Greetings, and welcome to the Cazoo fourth quarter 2022 preliminary financial results and revised 2023 plan. At this time, all participants are on a listen only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Mr. Robert Berg, Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Finance. Thank you, Mr. Berg. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining today's call and webcast to discuss our fourth quarter 2022 preliminary financial results and revised 2023 plan. You'll be able to find today's press release on our investor relations website at investors.cazoo.co.uk. We appreciate everyone joining us today. With me on the call is Alex Chesterman, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Paul Woolf, Chief Financial Officer, and Paul Whitehead, Chief Operating Officer. Before we get started, I would like to remind you of the company's safe harbor language, which I'm sure you're all familiar with. Management may make forward-looking statements, including guidance and underlying assumptions. Forward-looking statements are based on expectations that involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. For a further discussion of risks related to our business, please see the filings of Cazoo Group Limited with the SEC.
Now, I'll hand over the call to Alex.
Thanks, Rob. Good morning, all. Thank you for joining us today. As you will hopefully have seen from today's press release, we've set out our high level preliminary fourth quarter 2022 results, which we believe showed a strong end to last year, and a revised 2023 plan aimed at rapidly further improving our unit economics and conserving cash. The purpose of today's call is primarily to give you the opportunity to ask any questions you may have. We're very early in our 2022 year-end close process, but have today disclosed that in Q4, despite the significant macroeconomic headwinds, we had another strong quarter of U.K. retail unit sales of around 17,750 units in the quarter, up over 100% year-on-year.
We've now sold well over 100,000 cars entirely online in the U.K. in just three years since our launch, which is testament to the strength of our proposition and the continued adoption of online car buying. Our U.K. revenues in Q4 were approximately GBP 315 million and almost GBP 1.25 billion for the full- year, only our third year of operation. We also saw our U.K. retail GPU increase to around GBP 600 in Q4, showing continuous improvement every quarter during 2022. Our positive momentum has continued into 2023, and so far in January, we've seen solid unit sales and record finance and ancillary attachment rates.
Our balance sheet remains strong, with over GBP 250 million of cash and cash equivalents, plus over GBP 75 million of self-funded vehicles at the end of Q4. In the current economic climate, we believe the right course of action for 2023 is to focus on further improving our unit economics, materially reducing our fixed cost base, and preserving cash as we make continued progress towards our goal of reaching profitability without the need to raise further funding over the next 18-24 months. To enable these improvements, we're resetting our 2023 top-line ambitions to 40,000-50,000 retail units, allowing us to focus on higher margin, faster moving vehicles and to rationalize our operational footprint to increase cost efficiency.
Following this reset, we expect retail unit sales to return to growth in 2024 and beyond. This plan is in the process of being finalized and implemented and we'll provide more detailed information at the time of our full- year results in due course. In summary, while 2022 was a challenging year in many respects, our continued strong unit sales, notable improvement in unit economics during the year, and market-leading proposition gives us strong confidence that we can both deliver on our 2023 plan and realize the attractive long-term opportunity for Cazoo. I'll now turn back to the operator so that we can take any of your questions. Thank you.
Thank you. The floor is now open for questions. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad at this time. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Once again, that is star one to register a question at this time. The first question today is coming from Rajat Gupta of J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.
Great. Thanks for taking the questions, and thanks for the update here. Maybe a question, you know, firstly on the fourth quarter and then, you know, in 2023. Your cash and equivalents was down, you know, roughly, you know, GBP 60 million, quarter-over-quarter. Could you help us bridge that gap, you know, between the different items, you know, including contributions from EU, you know, any divestiture proceeds, and, you know, the core U.K. business. You know, just trying to bridge that, and then I have a question on 2023. Thanks.
Yes. Thanks, Rajat. I'll let Paul Woolf pick up on any detail. Generally, Q4 was a combination, the cash burn of U.K. burn at the old rate of fixed costs, which obviously are materially lower as we go into 2023 following this rightsizing and restructuring plan. Also a number of one-off costs related to the wind down of our operations in the EU, which we'll see a little bit more of in Q1. Beyond that, there should be no further one-off costs relating to restructuring either of the EU or the U.K..
Got it.
Yeah.
Uh, and then.
Hi. Alex.
Sorry. Go on.
Just to pick up on that. I think that's I mean, that's right. Broadly the majority of the cash was related to the U.K. trading business, but then with some positives and negatives in Europe, which more or less offset but were slightly negative overall.
Got it. Got it. That's helpful. Maybe on 2023. You know, it looks like you're suggesting, you know, roughly GBP 150 million in cash burn. Could you give us a sense of the cadence of that? Relatedly, you know, could you talk a little bit more about the cost efficiencies from the pullback in growth? You know, is it more geared towards GPU improvements or SG&A reduction? I'm sure it's like there's an element of SG&A too, but, you know, you know, the confidence would be helpful. Should we continue to expect EBITDA breakeven by the fourth quarter or has that also been accelerated with this new plan? That'll be all for now.
Get back to you.
Again, I'll pick up at high level and then pass to Paul to sort of expand on it. In terms of there's a combination of improvements in 2023. Yes, there is materially improved GPU expectation as we progress throughout the year. Also, significant cost savings. We expect SG&A savings of about GBP 100 million in 2023 versus the Q4 2022 run rate as a result of restructuring. Of course, there are one-off costs. When you look at that cash burn number that you talked about, there are one-off costs associated with the restructuring, which will largely be in Q1 of this year and may spill a little bit into Q2.
Got it. Great. Thanks for the color. I'll get back in queue.
Thank you. Once again, ladies and gentlemen, that is star one if you would like to register a question at this time. The next question is coming from Adam Berlin of UBS. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, Alex. Thanks for taking the questions. I just wanted thoughts on GPU for next year. Does doing fewer units help you accelerate the GPU more quickly? Is there a number in mind for where you'd like GPU to be by the end of 2023? That's the first question. I think the other questions actually have been asked.
Oh, yes. Sorry.
I wanted to ask you how big the restructuring charge was as well.
Morning, Adam, by the way. On GPU, yes, reduced volume does help improve GPU because it allows us to focus. When we're not optimizing for volume, it allows us to focus on higher value cars, higher margin cars, faster moving cars, faster stock turn, et cetera. We can be more selective and focused on higher GPU. We have aspirations to reach what we set out as our medium-term GPU target some time ago of GBP 1,500. We have aspirations to get there by the end of this calendar year.
On the restructuring charge?
We.
Yeah.
The plan is still in progress, so, you know, it hasn't yet been finalized. Paul, you might wanna talk to that.
Yeah. No, happily. I mean, as Alex said, it's not with. There is a We're still evaluating the property side of it. I mean, there's obviously a difference between the P&L and the cash flow. From a cash flow side, it's going to be, it's some a significant portion of the restructuring charges will be funded by the fact that we'll be running at a lower inventory. We have, as you know, been consistently told, significant cash tied up in inventory. We'll clarify all at the full results announcement, but it.
Self-funded inventory doesn't come down from 75 to zero. The GBP 75 billion isn't entirely subscription. We will always, you know, we'll still have many, many thousands of cars which are largely funded, but also have some self-funded. You should expect that we will throughout the year continue to have GBP 30 million or GBP 40 million of cash tied up in our own inventory.
Okay, thanks very much.
Thank you. Once again, ladies and gentlemen, that is star one if you would like to register a question at this time. One moment please while we poll for any additional audio questions. We are showing no additional audio questions via the phone at this time.
Great. Well, thank you everybody for joining, and feel free to reach out to Rob if anybody wants to follow us directly.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's event. You may disconnect your lines at this time or log off the webcast and enjoy the rest of your day.