Ladies and gentlemen, this is Faisal Arab, and I would like to welcome you all to SABIC's earnings call for the first quarter of 2023. Now, please allow me to hand over the call to Mr. Khalid Bin Salma, Director of Institutional Shareholder Relations and acting Global Investor Relations Officer of SABIC. To you, Khalid. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Faisal. Good afternoon, thank you for joining us today. I am Khalid Binsalamah , Executive Director . Today's call will be led by our CEO, Engineer Abdulrahman Al-Fageeh, and our VP, Governance and Global Controllership, Mr. Jens Lohmann. I hope you are all well. Before we begin, just a typical note that we would appreciate if you could keep the questions to SABIC only. As usual, we will be more than happy to facilitate any clarifications with other SABIC-listed affiliates. I would like you to note that any statements made during this call relating to matters that are not historically facts may be forward-looking statements. These statements are based upon assumptions of management, which are believed to be reasonable at the time made and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties. The actual results could differ materially from those forward-looking statements.
Please refer to the statements in the presentation slides and our financial reports, which are available at sabic.com. With that, I will now hand over the call to our CEO.
Thank you, Khalid. Ladies and gentlemen, good day to all of you. I hope that you and your families are keeping healthy and safe. We want to start, as usual, with sharing a few highlights for the first quarter of 2023 with you. With the revenues of $10.6 billion, we have generated an EBITDA of $1.4 billion and reported a net income of $2 billion in the first three months of this year. We are closely monitoring the changes and the recovery of the global market demand. New capacities in the first quarter of this year are adding more pressure on global prices, while there is limited relief on the variable cost.
We continue to keep our operating cost under control and maintain our strong balance sheet. Despite current market uncertainties, the determination to deliver on our growth, innovation, and sustainability remains intact. SABIC's long-term credit rating of A.1 or A+ was affirmed in March and April with a positive or stable outlook. Our commitment to innovation and sustainability was demonstrated this quarter through winning three gold and two bronze awards in the prestigious Edison Awards. This is the third consecutive year being recognized, signifying our consistent leadership in new technology development and innovation that supports our continued business growth and a more sustainable planet. To move to the next slide. We are guided by our ambition to become the preferred world leader in chemicals and determined to create value to people on our planet and also our shareholders.
Our priorities in this year, 2023, can be summarized in the four themes. First, we will look to maximize the value creation for our corporate programs, which is focused on assets performance, working capital optimization, digitalization, and cost control. We will also strengthen SABIC strategic relationship with our major shareholders, Saudi Aramco, further looking into streams of integrations and cooperations. Second, we are determined to explore, develop, and execute growth options in an effective, affordable, and sustainable way, both globally and in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. We will do it by establishing a strategic partnership that enable us to achieve better performance in managing risk. SABIC is fully supporting the Saudi Vision 2030, which lays emphasis on creating economic resilience and further diversify and grow the industrial fabric in Saudi Arabia.
We will position naturally as a chemical champion, and we will aim to be a key enabler to the Saudi transformation. In the first quarter, SABIC signed a framework agreement with Shareek Program to manufacture the catalysts with the aim of transforming Saudi Arabia into manufacturing hub for specialized material in the line of the National Industrial Strategy. Third, none of the above can be achieved without fostering a company culture of belonging, a culture of performance, and an organization that is ready in terms of capabilities and capacity, with highly skilled, energized, and engaged employees. Finally, yet importantly, carbon neutrality, circular economy, and ESG are integral to our strategy and will continue to be the focus. We will continue to deliver on our set targets to pursue responsible and profitable growth for the long term. Next slide, please.
SABIC is committed to continue leadership and innovation as a driving force to our growth and our sustainable solutions for our customers and business partners. This commitment has been recognized with five prestigious Edison Awards in 2023 in three different categories, reflecting SABIC diverse range of innovative solutions, food and agriculture, material science, and sustainability. The awards honor excellence in new product and service development, marketing, design, innovation, and determination of addressing the world's biggest challenges. We were also recognized with the second most innovative company in Saudi Arabia by Forbes Middle East and North Africa and the Research, Development and Innovation Authority, RDIA, based on innovation, sustainability, and ESG performance criteria.
Another key milestone in our carbon neutrality journey has been the successful commercial shipment of independently certified low-carbon ammonia, or what they call it, low ammonia, from Saudi Arabia to Japan, in addition to the one that we have supplied to Korea last year. Today also we announced the third one that has been delivered to our customers in India. In addition, in March, we announced an agreement to assess the RotoDynamic Reactor, which is RDR technology to support the decarbonization of ethylene production. This new collaboration is one of SABIC's many active programs aimed at reducing and ultimately eliminating the carbon dioxide emissions from the manufacturing facilities, as well as supporting customers on their energy transition journeys.
Also in March, SABIC joined the Value Balancing Alliance, VBA, a non-profitable organization which counts more than 25 international companies across the multiple industries and sectors as members. We are collaborating with the VBA and its members to advance methodologies for measuring the value that companies provide to society, the economy, and the environment. With that, thank you for listening, and I'll hand it over to Jens to shed light on our financial performance. Jens, please.
Thank you for the introduction, Mr. Al-Fageeh, and a warm welcome to our Q1 earnings call also from my side. My name is Jens Lohmann. I'm the Global Controller at SABIC and happy to introduce our latest financial metrics to you. As you can see by this slide, most of our Q1 financial KPIs moderately improved compared to the last quarter of 2022 in many aspects, in spite of headwinds from the market. Let us start with our top line. Compared to prior quarter, sales actually decreased by approximately 8% or roughly $900 million to $10.6 billion. 60% of the quarter-over-quarter decline in revenues is due to volume effects, mainly driven by lower production levels.
In addition, our Agri-Nutrients business was exposed to lower selling prices quarter-over-quarter, accounting for approximately 32% of the decline in revenues overall against fourth quarter last year. Hence, you will notice later on in this presentation that you will notice lower earnings in the Agri-Nutrients segment being more than offset by increased profitability in Petchem, which demonstrates a robustly hedged product portfolio at SABIC. Within our gross margin, the quarter-over-quarter decline in revenues of $900 million was compensated by lower feedstock and utility cost of $670 million, largely driven by the lower volume. We also recorded a decrease in manufacturing fixed cost by $220 million.
This upside was driven by lower depreciation, amortization, impairment and restructuring charges, as well as lower P&L effective maintenance costs compared to the prior quarter. Spent discipline was also demonstrated in the functional costs, which were SAR 210 million lower compared to the last quarter. All of these factors contributed to a positive recent trend in EBIT and EBITDA, as shown on the chart, despite headwinds in top line and underpin SABIC's operational and financial resilience.
As you can see on the chart, the first quarter EBITDA of $1.4 billion was 10% higher than in Q4 2022, and accordingly, SABIC's EBITDA margin actually improved from 11% in Q4 2022 to 13% this past quarter. If we excluded the dilutive margins on the revenues from the Saudi Aramco products, our EBITDA margins would have been slightly higher by 0.5% in both quarters. The share of the net income attributable to SABIC shareholders of $180 million in this quarter was 120% higher than in the prior quarter, which is very much in line with the average analyst consensus. Let me briefly walk you through the prior year comparison.
The comparison to Q1 2022 is characterized by significant margin effect of drop in selling prices across all regions and businesses. As reflected on the chart, revenues decreased by 25% year-over-year, down by $3.5 percent billion US dollars against Q1 2022. EBITDA in Q1 2023 was 60% lower compared to the same quarter in the prior year. A few words on SABIC's working capital, CapEx and cash flows. In Q1, we recorded a reduction of inventory in the first quarter by over $760 million US dollars, which is very good news. 80% of the depletion of inventory stems from finished goods as a consequence of adjusted capacity utilization, mainly in Europe and in the Americas, and major turnarounds in KSA.
These turnarounds also contributed to a relatively high CapEx spend of $830 million in Q1. SABIC was able to generate free cash flows of $1 billion in the first three months of the year, which translates to an increase of our net cash position of $700 million. In essence, despite a challenging economic environment, SABIC was able to solidify its net cash position with $4.5 billion, which is absolutely unique in our industry. As you will know, most of our industry peers are in a net debt position. In our opinion, this testifies expanded financial room to maneuver and for our growth projects in the areas of Liquids to Chemicals and catalysts as recently announced.
Consequently, our long-term credit rating of A.1 and A+ was affirmed in March and April by all rating agencies for the positive stable outlook. Moving on to slide number 7. This slide illustrates the demand trends we're seeing in key end industries for SABIC. Let's focus on the right-hand side of the chart. In the first column on the graph, you can see that demand in Q1 year-over-year improved slightly in packaging, transportation, automotive and healthcare, while it was flat in the remaining sectors, those are the gray dots, and clearly softening in Agri-Nutrients. On a quarter-over-quarter basis, which is the second column, we observed moderate improvements across end industries. As a trend, we're expecting low momentum in activity and sentiment in Q2, 2023, with low single-digit increase across key industries, basically a flat trajectory in demand.
Moving on to the next slide and our Petrochemicals segment. The EBITDA in our Petrochemicals and Specialties business in Q1 2023 has improved by over 90%, reaching $1.06 billion. That translates to a $500 million improvement versus last quarter. Over two-thirds of the quarter-over-quarter increase in EBITDA is attributable to polymers and one-third roughly to chemicals. This recent development in earnings was largely driven by lower volume-driven variable costs. As mentioned before, our sales volume decreased. Lower fixed cash costs, lower utility prices, and an improvement in spreads, in particular in MEG and PE. These positive impacts were partially offset by higher feedstock prices versus prior quarter, which increased by 2% on average for propane, butane, as well as naphtha.
The Q1 EBITDA margin of Petchem was at 11%, higher than the 6% EBITDA margin achieved in the previous quarter. Selling prices showed robustness in the Petchem business, mainly due to restocking activities in the market and anticipated demand from China. As indicated before, in some of our Petchem manufacturing facilities in KSA, turnaround activities have been running in the first quarter. We also responded to softer demand by curtailing output and hence lower capacity utilization, for instance, in Europe and in the Americas. The look back compared to the same quarter in the last year, Petchem and Specialties EBITDA declined by 59%, translating to SAR 2.5 billion, almost entirely due to lower selling prices across the Petchem portfolio, which you will see on the next slide.
This picture illustrates the movement in market reference prices in our key petrochemicals products in key regions quarter-over-quarter, this is in orange, and year-over-year in blue. The visual graphs alone implies recovery in markets across products and regions after the economic slowdown with high inflation and elevated interest rates, which we observed in the second half of last year, and which will dominate the economics also going forward. As you can see on the chart, the obvious year-on-year price collapse in blue has turned into a sequential quarter-on-quarter upturn. On the quarterly comparison, MEG prices increased by 10% due to higher demand fueled by China's economic recovery. Buyers entered into the market to replenish their inventories after the holiday season in anticipation of a short supply, potential short supply.
The rest of Asia and the MEA region also supported the MEG growth in Q1. methanol prices that indicate early signs of recovery as well. We observed solid demand from downstream industries. Selling price in MTBE increased moderately in the first quarter compared to the previous quarter. PE and PP prices also showed slight increases in the first quarter. Buying sentiment grew following the consumption of inventories built before the Lunar New Year holiday. However, we saw a slow recovery of PE demand in China than actually expected. Due to a favorable product mix between commodities and compounds, SABIC withstood downward pressure on polycarbonate market prices in the first quarter, driven by large imports from China to Europe and to North America. Moving on to slide number 10.
Now this slide reflects the integrated spreads of Petchem benchmark prices over primary stock cost, feedstock costs for our key products in key regions, explaining short-term market dynamics. In the first quarter, spreads of PE and PP remained almost flat, with the exception of the Americas. Product margins in China show slight improvements after reopening. However, as said, demand recovery turned out to be slower than expected. MEG spreads in China also advanced sequentially, quarter-over-quarter, but still remained negative due to overcapacities and large inventory levels. The trend in methanol spreads in Europe is still negative, but losing momentum due to the sharp decline in methane feedstock costs by 51% in this quarter. Moving on to slide 11, and referring to our Agri-Nutrients business.
In our Agri-Nutrients segment in Q1, EBITDA was at $300 million, which was 54% lower than in prior quarter, primarily due to lower average selling prices, softer demand and lower production output. The unique market conditions since end of 2021 still support strong Agri-Nutrients earnings. Average selling prices, however, decreased 28% quarter-over-quarter with seasonal effects, an oversupplied market and stagnant demand. Urea prices, for instance, account for more than 30% decrease in prices. Sales volumes also decreased in Agri-Nutrients by 21%, largely due to planned turnarounds in the kingdom. On a year-over-year basis, the Q1 EBITDA was lower by 61% compared to the same quarter in the previous year, clearly driven as well by lower average selling prices as indicated in the chart.
We're really talking about a completely different economic environment in Q1 versus Q1 last year. On April 10, 2023, SABIC Agri-Nutrients has successfully completed procedures to acquire 49% shareholding in ETG Inputs Holdco Limited. Short version is the EIHL. The financial impact of this transaction will be reflected during the second quarter of 2023. You will see that in 2023 Q2 financial statements. The acquisition of EIHL is part of SABIC Agri-Nutrients strategy to integrate the value chain and include the blending and distribution of Agri-Nutrients in the global markets, moving closer to farmers and end customers. SABIC will be benefiting from EIHL's presence across Africa, for instance. Moving on to slide number 12, our metals business, Hadeed.
Hadeed reported an EBITDA of $31 million in Q1, which translate to a minus of 50%, and this was due to lower margins on the back of a decline of average selling prices, combined with higher variable cost and partially offset by lower manufacturing costs. It's a typical margin squeeze situation for Hadeed. Compared to Q1 2022, EBITDA was down by 75%, driven by volume and price effects equally. Also here, lower manufacturing costs could not fully compensate for the declined selling prices. With that, I will hand back over to our CEO, Mr. Al-Fageeh.
Thank you very much, Jens. Going to slide 13. Okay. SABIC expects an average of global GDP growth rate of 2.1% for 2023. In the current macroeconomic environment characterized by high uncertainties, our focus was on safe and reliable and integral operations to serve our customers and business partners. Definitely, that will remains. We continue to put emphasis on financial resilience, efficient operational performance and a strong balance sheet. We also expect margins to be continuously under pressure in the second quarter. For the second half of the year, we are carefully optimistic to see a slight but gradual recovery in demand. Thank you very much. I'm back now to Faisal for arranging the Q&A.
Thank you, Engineer Al-Fageeh. Dear audience, if any of you would like to ask a question, you can simply use the raise hand feature available to you on the control screen. Please make sure to click the lower hand button once you have asked your question. You can also share your question in writing to our Q&A panelist.
First question from Prateek, HSBC. Prateek, go ahead please.
Yeah, thanks. Thanks for taking my question. I have 2. The first one is that SABIC has a global presence, right? You have plants in Saudi, China, Europe, and U.S. Could you give us profitability margins for SABIC on a regional basis? How well those assets are doing on a regional basis, and which regions are problematic and dragging down the profitability? That's number one question. The number two question is on your expected synergies from the Aramco deal for the rest of 2023. Thanks.
You can mention, yes.
In terms of profitability in the regions, the profitability in the regions follow the overall economic dynamics in the regions. Certainly, in the Americas and in Europe, as margins are under pressure, also our business is under pressure. We respond to that with transformation projects that are running in the Americas and in Europe for quite some time. In Europe, we started with that long before our peers did. As we are running integrated businesses between KSA and Europe and the Americas, there is no real simple regional performance. But we certainly are observing and monitoring the profitability of our assets in Europe and are now taking respective actions.
We are aware of a margin squeeze in those regions and correspondingly are monitoring the cost situation in particular.
For the expected synergies with Aramco, let me just shed light here on some of what we are doing with our major shareholders, Saudi Aramco. Actually, there is so many dimensions that we work together since the transaction took place through our collaboration and integration committee. The target that has been set is between SAR 1.3 billion-SAR 1.5 billion. Sorry, SAR 1.5 billion-SAR 1.8 billion. On the SABIC side, that has to be achieved from the synergies with Aramco. I can tell you that we are moving very well. Actually, we are exceeding the targets for the last year. Also, we are exceeding the target for this quarter.
We remain that we are going to achieve the target of the 1.5-1.8.
Next question is from Sashank Lanka from Bank of America. Sashank, please go ahead.
Thank you for the presentation. I have three questions if that is fine. The 1st one is, looking at your Petchem and specialty business, your EBITDA did go up quarter-on-quarter. Margins also were quite strong. Just wondering, I know you spoke about lower fixed cash costs, utility costs, can you just give us some more color on how we should look at margins in this segment, especially going into the rest of the year? Could we expect an improvement there? That's the 1st question.
The second question is going back to the synergies point, I wanted to know if there's any specific, you know, segmentation within the synergies where you think there's still value to be realized and something that you can work on in the coming months. The third question is the low carbon emissions ammonia. Was just wondering, you know, how is this different from blue ammonia? Because you haven't explicitly stated blue ammonia here. Given a lot of companies in the region, especially, SABIC is at the forefront of shipping this, any guidance on CapEx and how we should be thinking about returns for these blue ammonia projects will be very helpful. Thank you.
Very good. Yeah. Thank you for the questions, Sashank. I will pick up the first question. In terms of the Petchem EBITDA, the signals that we receive from the markets are very diverse in trends. Depending on the product, depending on the regions, you will get very different answers and projections. Overall, in Q2, we expect not a very visible as upward trajectory. Q2 will be very stable, most probably. For the second half of the year, we're very carefully optimistic, but it's a very fragile growth trajectory that we may see. The uncertainty, as Mr. Al-Fageeh highlighted, will remain in the markets, so it's really hard to predict any major upsides for the second half of the year.
If I take the second and the third, thank you, Shashank, for the question in the synergies. As I have said, I mean, the result is more than what we have anticipated in the beginning. I can tell you that the synergies with the Aramco sites, I think that can perform better. I think we are expecting that we'll have more from the synergies with the refineries that Aramco has owned, whether here in the kingdom or outside the kingdom. Some of them are medium to long term, and this is what we are studying at this point of time.
I can tell you that there is a huge opportunity in that synergies. As the low-carbon emission ammonia, and I think this is the same, it is the blue ammonia that has been announced earlier. We are expecting that this shipments of this low-carbon emission ammonia is going to open up the market in the fuel and in the mixed-fuel strategies that those countries are adapting to and will definitely enhance also our ability to produce more of those in the future.
Next question from Alex Kramer from JP Morgan. Alex, please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Can you hear me?
Yes, we hear you very well.
Thank you. I had a couple of questions. First of all, just if we go to the Agri-Nutrients, you've got volumes down 21% and prices down 28%, and yet your sales only at 35%. As far as I could some mismatch there. Got me on that. Also follow up.
Alex, one second, please. The sound, it's not very clear. Can you repeat the question, please?
If I look at the volume and price effects in the agrochemicals business, Volumes are down 21%, price is down 28%, but overall sales, I think we're only down 35% quarter-on-quarter. I'm just wondering what the difference is there or what I'm missing there. My second question is, we're seeing some capacity come on stream from previous plants shut down in the U.S. for instance, and elsewhere. I'm just wondering whether you're seeing any particular pressure on any product. I'm thinking perhaps in polypropylene. My third question is, were you EBITDA positive in the quarter in your European business? With regard to Europe, where do you stand on bringing the Wilton cracker back into service?
I will take the first question. Thank you, Alex. In terms of the Agri-Nutrients sales in Q1, yeah, It was a mix of these two effects, volume and price. As mentioned before, price, the average selling prices went down by roughly 28%. Plus, we had a volume decrease. You can say that, out of the, let's say, roughly $500 million of revenue decrease in Agri-Nutrients, $200 million were attributable to volumes, $300 million roughly were attributable to the price effects. That is the, that's the Agri-Nutrients', basically the narrative for the top line Agri-Nutrients in the Q1.
For the Stan.
Excuse me. When it comes to the EBITDA, I'm picking up the third question. When it comes to EBITDA in Europe, the EBITDA in Europe was under pressure in Q1. It was not positive, we are on a more positive trajectory going forward, hopefully with the restructuring measures that we have initiated. At the moment, Europe is for certain an area to observe for us.
For the cracker in Wilton, hopefully we are going to bring this before the end of the year. The most importantly is, when we bring back, I mean, the operations in Wilton to make sure that it's also hitting our objective in the decarbonization and making sure that the new technologies and the new also feedstock that we are adapting as a gas for the cracker, is to make sure that it does meet our requirements and our standards and the sustainability and our EHSS targets. I think Alex, you still have a question on the polypropylene? Yeah.
The good things about the polypropylene business, I mean, there is an, despite the capacity that comes on the stream, the good thing in the polypropylene application that it can goes to so many segments. The other good things in SABIC, I think the percentage of the differentiated and higher added value of our polypropylene segment is the highest among our polyolefins. I think that would help SABIC and would help us to improve our profitability in the future.
Next question we have from Faisal AlAzmeh from Goldman Sachs. Faisal, please go ahead.
Maybe 2 questions on my end. At the Analyst Day last year, you mentioned some long-term growth plans. I wanted to check whether it would be possible now to share kind of some long-term targets in terms of where you see SABIC's production can go up to. Are we looking at high double-digit figures? Is it potentially that it can double over time? Maybe if you can give us just some guidance towards where you expect SABIC to be in 10 years' time, and what kind of overall CapEx should we think about to get to those production numbers? That's my 1st question. My 2nd question is more near term.
What is the level of CapEx that you expect for this year in terms of for the overall business, particularly on the maintenance CapEx side? Thirdly, Quick one in terms of the fertilizer business. When we look at volumes, they were down Q-on-Q in Q1. Have trends reversed this quarter? Are you seeing a meaningful pickup in underlying demand? Be helpful to share some color there. Thank you.
Thank you, Faisal. I'll take the first question, then Angelo will take the second one. Okay. In terms of our long-term targets for the growth of the company, as you may know, we are supporting the Vision 2030 of the kingdom. Also the transformation in the way that we're doing our business by converting the oil into chemicals. I think we have announced that we are going to start the first mega project in Ras Al Khaimah with converting 400,000 barrel of oil into chemicals. Also, we announced also our Fujian cracker in China that also was supporting the conversion of the liquids into chemicals. This is the starting point, and we're still studying the others.
I think it will come in the pipeline. Definitely the those projects that is announced or going to be announced in the future is going to be depends in a very robust, solid economic business case that the company is studying. Definitely this is going to be supporting the value creation and value increase to our shareholders.
Yes, I'll pick up the second question and on our CapEx. Near term, we expect CapEx to be in between $3.2 billion and $3.8 billion for this year. When it comes to the split between run and maintain on the one hand side and growth project on the other hand side, let me give you a little bit of light on what happened in Q1. In Q1, as mentioned, our CapEx was at over $800 million, roughly 600 of which were investments in re-reliability, replacement and turnarounds. With the exceptional turnaround situation in Q1, the share of turnaround and run maintain CapEx was very high in Q1.
That will level down for sure in the quarters to come. We'll have a lower share going forward than observed in the Q1.
Next, we have a question from Ricardo, Morgan Stanley. Ricardo, please go ahead.
Can you hear me?
Yes.
Yes.
Okay. Thanks for taking my question. two questions on, on my side. You've been very cautious on your outlook for the rest of the year, including the second quarter. If you could just give us a little bit of a color on which product that you're most cautious with and you might see some more out-downside risks given the current outlook. Just if I may clarify om comment that you, that you guys had on the introduction on the free cash flow generation during the quarter. You mentioned that on the inventory release. If you could just please just repeat that number, 'cause I'm pretty much trying to get on even though the EBITDA number was higher on a quarterly basis, the free cash flow generation was lower.
I just wanna confirm it's if the decline on the free cash flow is entirely due to the increased CapEx given the turnarounds. Thank you.
I will take the first one.
Yes.
In the outlook for the products for this year and let me just tell you, I mean, the beauty of SABIC, I mean, portfolio is diversified among so many products. I mean, that will enable the company to manage very well the cyclical economics and the cycle that we are in at this point of time, which is the trends that we did not see any recovery yet that we are expecting to have. This is will help the company, I mean, by diversifying this portfolio and these products that would help the company to stay strong and also to deliver, you know, to our customers and to our business partners the right portfolio that will complement each other.
On the free cash flow, Ricardo, it's true. Your observation is right. We had a decline in free cash flow, quarter-over-quarter. That's, on the one hand side, certainly, a function of the relatively high CapEx in Q1. Also, we had a number of accruals that were set aside in Q4, which became payable in Q1, and that kind of pushed down the free cash flow as well. There were some timing and phasing effects in our cash.
Next question from Saleh Al-Tlayyan, FIM Partners. Saleh, please go ahead.
Hello?
Hello. Yes. I hear you.
Yes. Hi, this is Saleh from FIM Partners.
I just have a question in regards to SABIC Hadeed. 2022 was a very strong year in terms of top line and in terms of sales volume. My question is, we've been seeing lately some news from either PIF or Aramco with very huge large deals in terms of steel projects with foreign entities such as in China and other where in the world. Can you just clarify why SABIC Hadeed is being left out in that regard? We're not seeing really large projects coming out from that segment. Is it because there's differing views in terms of your outlook in the local market, as opposed to the government? It seems the government is really bullish on steel demand, whether it's due to shipbuilding, local shipbuilding here or car manufacturing, and SABIC Hadeed is not really that interested.
If you can just clarify your views on the local steel market and where SABIC Hadeed stands on that. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Saleh, for the question related to our steel strategy and to the Hadeed performance. Let me just clarify one point here that SABIC is starting to support the local developments for the building and constructions for many years. That segment that has been produced by Hadeed is related to the building and constructions. We have been supporting for almost 40 years now the development in Saudi Arabia for that segment. As far as other segments, other than the bars and the rebars, I think this is something that has a different strategy and different investments that Hadeed are not in.
Hadeed will continue to support the segments that has been started for many, many years and try to also support the strategies that has been established for the vision of the kingdom of 2030.
That was the last question. Thank you all for attending SABIC's earnings call for the first quarter of 2023. We will now be adjourning the call. Wishing you all a great week and end.