Ferronordic AB (publ) (STO:FNM)
Sweden flag Sweden · Delayed Price · Currency is SEK
40.90
+0.30 (0.74%)
May 5, 2026, 5:21 PM CET
← View all transcripts

Earnings Call: Q4 2023

Feb 22, 2024

Operator

Welcome to the Ferronordic Q4 presentation for 2023. During the questions and answer session, participants are able to ask questions by dialing pound key five on their telephone keypad. Now, I will hand the conference over to the CEO, Lars Corneliusson, and CFO, Erik Danemar. Please begin your meeting.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

... Welcome to this presentation, our fourth quarter 2023 results for Ferronordic. And if we start with a summary of the quarter, we call it a restart, and we feel definitely that it is after a challenging and a transformative 2023, where we went from having our biggest business in the eastern part of the world to having the biggest business in the western part of the world in less than a year. And we did a successful completion of Rudd acquisition that in the U.S. in Q4, in 2023. And Rudd result is consolidated for December, and balance sheet on 31 December 2023. And group revenue increased then by 30% to SEK 950 million, mainly driven that by the addition of United States, for one month, we should say.

However, the operating result declined to SEK -62 million. If we exclude one-off costs, it was SEK -15 million. We'll come back to that. Working capital, we're working hard to take that down, and we expect that to decline in the first half of 2024. We have a restructuring efficiency program launched in Germany, and the proposal is to pay no dividend in 2024. If we then turn to the next slide, basically again, then on the 30th of November, we acquired Rudd Equipment Company. It's one of the biggest dealers of Volvo CE and other brands in the U.S. December was strong for Rudd, revenue of SEK 308 million, with an operating profit of SEK 25 million.

That's an operating margin of 8%, and that was actually including then SEK 11 million of transaction costs. And we see big potential to build further on an already good business in the U.S. that we have acquired. However, in current markets, the fourth quarter was challenging. Germany order intake and truck deliveries decreased. The aftermarket grew, but not enough to cover our costs. We have launched a efficiency program in Germany to reduce administrative costs and to create a leaner organizational structure, and this is now under a new leadership in Germany. In Kazakhstan, the market for construction equipment decreased despite a growing actual economy. Our sales and machines also decreased in units, I should say, by 35%.

As mentioned, we have stock levels that are too high currently, both in Germany and Kazakhstan. We have a lot of initiatives to bring this inventory down, which should normalize during first half 2024. Obviously, as we see markets contracting in Germany, we're taking down used stock and rental fleets to strengthen the business and free up further capital. Good to see that the market and interest in electric trucks is still strong and growing. We are definitely ready for a restart after a challenging fourth quarter and looking forward really to 2024 after this transformational full year of 2023. So by that, I'll hand over to Erik for some more details on our Rudd acquisition.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Thank you, Lars. Yes, a few points on the closure of the Rudd acquisition. We announced the deal on the 13th of November 2023, and the deal was completed on the 30th of November. So as Lars mentioned, we consolidated the result in December and balance sheet in full on the 31st of December. We paid $10 million for two properties, workshops, and another $95 million for the shares, the equity 100% in Rudd. During this full year of 2023, Rudd had revenue of $258 million, with an operating profit at $21 million, and earnings before tax at $18.9 million.

This is based still on unaudited IFRS numbers, converted from still unaudited US GAAP numbers, I should stress, but these are the numbers that we have at this time. At the time of the acquisition, Rudd had slightly more than $50 million, $54.7 million of net debt. So that would imply an enterprise value of just below $150 million. So based on our purchase price of $94 million-$95 million for 100% of the equity, and these preliminary 2023, the price corresponds to 5x Rudd's 2023 earnings before tax, or an enterprise value of 7.3x Rudd's 2023 operating profit on the basis as I described above.

The purchase price will be subject to a true up of the balance sheet that is currently pending. We have made a reserve in our accounts for $1.3 million, or SEK 40 million, for such a contingent consideration to be paid following the initial results from that true up. Following the acquisition, Rudd's balance sheet as of the 30th of November, i.e., the date of acquisition, was subject to a fair value assessment, i.e., a fair valuation of all the assets and liabilities that is for the purpose of a purchase price allocation.

Based on this, so-called PPA, purchase price allocation and fair value exercise, which it remains preliminary at this point, and including also the contingent consideration that I mentioned, the $1.3 million. We paid, Ferronordic paid a goodwill of $14.5 million in the transaction. That corresponds to SEK 150 million. Well, goodwill, if we move to the next slide, short summary of group financials, before Lars will take you through some of the operational highlights. So group revenue increased 30% to 915 million SEK. German revenue was down 10% to 555 million EUR, -14% in EUR.

Central Asia, which at this point is Kazakhstan, was down 41% to SEK 52 million. And then you have the U.S. revenue contribution of SEK 308 million. The group operating result stood at -SEK 62 million Swedish krona. The German operating profit decreased to SEK 2 million Swedish krona itself. That was partly driven by one of restructuring costs, which we will get back to, and they are related to the efficiency program that we started in end of Q3 and through Q4, and also impairments. So, restructuring cost of SEK 23 million and impairments of SEK 11 million are included there. So excluding those, Germany standalone was -28.

In Kazakhstan, the operating result also decreased from to -6. In that result, there is also SEK 2 million of impairments of the stock, mostly slow-moving parts. In the U.S., the profit contribution was SEK 25 million positive, and as Lars mentioned, that includes the acquisition costs, which stood at SEK 11 million. So if we look at the group overall, and we exclude the restructuring cost at SEK 23 million, the impairments at total of 13, 11 in Germany and 2 in Kazakhstan, and the acquisition costs, the adjusted group operating profit would be then -SEK 15 million. Net income decreased to SEK 89 million. Net income is now exposed to currency.

We report in Swedish krona, have almost all the assets of the business in euros and US dollars, so FX is likely to be an item in our group income statement. Net debt stood at SEK 1.3 billion. The change in net cash position, of course, mainly a result of the acquisition of the American operations, to some extent, also increase in working capital. 34% equity to total assets and a book equity of SEK 1.6 billion at the 31st of December 2023. And with that, I hand back to Lars again for some operational highlights.

So basically, the German market is for trucks is on its way down for sure. However, in Q4, the registrations actually increased by 5%. It's really supply that is catching up with pent-up demand. However, going forward, we expect that to drop. As we saw ourselves already in Q4, new trucks in our area is in line with the market, 80% of the total. Our own sales in units decreased by 58%. We should mention that we had a very strong Q4 in 2022 in terms of deliveries of trucks. Used vehicle sales grew 176% in units to 216.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Here you can see we are actively selling out our used vehicle inventory. We're working hard in keeping a good balance there. Obviously, greater supply, of course, on the market, which is putting pressures on margins. We also see that demand for rental. Diesel rental, we should say, has declined, as I mentioned, as the supply of new trucks has normalized. So we see a kind of a normalization of a market which for three years have been not normal, I would say. It's been restricted by supply constraints, and demand has not been able to be satisfied by that restricted supply. It's now has caught up, clearly, and is on its way down for kind of a normalization and probably a bit more than that.

So obviously, as I said, we are reducing both our used stock and our rental fleet. What's good to see, and it's clearly quite common in this type of market environments, that the service and parts sales continues to deliver in situations like this, and we actually increased 20%—combination of organic growth and acquisitions. And obviously, this is extremely important for us, that we can continue to grow our aftermarket sales, to keep a profitable business moving in target, so to speak. We made SEK 11 million impairment of Sandvik stock.

We've had machines that's in inventory that are difficult to sell in the German market, and we took an impairment on those, and then SEK 23 million, as Eric mentioned, on one-off restructuring costs. I will talk a little more about that on the next slide. Giving us a gross margin, which decreased to 8.4% from 13.4%, which was then obviously impacted by the impairment of Sandvik machines. So if we talk about the efficiency program, obviously, we have had and have too much costs for the business at hand in Germany. We see a setting in the market. One of our key objectives have always been to have a high absorption level.

An absorption level means that how much our fixed costs are covered by the gross profits from the aftermarket. Usually what happens in a declining market for trucks, for machines, is that the growth of the aftermarket actually continues to tick on and be healthy and can actually grow. We want to increase that absorption level. That is the main objective of this efficiency program, to move non-productive costs into productive costs and also to cut down on non-productive costs and also to make our organization leaner, more efficient, and also more resilient for the future by reducing both horizontal and vertical administrative units.

So we have, for instance, then reduced the number of regions in our sales area from four to two, and we have removed a number of middle management roles. We have a new management team that then also includes group executives with the operational roles, including our group commercial director, our group HR director, and myself. We have also analyzed our cost structure across all functional areas to identify opportunities to reduce costs. However, it's important to note that we keep investing in an aftermarket structure, because we should capture the growth opportunities at the same time as we efficiency and productivity in our aftermarket organization, in general. So that's the target of this.

What we expect from this program is that we expect to save annually SEK 60 million starting from Q2 2023. This does not come free of charge, so we recognize one-off restructuring cost then in Q4 2023 SEK 23 million. So this is what we're doing to create a more efficient and more resilient business for this year, but also for the future. We need to become more productive and more efficient. So if we move to Kazakhstan, obviously the market is supported by the growth role of Kazakhstan as a regional hub. There's still strong commodity prices and big infrastructure projects going on. However, despite the economy growing and government investing, the market for construction equipment actually declined by 20% in Q4.

Our own sales machines in units decreased by 35%, whereas, you know, used equipment grew by 100%. You can see that the numbers are not that high. Stock levels, again, as in Germany, are high, working hard to normalize that in the first half of 2024. Also impairments of slow-moving stock in of SEK 2 million, gross margin decreased to 8.9%, and gross profit to SEK 5 million. Our contracting services team continued to explore potential work in Kazakhstan, and that's very, very important for us. We want to introduce the concept of articulated haulers, not only for ourselves in our own contracting services program, but also to the market. We were successful in that in another big market.

We haven't really come there yet in Kazakhstan to get traction on the articulated hauler market, which is, of course, a sweet spot for Volvo units. Okay, next slide. So U.S. network. As you can see, this is a map of our footprint in the U.S. now, starting from November 30 last year. As we said, Rudd is one of the largest distributors of Volvo CE, as well as other brands and strong brands, Hitachi, Sandvik, and Link-Belt Cranes. We have a sales area of all or parts of nine states in the Midwest, actually, Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Western Pennsylvania, Eastern Missouri, Southern Illinois, and then several counties in Tennessee and Maryland.

And obviously, the United States is the world's second-largest market for construction equipment, with substantive infrastructure investment programs, as we know. In 2022, the market for Volvo Construction Equipment products for GPE, which is general purpose equipment, which are the bigger machines, not everything that Volvo produces. But in that area, it was around 4,000 machines. It was higher in 2023. In general, we see this. We have had a good start. We have a good feeling for the company, for the organization.

The match of cultures and the match of what we want to achieve is very, very positive, and we have a vision that we share, and we're very much looking forward to developing this together with the team in the United States. The Rudd has a long, long history and solid customer base and very, very strong brand name and good customer relations, and we can build together a stronger and bigger company in the area. So we're very start on cooperation in the U.S. For Germany, the network looks like this. We have now 22 outlets in Germany. We have invested a lot. We have built a network that we feel is adequate for our purposes. We need to increase market shares.

We can sell more in the aftermarket in this network. We can, and we will become profitable. We will become more efficient. And now it's time to optimize, become more efficient and productive in this network that we have built. And that is the main task and obviously the target for the program we're putting in place, but not only that, but in general. So we have now a well-structured network that fills its purpose and a good base in Germany. Kazakhstan, this is the network that we have. And Kazakhstan is a potential, obviously, a market that has a lot of potential to grow, where our premium segment is a smaller part of the segment.

We need to be able to convince customers to buy premium, to take a longer look at their investment horizons when making investments into their equipment fleet. We are starting to get traction, and we feel that we're on the right track in Kazakhstan. We're also looking forward in Kazakhstan.

... So by that, I'm handing over to again, Erik, for economic development and some more numbers.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Thank you, Lars. Starting as we usually do, a bit of a macroeconomic overview, adding the United States to this chart. 2.5% GDP growth in 2023, expected to slow down a bit by the IMF, in 2024. So coming down 1.1 percentage point to 1.4% growth. PCE inflation is coming down, but as you may have seen on the last release, not as quickly as many market participants expected. So far, the funds rate remains high, and I think the consensus is moving to rate cuts coming now after May sometime. In a weaker economy, clearly negative territory in Q4, -0.4.

For the year as a whole, also negative 0.3. Some improvement expected in 2024, goes against some of the indicators that we're seeing at this point, but maybe, maybe rate comes down, it will give some, some, further fuel to the economy. Inflation rate was high through 2023, has come down in the beginning of this year, but again, they're a bit more resilient maybe than was initially anticipated. In Kazakhstan, strong economic growth, it is driven partly by its role as a hub in the region, commodity prices, also important drivers. Slightly lower, but still strong growth, 4.2 expected in 2024.

Inflation rates high, but expected to slowly drop, and then also to see rates come lower over time. With that, we move to the next slide and look at the income statement overview. So revenue up 30%, again, including Rudd, and of that revenue, 61% was Germany, 34% U.S., and 6% Kazakhstan. Of course, that was 1 month of U.S., so if one would take that as an indicator for 3 months, then the U.S. contribution would rather be 60%. The revenue mix is more or less what we typically see, 70% equipment, 27% aftermarket. That's the part that we want to see grow, of course, and then 4% other, most of which is rental business.

Gross profit up, along with gross margin, much driven by, again, the contribution of one month of Rudd in the U.S. If we look at Kazakhstan and Germany, we see lower gross margins, and that is, again, partly driven by the provisions or impairments that we did in those markets. Again, SEK 11 million in Germany in the quarter, and SEK 2 million in Kazakhstan. SG&A up significantly is 73%, but that is again driven by the inclusion of the U.S. business. And of course, the restructuring costs that Lars mentioned that we take as an investment really in the efficiency enhancement that we are planning and implementing in Germany to improve its resilience and economic performance going forward.

As a percent of revenue, SG&A sit at 21.5%, so also they're higher for, of course, the same reasons as mentioned above. Operating margin decreased, the operating profit at -SEK 62 million, or adjusted them to SEK 15 million, if we exclude the one-off costs related to restructuring and impairments and acquisitions in the quarter. Next slide, really just an overview. It comes from the Q4 report. So you can see there the contribution from the U.S. versus the negative result in Germany in quarter, and then the group costs. So as in this slide, Rudd covers the group well, and also part of the negative results.

But of course, in the future, we look forward to see these other segments contributing to the bottom line for the group. I move onwards to the balance sheet, a meaningful increase, of course, if we're looking quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year as well. Last year, we just, as you may recall, sold the Russian business on the 23rd of December, so just before the new year and 31st of December balance sheet. This year, we add Rudd a little bit less than a year later than that, on the 30th of November. So that sort of is consolidated on the balance sheet at the 31st of December of 2023.

So that explains, of course, a lot of the differences quarter-over-quarter and compared to year-end. PP&E includes a meaningful rental fleet in the U.S., so that would explain part of the increase there. If we look at the segments in terms of working capital in Kazakhstan, we see a small increase in percentage terms. It is actually a small decrease in actual monetary terms, but we had lower revenue in the quarter. So when we look on a percentage of revenue basis, it is a small increase. In Germany, we had an increase from 22%-26%.

As Lars mentioned, there is a revenue there as well, but also a result of long lead times, supply constraints after the pandemic, and trucks coming in while the market turned lower. In the U.S, net working capital stayed at 17% of revenue. Net debt stood at SEK 1.3 billion, mainly driven by the acquisition in the U.S. If we look at other balance sheet metrics, equity to assets decreased from 62%-34%, quarter-on-quarter. I mentioned the net asset value or equity of SEK 1.6 billion. For the group, with that, I move on to the next slide to show the change in the net debt.

So you can see here that it's much driven by the acquisition US. There's also a factor of the net debt that we acquire in the transaction, so that Rudd carried at the time it became Ferronordic US. And then a contribution also from net working capital, and that mainly being Germany in this quarter. If we look at the NAV of the group, so the total equity, we can see that that has come down slightly as a result of the losses that we had in the quarter and the FX effects. And looking at the balance sheet, you will see that the bulk of the assets sit in inventory and in PPE, property, plant, and equipment.

And again, mind you, that includes rental fleet, but of course, also property as workshops, the network that we've built, and then to some extent, receivables and cash and equivalents versus the liabilities that we carry. And with that, I want to hand back to Lars again for a roundup and the outlook.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Yes, thank you. So after a challenging and transformative 2023, we look forward with confidence to a restart in 2024. We are very optimistic about our expansion in the U.S. and the opportunities there. U.S. is the world's second-largest market for construction equipment, and we see that demand is supported by a dynamic economy and extensive support programs for infrastructure investment. The German economy looks weak, and the truck market is expected to decrease in 2024. We have taken steps, as we talked about, to adapt our organization and cost structure to a weaker market. We believe in continued strong demand in the aftermarket business, and we're confident that we will emerge stronger from current challenges and remain optimistic about the long-term potential in Germany.

Also, our operations in Kazakhstan, they continue to develop, even if they will be an even smaller part of the group's total operations in the future. So by that, I hand over to for questions and answers, please.

Operator

If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Adrian Gilani from ABG Sundal Collier. Please go ahead.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

The operator-

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Yeah, hi.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Is there?

Operator

Yes, hello. Are you able to hear me? Lars and Erik, are you there?

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Sorry, operator, we cannot hear you.

Operator

Hello? Can you hear me now? Can you hear me, Lars? Hello?... Adrian, can you hear me?

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

I can hear you. Who is this?

Operator

Okay. This is the operator.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay, perfect. I heard everything on the instruction.

Operator

You heard Lars also.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Yeah, and I hear, and not now, but I heard them before.

Operator

Okay. Yes, give me one second.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

[Foreign language]

Operator

The next question comes from Adrian Gilani from ABG Sundal Collier. Please go ahead.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay. Is my line open now?

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Yeah, yes. We hear you now, Adrian.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Perfect. Okay, a few questions here from my end. I want to start off on Rudd. It's the first time we see a gross profit figure for Rudd, and granted, it's only for one month, but it's-

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

[Crosstalk]

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay. It's only for one month, but 27%, that's a lot higher than your other segments. Can you just tell us if there's anything exceptional in the product mix or anything else that has boosted this figure, or is this a normal figure for Rudd?

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

I think, Adrian, what we can say there, I mean, they had a very strong December. That's visible. I think if you look at the annual numbers that we showed. So there is probably fair to say that it was product realization and product mix that contributed again to December being strong. And if maybe you wanna make sort of, you know, forecast, you should look probably more at the longer period. So take the year into effect, and also maybe use those indications that we provided in the press release.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay. So is it fair to say that the difference between the December EBIT margin and the full year EBIT margin is almost entirely that, you know, a very strong December? It's driven by the gross profit, so to say.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

I would say yes. I mean, if the full year is probably more indicative of normal business, so to say.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay, perfect. And then also you mentioned the main increase in unit sales in the U.S. came from articulated haulers and crawler excavators. So it seems more sort of mining tilted, not, not so much mentioned about the big infrastructure programs in the U.S. Can you give some sort of a timeline when the money from those federal infrastructure programs is actually expected to reach the market and drive demand concretely?

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

To be honest, the articulated haulers and wheel loaders are needed to build roads and infrastructure as well. So,

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay. Okay, that's, that's fair. Okay, in that, in that case, is it more?

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

With regards to those infrastructure programs, it's not, how do we say, discrete big programs. There is a lot of support programs that subsidizes and, I mean, supports basically infrastructure projects. So not easily to point to incremental when things will, so to say, hit the market. That will be a process in, you know, the upcoming years.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay, I understand. And then a broader question on Rudd, just to understand the whole rental conversion model a bit better. Is there some sort of rule of thumb you can give us for how long customers typically rent a machine before buying it out? And do they almost always end up buying it, or will one machine typically be rented out to several customers before someone eventually buys it?

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

It's a mix, Adrian. I mean, a machine can be rented for a couple of months. It can be rented for a longer period of time, but usually it would be between... I mean, this is very, very average, a year, maybe a year and a half. Not always is it bought out within from the same customers, it can also be taken back and sold to another customer. It can be taken back and put into rental for another customer. So it's, but it's very, I should say, way of going to market, but that's how it works. When we call rental conversion, it means then that the customer who actually rented the machine in the first place, he bought it.

Otherwise, it would go back to Rudd in this case, and be sold as a used machine.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Okay?

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Yeah. And then on Germany, regarding the cost saving program, will you go from essentially zero to EUR 60 million run rate, you know, between Q1 and Q2? Or are we going to see some partial savings in Q1 as well, and if so, can you quantify those roughly?

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Adrian, I think when you implement these programs, there are a number of initiatives that there are changes to organization. It doesn't happen overnight, but at one point. So we'd say that, you know, from second quarter to some point towards, I think, the end of the second quarter, this would be fully implemented. But, you know, if anything, thinking as an analyst, I would probably take a straight line, yeah, from 0 to 60 over that period. Does that make sense? Yeah, I mean, that's the best estimate I think you can use. It will be a gradual process over this period.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Yeah. Yeah, that's very clear. Thank you. And then a final one from my end. Before you've talked about, you know, there perhaps being more workshop additions and building out the network in Germany, but now focus seems to be more on cost control. So presumably, this means that we won't be seeing any new workshops pop up in Germany for a while. Is that fair?

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Okay. Again, Adrian, I mean, currently, we need to optimize what we have, and make sure that we make money in the network that we do have. But I don't exclude changes within the network, I don't exclude additions coming forward, but right now, we are making efficiency programs with what we do have in all respects. So, yes, that's our main target is to we need to turn Germany around quickly, and that's what we're focusing on.

Adrian Gilani
Equity Research Analyst, ABG Sundal Collier

Okay, perfect. In that case, that was all for me, so thank you for taking my questions.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Thank you.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Thank you, Adrian.

Operator

The next question comes from Anders Åkerblom, from Nordea. Please go ahead.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Hi, good morning. It's Anders here from Nordea. Thanks for the presentation, and it's nice to see such a solid performance in the U.S. here. So I was wondering, firstly, if you could just holistically talk a bit about what you're seeing so far in the year here in the U.S. It will be interesting to get some flavor on how the market is trending currently and what you've seen, you know, so far.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Well, I think we're typically cautious on giving guidance. We would provide that, you know, outlook statement for you. I think what we can say in general is pointing towards what we expect in the U.S. economy. It is typically a good indicator of the market activity. And we say that there is expected to be a slowdown in the market to some extent. But on the other hand, there is a balancing factor I think that the market has been somewhat supply constrained. And that is sort of rectifying.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Mm.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

I think that's the balance of those two effects that we're looking at when we look into 2024.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Sounds fair. But in terms of like the mix here, I understand that we shouldn't extrapolate Q4. But I mean, could you give us a bit of a direction in terms of the aftermarket here, both in the U.S. and maybe also Germany, and what do you expect for 2024?

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

... No, I don't think we can, I mean, give estimates for aftermarket. I think, I mean, looking at the revenues that we have in last quarter, what we typically say is the aftermarket is more stable. We're looking to grow the aftermarket in all our markets, that's clear. The equipment sales part of the business is more, it's more exposed to external conditions. The growth of the economy, commodity prices to some extent, infrastructure projects that were mentioned to customers, how do they choose? And that will make the aftermarket, which again, is more stable and, hopefully in as we're aiming more strategically growing, that's more stable.

But the percentage, the mix of aftermarket will vary, as the equipment sales part of the revenue stream is a bit more variable, and variable economy.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Yeah. But what we could add there, and it's clearly is that what we see in Germany, considering that we do expect the truck market to go down, and we hope then that we will see our aftermarket continuing to develop, the share of the aftermarket in our total revenue will hopefully go up. That is what's happening in a declining market, and that is a healthy mix of revenues, obviously, from a gross margin point of view.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Right.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

So that's why we are so focused on the aftermarket. We've always been there. We should also say that in the U.S., the penetration in the aftermarket that has historically been good. Customers are being taken care about and are loyal in the aftermarket, and that's a very, very good base to stand on for the future. And obviously, we see opportunities to take market shares in the U.S. further on machines. And when you have a strong base in the service footprint, so to speak, that is a good base for growing both top but also bottom line.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Right. That's very clear. Thank you both for an elaborate answer. I just have, like, a final question on your working capital here. You mentioned that you see improving working capital now in H1. I mean, do you expect this mainly from phasing out inventory? And I mean, I understand that you can't give an exact number in any sense, but like, in terms of pricing, what do you kind of see here trying to phase out this inventory? Is it difficult to kinda maintain your historic pricing level or yeah?

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Well, clearly, in a declining market, pricing becomes an issue, clearly. We should, however, remember that margins in the truck market are quite thin to start with. So, it shouldn't have too much effect, we believe, on the total. Again, the more important thing for our profitability is how we can handle the growth and efficiency and productivity in the aftermarket. And that's the key really.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Right

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

... to the bottom line. So, we want to release capital, and we want those trucks that are now in inventory to get out in the market and go into our workshops. So, it's a mixed bag really, but that's what we're trying to achieve.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Yeah. Maybe just to add to that also, I mean, we mentioned that we've had these supply effects, long lead terms, so this address is also a bit of a balancing. Just we've had strong supplies coming in to us, and so the market that has been fading somewhat on the sales side. And that now rebalances in the first half when we will put more of that inventory that we have out in the market than we have supplies incoming.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Right. Right. That's, that's very clear. Okay, thank you both. That's all from my end.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

Thank you.

Anders Åkerblom
Equity Research Analyst, Nordea

Thank you.

Operator

There are no more telephone questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.

Erik Danemar
CFO and Head of Investor Relations, Ferronordic

Thank you very much. We had one question on email coming in with regards to net debt in the U.S., and how that changes over time. And I guess what I could say there is that it's largely driven by working capital, of course. And there is a certain time when inventory is on supplier payables for us, receivables for them. And then after that, it typically goes over to either VFS or other financial institutions, and then becomes debt. And the time when it sort of moves from one to the other impacts the net debt situation. So that's just explaining the mechanics of that.

Lars Corneliusson
CEO and President, Ferronordic

All right. So if no further questions, thank you for calling into this presentation for Q4 2023. We again look forward to a 2024 with confidence, and looking forward to speaking to you again in the quarter. Thank you very much, everybody, and bye-bye.

Powered by