Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for taking the time to participate in today's PT Avia Avian Tbk, or Avia Full Year 2023 Earnings Call. For your information, we uploaded the presentation materials to our website yesterday. The plan for today is to start with a quick presentation, followed by a one-hour question and answer session. To ensure the session runs smoothly, we will mute all the participants at the beginning of this presentation. If you have any questions during the presentation, please use the Q&A chat box, and we will answer them during the Q&A session. For those who cannot join us today, please note that the webcast of this event will be uploaded to our website no later than tomorrow. Thank you again for being here today. Allow me to start by introducing myself. My name is Andreas Timothy Hadikrisno.
I'm the Head of Investor Relations of Avia, and will be moderating this earnings call today. We are joined today by three other presenters, starting with Mr. Ruslan Tanoko, the Vice President Director of our company, followed by Mr. Robert Tanoko, the Operations and Development Director, and finally, Mr. Kurnia Hadi, the Finance Director. In 2023, total revenue reached IDR 7 trillion, which is the equivalent of $461 million. In the same period, we recorded a gross margin of 45.4%, an EBITDA margin of 27.5%, and a net profit margin of 23.4%. We are supported by a team of over 8,000 dedicated and skilled employees.
In the end of 2023, we had 158 distribution centers spread across Indonesia, comprising 118 wholly-owned DCs and 40 third-party DCs, providing high-quality services to more than 56,000 retail outlets in 38 provinces and 99 cities in Indonesia. Avian Brands delivered solid full year 2023 results, where consolidated sales increased by 4.8% year-on-year. Both the architectural solutions and trading goods segments recorded positive sales growth of 4.3% and 6.8% respectively. Notably, both segments also achieved significant double-digit growth in gross profit, resulting in an overall increase of 17.1% in consolidated gross profit and a consolidated gross margin of 45.4%, the highest level recorded in the last five years.
In addition, EBITDA also demonstrated positive growth with a 15.8% year-on-year increase, and a recorded margin of 27.5%. Furthermore, the net profit recorded double-digit growth of 17.3%, with a robust margin of 23.4%. This is the highest level recorded in the last 5 years for the net profit margin. Despite the downward trend in the inflation rate, concerns regarding purchasing power are still evident owing to the rising consumer price index and pressure from primary food inflation. The wholesale price for rice, which is the staple food for Indonesians, has risen by 70% year-on-year. Adding to the challenge is the fact that minimum wage increases in the past 3 years have failed to keep pace with the price inflation in the building materials industry.
In fact, the trend of weakness was perceived across various industries, with one ceramic tile company reporting a negative sales growth of around 5%, and one of Indonesia's largest FMCG enterprises reporting around 6% decline in sales, both for the full year 2023. Avian Brands has been strategically positioned with a comprehensive product portfolio that caters to all consumer categories, from economical to premium price points. This diverse range of products is further supported by our robust innovation capability and nationwide distribution network. As a result, we are confident in our ability to enhance our market share and strengthen our position in this industry. Supported by a highly committed research, development, and innovation, or what we call RDI team, we launched 14 new products in 2023 across various categories.
Five of these new products belongs to the more economical price segments, which were introduced by leveraging our well-known brands. In the fourth quarter, we launched a more premium product in the wood and metal category, Avia 3-in-1 .... The introduction of this particular product showcased our strategy approach of not only launching more economical priced products, but also expanding our premium products. In 2023, we expanded our distribution network by adding 9 wholly-owned DCs, 10 new mini DCs, and 3 third-party DCs. As of the end of 2023, we have 118 wholly-owned DCs, 14 mini DCs, and thirty-four third-party DCs. Within our wholly-owned DCs, we have 587 delivery trucks and 43 three-wheelers motorcycles for the express delivery services, which enable us to make around 10,000 deliveries on a daily basis.
In addition to our logistical infrastructure, we have implemented several technology-driven initiatives that have enabled us to fulfill 94% of 1-day and 34, 33% of express delivery services to retail outlets. Our express delivery program has been well-received by retail outlets, allowing them to boost their profitability without increasing their inventory and lowering their working capital. This program facilitates product delivery within 2 hours of order placement, which has been instrumental in improving customer satisfaction and incentivizing them to offer more variants to our products. In the fourth quarter, consolidated sales witnessed a 6.7% year-on-year growth, amounting to IDR 1.8 trillion. For the full year, consolidated sales increased by 4.8% compared to the previous year, reaching IDR 7 trillion.
Throughout 2023, we recorded transactions from more than 56,800 retail outlets across Indonesia, an increase of more than 700 retail outlets compared to last year. The rise in the number of retail outlets is a testament to the company's steadfast commitment to fostering high-quality relationships with constant improvements to customers and providing them with unparalleled service quality. I will now pass to Pak Hadi to continue the presentation.
Thank you, Pak Andreas. Good afternoon, everyone. This slide provides an overview of our sales distribution across five major islands in Indonesia. To monitor our progress in each of these islands, we use the GDP contribution of each island as a benchmark for our sales. We have placed greater emphasis on allocating more resources to areas where we lag behind, specifically the Jakarta region in Java and the northern region of Sumatra. In the islands of Kalimantan, Sulawesi, and the rest of Indonesia, our sales contribution is higher and well ahead of GDP contribution. We have decided to limit the specific details regarding the breakdown of our sales due to the competitive dynamics of the paint industry in Indonesia. We will share our sales breakdown by segment. For investors who require this information, please reach out to our Head of Investor Relations.
The chart on the left presents our sales division by segment. The sales contribution from the architecture solution segment was able to be maintained at around 80%, with the remaining 20% of sales coming from the trading goods segment. The wall, wood and metal, and waterproofing categories remain the top three sales contributors for the company. The wall category experienced high single-digit growth in 2023, while the wood and metal and waterproofing categories grew in mid-single-digit. Regarding the sales breakdown by customer, traditional retail outlets contribute 92.5% of total sales, and the contribution of modern retail outlets accounted for 7.5%. On the other hand, if we divide sales based on the distribution network, wholly-owned distribution centers contribute around 88% of sales, while third-party distribution centers contribute around 11%.
In the fourth quarter, consolidated gross profit exhibited an increase of 12% year-on-year, amounting to IDR 825 billion. The consolidated gross margin for the quarter was recorded at 44.5%, marking a 2.1% increase from the previous year. In the full year, gross profit also demonstrated a double-digit growth of 17.1% year-on-year, almost reaching IDR 3.2 trillion. The corresponding gross margin was recorded at level of 45.4%, exhibiting a 4.8% increase over last year. Please note that the accounting reclassification of below-the-line expenses in 2023 contributed to the increase in gross margin by 1.4%. However, the improvement in gross profit was mainly driven by the decline in raw material prices.
In the fourth quarter, consolidated EBITDA significantly grew by 19.8% compared to the same period last year, amounting to IDR 503 billion. The recorded EBITDA margin of the quarter was 27.2%, marking a 3% increase compared to the same quarter last year. For the full year, EBITDA was recorded at IDR 1.9 trillion, representing 15.8% growth over last year. During the same period, EBITDA margin reached 27.5%, indicating a 2.6% increase compared to last year. The improvement in EBITDA was driven by the improvement in gross profit, as well as the effective control over operating costs. Furthermore, in the fourth quarter, consolidated net profit grew remarkably by 26.6% compared to the same period last year, amounting to IDR 447 billion.
The recorded net margin of the quarter was 24.1%, marking a 3.8% increase compared to the same quarter last year. For the full year, net profit was recorded at IDR 1.6 trillion, representing 17.3% growth over last year. During the same period, the net profit margin reached a 23.4% level, indicating a 2.5% increase compared to last year. The Architectural Solution segment witnessed a sales growth of 3.8% year-on-year during the fourth quarter, amounting to IDR 1.4 trillion. The full-year sales also rose by 4.3%, reaching a total of IDR 5.6 trillion. The sales volume in the fourth quarter experienced a substantial growth of 13.3% in comparison to the same period last year.
The overall growth in sales volume for the full year 2023 was 1.6%. During this year, the company has diversified its product portfolio by expanding its offering across multiple segments, including wall, wood, wood and metal, and waterproofing. A special focus was placed on completing the economical price product range by the end of third quarter in response to the weaker consumer purchasing power. In addition, more products were launched with enhanced quality and tailored features to expand our consumer base and boost market share. Product innovation were accompanied by aggressive marketing strategies and were further supported by the company's fast distribution network to ensure market penetration on a nationwide level. During 2023, the Architectural Solution segment recorded transactions from more than 51,700 retail outlets, representing an increase of more than 1,300 additional customers compared to the last year.
Avian Brands' unwavering commitment to building a high-quality relationship with customer through exceptional service offering and marketing initiative has gained the company a special position in the customer's mind. The Avian Brands Priority Customer Program was developed as a means to focus on big retail outlet with significant contribution to sales. This initiative offer various incentive and benefit to large retail outlets, thereby elevating their status not only as customer, but also as valuable and trusted partner. This program has proven to be highly effective in boosting our sales. The Trading Goods segment experienced a significant rise in sales during the fourth quarter, recording a double-digit growth of 18.1% year-on-year, totaling IDR 415 billion.
For the full year 2023, the total sales for the Trading Goods segment exhibited a growth of 6.8% year-on-year, reaching IDR 1.4 trillion, mainly driven by the growth in PVC pipe category. Throughout the year, transactions from nearly 50,000 retail outlets were recorded in the Trading Goods segment. Additionally, the Trading Goods segment total customer base for the year accounted for around 84% of our overall consolidated customers, indicating a high level of synergy that this particular segment holds within our business ecosystem. In the fourth quarter, the Architectural Solutions segment recorded a gross profit of IDR 749 billion, representing a 9.6% year-on-year growth. In the same quarter, the gross margin for this segment reached a 52.1% level, indicating a 4.4% year-on-year improvement.
For the entire fiscal year, the gross profit for this particular segment improved by 17.7%, amounting to IDR 2.9 trillion, with a recorded gross margin of 52.2%, exhibiting a 5.9 year-on-year improvement. Regarding the trading goods segment, the gross profit for the fourth quarter significantly improved by 42.6% year-on-year, reaching IDR 76 billion. The corresponding gross margin for the quarter was 18.4%, marking a 3.2% improvement compared to the same quarter last year. For the full year, gross profit was recorded at IDR 251 billion, representing a 10.8% year-on-year growth. Gross margin for the year was 18%. I will now pass to Pak Robert to continue the presentation.
Thank you, Pak Hadi. Total capital expenditure for 2023 accounted for around 3%, with around 1% allocated towards the construction of the third factory in Cirebon, and around 2% allocated to the routine CapEx. Our ability to generate a high level of cash, coupled with a low routine CapEx, has contributed to the solid free cash flow, which accounted for around 17% of total sales. This has bolstered the confidence of the company in fulfilling its commitment to distributing our minimum 50% dividend payout ratio. Please note that, that we continue to pursue our merger and acquisitions strategy. In the meantime, we will maximize our dividend payout ratio. Over the past 2 years, we have distributed dividends equal to around 90% of our net profit.
With regard to accounts receivable management, the company has been able to maintain its on-time collection of accounts receivables, reaching 90.4% as of the end of September 2023, despite the challenging economic condition posed by the high inflation rate. Retail outlets have given us top priority in terms of payment, and we believe this is a result of our persistent commitment to building strong and long-lasting relationships with them. We will continue to preserve this relationship in the long term. The company is committed to conducting business operations in a responsible and sustainable manner. We continuously monitor and measure, and report our progress and results in the areas of environmental, social, and governance practices. In terms of product stewardship, we have 29 products registered under the Green Label Singapore.
Furthermore, 81.5% of our products are water-based, and as much as 50.7% of the materials used are renewable-based. From an environmental perspective, we have made multiple progress on renewable energy and reduction of energy intensity, hazardous waste disposal, and greenhouse gas emissions, Scope 1 and Scope 2 . In addition, we have also made various improvements in the social and governance aspect, as shown on this page. As we embark upon the year of 2024, we remain confident in our strategic plan, our capabilities, and the differentiated product and service solutions that we offer to our customers. Given that the economy is impacted by the uncertainty in the presidential election, we are adopting a moderate approach with our guidance, and aim to grow our sales by 6%-10% and increase our volume by 4%-8%.
Our company is committed to pursuing growth initiatives that will enable us to better serve our customers and become a more valuable partner to them. To this end, we are focusing on product innovation, TT machines acceleration, and distribution center expansion. Additionally, we are continuing the express delivery program as more customers are seeing the benefits it provides. Our ultimate objective is to help our customers increase their profitability and achieve their business objectives. That concludes our full year 2023 presentation. Thank you very much for joining today's earnings call, and I will now pass to Pak Andreas to moderate the Q&A session.
... Thank you, Pak Robert. We can now proceed with Q&A session, which will last for one hour. The first question goes to Ibu Natalia Sutanto. We have two questions from Ibu Natalia. Number one: Do you think the strong year-on-year fourth quarter 2023 volume in architectural solution will continue in the first quarter 2024? And number two, can you share about February 2024 sales and volume? Do you see improvement month-on-month? How about year-on-year?
Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you again for the question. As we enter 2024, as Robert have mentioned towards the end of the presentation, right, the biggest uncertainty that we're facing is the business sentiments from the presidential election. As you know, there's still a lot of news being talked about the election. You know, people are contesting the numbers and everything else. Nevertheless, what we see from our business point of view is that we're glad that the election actually only happened for one round, because if it had happened for two rounds, it just means more uncertainty in the business, and that's really not good for the economy.
That being said, we are cautious about what we think we can achieve in this year, and therefore, in terms of our guidance, we are looking that, you know, the sales is between 6%-10%, and then volume is between 4%-8%. Now, with regards to the confidence that we have in this year, continuing our Q4 performances, well, I think we're now in a better place in terms of the gap between the price inflation of the building materials and the minimum wage, right? After all, this January, end of January, we had another minimum wage adjustments.
So with that in mind, we think that people will go back to buying more premium product than they used to, because in Q4, the buying power was still pretty much impacted, and therefore, they tend to go down to a lower quality, more economical-based products. But I think in this year, with the gap narrowing between the price inflation as well as the minimum wage, we think that some customers will go back to the product that they used to buy, and therefore, we made it an estimate that our volume will only grow between 4%-8%. January has been good, but February looks a bit uncertain. So, I think in January, people were still not paying too much attention on the economy, and therefore, the trend continues from the Q4.
But, as we are concluding the month of February, you know, I think some uncertainty is creeping up. So I think we'll stick to our guidance and see how the year goes, but we will never stop to identify opportunities and, you know, try to improve any flaws within our operations.
Next, we go to Ibu Arta Advanti. With increasing sales and net profit, what about Avia's dividend in 2023 financial year? How big is the dividend payout ratio that will be given?
Thank you, Bu Arta. For 2023, we had distributed interim dividend of IDR 11 per share on October 2023, which is in total amounted to more or less IDR 680 billion. The final amount of dividend for 2023 will be decided during the next annual general meeting in April. Yeah. And about the second question, I think Pak Robert has mentioned that we have a commitment, at least we will distribute 50% of our net income as dividend. But for the last two years, we distribute around 90% of our net income as dividend. Yeah. As long as no specific capital allocation, like M&A or CapEx. Yeah. Hopefully answer your question.
Thank you, Pak. We go to the next, Ibu Nitya from Kontan. Number one. We have three questions from Ibu Nitya. Number one, please explain how much revenue and sales volume growth target in 2024. I think this question has been answered in the last page. And next, how much did each business segment contribute this year? That's question number one. Number two, how much CapEx is prepared in 2024? How many products will be released this year? What are the types? And number three, last one, what business diversification plans does Avia have in 2024? Are there any corporate action plans this year?
Yeah. Thank you for the question. So the question with regards to the products that we will launch this year, right? We're always trying to identify opportunities where we can basically make a difference in the market. So generally, every time when we look for these opportunities, we always see what... Is there any product that's available in the market for that particular type that we want to launch? If there is, and we don't have that product yet, so the approach from our R&D team is that, okay, what kind of improvements can we make?... because it's never our intention to just launch a product which is exactly the same as the ones that exist in the market. That's not our way of thinking. We always try to make improvements.
If we cannot make improvements, then we look at, okay, can we make this product at a better price? So those are the two considerations that we put in mind when we want to launch any new products. And obviously, as you know, the top three revenue contributors for the company are the wall paint, the wood and metal paint, and the waterproofing. So opportunities will definitely be in those segments. I can share with you that not much products will be launched in wall paints, because we have launched enough in the past two years. So other segments would probably get priorities over the wall paints, and we'll just focus on the existing product lines that we have in the wall paints, but other segments will definitely have more and more products.
I mean, I wanted to highlight the products that we launched in Q4, which is, as you see here on the right-hand side in the middle, called Anti-Rust Paint 3-in-1. Well, this is a product that we basically came up with after our Thailand trip last year in March. So when we went to Thailand to study the market there, we looked at this is an interesting product that Indonesia doesn't have yet. So I think it's quite common for Indonesia to have 2-in-1, which is just a primer and the top coat. Well, again, consistent to our style, right, we wanted to make improvements. And when we launched this 3-in-1, well, the anti-rust property is one that we believe is gonna be the game changer in this segment.
Obviously, because this product is more premium, then it will take some time for the market to adapt to this price point. But this is also an important way for you guys to understand that we are not only launching a more economical products. So making more premium products is definitely in our agenda, and we'll continue to identify opportunities in that segment. Can you read the other questions, Andreas, that I haven't answered?
Number 3, Ruslan: What business diversification plans does Avia have in 2024? Are there any corporate action plans for this year?
Okay, thank you. So as a company, we are very focused in, in the paint segment, so you will not see us acquiring ceramic tile companies, you know, and adjacencies in that line, because the aim is to keep the paint segment or the architectural solution contribution to be at least 80%. So that's the very much the focus, and, I mean, for obvious reason, right? You can tell from the gross profit margin that, you know, the paint segment delivered a solid 52% gross profit margin, whereas the trading good is only about 18%. So we believe that within the other building material industries, it's very difficult to identify other segments where the gross profit margin can be more or less equivalent to that of the architectural solutions.
So with that in mind, we're really not looking to do much diversification into other adjacencies, unless we can identify something along the line where the gross profit margin meets our criteria, and more importantly, we're only targeting to sell the same products into building material shops. We don't want to start looking for a new channel, because that would means that we're not working in an efficient manner, and that's not good. So we need to identify that if we are diversifying into anything new, well, is the building material shop sell them? Do they sell them, right? Is this a product for the project segment, within the paint or something? So we ask ourselves those kinds of questions to see whether that would meet our criteria or not. Corporate action in this year is highly unlikely.
I can share a little bit with you that we are looking very closely to one company at this point in time, but unfortunately, it is something that will take a bit of time, and it is very unlikely that anything will take place in this year. Hopefully that answer your questions. Thank you.
Maybe, maybe I just add a question about how much CapEx is prepared for 2024? Yeah. For 2024-
...
We, we prepare as much CapEx of for Cirebon plant amounted to IDR 450 billion, or more or less 5% of sales. Besides that, we have a routine CapEx, about 2% of sales. Yeah. Thank you.
Thank you, Pak. Next questions comes from Nasrullah, from DBS. Do you see other players' sales volume also growing around 13%-15% in fourth quarter 2023? How is the inventory situation at the building material store level? Is the inventory currently high? Pak.
Okay. First of all, we don't think that the inventory at the retail shops are high, because there was hardly any price hikes taking place last year. So what you see is that retail shops are incentivized to carry more inventories through activities such as virtual gathering or offline gathering, right? Many companies conduct these type of activities to try to push more sales to the retail outlets. So we always do that also for many, many years. But we believe that now retail outlets are sitting on comfortable level of inventories. Okay, I think that's the key, because if there hasn't been any price hike, there's really no need for them to carry too much inventory.
Generally speaking, as a rough guide, every time we conduct one of these type of, gathering activities, virtual gathering, you know, sales will go up, you know, 30%-70%, but then it just means that next month they'll buy less. So but whereas if you are looking for the price hike, they tend to want to stock up a bit more than, than just kind of, 30%-70%, and that's why they tend to be sitting on higher inventory. But they're, they are just sitting on comfortable level of inventory at this point in time. I'm sorry, the first question that I missed?
Do you see growth from the-
From competitors, yeah. Look, to be honest, we believe that we were the only company growing at that kind of a volume in the Q4. Now, I'm able to say this because we keep a very close eye on our competitors' activities, right? And we hardly see any new products being launched into the market last year, okay? You can name all the competitors there are in the market, and you will find it quite difficult to find any new products that has been launched into the market. You know, multinational companies, you know, I can mention a few, AkzoNobel, Jotun, Nippon, Kansai, they probably launched between one or two products last year at most. And local companies hardly do any product launches. They just stick with one or two products that they have, and that, that's it.
So with that in mind, I think it is very unlikely that any of our competitors would be able to deliver that kind of double-digit volume growth in Q4. Thank you.
Thank you, Pak. Now we go to next question, comes from Danif S. Fandiari from Mandiri Sekuritas. Question number one: 2024 growth value is 6%-10%, while volume is 4%-8%, implies 2% ASP improvement. Is it correct? From ASP high or lower economical brand percentage, can you explain? And then question number two, reclassifications. Could Avia team explain further the nature of deferred tax assets? Why was full year 2022 and prior not restated? How should we view normalized GPM, EBITDA margin, and net profit margin going forward? And question number three, Lebaran impact was absent in full year 2023, going by second quarter 2023 volume versus second half 2023. Should we expect the same going forward?
Okay, I'll answer the first one first. I think when we look at the... Well, sorry, my mind just went blank, Andreas. Read one by one.
Okay, number-
Number 1, question number 3 already.
Okay.
Go ahead.
Question number one, Pak. 2024 growth-
Uh
... value is 6%-10%-
Yes, yes, yes
while volume is 4%-8%.
Okay, I remember. Okay, let me focus on that question first.
Okay.
So, as I mentioned earlier, right, we believe that when the gap between price inflations of our products, yeah, is narrowing to that of their minimum wage, right? That some consumers will ideally go back to previous products that they have used, rather than sticking with that more economical products. More economical products is always needed in many areas throughout Indonesia, because not all cities have the same capability when it comes to spending power, right? But what we believe this year will happen is that things will normalize a bit more than what we did in what we delivered in Q4. And keep in mind that some of the activities in Q4 was also because of sell-in to the retailers, so now they're start selling them out and everything else.
That's why we see that, okay, if sales are gonna grow between 6%-10%, based on our estimates, I think volume will grow a bit slower. Now, will that come from price hike or ASP hike? We don't have any plans to actually do any price hike at this point in time. Strangely enough, right, just a few days ago, we met for our monthly gross profit margin discussion, where, you know, all of us here on the panel join. And we still see that the month of January, the gross profit margin for paints are still holding quite well, okay? When we compare that to December, you know, slight improvement. But just a few days ago, a very local company decided to do a 4% price hike for the wood and metal segment.
So we were like, "Why are they doing it?" So we don't understand. But for us, for this point in time, we really do not see any price hikes taking place, unless things change drastically and raw material prices shoot up for whatever reason, it's another war or any activities throughout the world, God forbid, another COVID-type variance or whatever, then we may need to make adjustments. Other than that, we won't. So the difference in the value growth to that of the volume growth will come from just different product mixes that will be accepted in the market. Maybe I'll continue to question three before I hand over to Hadi for question two. But can you read again, Andreas, so that I don't forget?
Question number three, Pak?
Yes.
Lebaran impact was absent in full year 2023-
Yeah
... going by second quarter 2023 volume versus second half 2023. Should we expect the same going forward?
Yeah. So when we saw the numbers on the number of people which traveled during Lebaran last year, it's definitely one of the highest numbers compared to during COVID, right? So I think it shows that things are recovering. But again, keep in mind that, you know, the activities, the cultural-driven need to repaint their homes obviously needs to be balanced out with their purchasing power, right? If you don't have enough money, then obviously that's something that they can still postpone. So that's what we- that's why Q2 last year wasn't as strong. Well, we think that this year, Lebaran will definitely be better than Q2. The unknown that we're facing is that whether there's gonna be any results from the election per se, that will create any kind of chaos.
If that is no longer the case, then we believe that Lebaran this year will definitely be stronger than Lebaran last year. I'll give it to Hadi for Q2, for question two.
Thank you.
Should I restate again for Hadi?
It's okay. I can read the question.
Okay, fine.
Okay, regarding your question about reclassification and adjustment, I think for 2023, we have one reclassification and one adjustment from our auditor that had impact on our gross profit and net income. This reclassification adjustment also affect the previous quarter numbers. That's why... Yeah, Terry, maybe you can... Yeah, thank you. Go to... Yes. So, if we look at the table on the upper side, yeah, the reclassification was carried out on BTL marketing expenses, which were more suitable if recorded as part of sales and marketing expenses rather than recorded in COGS. Total reclassification amounted to IDR 98 billion, which is IDR 77 billion, affecting the QTD September 2023 figure. This reclassification only had an impact on gross profit, while the operating profit remained unchanged. Yeah. The detail is shown in the upper table, right?
And apart from that, we have another adjustment from our auditor related to the deferred tax, yeah. Because, usually we only, calculate, deferred tax on the PL basis. But for this year, our auditor start to record the deferred tax based on, balance sheet approach on, also. So, in 2023, we have to record, adjustment, related to the, deferred tax, which is amount to around IDR 77 billion. Yeah. And then, the, the next question is, how should we view the normalized GPM, EBITDA margin, and net, net profit margin?
I think, when we talk about, margin, if we look at the raw material price during the last 3-4 months, we can quite sure that the gross margin for the architecture solution up to first quarter 2024 will be at more or less the same level with the full year 2023 result, yeah, because of the inventory, that we hold, yeah, both in raw material and finished good. And as we all understand, raw material price will always be one important factor, for our gross margin, and, unfortunately, this is, something that, beyond our control. So, for full year 2024, I would say that, the gross margin for the architecture solution will be hover between 50%-52%, while for trading, it will hover around 17%-18%, because again, it, it's just a trading, right?
Therefore, for the consolidated number, we are pretty comfortable to say our gross margin will be around 43%-45%. On the operating level, I think, for EBITDA, we will be hover around 25-27, and net income between 21%-23%. Hopefully that answer your question, Danny.
Thank you, Pak. There is additional question from Ibu Arta: What about Avia's net profit target? What percentage growth is targeted? I think it answered before, yeah, Pak Hadi?
Yes, it is.
Okay. And then we go next, question from James Nicholas from JC: Could you please elaborate on the drivers of improvement in gross margins for the business? Thank you.
Yeah, I think for 2023, the main factor for improvement in our gross margin is because the raw material price.
Raw, yeah.
Yeah.
Okay. We go next to Gerard Hugo from Verdhana. Congratulations for the good set of results. Can you help with two questions? Question number one: How's the competition landscape looking in 2024? Any aggressive move from the competitors in form of price cut or any promotion? And question number two: Any margin or net profit, margin after tax guidance for the full year 2024?
The competition landscape in Indonesia is going to continue to intensify, especially when many paint companies look at our numbers, right? And then they can also look at another paint company who is also sharing the OP margin for Indonesia. So obviously, that will be an attractive proposition for them to say, "Huh, okay, how can we participate in the Indonesian market?" Which is why we decided to reduce our, you know, data sharing. You can see it from the pie chart. It used to be a lot more colorful, now it's just two tones. Even though we're a paint company, we'd like to show you more colors, but I think this is being done to serve our best interest going forward.
Nevertheless, for our investors, we are more than happy to share these numbers with you, and just reach out to Andreas, and you all know his email on the third page, I think. But what's good about Indonesia is that price cut never happens, right? But intensifying on promotion certainly happens. I think I shared to you guys, you know, previously that when profit margin goes up, okay, as we have seen now, right, definitely going to be more activities in terms of the promotion, whether that's below the line, whether that's television or digital, whether that's the branding, whether that's sales promotion girl, you name it. So those type of activities will continue to happen and take place in Indonesia. And, you know, but they predominantly come from multinationals.
Not many local companies are actually becoming a lot more competitive in this country. They just tend to wait and see. If during COVID, when the market was quite tough, raw materials price, you know, shot up, most of the local companies really did nothing. They just wanna ride the wave and wait, wait, wait, wait it out. But multinationals continue to focus on the Indonesian market because, you know, it's one where the profit margin is incredibly attractive, and that's how we see the competitive dynamics in Indonesia, and that's why we decided to share less. I think NPAT guidance has been mentioned by Hadi earlier.
Yes. Okay. We go to next question from Divya, from Morgan Stanley. Question number one: In fourth quarter, why was the implied pricing in architectural solution was down 8%? Is there any downtrending in wall paints and waterproofing? Why do we expect this to reverse in 2024, and for value growth to be higher than volume?
Yeah. I think, as I mentioned earlier, Divya, where in Q4... I mean, keep in mind that we completed our product launch for the more economical product in Q3, right? Let's look at the wall paint here on the top right, in the blue labels. You can see that there was, like, one, two, three, four products that we launched, right? Because they were only completed in Q3, that therefore, a lot of the activities tend to take place in Q4. And whatever products that we sell in Q4 is basically a sell-in to the retailers, right? So that's why the volume is very high in Q4, because they're buying them. And because they're buying a lot more of the economical products than the, you know, the pricing or the ASP dropped.
Now, when we look now at 2024, as I explained earlier, right, we believe that, you know, the consumers or the retailers are no longer conducting a lot, too many sell-ins, not as aggressive as they did in Q4, and therefore we think that things are gonna normalize. And this is also as the side effects from the, you know, the narrowing of price gap, price inflation gap to that of the minimum wage. So that's why we believe that this will happen in this year. Hopefully that answer your questions.
Okay. Question number two from Divya has been answered before, about the guidance for profit margin. And then we go to question number three, housekeeping question: Why was effective tax rate lowering lower in 2023 at 17.5% versus 20%?
Thank you, Divya, for your question. In calculating current tax expense, we need to do tax reconciliation, because in profit before tax, usually include item that non-taxable. And in our case, it's interest income from bond and time deposit, which is subject to final tax. So we need to exclude those income before calculate the tax expenses. So as a result, current tax expense is smaller than... And the effective tax rate is lower than normal tax rate of 22%. Yeah. Thank you.
Okay. We go question to Tian from HSBC. Tian has three question. Question number one has been answered before about the guidance for profit margin. We go to question number two: On tinting machine rollout, what is the install base? How much was contribution in terms of volume or sales in 2023? What is the plan for 2024?
Okay, let me answer that first. Unfortunately, Tian, again, due to the competitive landscape, we cannot share those data with you. As you know, you know, many of our multinational competitors are keeping a close eye on us as a company. But what I can share with you is that I think if you look at another company's presentation for their strategy in Indonesia, it's quite similar to us when it comes to tinting machines. I think we all realize that how critical the deployment of tinting machine is toward our future success, right? Simply put, tinting machines require capital, right? Local companies do not have that capability. We do, and many multinationals do. So I think if transitions from ready-mix can happen to tinting, I think that will be in our favor, because we, we, we will benefit greatly.
We have a lot of products, and we have, you know, the capability to provide those services. Because maintenance of tinting machine has been the single biggest issue out of all the problems of tinting machines in Indonesia, because imagine if you don't have a DC like us, right? And then one of the shops in Papua installed one of your tinting machines. If it breaks down, how long will it take you to go there to send your technician? How much will it cost you to go there? And then once you go there, do you even have the spare parts to fix it? So these are all questions, and which is why many retailers sometimes are very reluctant to install tinting machines. But we don't have any of those issues, right? We have... You can look at the map here, right?
We have DCs everywhere, and we'll be adding more in the future. So once we install a tinting machine in Papua, if it breaks down, well, our people will go there same day or maybe tomorrow, right? And spare parts, once we go there tomorrow, we can identify what's needed. Many of our DCs carry the basic spare parts that tend to break down the most often. Okay, so we already carry those. So what we wanted to convey to our retailers is that, look, when you install tinting machines from any of our competitors, you need to watch out whenever there's a breakdown, because if there's a breakdown in tinting machine, you have zero sales, right? So that's another concern from the retailers, because what happens if there's a breakdown?
So we don't have that problem, because we are locally based, we are really close to the retailers, and we can provide all those great services. And our people go there either on a monthly basis or on a two-monthly basis to basically conduct services before any of our tinting machines break down. So again, going back to your question, the aim for us this year is to intensify and speed up our tinting machines deployment. Why didn't we do it before? Well, now we have more products, right? All the wall paints that we've launched, they can all be tinted. All the waterproofing that we've launched, they can all be tinted, right? So obviously, with that in mind, it is in our interest to speed up our tinting machine deployment so that we can also benefit; it will benefit the company in the future.
So one thing that I can lastly, that I can share with you, Tian, is that what is the installed number of tinting machines, right? Every year we conduct a survey on this, because what we don't want to do is get caught off guard, and let's say one or two of our competitors decide to install tinting machine in many locations and we cannot find them, or we, we don't know that they have. So this is not good. So based on our last survey, which we, we conducted in October, November last year, our tinting machines that we have in this country are still far ahead by a huge margin. So I think it will be quite challenging for our competitors to catch up to that.
So we still are leading in the tinting machine deployment, and we'll continue to do so because of the speed up of our tinting machine deployment this year. Thank you.
Question number three, the last one, is update on Cirebon site project. What is the status of completion? How much of this year's growth CapEx was allocated?
Okay, I'll take the question. Thank you, Tian. So the third factory in Cirebon has completed the landfill phase by end of 2023. So the current stage are on the structure process from piling, which already progressed well at about 30% now. And the completion of the third factory still remain the same, to be completed in 2025. Regarding the CapEx, as Paadi has mentioned previously, the CapEx for the third factory this year will be allocated about IDR 450 billion, about 60% from the budget, IDR 750 billion, that has been planned from the beginning.
We go next to William Jefferson from Maybank. How is Avian's involvement in IKN? Any commitments from there? If so, how much can we expect from it in terms of sales volume?
Thank you for the question, William. Look, as a company, we hardly supply directly to any government entities because of complexities, you know, and you know, some of the difficulties. But what we can share with you is that IKN or Nusantara is located between two big cities. In the north, you have Samarinda, in the south, you have Balikpapan. And guess what? We are the market leaders in those two cities. Now, you can imagine that IKN cannot basically import all of their workers from Java, right? They will use a lot of local contractors because of the size of the investments that they're making. So because of all the local contractors and investments there, they're so accustomed to using our products.
So after this, the effect from IKN will also benefit us, but we cannot share directly how big of a sales volume that will be. Now, on top of that, our team are constantly making approaches to various government entities, which will help to allow our products to be specified in their building. Even though we will still not supply to them directly, we will go through a third party to supply. But the efforts in trying to get our products specified in IKN has taken place for more than a year already. And we will continue to do so.
Even when IKN is completed, we'll continue to do this, because the project division is something that we want to grow for the company, so that we can be, you know, the number one paint company, not only in retail or, you know, but we can also be the number one paint company in all segments, right? In all channels, I mean, not segments. You know, whether that's B2B, whether that's, you know, project, you know, and you name it. So we're keeping an eye on all these different channels that we need to be present and, slowly making progress on those aspects.
Next question's from Anutri. Anutri from NT Asset. May I confirm with you that the volume growth in fourth quarter 2023 was mainly driven by new products launched throughout 2023?
Okay, thank you, Anutri. No, the volume growth in Q4 was a mix between existing products as well as new products. Okay, we cannot make that kind of meaningful growth from new products alone. So essentially, we did quite well. We were pushing, you know, really hard in Q4 to do better because we have disappointed, you know, a lot of investors from the beginning. So we wanted to make a big change. And even this year, you know, I went to Batam, I went to Palembang. I've been meeting a lot of customers. Just last night, we invited a bunch of customers to come to our office. They just probably concluded the factory visit as well as the R&D visit today.
And so these are all customers where we believe that they're still selling more of our competitors' products, and hence, we need to persuade them to carry our products. So I think earlier, we mentioned that the Avian Brands priority customers, right? That's something, a new initiative that we've launched, and it has proven to be very effective. So all the 30-plus customers that I entertained last night, having dinner at our office, you know, we called a private chef to cook for them and everything else, give them something experience, right? They're all belonging to the priority customers because these are the type of customers that really require additional services, that require additional care, and want us to give them some kind of a very meaningful differentiation. So that's how we see it.
Thank you.
Okay. Next question from Theodorus Melvin from Stockbit. Thank you, Ruslan, Robert, Kurnia, and Andreas, for the opportunity to ask. Melvin's here from Stockbit. Congratulations on the impressive and strong fourth quarter 2023 and full year 2023 results. It is truly amazing to deliver the improvement, particularly given the challenging circumstances and political uncertainty. There are several questions from me. Question number one: If my calculation are correct, I've noticed that in fourth quarter 2023, there was a double-digit Q-on-Q growth in volume, but it seems to have resulted in a lower ASP per metric ton. Could the Avia team elaborate on this trend?
Yeah, let me answer that now. Yes, so as I explained earlier, Melvin, we completed our more economical product launches in Q3 last year, and therefore, we only noticed the volumes, the double-digit volume growth in Q4, and because they are more economical, and that's right. So, that resulted in a lower ASP. I hope that answer your questions.
Great. Question number two: Could you provide insights into which geographic region experienced the highest growth? Additionally, could you explain why this particular region outperformed others in terms of growth?
Yeah. Again, Melvin, we refuse to share details on the growth per island, let's say, again, because of competitive dynamics. But I think you can get a glance that when you compare this to our previous presentation, you can see that the numbers move slightly here and there. And obviously, from there, you can gauge, like, in which locations that we're doing better. But what we can say is that Java Island, overall, has no impact from the benefits of, you know, rising CPOs and minerals and everything else, right? So therefore, you know, the outer islands tend to do better than Java Island last year, and that's why you can see a bit of contraction from our Java sales contribution.
Last question from Theodorus Melvin. Based on some of the information I've gathered, there seems to be a rise in the purchasing power of the lower middle class in the first quarter 2024, accompanied by a decline among the upper middle class. Have you also observed on this trend?
Yeah. Unfortunately, not yet, Melvin. You know, we operate everywhere in the country, right? And I'm always in constant communication with my team. It was my first visit to Batam, it was my first visit to Palembang, and I really learned a lot. So we're planning now where the next trip is gonna be, for me. And when I meet with customers, I really ask them a lot of questions to understand more, and ultimately, the goal is to how it is that we can improve their profitability, right? What kind of difference can we make as a company so that you don't always look like, "Well, hey, can you give me another percent extra in terms of promotion?
Because that company is giving me 2%, you know, and maybe you give me 3%." We wanna stay away from those. It's true that we will ultimately give them something that is appealing to them in terms of profit margin or whatever that is, but that's not the only reason why I made that travel, and that's not the only reason why this company exists up till today. Because in terms of differentiation, we don't just look at it from margin point of view, right? How can we help them to grow? So one interesting question that I can share with you is that in the city of Batam, retail customers open from Monday to Sunday, seven days a week. So I was like, "Wow, so what do you do with your money? Because you make so much money since you work every day throughout the year."...
So they were all laughing to that question, but they—what I learned is that they are tired. Because to them, I work every day, because they worry that if they shut down, that their customers will go to other shops, right? So they ask me, "What are some of the suggestions that I can have to solve this issue?" When it comes to the second question also, when it comes to the next generation, right? "I have sons, I have daughters, they don't wanna be involved. How can we help?" And things like that. So I mean, priority customers is again where we want to make that differentiation, right? So we tell them, "Look, whenever you guys, as priority customers, have issues, you can come to us, right?
If my staff are not able to give you meaningful answers, I will do that myself, right? Because that's what we're here for. Not just to give you an extra 1%, not an extra 1.5%, but to really help you with your business decisions so that you can feel that, wow, I learned a lot from Avian, and I would like you to be my really trusted partners because you helped me to solve my biggest dilemma," whether that's from family, whether that's from shareholding structure, whatever that is, right? But we make ourselves available to them so that they really feel that meaningful differentiation. Thank you.
We go next to a question from Felicia Barus, from Citigroup. What is your guidance for marketing expense, BTL and ATL, in 2024? If you expect demand for premium segment will return?
So I think it's important to go back to one point where during the script earlier, where BTL budget for existing products remain the same. Okay? Because, you know, that's how we operate. We don't wanna keep adding budgets, and budget, and budgets, right? But BTL for new products, obviously, that's where we become very competitive. Because, look, let's face it, right, the shelf space at the retail outlets are very limited, right? They're filled with products. So how do we incentivize retailers to carry our products? So we came up with this idea. For the priority customers, we ask for a percentage of number of display area. So, you know, we already have two types of criterias for priority customers.
I think if you go back to the flag, you can see that we have one is silver, okay, one is gold category. So for silver, there's a percentage of product displays of our products that you need to display in order to qualify, and for gold, the percentage of product display is even higher, right? And among that, many other criteria are needed. They have to grow in volume, and blah, blah, blah. But what we also want to give them is that, "Look, these are the benefits that you get," right? So that's very appealing to them. But going back to the point where I made earlier, Darrek, whenever profit margin goes up, Felicia, unfortunately, BTL or ATL is likely to go up as well, right? So I think that would be what I can share with you.
I think we do expect competition to remain tough in this year, and whether our, if our BTL and ATL is gonna go up, I think that will be the case, but we will do our best not to go overboard with those, you know, BTL and ATL hikes. Which is why, going back to Hadi's point earlier, net profit, you know, we're estimating that our net profit will hover between 21%-23%. You know, it's impossible for us to go up anymore on this net profit because, you know, too many uncertainties, and I do expect, intensifying competition will be even, you know more, in 2024.
Last question from Felicia: What was driving the higher trading goods performance in revenue and GPM in fourth quarter 2023?
Yeah. So I think that was also a bit, that was also an important question that I asked my team, Felicia. I mean, why was trading doing so well in Q4? So I think the quick answer is that there must be some kind of pent-up demand in those segments, because obviously, most of these are coming from PVC pipe, right? So PVC pipe growth was very strong in Q4, continues to be very strong in January, and February is also doing quite well. And the good thing is that you can also see from the gross profit margin within the trading, that it has been more or less quite consistent, okay? So we're not sacrificing our margin within the trading goods in order to get those sales. So that's not what we did.
But for a bit of a strange reason, the PVC demand has been picking up quite well. What I can share with you, Felicia, is that many of our competitors, our top competitors in Indonesia in the PVC pipe category, have been adding percentages to incentivize shops to buy from them. But, you know, demand for our products are still very strong. That's why we don't need to give our retailers extra margins for the trading goods. But what we do with them is, again, you know, we offer them a lot of the delivery services and, you know, improvement of services, I think, is one where they enjoy the most. And we're also going to our priority customers in the paint segment, right? Priority customers only exist in the paint segment. We don't have it for the trading goods.
But then we look, okay, how many of our priority customers have not yet become clients of our PVC pipe? And then obviously, we go there, and the success rate is quite high. So and guess what? These are customers with a lot of money, right? So the moment they decide to buy our PVC pipe, sales are gonna be quite meaningful. So I think that's another criteria of success when it comes to try to persuade them to go, because they feel happy already becoming our priority customers, and say, "Well, I'll buy your pipe, no big deal." So, I think that's why, trading goods have been performing quite well.
There is another additional question from Danif. Follow-up on question number four: Since the accounting treatment has changed, how much BTL and ATL as a percentage from revenue can we expect going forward? Are we expecting uptick in ATL, any ad spend to improve brand equity?
Yeah. Yeah, I think, first of all, I need to clarify, there's no change in accounting treatment. It's just, like, to reclassify to more better classification, I think. So if we look at our 2023 number, I think our BTL is about 7.6% of our sales, while for the ATL is about 2.8% of sales. So the total is about 10.4% of sales. Going forward, I think, as Ruslan also mentioned before, because of intensification of the competition and everything, we will sacrifice more margin. Because, as you know, our margin is currently one of the highest, right?
So, what I'm trying to say is, if we sacrifice maybe 1% or more, and we can get growth in our sales, why not? Yeah. I think that's, that's the point. Yeah. Thank you.
Yeah. So let me just add to that. So Hadi is absolutely spot on. So which is why, going back to the point, right? We are, you know, forecasting that our net profit will hover between 21-23, right? It's not gonna be staying at 23 because we do expect intensifying competition, and we do expect that. I think it would be wise for the company, for our future, to sacrifice 1 or 2% of our margin in order to deliver very strong double-digit growth. So that will be the focus for now, because we definitely are the one paint company with the highest net profit margin in the world. So, you know, let's not push that anymore.
It's already very high, but what we want to do is really focus on the sales and really focus on the volume, so that we can continue to be the very dominant market leader and continue to improve our market share position in this country.
The time is about 12 minutes left, so we have 1-2 questions available after this. Next question comes from Anutri: Why do you think other multinational brands are not launching new products or introducing more innovative products, like your 3-in-1 paint, to the market, despite their experience and expertise in the other markets?
Yeah, very good question, Anutri. So when we went to Thailand last March, right, we looked at many of these products, and, like I said earlier, that's how we got the inspiration for the three-in-one products. They are actually, actually coming from some of our existing competitors in Indonesia. So it's a very good question that you ask, why are they not bringing it here, right? I think it's only a matter of time, Anutri, before they decide to actually bring some of those products. Now, to put things into perspectives, even with all the products that we've launched so far in the past two, three years, we're still number three in terms of our product portfolio in the country, okay? So number one is a local company, number two is a multinational company, and we're number three in terms of product portfolio, okay?
So we don't have the most product variants in the country yet, and that's why we feel comfortable with introducing more products. We introduced two products, month of February. Tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow, 1st of March, we'll be launching one or another two products into the market. So I think for multinationals, even though they have the technology and all the products from the different countries that they operate in, I think they will bring some of those products to Indonesia sooner or later. It's only a matter of time.
Question from Harry Welton: Can you repeat the CapEx guidance for full year 2024?
Yeah. Thank you, Harry, for your question. I think, as we mentioned before, we have a routine CapEx of 2% of total sales. And beside that, we have a expansion CapEx for the Cirebon. For this year, we budgeted around IDR 450 billion, which is around 5% of total sales. Thank you.
Is there any other questions? We still have 10 minutes left.
Okay, well, if we don't have any more questions, thank you very much to everyone for joining our presentation today, and we'll see you again in the next few months. This year, we wanted to actually do our earnings call a bit earlier, but after we switched to a new auditor, right? And as you can tell from the whole reclassification, we didn't want any of this to take place, but we had no choice, right? They were really insisting on some of these changes to be made, and therefore, we could not actually do an earlier earnings call. To be honest, Hadi and his team have been stressed out. You know, he told me that he was talking to our auditor until, like, 1:00 AM or 2:00 AM.
We only got the audited results to be released yesterday afternoon, if I'm not mistaken, right? That's why, you know, timing for this is really tight. We only launched this... But we know that next year, for the audited results, it'll definitely be better because now that we're, you know, in line with our auditor, you know, some of the postings, you know, where they need to be recorded and everything else, I think that that will be something that we know each other already, and there's no surprises. But thank you very much for the presentation, for joining us today, and hope to see you all next time. Take care.
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Thank you. Take care.