Dear ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Kofola's 2024 results conference call. Martin Pisklak, the Group CFO, will now present a summary of the results.
Dear investors, Martin Pisklak speaking. I'm very glad that I can present the final results of Kofola Group for 2024. Basically, we confirmed the preliminary results, which we published in February this year. So, overall, consolidated revenues totaled more than CZK 11 billion, and our consolidated EBITDA reached CZK 1.85 billion. These are really very strong and record numbers, which we are very proud of. Because of these very strong numbers, we decided to propose for the general meeting a really very nice and also record dividend: CZK 21 per share. I believe that all the shareholders will appreciate such a nice dividend, which represents approximately 4.6 percentage points of the current share price on the Prague Stock Exchange. Please, now you can hear recordings of my colleagues who will present results of the individual business units of the Group. Thank you.
Dear investors, here is Daniel speaking. Let me briefly comment on last year's performance in Czechoslovakia. 2024 was very positive from FMCG perspective. Real household consumption was increased due to economic stabilization. Retail sovereign market grew 4%, on-the-go around 10%, on-premise market performed less with significant local differences. The Slovak market was impacted by sugar tax front-loading in Q4. For Kofola company, it represents EUR 3 million. We enjoyed extraordinary successful marketing support, including complex Kofola rebranding. Costs were under control, so EBITDA 24% growth is not a surprise for you. Thanks for your applause. Now, back to 2025 real situation. The Slovak market dropped more than 10% due to crazy sugar tax implementation. Consumer confidence decreased in the Czech Republic too, whether it's cold and rainy. We successfully launched key innovations, for example, Targa Florio retail formats, and replaced Rauch's portfolio.
Main success is Curiosa in HoReCa, with 20% higher listing than the previous brand. We had to react to negative market development with operational savings. We are very well prepared to top season, and we keep our EBITDA target for 2025. Thank you for your attention, Daniel.
Hello, everyone. This is Marián Šefčovič , CEO of Adriatic speaking. In the year 2024, the Adriatic region demonstrated strong sales across all markets, with revenue up by 11% year -over -year due to increased consumption in tourist season although September, driven by prolonged cold and sunny weather. Slovenia saw an 8% increase, Croatia 17%, and export markets achieved substantial growth at 6%. We are especially content with Croatia's revenues improving by double digits. EBITDA has improved significantly in 2024 by 31% compared to last year. We are particularly pleased that in 2024, for the first time, EBITDA in Croatia was positive.
We started 2024 with the launch of a solar power plant, which we installed on the roof of the production facility in Radenci. The solar power plant covers approximately 10% of the annual electricity needs. The year 2024 was also dedicated to new ingredients and reformulations. We successfully launched two new drinks in the functional drink segment: Functional Balance and Iron Power. The transition to the new visual identity of the Pepsi brands was also very successfully implemented and accepted by consumers in both markets. We also successfully launched a completely renewed recipe and packaging for our brand, Oraketa. In 2024, Studena brand was the most awarded brand in Croatia. We have won 11 different advertising prizes, among which are IDX, Grand Prix, FE Silver, and Balkans editors. In September, for the first year in a row, we continue our tree planting campaign.
In 2024, we invited business partners and other companies to make their team-building activities green by supporting tree planting with drones, which helps reforest areas that are difficult to reach. Looking back on 2024, increased sales volume and stable market positioning helped to increase overall financial performance in the Adriatic region. Thank you, Marián.
Dear investors, this is Martin Rosypal speaking, Finance Director of the Beer Segment. I'm pleased to provide an update on our fourth quarter and full-year results within our division, which has been part of the Kofola Group since mid-March 2024. In the fourth quarter, our breweries achieved approximately 7.5% revenue growth. The Holba beer did not fully fulfill our plans in the fourth quarter due to floods in the region, where we have a strong presence, but the rest of our portfolio helped us cover lost volumes, and both our plan and last year's fourth quarter results were exceeded. Our full-year revenue grew by 10%, driven by strong performance in both the Czech and export markets. All brands and packaging formats surpassed 2023 results.
Our full-year EBITDA also increased by 10% compared to 2023, despite limited sales price increases that did not fully offset rising costs, particularly in labor and energy. The excellent quality of our beers has again been confirmed by podium awards in several tasting competitions. Zubr Grand, Zubr Gold, and Litovel were the most successful. We are excited to enter 2025 with rebranding of our two brands, Holba and Zubr, which will also be supported by marketing campaigns. We have launched some trade-ons, for example, Holba lager Keprník in retail formats or a new flavored Litovel. Thank you for your attention, and I wish you a great day.
Ladies and gentlemen, now it's time for your questions. If you wish to ask a question, please click on the raise hand icon on your participant panel. When prompted by the organizer, click on the unmute me icon. If you have no further questions, click on the lower hand icon. We have a first question from Mr. Bartek. Please go ahead.
From the beginning, because of some connection problems, but if you can elaborate a little bit on the outlook for the second quarter, how it looks like overall, especially in Slovakia.
Thank you for your question, Petr. Basically, second quarter, in April and in May so far, we see a recovery of the market. The numbers are starting to beat the previous year a bit, not in Slovakia. Still, we are below sales in Slovakia due to the sugar tax, but overall, second quarter is so far according to our expectations. After a decline in the first quarter, which was also expected in our internal budgets, the second quarter continued according to expectations. At the moment, we feel that the overall targets which we proposed for 2025 should be reachable.
Thank you. So you're looking for a slight growth in other markets than Slovakia?
Yeah, exactly. Basically, the majority of the drop of the revenues, which you see in the first quarter, we dropped in revenues some 8%-9%, is strongly related mainly to Slovakia and partly also to the Czech Republic. I would say that there are three major reasons for this. The first reason is, of course, sugar tax in Slovakia. A lot of customers did some pre-stocking already in December, so that's why the sales in the first quarter were weaker. Also, the price increase on the shelves. We see that consumers should somehow get used to the new prices. The first quarter was weaker, especially due to sugar tax in Slovakia. The second reason for a weaker first quarter was the bad weather. Really, it was cold and rainy, which is not the weather which we would like to see during the first quarter.
During the first quarter, we need to have typical winter weather, so snow, people on the mountains, and so on. The weather was not with us in the first quarter. The last reason for the drop of revenues is the fact that with the termination of Rauch cooperation, we left the retail format of the juices. Basically, at the moment, we do not sell our juices into the retail channel. We replaced Rauch with our new brand, Curiosa, and licensed brand Dilmah. These two brands are active at the moment only in HoReCa and Impulse channels. We are basically very limited in retail at the moment. This fact should not have any negative impact on the margins because the retail business with the juices is really with a very negligible margin. There should be no strong impact on the profitability because of this fact.
Of course, the revenues are affected by this fact, and that's why the revenues are lower in the first quarter compared to the previous year.
One more question on the dividend. I don't know whether you commented on that before, but if you can share a little bit your view on the mid-term dividend payouts, what's your thinking? Maybe any targets in terms of leverage or how we should approach it?
Yeah. Basically, still it is valid the target that if no major acquisition comes through in 2025, we would like to keep the leverage slightly above 2x EBITDA. 2x EBITDA, that's still valid also with this amount of dividend. Once we were thinking about the dividend, we were taking into consideration, of course, cash flow of the company, but also the current share price. We believe that these 4.6 percentage points or 4.5 percentage points are some, let's call it, reasonable and fair dividend yield. That is why we decided in this way. For the next year, at the moment, we did not update the dividend policy yet, but we may assume that our thinking will be very similar to this year.
If there are no major investments and acquisitions and the cash flow of the company is working well, there should be basically no reason not to share this profit with the shareholders.
Very much. Can you confirm you said that you see the dividend yield between 4.5% and 5%?
At the moment, or yesterday, we closed some CZK 450 per share. If CZK 21 divided this amount is approximately 4.6 percentage points, something like 4.65 percentage points . Let's see if we can keep it in next year. At the moment, we think that this 4.5% approximately is some reasonable dividend yield.
Thank you. Congratulations to the results.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please click on the raise hand icon on your participant panel. There are no more questions. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. A recording of today's call will be available on our web page. You may now disconnect. Thank you and have a nice day.