Thank you. Let's maybe click the Q&A slide-
Yes
...here. Thank you, Tuomas, and thank you, Antti, both. Now it's then time for the Q&A. Operator, we are ready for the questions. Please, let's go ahead.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Martin Roediger from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Yes, thanks for taking my three questions, actually. One is a clarification question. Can you quantify the inventory write-down in Q1? And in which segment did that occur? Was it in Water Solutions or anything else? Secondly, is there any input material, regardless of its organic or inorganic or sulfur-related or metal-related, where you see a risk of limited availability for this input? And thirdly, regarding top line, you mentioned that the volumes have been flattish in Q1. Some other chem companies talked about some pre-buying activities or restocking done at clients in March. Why is it different at Kemira? Why don't I see any restocking at clients in your volumes in Q1? Thanks.
All right. I'll start, and I'll let Tuomas comment on the inventory-
Yeah
... write-off question. I'll start from the end. The last question, the demand. Yeah, I mean, it depends, of course, on the markets that you serve, how much capability there is in the value chain to stock the materials. That's one thing. The other thing is that we were actually very prompt o n the day one of Iran war to announce order controls in all of our major product lines as we were anticipating this kind of restocking.
It may look good in terms of inflating the top line for one quarter, but in the end, that's customers buying with the old prices when everybody knows that the raw material cost will go up. We tried to manage the situation so that there would be as normal in these market conditions, as normal demand pattern for the quarter as possible. The second question was, remind me again, related to the-
The first one was the inventory.
It was about the input material.
Yes.
Oh, yeah. Any disruptions.
For limited availability.
Yes.
Yes.
Yeah, our operations are managing the situation very well. We are covered for several months in all of our main or even less important raw materials. Short term, I don't see a risk. Of course, if the situation prolongs, there will be certain material flows that will be impacted. There are some of our key raw materials, alpha olefins, for instance, where Qatar is roughly 1/3 of global production. At some point, the world will run out of these. Short term, for several months, we are quite well covered. The inventory write-down.
Yeah, if I may continue there. The inventory write-down that, Antti, you mentioned in your presentation. That was really related to the Packaging & Hygiene Solutions, and we're not disclosing the exact number there, but anyway, it was not in a way on a company level material, but of course is visible in the business unit numbers. No drama there, but still an effect on the business unit numbers.
Thank you.
Thank you, Martin. Let's now take the next question, please.
The next question comes from Joni Sandvall from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks, Antti, Tuomas, for the presentation. Maybe starting with the PHS question on the new organizational structure you are driving, new structure all around the geographies. Could you give any indication how this has been developing on different geographies? Is the problem now what we are seeing, is it purely driven by APAC?
Yes. The implementation of the new operating model is progressing very well. We are roughly 80% there. We are measuring it in different dimensions of the customers transferred to the new channels and so forth. We are roughly 80% there now as we speak at the end of the quarter one, so progressing well. The softness, yes and no. Overall, the Packaging & Hygiene Solutions market globally is soft. The demand softness we see in all geographies. When it comes down to the combination of soft demand and a really fierce competition which drives down the prices and thus profitability, then that impact is clearly the most clear in APAC and especially China. We are not, of course, disclosing the business unit, geographic unit numbers, but as previously I can say that both the Americas and Europe are producing healthy profits in Packaging & Hygiene Solutions.
Maybe to continue there a little bit.
Okay.
Of course, in the Americas, there is then more FX impact compared to the two other regions.
Yeah.
Okay. Second question on water and especially industrial side of that. Have you seen any pickup on demand during the quarter or any sequential comments inside the quarter of the demand situation?
Yeah. First of all, we, of course, don't comment within the quarter things, but overall, on the industrial side, as I've explained earlier, so basically the demand for our chemicals for industrial water treatment is dependent on the level of industrial activity in various different industries. We haven't really seen any major pickup of the economic activity, especially in Europe, but also China is subdued and even U.S., which typically has been driving, is not doing that well. The overall economic activity is still down, and that is reflected on the demand in the industrial water solutions side.
Okay. Thanks. A short question on the logistics side. Do you have any index clauses for the logistics costs?
Yes, we have all the possible arrangements like with the sales prices as well. We have those that are purely spot where there is no indexes. We have some where we have indexes in the contract. It depends on the nature of the business. Some, yes, but not overall everywhere.
Okay. Lastly, around the guidance and or the long-term target to remain within the 18%-21% EBITDA margin level, is there anything else than seasonality supporting the profitability now going into Q2 where we know that costs are still increasing? I'm just thinking you are speaking about reaching the bracket-
Mm-hmm
...on quarterly basis. Should we expect this already in Q2?
I surely hope. This is again the situation where you really don't know how long does the Iran war last? How long does the impact last? How quickly do the material costs get normalized, or do they get normalized at all? Will the situation even worsen? We are, as Tuomas explained, really promptly acting on our cost base and impacting those areas that we can impact. We have gone out and are executing price increases. We basically started that on a day two or day one after the Iran war started. Basically, we are doing everything that we can impact to get as quickly as possible back within the brackets. Do I have a crystal ball? Can I promise you that quarter one will be there within the brackets? No, I can't.
If I may continue there. Just like that, and normally, and also now, we're not commenting on the in-year quarterly guidance. In general, we can say that as I already explained in my part of the presentation. In the Water Solutions business, so in general and looking at the historical seasonality of our business, so the Q2 and Q3 are stronger ones than the Q1, so.
Then maybe-
Okay, thanks.
Maybe regarding the M&A, so currently the expectations related to the SIDRA Wasserchemie acquisition are that it will be completed during the second half of the year, so that's just to be clear with that as well.
Thanks, that's all for me.
And then I think we are ready for the next question, please.
Next question comes from Tomi Railo from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Hi, everyone. It's Tomi from DNB Carnegie. A couple of questions, if I may. Starting with the overall cost increases, what level of percentage increases are you seeing in the oil derivatives, and maybe also in the logistics costs?
Again, not-
If you can put a number.
...not commenting the percentages, but basically if you want to do the math, you can do the math. The oil price typically in chemical value chain, if the end product is oil derivative, comes through quite straight. You know that 1/3 of our cost base is oil derivatives, and you see oil coming from $65-$100 or whatever rough numbers you want to use. You'll get the percentage impact from there. Of course, there are other impacts, so it's not exactly directly. The impacts are expected to be over 10% increases in that cost base.
Okay. That's very good. It's pretty straightforward, and there are obviously polymers and other, but the oil price gives a good indication.
Yes.
Maybe on the price increases. I know it's difficult, but what kind of price increase attempts have you made overall, and maybe what is the reaction among the customers?
Yes. As mentioned, we started the price increases immediately when we saw that the raw material costs and logistics costs will go up. There are several different mechanisms for that, depending on the customer contracts. As a result of the previous crisis, we have typically tried to shorten the price validity in our contract. Basically we are faster to react than we maybe were some years ago. Basically, the natural way is when there's a price update point in the contract, so you do that there, in a normal manner. There are surcharges and adders, especially for the mitigation of transportation costs that can be used in several cases. Those can be implemented immediately.
There are, of course, some customer contracts where basically we need to discuss deeply with the customer and negotiate whether the kind of basis on which the original contract was done is valid anymore in this new world. All of these mechanisms apply. Some of them are quicker to impact, some of them are slower to impact. Basically, the overall situation as mentioned will be then visible as we move forward because there is a lag before we see this in our P&L.
Just to follow up, is it kind of low single digit, mid single digit, double digit?
I will not comment that, but I forgot to answer the latter part of your previous question. Basically, what is the reaction from the market? The reaction, nobody likes the price increases, but the reaction has been, in that sense, quite reasonable that everybody lives in this same world. Everybody sees the same cost increases, not only in our chemicals but in other areas. Everybody sees the logistics cost increase. Everybody sees it when they drive home in the gas pump. Basically, the environment in that sense is, in a sense, understanding of this situation that we have.
On the savings, can you say something about the timeline and potential costs, but would you expect any savings to materials already this year, or is it mostly 2027?
Maybe Tuomas must answer that.
Yeah. Thanks, Tomi, for the question. Regarding the savings, of course, it's in a way too early to conclude since we just today, this morning, started the process. It of course depends on the process and how it goes and what are the final decisions made there as a part of the process. Anyway, as we disclosed also, in a yearly basis, EUR 50 million, and then you can use the calendar time in a way as a proxy there in estimating the impact for this year. That we can say that we expect positive impacts already this year.
Maybe on the seasonality. It's a bit tricky just to estimate, and think your messaging seasonally stronger second or third quarter. Then again, bigger impacts from the increased costs in the second and third quarter. What is your assumption that you are assuming that the second and third quarter are better in terms of earnings than the first quarter? That's how I read it, keeping your guidance intact.
Well, your lead to the question kind of answered that. Basically, we are living in the world where we know that we have seasonally stronger quarter two and quarter three, especially in the Water Solutions. That is caused by the type of demand that there is, a warmer season in Northern Hemisphere, more water consumption. Basically, that pattern doesn't get impacted by the world economy.
Mm. And then-
On top of that, we have then now the war in Iran, and nobody knows how long the shock will last in the raw material market. That will, to some degree, of course, eat the benefit of the better quarters. Our price increase actions take also force during the second and third quarter. Basically, with this, everything that is going on, I just can't precisely answer your question.
Maybe, Tomi, related to the Water Solutions seasonality, the Q2 and Q3 are stronger versus Q1 is more related to the volumes. The actual demand and the use of water treatment. You have the other elements on top of that.
Thank you very much. Final question, if I can.
Sure
Still.
Let's have this as a final question then.
Caustic soda. Yes, it's fine now. Caustic soda price has been jumping, especially in Asia. Of course, that had an impact a couple of years ago, a substantial impact on the profitability. Anything you can comment on that? Are you seeing the increased price potentially impacting you, or how does the dynamic work again, if you can remind us?
Yeah. I think the dynamics are unchanged. Basically we are producing caustic soda and selling it. For our own production, and it's a commodity, so there's a world market price for that. Basically, when the caustic soda commodity prices go up, we get the benefit from that share of our caustic business where we are producing it ourselves. We are trading it as well. Basically for the traded part of the business it will increase the top line, but typically there is not similar margin impact as there is from the own production side.
Then of course, in many of our production facilities, we are also using small amounts of caustic soda as raw material. There we have the cost increase impact then. Overall, as you mentioned, and as we have earlier been commenting, our scope of usage or selling caustic soda has not changed. Similar impact as if you go back to your files and you see previously, basically the same impacts you can expect to happen in the current environment if and when the caustic prices go up.
Very clear. Thank you very much.
Thank you. We have also received some questions through the webcast chat. I will now take them here in between. We could start with Packaging and Hygiene Solutions and APAC. There is a question that the challenges in Packaging and Hygiene Solutions in APAC seem rather structural than cyclical. Would you consider some structural changes in your operations, or do you see that operational changes will change the profitability here enough?
That's a correct conclusion. Now we have to be more specific, especially the China part of the APAC market, Chinese market. The situation or the challenges are structural, so definitely not seasonal. Basically there's increased competition, there's been more capacity added to the already oversupplied market as in many chemicals in China. That is a structural challenge that we need to tackle. Obviously we are analyzing the situation and working on that, and structural solutions are not out of the question.
Maybe next question related to the kind of like one-offs. Here is the Packaging & Hygiene Solutions inventory write-off, but then also you mentioned one-offs in Q1 for Water Solutions. Could you please estimate the combined effects from both inventory write-down and one-offs? Could you please also update us on the situation and the impact from the tolling business in Water Solutions for Q1?
Well, I'll let Tuomas calculate in his head and see what he says about the combined impact. I'll talk about the tolling business, basically because that has been impacting last year, especially big changes quarter- to -quarter. Basically, again, let's remind everybody that simplified, we have three different parts on that business. One is normal market type of business, so we have several chemicals going to several end customers via that kind of a tolling customer. That's roughly a third of the business.
Roughly a third is one customer that they have in oil production, and one-third is another customer they have in a kind of other part of the value chain in different geographies. Basically, and these two big single accounts were the ones that were impacting having these problems last year. Now we see normalized situation in both, basically and no further disruptions. We would basically expect from Q2 onwards a more normalized situation with this tolling partner business. That's maybe it.
The one-offs.
Yeah. Continuing on the one-off type of items there in Water Solutions. They were type of items that are part of the business and there just happened to be a bunch of them during the Q1. It's not about the calculation, it's about putting a number on it. They're kind of a combined impact. We're not putting a number on it, but let's not exaggerate on its impact on our financials. We can say that it's anyway the combined impact is in single-digit EUR millions. That gives you a ballpark at least.
Yes. Then there was a question related to logistics costs. I think that this was partly replied already, but let's still take this. How much you had headwind from logistics costs in Q1 sequentially, and how much you expect is still to come through in Q2?
Again, we don't comment on the logistics cost separation from the other costs. Let's just reiterate the earlier thing, that basically the impact on quarter one from these impacts of Iran war were relatively limited because it really kind of the raw materials didn't get through yet, the cost increases. It was mostly the logistics cost. Again, I presented the cost structure where you see which part the logistics cost play in our thing. You can look at the diesel prices if you want to get the proxy from that, how much percentage change has been. Relatively easy to get a reasonable estimate if you want.
There was one last question related to the pricing in Water Solutions. Why are the prices decreasing in Water Solutions?
Well, of course, there are several reasons for that, not one single thing. Mostly it's really driven by the industrial side again, where we commented that the overall demand is weak because the industrial activity is down. Now, that of course then means that all of the suppliers have idle capacity, so basically it is more difficult to push through any changes in the raw materials. At the same time, if you look at the raw material development, which Tuomas presented.
Yeah
The raw material costs were decreasing in the first quarter. Basically then customers are pushing us hard to get their share of that. Then in an environment where basically the demand is really weak, it is more difficult to hold on to your prices than it is in a situation where the demand is strong.
Thank you. I think that we have now covered all the questions that we have received, either through the chat or by operator line. It's time to conclude the webcast. I would like to thank everyone for the active participation and questions and if there are any other questions, so you know where to find Kemira's investor relations team. We are here to help you. Just as a reminder, so we will be back in the results studio in July with our half-year financial results, and the date is July 17th. See you then at the latest. Finally, I wish everyone a great day and also a good weekend. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.