Good morning, and welcome to the Third Quarter 2023 Earnings Presentation for Elopak. My name is Mirza Koristovic, and I'm Head of Investor Relations. Today's presentation will be held by the CEO, Thomas Körmendi, and the CFO, Bent Kilsund Axelsen. The presentation will last for approximately 30 minutes, and there will be a Q&A session after the presentation. The presentation will also be webcast on our webpage under the IR section. There will be a possibility to ask questions from the audience here in Oslo, and also for the audience through the webcast on the chat function. With that, I leave the word to our CEO, Thomas Körmendi.
Thank you, Mirza, and good morning to everyone here in Oslo on this snowy morning, and everyone else who's listening or watching on the web. Let me just start by saying that it is a great pleasure today to present our Q3 results, which are a really strong Q3 result. As you will see, throughout the presentation, we're delivering across geographies, across businesses, and in fact, delivering, meeting, or exceeding all of our mid to long-term targets. Great start, and let's get into it. Firstly, for those of you who are not so familiar with us, a very short glance of who we are. We are, in fact, the world's largest fresh liquid carton packaging company, supplying in around 70 countries, 14 billion packs, and producing at 11 sites currently.
The majority of our business is what we call EMEA, which is a very wide definition, including also Africa and India. And the other part, Americas, consists of Canada, U.S., Mexico, and the Caribbean Islands. In the portfolio, we are mainly a fresh liquid carton packaging supplier, but we also have a very significant and important aseptic business that we will come back to. But very importantly, we are in the business of sustainable packaging. This is what we do. We work with sustainability at the core of everything we supply to our customers. And we do that primarily by supplying essential commodities such as milk, juice, and food, but not only. But we are generally supplying the world with nutrition in the many countries where we're currently supplying.
The sustainability part is essential in what we do, and we look at ourselves as replacing plastics. This is a task that we think is important from a world point of view. Thank you. Equally, also a very, very strong business driver that we are engaged in. And on that note, if you look at the ESG or sustainability ratings we have, we have just been rated in the top 2% in the world from an ESG point of view by receiving the gold rating of EcoVadis. We've actually improved on our rating from last time, a little bit higher rating.
Meanwhile, also, of course, benchmarks are changing, but we also have a number of other achievements that have been, that are essential to us and the commitments we have made, not the least towards the science-based targets, where we were the first bigger packaging company to sign on to the 1.5 degrees maximum temperature increase in the Paris Agreement. Okay, so enough about that. Let's look at Q3, and there is enough to look at because it has been yet another quarter of, of very strong performance that we've had. Firstly, of course, we look at revenue, where we had an organic revenue level of around 5%. We also had a very, very solid EBITDA development, leaving us with a margin level of 17%.
And that is driven, not the least, by the growth and the continued momentum we have in Americas, where we are delivering on the strategy we've outlined around adding more customers, building market share, providing more innovative solutions, and not the least, also the filling machine business. But we also announced in June that we would be building a new plant, and we are now setting up a state-of-the-art plant in Arkansas, in the U.S., and this will complement the factory we have in Canada, which is currently the world's largest Gable Top factory, a modern Gable Top factory, I should add. And with the plant in Arkansas, we will now have a footprint in Canada, the U.S., Mexico, and in Central America.
We also see in EMEA, very importantly for our business, of course, solid growth and profitability, thanks to the initiatives we have been taking throughout the last few years. MENA, as you recall, which we acquired during last year, is now, after some struggling, back and delivering growth and profitability, as per plan. What we have seen, and we come back to that, is that while material prices are softening in some cases, we still believe that, volatility is there, and it does clearly impact consumption, to some extent, throughout both our business and, let's say, groceries in general.
Finally, and very importantly, we see, as Bent will come into the present on the balance sheet, very good cash generation in the quarter, and all of that leaves us with a strong belief and confidence that we will end the year on a strong note. Importantly, the longer-term market fundamentals remain very, very attractive. A little bit more on the revenue side. Revenue, as you can see, on a year-to-date basis, is up by 12%. It is driven by Americas, where we're driving on the momentum. It's driven by the business that we have built and acquired in MENA and in India, and it's driven by the business development we have also on the service business that is now improving, thanks to some initiatives we've taken there.
On the profitability side, we have also seen, and on this chart, very good development. Clearly, it's versus a year, last year, where we all recall very, very heavy raw material pricing, and by the time we implemented the price increase, it skewed the comparisons somewhat. But very importantly, is that the activities we've taken to bring back the profitability to the normalized level in Europe has happened and is delivering, as we will see. And also, we are seeing that the new business we are generating and have acquired is delivering very nicely towards our result. I think we're back on the slide here. So EMEA.
EMEA, from a revenue point of view, we could say that we've seen stable volumes, and actually, we're pretty happy about that, to be honest, given the consumption development we see and the overall pressure on groceries. We see some shifts from premium to private label, clearly, but there is a strong impact or there is an impact across Europe on consumption, driven by purchasing power, driven by the inflationary pressure that consumers feel. Meanwhile, our roll- fed business, which has been doing very well the last few years, continues, not the least, with, of course, strong growth in India. But also we are delivering well on the European business of the roll- fed business, pretty much in line with where we planned for this time, or more importantly, versus last year.
As I explained a few times, a few quarters ago, MENA, given the lower purchasing power, is more impacted by economic downturns, and the availability of raw milk meant that consumption of milk decreased for a while. Now, we are starting to see the trend, if not move, then stabilize and slightly improve. So we are seeing volumes coming back in MENA and seeing a competitive environment, but a lot of activity from a business point of view. On the Americas side, this, of course, is a story that we spent some time on during the last quarterly presentation to highlight what is actually happening there. And what we can see is that from a market point of view, factors as in Europe, but we continue to deliver and grow as we have.
That is primarily driven by onboarding new customers, new business, driving our market share with you know within the dairy sector, within the juice sector, that we started, as you recall, maybe during last year, when we introduced a board type for the juice market. So we see good growth. We see growth across both dairy and juice. We see growth both within existing customers who do have dual supply and brand-new customers whom we are onboarding as we speak. Importantly as well, and part of the Americas strategy, are the filling machines. And what we presented a while back, that we are installing more filling machines. Installing filling machines are very important because it allows us to present innovations, and with the innovations, we can de-commoditize a commoditized business.
And that process and that development of filling machines continues. We have a strong backlog for that, also in the period to come. All in all, a very, very good development, and importantly, it's consistent with the many, many quarters we have had for a while now. So let's just look at what that means from a strategy point of view. And some of you who've attended these presentations have seen this slide. This is what we're delivering on. This is what is driving us right now. On one hand, the Americas opportunity, which evidently led to us driving innovations, driving new products, driving filling machines, the aseptic platform with new Pure-Fill filling machine platform that we have launched and is operating in both Spain and in Austria.
The footprint, which includes the inclusion of MENA and India, and for us, in the strategy point of view, means that we are going deeper and building that business. Coming back to that in a second. The plastic to carton conversion, which is the big holy grail, you could say, and what is the driver for us in the business in the longer term, and then the commercial excellence, which really relate to the pricing initiatives we took, the continued operational improvement that we have ongoing, and of course, value engineering around the materials, the boards, and the supplies we do. Let's just have a look at some examples on this, and they are examples to illustrate in our world, in our view, how the world is moving.
One of this is a small but very, very innovative, successful now in UK initiative, with a product called smol. I think it's correct the way I pronounce it. This is an idea which came up during COVID, where people couldn't go shopping and where you needed to get your household chemicals, your washing, your detergents, your softeners, your soaps, et cetera, in a new way. It was started with a very, very strong idea, say, "Why don't we do this as a subscription service, and why don't we do it then in a sustainable way?" Instead of the vast amount of plastic littering that you have out of this industry, this is now a refill service. You buy a one-time only plastic, in this case, can or bottle, and then you continuously get your refills in a sustainable carton format.
So for us, it's interesting because the new ways of thinking, the new ways of being a little bit more innovative of how products are supplied and used, actually typically means that the choice is carton. The other one we have, and this is, of course, from a European point of view, this is the Holy Grail in Europe, because UK is a very, very significant market, milk market. It is also a dominant, dominated completely by plastic, primarily HDPE bottles. So the second largest milk processor, Freshways in UK, chose last year to install two high-speed filling machines from us, and they have now started launching their products. They are supplying it to bakeries, food services, and all of that non-retail currently.
And of course, we hope and believe that there will be a retail story to tell in one of these quarterly meetings as well. What is absolutely certain is that there is a lot ongoing on exactly the dairy field in U.K., so I hope to be back on some projects very, very soon. One of the third element in the strategy chart relates to geographic expansion, and we have talked about it, and we are very, very strong believers in India. And India, just to get it, is a massively huge opportunity from a pure size point of view, that's evident, but also from a milk point of view, and also because they currently have legislation, regulation, which actually drives the banning of single-use plastic items.
Now, in India, that means a lot of items, and it doesn't necessarily mean that they are banning milk pouches, but they are very, very high consumer of plastic as such, and single-use plastic, and there's a high level of recognition that littering of plastic around in India, and for those of you who've been there will see this, is something that has to be addressed, and that is being addressed right now, and that's part of why carton is growing fast as it is in India right now. They have a commitment to net- zero and 2070 is maybe far away, but it's also a big place, so there are a lot of activities that needs to go on. So from our point of view, if you think back to when we presented this in 2022, we talked about the India activities and the India setup.
What we said at the time was we would invest the equivalent of EUR 16 million. We have invested currently EUR 13 million of the 16. Eventually, also on the co-option. Why? Because there is a significant roll-fed market, and of course, we want to take part of that and build a business before we go into the next phase, which is launching Pure-Pak, which will be on the back of the investments we are making now. We also said that we would see around EUR 80 million-EUR 100 million in a five-year period, and we are very confident that that is going to be achieved. What we said was that we will arrive at a, a positive EBITDA in three years. That turned out to be wrong because we did that in six months instead.
So we are delivering in India on growth and very happy to say that's the case on profitability. India, it's an attractive place. A lot of people are going there, but we are very determined with our very, very good partnership with GLS, that we are building on the plan we had and delivering in line with the plan we had. We are going to offer a wider solution of products. We've started with small portion packs. In India, that means really, really small. They are 125 milliliter, 100 milliliter, very small ones, and then all the way up to a liter size, and then expanding through more regions as we are now building the sales force from the very local areas that we are in around Delhi to a much wider scale.
Very positive towards our development in India and excited about moving into the next phase and offering also Pure-Pak in India. With that, Bent, I will hand over to you.
Thank you. Thank you, Thomas. I think we need to be honest that we ended the quarter slightly better than what we expected ourselves a few months ago, with a 17% EBITDA margin and with a strong cash flow generation. So I will take you through the drivers of this improvement. With our operating segments, EMEA and Americas. So when it comes to EMEA, the key driver here is the price increases that we implemented in the beginning of the year, that we have maintained throughout the year, and we have seen now that the raw materials are actually in line with last year. I think what is important to remember, even though we see some softening, raw materials are actually at a historically high level still. I think that really is an important to remember.
We look also at another thing that I think is important to mention on EMEA, with the 16.4% EBITDA margin, that is actually what we need to deliver in order to contribute to the mid-term targets for the group. So basically, the margins in Europe are coming back to where they should be. They are back to normal levels. Another driver is, as Thomas mentioned, the positive developments in our new markets. In MENA, while the overall volumes are stable, we are seeing improvement in our profitability, and we also see growth throughout the quarter in India. As everybody else, we see the effect of the inflation that is impacting in our fixed cost base.
The last point on EMEA is that we have a positive one-off effect for the quarter of around EUR 2 million that bumped up the EBITDA up to EUR 40 million in EMEA. In Americas, it's the story continues. It's a continued profitable growth. We see the key driver here is that we are onboarding a lot of new customers. That is the key driver for the growth, but we are also growing with the existing customer base. In the quarter, we have a particularly strong product mix that's really improved profitability, and we also see strong operational control. So while we are growing the top line, we are able to manage the cost base in a very good way.
The EBITDA bridge is, and what is, look, when we look at this bridge, is that now the raw material change is now stabilized, and we are seeing a, I say, a slight improvement on the raw material situation. So that is the key kind of change, from what we've seen before. If you start on the left-hand side with the net revenue mix, that is basically the contribution effect from our pricing efforts in EMEA, our profitable growth in America, and the contribution from our new businesses. That makes up the EUR 18 million, and remember, we also have the EUR 2 million in one-off effects.
The raw materials is +1 , and what we are looking at here is a, despite an increase of our board cost, as we talked about in the previous quarter, that has been more than mitigated and more than compensated for, for all the other raw materials in the group. Operations, up around EUR 2 million-3 million. That is one increased R&D efforts, but it's also the inflation of our fixed cost base. If you add the other items, that's bringing us then from EUR 32 million-48 million euro. If you go to the cash flow, we have a cash flow from operations of EUR 108 million. If you compare that to one year ago, that number was 25. So I think that is an improvement.
The key driver here is the profit before tax of 82, which is up from, I think it was around 18 million EUR, 14 million EUR one year ago. What is also helping this cash flow is the working capital. That is increasing only 5 million EUR, which is a moderate increase for the company, and that number last year was actually 46 million EUR increase. We have managed the 2023 situation very well because we also have a top-line growth. In that working capital, we have increased inventory of filling machines, but that is mitigated by prepayment from customers. We also have some increase in the packaging material stock as well. Other operations is basically taxes and also unrealized currency gains.
If you look at the cash flow from investments, that is EUR 13 million. That is slightly lower than normal, and it's driven by two things: Our maintenance program. We typically invest in our plants more in the second half of the year, so we expect to spend somewhat more money on maintenance for the last quarter. And as Thomas mentioned, we have some delays in filling machine commissioning that also impact the CapEx. If we move to the next, cash flow from financing is EUR 92 million, and that brings us to the cash level of EUR 29 million. And the takeaway here is that when we've been able to pay down on our bank debt by EUR 51 million.
So that, that brings us to then the, the, the financial position and, you know, everything cannot go up, and that is the case for leverage ratio, which went the other way. We are today at our midterm target of 2, which we are extremely happy about, and it's a really radical drop from the 3.3 that we had the end of last year. Second quarter only, we had 2.6, so we are extremely pleased by this development, and then gives us the balance sheet to meet the future. It's driven by an improved LTM EBITDA of EUR 47 million, as well as paying down on our bank debt by EUR 51 million. I think as a fun fact, we're also back to the leverage ratio we had before we acquired Naturepak and, GLS. Now to the outlook.
So what we are saying this time is that despite the inflationary pressure, we expect a strong end of the year. We expect our full-year revenues to be above EUR 1.1 billion, which is in line with our midterm targets. Our full-year EBITDA, we expect to be above EUR 170 million. That reflects the improved profitability in the third quarter. It also, in that forecast, we also, acknowledge that there are some particularly positive impacts, like the one-off we talked about, that will not be repeated into the fourth quarter. So with that, I will, leave it to you, Thomas.
Right. Thank you, Bent, for this, and then let's just quickly sum up here. What we tried to present here is that we continue on the path that we have been now for a while, and I think, with this quarter as well, we have seen that we are maneuvering through what is otherwise quite difficult days, as we all see, and delivering very, very consistently good results. We have improved, and we have developed, and what is very important for us is that it's not one item that's developing, but it's a whole set of the items in the strategy part that continues to deliver on our delivering the results we're seeing.
So we remain, to Bent's point, very confident when it comes to a strong 2023, and a very strong 2023 for us, I can say, and continue to remain very optimistic around the future of the business we're in. Thank you.
Thank you for your presentation, Thomas and Bent. We will now go into the Q&A session. We will begin with the audience here in Oslo before we take on the ones that we have received online. For the journalists that are here today, we will set aside time immediately after the Q&A session. So let's begin. I would like to kindly ask you to please state your name and the company you are representing, and also please use the microphone here in Oslo. Okay, while we wait for the audience, in Oslo, we will take first question received from Charlie Muir-Sands from BNP Paribas online. "What was the nature of the EUR 2 million one-off benefit in the third quarter?
You want me to take that, Thomas?
Please take it.
Yeah. So that was a commercial disagreement where we agreed. So that was a reversal of an accrual that was made for the second quarter.
Good, thank you. And, another one from Charlie in BNP: "Stable volumes, does that mean stable year-on-year or sequentially quarter-over-quarter?
This is stable year-over-year when we made that comment.
Good. So then, regarding the new plant in the US, factoring in the Arkansas project, what might be the level of CapEx in 2024?
Yeah, so that CapEx will be mostly in 2024. So I think what we, we said in the stock notice is that it's only gonna be around NOK 50 million and a net debt impact of NOK 70 million, but we are also in the finalization of that project, where we are optimizing the scope of the project.
Thanks. Let's see any questions from Oslo here. Do we have any? No. I'll continue with the analyst from DNB, Niclas Gehin. As you mentioned in the beginning of the presentation, you are delivering ahead of your mid- and long-term financial targets. Should we think of Q3 EBITDA and EPS as a sustainable run rate level going forward, or are there any one-offs or fluctuations that explains why this quarter was ahead of your targets?
So I can take you through the three drivers why Q3 ended better than what we expected. I think the first one is that the product mix in Americas was better than expected. The second point is that the open position we had on PE were more attractive than we thought, and we saw a dip in the spot prices in Q3, and we see some of these prices now coming up. We also have softening of all other input factors across the board, a little bit here and there, that adds up to the picture. And then we have to remember the NOK 2 million that will not be repeated. So you can say that the fourth quarter is taking that into i f you look at our full-year forecast of 170, that is taking that into consideration.
Good. Thank you, Bent. Robin Santavirta from Carnegie, input costs. Sorry, he has several questions. I will take them, the ones that we haven't answered. So, input costs: what are you seeing in terms of input cost development during the end of the year and early 2024? That's one. Second one is: What are your hedges for PE and aluminum? And the third one: How do you expect board paper board prices to develop in 2024?
Right. So if you start with the rest of the year, our financial plus commercial hedges for the rest of the year on PE is around 80%. When it comes to the spot prices on plastic, we see that they are on a moderate rise compared to what we saw in the third quarter. When it comes to the hedging for 2024, that is something that we will revert to in the next quarter.
All right, one from ABG, Noel Kjærhus: Do you expect price pressure from customers going forward as input costs are coming down?
I can answer that. And the simple truth is, yes, we do that. I think everybody, every industry are experiencing price pressure. We are as well. As Bent explained, we remain at a very high, historically high input cost level. We are still facing inflationary pressures, et cetera. So, yes, there are evidently discussions and pressures, but, I think we have very good argumentation to say that actually, the cost level remains very high.
Right. Thanks, Thomas. We have two unanswered questions from Fredrik Wandrup in Boldhaven. So number one: Can you please give an update on the status of the installation of machines in the US? How many are left? That's number one. And then the second one: Could you elaborate a bit further on India, given that you are running well ahead of plans? Is there an opportunity to invest even more and broaden the offering in the market?
Right. Very good question. Let me start by India. And actually, we are, at this moment, reviewing with our, joint venture partner, should we accelerate? Can we accelerate? It's not only a question of willingness here, it also has to do with availability of equipment, et cetera, et cetera. There are some constraints that we are facing, but, we have a very good team in place now in India, and they are actively looking at this, and we actually talk about it within a month, that this will be reviewed. On the filling machine side, so what has happened during this year is that we have seen, which is not uncommon by the way, we see that in Europe as well, delays, various reasons.
Customers want to delay their projects and finalize building, construction, civil work, whatever it is, that impacts some of these filling machines. In some cases, we have been the cause of delay as well, simply from a practical reasons and some issues related to that. But so the amount of filling machines that we will actually commission this year is going to be a little bit less than what we thought. But all of the ones we are not installing are just moved into next year. It's all contracted. What we are seeing is that the backlog of interest in new filling machines remains at a very solid and strong level, and I believe, as we now see, both the same customers ordering the second filling machines and more.
This is an industry where people know each other. You are seeing this as a very attractive and modern, high quality offering from filling machine. We will start seeing that this is just going even at a higher speed.
Good. And Charlie Muir-Sands from BNP is asking about the PPWR. "Following the publication of the latest draft of the EU's packaging, Packaging Waste Regulation by the ENVI committee, how do you assess the likely impact of this on your business, positive or negative?
So I think this is a very, very good question that actually can take quite some time to discuss. But overall, I mean, I think it's fundamentally important that we, as a company, actually support regulation in this industry. Why? Because it means that the companies who are supplying sustainable solutions will actually benefit from this at some point. I think this is good for society, good for us as consumers as well. So we are actually supporting that we increase the recycling, that we do the activities that are more or less outlined in the PPWR. This is also supported by ACE, the Alliance for Carton and Environment, who are driving the same direction for this.
The discussion, well, of course, which is relevant, is more on the mechanics of this, some details in this, how it should be done. To the point, is it good, is it bad? We believe that with the innovations that this will generate and will, someone like us will be, incentivized to do by regulation, if you put it like that. We think this is a good thing for Elopak, and we think this is a point where our solutions have a very good position in a longer perspective.
Sounds good. Thank you, Thomas. And, one more for Bent, perhaps. This is from Håkon Fuglu in SEB, analyst. "Thank you for the presentation. Can we assume that the liquid board prices are fully reflected in the Q3 numbers? And do you expect liquid board suppliers to push for higher prices for 2024 and beyond the CPI?
So when it comes to the third quarter, there were some positive position effects because there are very many different grades. We have different plants in different locations. There were some minor position effects in the third quarter, so almost at a full run rate. When it comes to next year, I don't really have any comments, but I'm sure that will be reasonable.
Okay, and the last one, it's from Martin Melbye in ABG. "Where do you see your Pure-Pak prices into Q4 and 2024?
Fourth quarter, and then 2024.
T here are no changes to our prices in the fourth quarter. And when it comes to pricing for 2024, we really don't have any comments.
Good. Do we have any questions here in the audience in Oslo? No. Thank you very much for your attention. That concludes our session, and have a nice day.
Thank you very much!
Thank you.