Hello, and welcome to Bulten's Q3 2022 presentation. My name is Ulrika Hultgren, and I am the SVP Corporate Communications and Investor Relations. Presenting the report are Bulten's President and CEO, Anders Nyström, and our CFO, Anna Åkerblad. As usual, you will be able to ask questions after the presentation, both from the web as well as in the telephone conference.
The agenda for today, we can go to the next slide. The agenda for today will be a brief overview of Bulten, the market development, the results for the third quarter, and finally, some words about our focus for the rest of the year. I will now hand over the word to Anders Nyström. Please go ahead, Anders.
Thank you, Ulrika, and, welcome everyone. I will begin with an overview of Bulten for those of you who may not be familiar with our company. If we turn to page four, please. As most of you know, Bulten is a supplier of fastener solutions.
Our primary customer group is light vehicle and commercial vehicle OEMs, but customers categorized as automotive suppliers and customers outside of the automotive industry are continuing to grow their share of our business.
It's important to know that we don't just supply the hardware. To many of our customers, we're a partner for product development support, innovation, procurement, and logistics. Bulten's three largest customers still are Ford, JLR, and Volvo Cars.
To be an approved supplier to this many customers has already clearly helped us to grow in the past years, and we're continuously adding new customers. Next slide, please. Some words about the market development. We turn to page six.
We continue to rely on LMC Automotive for statistics and forecasts in the vehicle sector. Quarter three was a strong quarter for light vehicle production globally. The full year 2022 is forecasted by LMC to show a 6.8% recovery over 2021 for light vehicles and a drop of 15.7% for commercial vehicles.
For Bulten's mix, this corresponds to a 4.2% market recovery on a full year basis. It should be noted that the full year light vehicle recovery is driven by North America and China, with our main market, Europe, actually showing much weaker recovery rates than the rest of the world. Turn to page seven.
In this graph, you can see how LMC's global vehicle production forecasts have changed over time, with the light vehicle recovery being slightly stronger in 2022 versus the prior version and commercial vehicles deteriorating forecast to forecast. Next slide, please. Our raw material costs continue to rise in quarter three. We base our production primarily on steel wire rod, and this graph is the official price statistics from Deutscher Schraubenverband.
The price is now at an all-time high. This index is one of the ones we use to regulate our customer pricing. However, pricing is normally updated in the next quarter, which means that increases paid in one quarter are reducing our margins with a reverse positive effect in times when prices go down. We have now had a two-year period with sharp increases in which prices have more than doubled, which have eaten into our margins.
On to page nine, please. Normally, wire rod pricing is following the price of cold-rolled flat steel with some time lag. Here, we can see that cold-rolled has dropped since quarter two, and we expect this to give effect on wire rod pricing as well going forward. Turn to page 10. Energy price is a well-known issue in the entire society in Europe, and Bulten is no exception.
Natural gas, which is used in some of our European heat treatment lines, saw a sharp increase in quarter three with a peak in September. Compensation for these types of inflationary costs are subject to negotiation with our customers and are only covered after the fact. A few words about the third quarter, and we can turn to page twelve, please.
Our growth in the third quarter is really encouraging, being by far the highest third quarter to date for Bulten. The supply chain disturbances have continued for our customers to a higher degree than what we expected when we went into the quarter, leading to continued difficulties for Bulten regarding material and production planning, keeping our inventory levels at much higher levels than what we actually need.
The raw material prices have started to flatten, but we still saw increases in quarter three. This coupled with inflationary cost increases that have put a lot of pressure on our margins. On page 13. Very encouraging news in the quarter was that Bulten was awarded a comprehensive package of business on new electric vehicle platform with a producer in China. Bulten also entered into a collaboration with Polestar on their groundbreaking concept, Polestar 0, which is aimed at producing an entire electric car in a fully climate neutral value chain.
In this project, Bulten will have a unique network of other partners to work with to develop climate neutral fasteners. That's a big challenge, but it's not an impossible one. This fits perfectly with our strategy to be the absolute leader in innovative and sustainable fastening solutions. Now I leave the word to Anna for more on the financial numbers in the quarter.
Thank you, Anders. If we turn to page 14, you can see an overview of our quarterly sales the last years, including 12 months rolling sales. We had our second highest sales ever in the third quarter, and we have exceeded SEK 4 billion in 12 months rolling sales for the first time. We saw higher sales growth to automotive OEMs and continued sales growth in other industries outside the automotive sector in the quarter.
Next slide, please. On page 15, it is satisfying to see that our effort to grow in industries outside automotive have given result in increased sales. This customer group is now contributing with over 10% of total sales year to date September, compared to 7% year to date last year.
When focusing on the third quarter, this customer group contributed with 12% of total sales compared with 10% the same quarter last year. Our main customer group is still OEM light vehicles with 64% of total sales year-to-date September. Next slide, please. To SEK 47 million in the quarter, equal to 4.3% margin.
Taking into consideration the currency effect, the EBIT margin amounts to 3.9%. We improved the EBIT in challenging times, but we have been impacted by continued increase in costs for commodity goods and energy, which is only partly compensated. Next slide, please. On page 17, you can see our financial summary of the third quarter, and adjusted earnings per share amounted to SEK 0.65 in the quarter and SEK 5.19 for rolling 12 months.
Next slide, please. The cash flow from operating activities, including change in working capital, amounted to SEK -27 million in the third quarter. Cash flow from investing activities amounted to SEK -69 million in the quarter. Key figure affected by the start of the construction of a new facility in Poland in May last year. Cash flow from financing activities amounts to SEK 145 million. The total cash flow for the quarter amounted to SEK 87 million at the end of the quarter.
The increase in total assets compared to both last year and year-end relates to increase in inventory and the construction of new facility in Poland and new leasing contracts. We have been tying up capital in inventory and have now taken additional measures to increase the activities to release capital.
Our net debt, including lease liabilities, was also impacted by the new lease contracts. Our adjusted rolling twelve months key indicators 2022 are affected by cost increases in raw material, energy and transport, as well as tied up capital in inventory, as already mentioned. However, last year's rolling twelve months included the two best quarters in respect to EBIT margin ever, which were Q4 2020 and Q1 2021.
Our adjusted net debt and adjusted EBITDA ratio is at -1.8 at the end of the quarter, and our equity ratio excluding financial lease at 49.1%. Next slide, please. On page 20, you can see our financial targets as well as some of the guidelines regarding relevant key figures for Bulten. Comparing with the same quarter last year, the growth in sales is 43%.
In the right-hand table, you can see some guidelines for some other key figures. We are very much in line with our guidelines. A guideline for average net working capital in relation to 12-month sales is about 20%-25%, depending on the growth pace.
At the end of the quarter, we had a level of 24.7%, which is at the upper level of our guidelines, and additional measures were taken to decrease tied up capital, as already mentioned. The guidelines for capital expenditures as percentage of 12-month sales are 2%-3% for maintenance of equipment and additional up to 2% for capacity, depending on the market development. At the end of the quarter, we are at a level of 6.5%.
As mentioned before, we started the construction of the new facility in Poland in May 2021, and this of course affects this figure. We also have postponed capital expenditure due to the pandemic that also impacts this figure when we start up again. The guideline for depreciation as percentage of 12-month sales is 4%-5% considering IFRS 16. Without IFRS 16, it has been in a level of 2%-3%. At the end of Q3, we are in line with our guidelines. Now back to you, Anders.
Thank you, Anna. If we turn to page 22. Or some words about what's in focus for the rest of the year. The number one priority for us right now in the next coming weeks and months is to convert our inventory into cash. Many actions have been implemented to this effect before, but more actions are being taken. We continue to negotiate with customers also to recover the dramatic cost increases accumulated during this year in order to improve margins.
These are tactical measures that are very necessary for us in order to create financial headroom to also execute on our strategic plans of driving innovation, expand in new markets through the right M&A activities, and to be competitive and continue to grow organically. To page 23.
Finally, it is appropriate to remind everyone to be a SEK 5 billion company delivering 8% EBIT and 15% ROCE in 2024. 2022 so far has been another tough year, but with strong growth. Now we are very determined to turn that tide on margins and cash flow. That concludes our presentation, and we're ready for questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you do wish to ask a question, please press zero one on your telephone keypad. If you wish to withdraw a question, you may do so by pressing zero two to cancel. Once again, that is zero one if you would like to register for a question. Our first question comes from the line of Mats Liss from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.
Yeah, hi. Thank you. A couple of questions. Well, first, I mean, you mentioned on there, your focus on passing on costs and, then again, you also mentioned that, demand is good, and it's expected to continue well into 2023.
I guess the question is more that, well, given the pretty good demand, how do you rate, well, chances of passing on? 'Cause I guess steel is one thing, and should be sort of contractual, agreed, so to speak. Maybe you can also touch upon how much those costs are in compared to the others like energy and freight and so on, that maybe affect you also.
Well, hi, Mats. Yeah, just to comment on the steel. I think you asked what's our possibilities to actually forward those costs to the customers. They're very good, I should say. It's just that the negotiations when it comes to both steel and inflation, they are taking longer than we had anticipated.
We are closing negotiations with customers at a pretty rapid pace now, and you know, that will come into play in quarter four. However, you know, quantifying those numbers to you in the call would be to give guidance, and I should refrain from doing that as you know.
Yeah, that's probably a good advice, though. Coming back to the good demand, I guess you see, I mean, the good demand is more related to customers having production plans and you get, you see, pretty good long term. Is that the case, or is it more the LMC Automotive guidance that you relate to when you talk about good demand?
No, I think we see that still customer order books are very full. Delivery times on new vehicles are long. I'd say that the backlog of pent-up consumer demand will carry us way into 2023. Even if we would have a weakening of demand in the consumer link in the chain now, there's still a backlog in the OEM order books that will carry us for a pretty long time.
I guess normally we have this seasonally related slowdown during the Christmas holidays. It should be expected to be somewhat less pronounced this year, or is it more normal for those customers like to catch up a bit on their order backlogs?
That's a good question. I think there are more working days in December this year than there normally is. You know, historically, we do see shutdown days around Christmas. I mean, not the least for the maintenance of plants. Last year it was due to semiconductor shortages, and they sort of took the opportunity to close down plants. We don't have any notification of extended shutdowns in December this year, but
Looking at some of the costs, I guess you have the cost, energy cost there, and I was just wondering, could you say something about how you hedge those costs?
Yeah, it'll be a long story because, you know, we have a number of plants around the world, and the market dynamics for energy is quite different depending on whether you're in China or Poland or Germany and Sweden. We do have various stages of hedging or fixed prices on energy for electricity and gas. They have different expiry dates. What I can say is gas is our biggest issue in Europe. That's something we have in common with most of the industry.
Yeah, great. A couple of one further down the P&L. Looking at the financial net, you had some currency related charges. Non-interest anyway. What did they relate to, and the net finance charges?
It's unrealized exchange gains or losses then. It's different currencies, local currency, and it's mainly related to the Polish plant.
Okay, great. Finally, about the tax line there, it's a bit above guide, well, looking at the quarter anyway. Well, will it sort of re-decline going forward, or should we expect it to be on this level for a couple of more quarters?
It will be new time next year, so to say. It would remain on this level this year, but then we have a new year next year and a new level.
Okay, good. Thanks. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. As there are currently no further questions, I will hand the word back to the speakers for any final comments. Please go ahead.
Okay. Well, thank you for listening in. I appreciate your interest in our company and I wish you a nice evening.