Welcome to the HICL Infrastructure PLC Four-Year Results Investor Presentation. Throughout this recorded presentation, investors will be in listen-only mode. Questions are encouraged, and they can be submitted at any time by the Q&A tab situated in the right corner of your screen. Just simply type in your questions and press send. The company may not be in a position to answer every question it receives in the meeting itself. However, the company can review all the questions submitted today and publish responses where it's appropriate to do so. Before we begin, I'd like to submit the following poll. I'd now like to hand you over to the team at HICL Infrastructure PLC. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us this afternoon for HICL's Annual Results Presentation for the year ended 31st of March 2025. The presenters today will be Ed and Ross, as usual, but we're also delighted to be joined by Mark Tiner for his inaugural set of financial results as HICL CFO. Following the formal presentation, as usual, we will take questions, and you can submit those through the platform online. With that, I'll hand over to Ed to kick us off.
Thank you, Mo, and good afternoon, a very warm welcome to this set of annual results for HICL Infrastructure PLC. I'm going to start on slide four of the presentation with a restatement of HICL's core proposition. In periods of macro volatility, such as the one that we're going through now, fundamentals can be lost in the noise, and it's important that we refocus on the underlying quality of what HICL investors actually own. HICL's proposition is straightforward and differentiated. The company invests in high-quality infrastructure in private markets, offering that exposure to listed market investors in a liquid and diversified vehicle. These are core assets defined by their quality and risk profile. We actively manage them in order to realize the inherent value in each and every one of them, whilst also managing overall portfolio construction long term.
The company benefits from an expert management team spanning an international platform and 25-plus years of specialist infrastructure experience. Taken together, the elements combine to deliver a defensive platform positioned for growth. This is reflected in this set of annual results, which we start with on page five. This is another resilient result for the company: a solid operating performance, capital allocation discipline, and strong prospects for growth. Starting on the left with capital allocation, in the year, we saw the completion of two previously announced divestments, both achieved above NAV. We saw the repayment of HICL's revolving credit facility, now refinanced out to July 2027.
We saw the completion of the company's initial GBP 50 million buyback, now expanded to GBP 150 million, and further selective divestments, GBP 200 million plus, targeted for this year, where these enhance long-term portfolio construction and in support of HICL's investment and buyback commitments. To the middle column, a solid operating performance in the year. Stronger cash generation from the portfolio with dividend cash cover higher in the period at 1.56 times or 1.07 times excluding profits on disposal. This positive trajectory remains on track to reach 1.1 times by the end of this year and underpinning further growth in the dividend guidance issued today at 8.5 pence for FY 2027 and reaffirming the existing guidance of 8.35 pence for financial year ending 31 March 2026.
On the other side of the ledger, HICL's growth assets, now making 45% of the portfolio by value, recorded 11% EBITDA growth in the year, outperforming budgeted performance and largely offsetting modest underperformance in HICL's PPP portfolio, which we took at the half year. This growth is a key feature of the company's long-term prospects, which we look at on the right-hand side of this slide. The company has self-funded growth CapEx of over GBP 450 million over the next five years, driven by those strong infrastructure megatrends and compounding asset-level returns. For HICL investors, this growth complements the company's defensive positioning to deliver a strong total return proposition. On recent trading, HICL offers marginal buyers a prospective 10% net return, and that includes a share price yield of over 7% on today's trading.
On slide six, we've set out some further key metrics for this set of results: a modest 3% decline in net asset value over the year to GBP 1.531. That's largely as a result of higher discount rates adopted in the period, which you can see at the bottom right of the slide. That's partially offset by the solid 7.7% operating performance there on the top right. Mark will come on to all of these metrics in some more detail in a moment. Turning to slide seven, which revisits HICL's strategic portfolio construction. This is the second time that we've included this slide. It's commonly known as the yielders and growers slide. As I mentioned at the outset, HICL offers the key attributes of core infrastructure: a defensive platform positioned for growth. That's really the story that you can see here on this slide.
Over the years, we've worked hard to extend the portfolio's cash flows beyond the PPP portfolio, increasing asset life, bringing real growth into the portfolio, and complementing the increasing maturity of the company's PPP assets. That's what you see here. The yielders, effectively the PPP portfolio, with an average life of 13 years, yielding strongly at 10% per annum. Balanced with HICL's growers, those longer life assets are essential for the company's long-term earnings, with an asset life of 51 years and 6% forecast EBITDA growth on the back of having achieved 11% EBITDA growth this year. The design here over time is that as these growers deliver their capex and mature, they evolve into yielders. In this way, the two component parts of the portfolio come together to deliver a long-term earnings platform from which HICL can continue to deliver capital growth and dividend growth for shareholders.
Again, this cash flow chart is simplistic in that it assumes that all cash is paid out, whereas in reality, what we'll see is dividend cash cover being reinvested into the portfolio and allowing us to further build out the right-hand side of this slide without need for external capital. Just to reiterate that point, this platform is of a maturity and scale to be self-funded and self-sustaining. One final slide before I pass on to Mark. The return available now on slide eight, the return available for buyers of HICL is currently the highest in the company's history, which this slide sets out. HICL increased its discount rate used to value the portfolio by 40 basis points in the year to 8.4%. This is the best guide for the expected gross return from the portfolio if the company was trading at NAV.
The nature of the discount to net asset value means that the marginal buyer does better than that, effectively buying a pound's worth of assets for just shy of GBP 0.75. This discount boosts the steady state return available from up to 11.1% gross or around 10% after fees. That is for a 30-year plus set of cash flows, inflation-correlated returns, and of course, more than 7% of that return coming through the cash dividend alone. It is also worth highlighting here that the new fee basis announced today and effective from 1 July this year will reduce the OCR to a pro forma 0.95%, further enhancing net returns. Finally, these returns exclude any share price re-rating back to the NAV, which on these numbers would equate to a 36% share price return over and above the steady state returns that you see here on this slide.
With that, I'll pass over to Mark for more detail on the financial results.
Thank you, Ed, and good morning, everyone. I'm delighted to present to you the review of HICL's financial performance today. On slide 10, we show the NAV per share bridge for the year to 31st of March 2025. Starting with opening NAV per share of 158.2p, the portfolio generated 12p of value accretion during the year. This was offset somewhat by a decrease of 6.3p relating to an increased discount rate due to the impact of macroeconomic assumptions used. The company's share buyback program, which was renewed in March, targeting a further GBP 100 million of buybacks over the course of 2025, contributed NAV accretion in the year of 0.9p. Fund expenses of 2.6p per share includes management fee and represents an OCR for the year of 1.1%, a four basis point reduction from last year.
A small foreign exchange loss of 0.8p after hedging and the 8.25p dividend paid in the year completes the bridge to our year-end NAV per share of 153.1p. On the right-hand side of the page, net debt at the year-end was GBP 102.2 million, a GBP 200 million reduction from the previous year. This was a result of the sale proceeds of Northwest Parkway and the Hornsey Two Offtoe being used to pay down the RCF in the early part of this year. This month, we successfully extended the RCF for a further year on the same terms to June 2027. HICL's net debt principally comprises the GBP 150 million of private placement notes offset by GBP 58 million of cash and led to a fund gearing percentage of 7.4%. Available liquidity at the end of the year, including undrawn RCF capacity, was GBP 441.8 million.
On slide 11, and zooming into the valuation of the portfolio, we present here our usual bridge from last year's director's valuation to this year's. During the year, the company committed to invest a further GBP 49.9 million into Affinity Water, following the beginning of AMP8. Cash distributions of GBP 226.9 million were received from the portfolio, giving a rebased valuation of GBP 3.04 billion. The portfolio returned GBP 235.5 million, which included unwinding of the discount rate and portfolio performance. Key items here included a strong contribution from Affinity Water and the growth portfolio generally, offset by the lifecycle cost provision taken at the half year. Onto the next block, we increased the weighted average discount rate by 40 basis points over the course of the year in response to increasing government bond yields across our geographies, and this despite reductions in base rates across the board.
This had the effect of reducing the portfolio value by GBP 126.2 million. Sterling strengthened during the year, resulting in an unrealized FX loss of GBP 38.3 million, or GBP 15.3 million once the company's balance sheet hedging program is taken into account. The resulting final valuation is GBP 3.1 billion, or GBP 3.2 billion, including the aggregated equity commitments outstanding at the year-end. Moving on to slide 12, we present here some key portfolio valuation sensitivities. We have just looked at the impact of a discount rate increase on valuation this year. A 40 basis points increase has driven a 6p reduction in NAV, consistent with our sensitivity for a 50 basis points change presented here. Due to the nature of the long-term contracts in our portfolio, higher inflation has a positive correlation to NAV, reflecting the portfolio's 0.7 times inflation correlation.
The other sensitivity I would like to comment on here is the slight positive correlation of interest rates, considering interest income on cash and interest payable on debt. This reflects the large interest-earning cash balances in the PPP portfolio especially, and the fact that practically all interest on the portfolio debt is fixed in nature. On slide 13, we take a closer look at the portfolio debt profile. All portfolio debt is non-recourse to the company, and as you can see from the donut on the left, only 2.4% of the overall balance is due for refinancing in the next two years. Indeed, only 14% of the debt is due to be refinanced at all, as the remainder is fixed-term concession debt on the PPP portfolio. We show this in the debt profile on the right.
As a result of planned debt amortization in the PPP portfolio, gross portfolio gearing reduces from 66% today to under 50% in 2040. This effectively matches the average gearing of those assets which do have refinancing requirements, which is 51% at the 31st of March. Moving to slide 14, here we are providing some new disclosure, which builds on the yielders and growers chart that Ed has presented. That chart shows the long-term cash profile of the portfolio split between growers and yielders. Here on page 14, we take a deep dive into cash generation for the year just ended to show how the dividend was covered in the year. On the left, we have cash flows from the yielders, our PPP portfolio.
Operational cash flows of GBP 682 million are sufficient to service debt, including scheduled amortization, and cover lifecycle costs together with cash released from reserves at portfolio company level put aside for that purpose. In 2025, the portfolio of PPP assets contributed GBP 177 million of free cash to dividend cover. On the right-hand side, growth portfolio generated GBP 253 million of EBITDA in the year. After servicing debt, the growers spent GBP 80 million on capital expenditure. We will talk about this further on the next page, but this is predominantly growth capex in nature. The growth portfolio contributed GBP 49 million to dividend cover. To the middle block, aggregate portfolio distributions of GBP 226 million covered fund-level costs, giving GBP 178 million of distributable cash flows. This covers the year's dividend of GBP 166 million by 1.07 times.
This excludes the profits on disposals closed in the year, which increases the cover to 1.56 times. Finally, on this page, we show earnings cover of 1.13 times, calculated as portfolio return of GBP 235.5 million before the impact of macroeconomic assumptions, less costs, and divided by the dividend. Following on the theme of growth CapEx on the next slide, our growth portfolio deploys substantial capital each year to increase its capital base and drive future earnings growth. In the next five years, our growth portfolio will invest over GBP 450 million in capital expenditure, all self-funded. The great majority of this is growth CapEx. At Affinity, we forecast substantial RCV growth over the course of the five-year regulatory period, increasing RCV by 30%. We expect this to directly drive an increase in revenue and EBITDA through the regulatory return permitted to the company.
At Forty South, TNT, and Altitude, each company has plans for CapEx to increase its asset base and push the revenue perimeter wider. This comprises new towers and tower upgrades at Forty South, building extra transmission capacity at TNT, and rolling out fiber to the home by Altitude in France's regulated fiber market. Ross will provide more detail on each of these assets shortly. Moving to slide 16, the portfolio's CapEx deployment will drive future earnings, which drive increased NAV, a key component of HICL's total return strategy. The other component, of course, is the dividend, covered by distributions paid out of the portfolio, as already shown. We are pleased to confirm the dividend guidance of GBP 0.0835 for FY26 and of GBP 0.085 for FY27. We show on this slide the progression of the dividend cover since 2022 and projecting into the near-term future.
We expect dividend cover of 1.1 times in FY2026, supported by increased cash generation in the portfolio. Looking further ahead, we provide new guidance on dividend cover in FY2027. We expect dividend cover in this year and the years after it to be a minimum of 1.1 times. We are keen to maintain a balance between a progressive dividend, well covered, and the ability to redeploy surplus cash into the portfolio to generate future returns through growth capex, reinvestment, or bolt-on acquisitions where appropriate. This is why we are targeting a minimum of 1.1 times dividend cover to give shareholders comfort that the dividend is suitably covered and within the portfolio to make the most efficient use of remaining capital. I'll now hand over to Ross to talk to you about portfolio performance in the year.
Thanks, Mark. Good afternoon, everyone. As usual, I'll start with a couple of slides which summarize our approach to portfolio construction before jumping into the asset-level performance. Here on slide 18, you can see HICL's core infrastructure framework. All of our assets are positioned at the lower end of the infrastructure risk spectrum and benefit from high-quality cash flows, defensive market positioning, and a strong social license. We're guided by this framework when we look at new investment opportunities, and this includes those which might exceed the return hurdle set by share buybacks. This disciplined approach will ensure that any future acquisitions are appropriate for a core infrastructure portfolio. Turning to page 19, you can see a snapshot of HICL's current portfolio, which is very well diversified across sectors, geographies, and revenue types. These charts haven't moved too much over the year.
The 10 largest assets now make up 51% of the total portfolio by value. You might spot that the valuation of Affinity Water has grown slightly, and Altitude Infrastructure now features in the top 10. Let's now look at the portfolio performance during the year. I'll run through the six large growth assets individually and then cover the PPPs as a whole. Starting with Affinity Water on slide 20, this is HICL's largest investment at just under 11% of the portfolio value. The growth in valuation over the year reflects the GBP 50 million equity commitment, which will be injected by March 2026, and also the outcome of the PR24 price review. As we flagged in March, Affinity's final determination contains several positive adjustments, including to the WACC, to the TOTEX allowance, and also to the incentive mechanism.
This provides us with clear visibility over the business plan for the next five years, enabling us to unwind some of the discount rate premium associated with the uncertainty around PR24, and crucially, allowing us to resume equity distributions from FY26. Since we acquired Affinity Water in 2017, we've been working extensively alongside our co-shareholders to reposition the business. The difficult decision to reinvest free cash flows during the previous regulatory period has paid off. Affinity Water has been able to undertake a significant program of capital investment and, at the same time, reduce gearing by 5% over the AMP. At this same time, Affinity Water has been working closely with InfraRed, and InfraRed has been building out a new management team led by CEO Keith Haslett. Keith's team has overseen a marked improvement in operational performance. This is clearly reflected in the final determination outcome, but also in this year's financial results.
EBITDA was 5% above our valuation assumption, and Affinity is now a top quartile performer for several of the most important customer measures for a water-only company, including leakage reduction. In March 2025, Affinity capitalized on the final determination by issuing a GBP 350 million 15-year fixed-rate bond. This exemplifies the company's sophisticated approach to treasury management. The margin achieved was smaller than Affinity's existing spreads, and there is now no refinancing requirement until 2033, which is well into the next regulatory period. Alongside the equity commitment from shareholders, this bond will support a sizable AMP8 investment program, a 30% growth in regulatory capital value, all in the context of a modest bill increase and a reduction in gearing to 70% by 2030. The strength of Affinity's relative positioning in the sector has clearly been recognized by Ofwat, but also by the ratings agencies.
The company has formally accepted its final determination and, without the distraction of a CMA appeal process, is free to focus on delivering its business plan for the next five years. On slide 21, we have some detail on HICL's two large demand-based assets. Starting with the A63, where traffic remained broadly in line with our valuation assumption, as you can see on the chart. Although toll revenue was slightly behind our forecast due to lower-than-expected inflation, this has not materially impacted the valuation of the investment, which was stable during the year. The road is strategically positioned on a key European transport corridor, and the year-on-year growth for both light and heavy vehicles compares favorably to our long-term blended assumption of 1.4%. Moving to London St. Pancras High Speed, this was formerly known as High Speed 1.
It is a bit more of a mouthful, but does avoid any confusion with HS2. International train path bookings continue to grow, with revenue from this segment increasing by 8% year-on-year. As you can see from the chart, this is actually slightly behind where we expected to be. Eurostar placed fewer spot bids than we've seen historically, including during the summer. On the other hand, retail income did benefit from the Olympics, ending the year 7% above budget, and all in all, this meant that EBITDA and distributions for the year were in line with our valuation assumption. Over the coming years, we expect Eurostar to continue to manage their yield and prioritize the maintenance of their fleet. As a result, we've slightly reduced our short-term growth forecast, although encouragingly, the level of spot bookings over the last month appears to have picked up considerably.
More strategically, securing a second international operator is a key priority to unlocking the full growth potential of this investment. A lot of progress has been made in the second half of the year. LSPH launched a targeted growth incentive scheme, and the rail regulator published its final determination for the company, as well as a long-awaited study into depot capacity. The management team continues to work closely with potential operators, some of which have now joined forces. Our valuation assumes a probability-weighted uplift in train paths for a second operator. You can see from the sensitivity how a change to this assumption would impact NAV, noting that if there was to be no second operator, the impact would likely be mitigated by a reduction in the discount rate premium of the asset and additional Eurostar parts.
On the domestic side, bookings remain below the contractual underpin, but they have increased by 12% compared with FY2024. We've retained our forecast of a return to pre-COVID levels by 2028, but there are signs that we might outperform that, with the December 25 timetable showing further growth to just under 90% of pre-COVID levels. Turning to slide 22, we cover three assets which are investing extensively to grow the size of their networks and will continue to benefit from the global megatrends of digitalization and decarbonization. Starting with Forty South, which continues to perform well operationally and financially. Although 90% of the revenue is derived from a long-term anchor tenancy contract, EBITDA grew by over 10% during the year, reflecting the growth embedded within HICL's valuation assumptions. Securing new co-locations is a key source of this growth.
During the year, Forty South outperformed HICL's valuation by signing 77 new agreements, most of which were with the New Zealand Emergency Services Network. Although the MNO market is expected to be slightly softer in the coming years, you can see from the sensitivity that our long-term growth assumption for the tenancy ratio is pretty modest. The company also continues to progress tower upgrades and new tower deployments, with the management team focused on improving procurement efficiencies and reducing capital costs. Forty South now has over 1,600 towers and is on track to deliver the five-year program contractually agreed with 1NZ. Moving to TNT, both Cross Texas Transmission and One Nevada Transmission continue to perform very well operationally, as demonstrated by the availability over the period, which you can see on the page.
Although the valuation has reduced during the year, this is due to increases in the U.S. reference discount rate, as Mark mentioned earlier. CTT continues to focus on growing its transmission capacity. It invested over GBP 15 million during the year alone, and capex next year is expected to be three times more than we thought back in March 2024. Our valuation currently assumes that this is an acceleration of capex, but we will commission a study to assess whether this is, in fact, incremental, and if it is, that will have a positive impact on the valuation. CTT also submitted its regulatory rate case earlier in the year, with a decision expected in the summer. This is a much more simple process than in the U.K., with the really key output being the allowed return on equity.
We will provide a further update on both of these valuation drivers in due course. Finally, on this slide, Altitude Infrastructure, which moves into the top 10 for the first time at just under 3% of the total portfolio by value. As a reminder, this asset benefits from France's attractive rural market framework for fiber networks, which was underpinned by national deployment targets. The company earns inflation-linked wholesale revenues from all of the major internet service providers under a regulated tariff structure. Since acquisition, the management team has been prioritizing the rollout of fiber across the 27 underlying concessions. By March 2025, this rollout was 96% complete, and the focus has now shifted to moving customers onto the network. The take-up of fiber currently stands at 56% on a blended basis, in line with our valuation assumption.
As you can see on the slide, our forecast assumes a long-term fiber penetration rate of 89%, and this is deliberately consistent with the current penetration rate for broadband as a whole, noting that the copper network is being gradually decommissioned over the coming years. More broadly, the management team continues to actively explore new growth opportunities, either through the expansion of existing networks or actually by building out and running new networks, capitalizing on Altitude Infra's in-house construction management and operations expertise. Finally, from me, with the PPPs on slide 23, which represent 57% of the portfolio by value, these assets benefit from availability-based contracted revenues, which tend to be linked to inflation and fixed-rate long-term debt structures. From an operational perspective, the vast majority of HICL's PPPs performed well during the year, with aggregate availability above 99%.
Despite the highly contracted nature of the revenues, InfraRed does take an active approach to the management of the PPP portfolio. That's both at the asset level and also through its leadership role within the public sector and the association of investors in PPPs. On the left-hand side of this slide, you can see some of the key focus areas for the year. These include working with clients to ensure a high level of service delivery, managing assets through their construction phases, and overseeing the delivery of works to improve facility condition. Following a review that we mentioned at the half-year, InfraRed identified and recognized an increase in forecast cost risk associated with lifecycle on the 36 UK PPPs, which do bear this risk.
We are comfortable that the adjustments we made back in September remain appropriate, and we will continue to monitor lifecycle risk as assets approach handback. On the right-hand side of this page, we've added some new disclosure, which sets out the sensitivities for just the PPP assets. These demonstrate the importance, really, of portfolio construction. With shorter, finite-life concessions, PPPs provide a defensive base of the portfolio, complemented by the growth assets, which have slightly different sensitivities, offering higher returns and stronger inflation linkage. On that note, I'll hand back over to Ed, who will talk you through what we're seeing in the market and how that impacts the business model going forward.
Thanks, Ross. I'm now on slide 25 with some views on the core infrastructure market.
The chart on the left shows the total number of infrastructure transactions in private markets, as well as the number of core deals, i.e., HICL's focus, on the right-hand axis. Clearly, private transactions have decreased over the last three years, impacted by macro volatility. However, at an average of 50 core deals a quarter over the last year, these numbers are indicative of a healthy, liquid, and well-functioning market and really speak to the through-cycle appeal of high-quality infrastructure for a broad range of investor types. Against this backdrop, HICL has rotated over GBP 500 million worth of assets, leveraging InfraRed's relationships, networks to achieve the strong economics across the top left of the slide, consistently and at scale. Looking forward, we've set out some interesting leading indicators on the right-hand side of the slide.
The pies here show the proportion of private market fundraising in the core infrastructure segment versus other infrastructure strategies. Whilst allocation to core infrastructure was subdued in previous years by strategies promising higher risk and return, the prospect of rate cuts across developed markets sees far higher allocation to core strategies in 2024, making up 42% of capital raised. This provides a highly relevant leading indicator of the weight of institutional capital that we can expect to be chasing core infrastructure transactions, adding buy-side pressure to deals and supporting valuations. Large institutional transactions, such as the BBGI take private, add further weight to this indicator. As HICL continues to progress its own divestment activity this year, with our ambition set across the right side of the slide, we see these supportive dynamics firsthand, and we remain on plan with our divestment target.
This model of portfolio rotation and reinvestment is key, which we turn to now on slide 26. As I said before, HICL is of a size and maturity where its business model is self-funded and self-sustaining. This is achieved through three key actions. Firstly, driving surplus free cash over and above the dividend through operational excellence and active management. Investors can see this through the strong performance of the growth assets in the year and the increase in portfolio cash generation. Secondly, rotating assets strategically to improve long-term portfolio construction and drive additional cash from disposal profits. We've delivered over GBP 1 billion of accretive disposal since IPO through all manner of market conditions, with GBP 200 million targeted for this year. Thirdly, reinvesting accretively, either through share buybacks or other investment opportunities where the risk-reward is attractive and progresses HICL's strategy.
Here, HICL has expanded the buyback program from GBP 50 million to GBP 150 million, and we continue to evaluate investment opportunities highly selectively with a focus on the existing portfolio. It is worth highlighting as well that variable market conditions, such as the ones we are seeing at the moment, do present compelling opportunities to make high-quality additions to the portfolio. Equally, the environment for private investment in infrastructure remains positive, with increasing levels of political support as governments go about driving growth and responding to those powerful megatrends continuing to increase infrastructure demand. Finally, some key messages on slide 27 before we jump on to the Q&A. This result represents a solid operational and financial performance. Underlying cash flow generation has increased. The board has guided further dividend growth, and HICL's growth assets have outperformed. From here, the company has guided a disciplined capital allocation approach.
The buyback has been upgraded. A judicious approach to new investments remains against a largely undrawn RCF and a target for selective disposals of GBP 200 million, which we continue to use to enhance long-term portfolio construction. Strategically, the portfolio is set up for success: a strong long-term earnings platform, significant investment CapEx, compounding returns at asset level, a portfolio generating high levels of free cash, and supporting effective capital allocation. That concludes the presentation, and I'm very happy now to get into some Q&A for those of you that have submitted it. Thank you.
Thanks, Ed, and thank you to everyone who has submitted questions. We'll start with a couple on the topic of risk, and Ross, these might be good for you.
First question is, given the current elevated geopolitical and regulatory risks, especially in the U.K. infrastructure policy and water sector regulation, what contingencies does HICL have in place to mitigate any adverse regulatory changes?
Yeah, it's a very good and timely question. Let's start with water. Clearly, Affinity Water is our largest investment, just under 11% of the portfolio. I mentioned earlier on that we'd released a portion of the discount rate premium that we'd previously held to factor in some of the potential uncertainties around PR24. Clearly, we've released a portion of that, but it's important to say we're still holding an element of discount rate premium for other regulatory uncertainties. This obviously includes the CUNLIF review that's currently ongoing into water regulation in the U.K.
What I would say is that both InfraRed and the Affinity team directly have been pretty engaged with the CUNLIF review process. We've fed in directly, and from what we've seen so far, it looks to be a pretty considered and thoughtful process. We await the results of that in the summer. Just to reassure you, we do have some contingency there. More broadly, in terms of the U.K. policy sphere, I think from our perspective, the most important thing we can continue to do is build good relationships and maintain good relationships with our public sector clients, which we believe we have. We're also very much part of the dialogue around potential new funding models for infrastructure investment, including the ways in which private sector capital could invest in social infrastructure to remedy some of the things we're seeing in the U.K. on the infrastructure need.
Thanks, Ross. Another one for you. The portfolio seems quite concentrated. Does this not add some risk? What is the top 10 as a percentage of the portfolio?
Yeah, it's a good question. The top 10 represent 51% of the portfolio by value. We're pretty comfortable with that. That means over nearly half of the portfolio is diversified across a large number of other investments. Another key measure we look at in terms of concentration risk is the single large asset or the largest two or three assets. Affinity Water is the largest at just under 11%. We think that that's very manageable and, in any case, well inside the limits set by the investment policy.
More broadly, if you look at the split of revenue types, the split of clients, the split of geographies across the top 10 assets, it's this diversification that really gives us comfort around the portfolio and the risk mitigations that we have inherent within that.
Thanks, Ross. Mark, one for you on dividend cover. Dividend cover of 1.1 seems tight. Would it be worth considering building a higher cover to ensure its safety in the event of any downturns or company-specific developments?
Yes, thank you. It's a good question. The 1.1 times, it's obviously what we are forecasting for FY2026. Beyond that, we're taking the approach of seeking to meet a minimum dividend cover from FY2027 onwards, set at 1.1 times. We think that actually that's not too tight. We think that 1.1 times gives suitable dividend cover.
I remember that's after payment of costs as well. We're purely looking at the actual cash outflow for the dividend itself. By setting a minimum, we do not rule out having a higher dividend cover reported in future periods than 1.1 times. Like was alluded to in the presentation, we are balancing our commitment to growing the dividend to also reinvesting in the portfolio. Where appropriate, we are using surplus cash that arises from dividend cover to reinvest in our portfolio so long as the returns that we see there, the risk-adjusted returns, are compelling.
Thank you, Mark. A few questions, Ed, for you at a more strategic and market level. The presentation suggests HICL is in rude health. Why is HICL on such a wide discount? Worse, why are the annual dividend increases well below inflation?
The purpose of investing in a company like HICL is dividend growth, but the value of HICL's dividend is reducing in real terms each year. This is clearly the real reason why the shares are so lowly rated.
Firstly, looking at the discount, I think we continue to be frustrated by the extent of the discount at which HICL shares are trading versus the valuation. Note that that's a feature across the sector at the moment. HICL has been among the most proactive in continuing to prove the valuations within its existing portfolio through asset divestments, over GBP 500 million worth of divestments at an average premium of 11% above NAV, which is clearly some margin away from where the shares are trading.
We are very comfortable that the valuation of the assets remains appropriate and that the share price discount is more an issue with flows than it is fundamentals. We are seeing a period of macro volatility, which has caused some of the capital to seize up or indeed to move into other asset classes. We are waiting for some stabilization in that approach. Equally, we are continuing to control what we can, which is through excellent operational performance by making sensible capital allocation decisions, selling assets at a premium, buying back our shares at a discount, and continuing to market the shares with new disclosure to new investors in order to continue to drive buy-side support for the company. That is certainly on our radar.
In terms of the position of inflation, the dividends, our inflation correlation relates to the returns, and that's been a really strong feature of the company over this high inflationary period where we've seen rates much higher, but offset by the impact of inflation on the cash flows. That's why the NAV has been quite so robust over recent years, despite the fact that we've now increased discount rates by 180 basis points since the onset of the higher inflation environment. In terms of the dividends specifically, as I mentioned on the yielders and growers chart, we've made some deliberate decisions around portfolio design to extend portfolio cash flows into higher growth assets with longer life, actually with higher inflation correlation over the long term. Some of those have been at lower yields. We have taken the opportunity to right-size the dividend in order to make sure that the portfolio can support a growing dividend and a stable and growing net asset value over the next decades rather than overdistributing in the short term. Some insight on the decision and the strategy of the portfolio there.
Thanks, Ed. We have another question here relating to valuation and the chair noting the disappointment with the share price performance and what initiatives were being used, were being implemented to close the valuation gap. I think you have addressed all of those. I will move on to the final question that we have. I have held shares for many years, and whilst pleased by the solid income yield, it would be nice if the share price reflected the quality of the earnings.
Share buybacks are one answer, but by buying your shares on a continuing basis, you are effectively gradually winding the company up to a point where it loses the benefits of scale. Would there be logic in joining up with other funds with similar rationales and by increasing size and security increase the overall risk profile and the perception of the business amongst investors?
Yeah, I mean, this is a really good question. Yes, certainly your point on the efficacy of buybacks is well put. For us, we look at the economic merits of buybacks in terms of buying back our own shares at higher implied returns and retiring the dividend obligation associated with those shares cheaply. There is merit in doing an element of that, but our response to the current discount cannot only be about buybacks. I share your view on it being ultimately self-defeating.
Certainly, there's a range of views within our shareholder base around buybacks, and we continue to plot really a line of best fit around making sure that we're realizing the benefit of buybacks, but not just satisfying marginal sellers through buybacks, but also continuing to drive a forward-looking proactive strategy to attract new buyers to the company. Ultimately, the share price situation can only be improved by attracting fresh capital to the sector, fresh capital to HICL in order to drive the share price higher. In terms of the opportunities around scale, I think it is important that these companies remain of sufficient scale in order to attract institutional buyers in particular to the portfolio. HICL is already one of the most liquid and largest of the infrastructure investment companies. Undoubtedly, there'll be opportunities to increase the size and scale of the vehicle.
It is really about making sure that we are looking at options for that which genuinely take the company forward. That is something that we continue to explore both in public markets and in private markets. Ultimately, something that we will continue to plug away at in terms of how we make the company more attractive to a broader range of investors.
Sorry, I did say that was the last question, but we have had one just come in now, which I think is really important and would be good for you to touch on, Ross, if possible. Do you disclose the impact of disposals on portfolio returns, i.e., that you are not selling your best assets?
Yeah, I mean, that's a really crucial question, especially given the focus that's been on disposals, obviously having made over $500,000,000 of disposals in the last two years and with the board's announcement of a further GBP 200 million of disposals going forward. Let me just say, first and foremost, when we make disposals, the priority really is around improving the composition of the portfolio, so quite the opposite. We look for assets within the portfolio that aren't meeting certain key requirements and that screen poorly against certain key metrics. Those include return, yield, inflation correlation, and asset life.
Generally, what we've seen is that assets which have lower than average returns, low inflation correlation, and short asset lives, which often tend to be kind of mature PPPs, we can improve the overall composition of the portfolio by disposing of those assets often at a slight premium to net asset value and rotating those proceeds accretively. That's exactly what you saw, for example, in the GBP 200 million portfolio sale to John Laing. From time to time, we do get offers for assets that we do think are high quality in the portfolio, and we'd only really ever consider those on a highly opportunistic basis. We did dispose of the Northwest Parkway last year, which did screen well against a number of those metrics. Ultimately, that was purely an economic decision with the buyer offering a 30% plus premium to net asset value.
Obviously, shareholders have recognized over 2 pence of NAV accretion as a result of that disposal. That is really how we go about it. That is the process that we are currently following for the disposal program that we have set out for this year.
Thanks, Ross. That concludes the presentation today. Thank you very much for taking the time to join us this afternoon. Thank you to shareholders for your ongoing support.
That is great. Thank you for updating investors today. Could I please ask investors not to close the session as you will now be automatically redirected to provide your feedback in order that the management team can better understand your views and expectations? On behalf of the management team of HICL Infrastructure PLC, I would like to thank you for attending today's presentation and good afternoon to you all.