The conference will be recorded, and recordings will be uploaded to our relations website, as the same as the presentation for the investors with our current result and information. We would like to welcome you in the name of our board. Today's teleconference will be provided by Krzysztof Soszyński, Vice President, and Piotr Zamora, Member of the Board. All questions you can ask after the presentation, so please, Krzysztof, the stage is yours.
Thank you very much, Magda. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. We will traditionally start by presenting information regarding our position in independent aftermarket. At the end of the third quarter 2024, we achieved dynamics of 7.6% in Polish złoty, Polish currency. However, if one compares the dynamics at the constant EUR/PLN FX rate, Inter Cars achieved 14.5% sales dynamic, almost twice the sales growth of our European competitors. In 2024, the group strengthened its overseas expansion further in countries where it developed sales based on a subsidiary network and in countries where it sells directly to the customers. In the last 12 months, 34 new subsidiaries were opened in foreign countries. As can be seen, Inter Cars' organic growth path is an effective way of consolidating the market and is currently outperforming the M&A path, which is fraught with the risk of not realizing synergies.
Inter Cars' revenue from the domestic market accounted for approximately 40% of the total income of the entire group, the same as in the same period of the previous year. The Polish market remains the primary sales market for Inter Cars Group. Many suppliers which sell the products to OEM to the production plants are experiencing problems due to the lack of demand from automotive manufacturers. To the largest extent, the discounts those suppliers which are directly as well in the shipments to EV manufacturers in Europe, one of the examples is Volkswagen, and this exactly is showing that stopping subsidies for new electric cars does not help sales and industry transformation. The assumed pace of change is too fast of the Green Deal and has a negative impact on competitiveness if we touch as well the producers from China or from the United States.
Sales, of course, in the medium segments have fallen significantly, and while only the luxury segment is defending itself, Tier One manufacturers will fight for the aftermarket, and for the big players, this is good news for the Inter Cars company. If we look on our biggest market, the Polish, which is always showing us the next trends, if we look to the Samar report, the company which shared the Polish market from the side of the sales of the new and used cars, we see quite good sales and import of the used cars. If we look for the cumulative 10 months, we are on the level 820,000 cars, which prediction for the whole 2024 is up to a million imported cars, which is naturally after a few quarters our customers on the beginning for products like lubricants and the brakes, but in the future for more advanced repairs.
The age of imported cars has established on the level of 12 years old cars, which naturally is in our sweet spot, and we see that most of these cars are with traditional, we could say, internal combustion engine, petrol, and diesel. As well, something which is interesting is that we see quite big growth as well of imported cars with alternative supply of the traction, but 66% is still with the hybrid, which means with the combustion engine connected with EV engine. The dynamic of registration of pure electric vehicles is quite big, 38% in comparison year- to- year, but if we look to the new registration, it's only 0.6%, which means that it's still very limited numbers. Interesting conclusion can also be drawn by analyzing data on registration of new electric vehicles in Poland, Tesla, and the brands from China dominating this list.
This is something what I mentioned before about the European industry and the problems of the competitiveness, which maybe now will be touched by EU new governments. From the side of our data about the segments, it's 14.5% of the growth in Euro consists of many segments of Inter Cars. The best performance for passenger part segment, 16% of the growth, 24% of the growth in the battery segment, 14% in the tire segment. The lowest growth rate is in the truck part segment, around 10%, but if we compare the economy in Europe, this is like above the market, which always we try to grow faster than the market or even on the market, which is declining as well, have better performance above the decline.
We expect the dynamic of the segment of the truck segment will come back as well based on the EU funds, which probably will be adopted next year. If we look at our map as well, you will see it on our presentation. We are the leaders in the sales dynamic in most Central and Eastern countries. In the truck business and as well in all products connected with the body repair, we are a leading company in Europe. It is also worth noting the market consolidation in Europe and Poland is progressing, which in our view also contributes to increased competition, but in the long term, improve the industry profitability. We try always as well to have this comparison to markets outside Europe and the US. The consolidation rate is around 75%-80%. By the top 10 players in Europe, it's less than 30%. Now I give the voice to Piotr.
He will explain and provide the data about financial performance of Inter Cars.
Hello everyone. Thank you, Krzysztof. So traditionally, we move on to the financial section in which we would like to highlight a few important elements contained in our financial statements that present our performance. During three quarters of 2024, Inter Cars generated consolidated sales revenue amounting to PLN 14.3 billion compared to PLN 13.3 billion in the same period of the previous year, which means an increase of 7.6%. However, the group sales dynamics when converted to Euro shows a solid increase of 14.5%, which in our opinion, more realistically reflects the sales dynamics, especially of the companies whose functional currency is Euro. And in our group, we have almost 25% of turnover is generated by such companies. We would like to emphasize that in terms of sales dynamics measured in units, the group generated sales increase of slightly above 10%, exactly 10.4% increase, which in our opinion.
is in line with the guidelines that we provided to you at the beginning of 2024, so in other words, we are very good on track with what we have guided, how we guided the market or what we promised to the market. We have not met so far the volume of sales in terms of the value. However, in terms of the units, yes, we are right on track. According to our assessment, in our opinion, the following factors had an impact on sales dynamics in the entire period of 2024. The first factor being a change in the pricing policy of parts manufacturers. After a period of large price increases, price reductions followed starting from the beginning of 2024.
Also, the second factor was the reductions in prices of goods purchasing, especially in euro, resulting from strengthening of Polish złoty, which also affected goods or spare parts that we purchased in złoty because some of the products purchased in złoty also, we can say, substitutes or products that could be used for the same. Basically, we may have for the same product line, the spare parts purchased both in euro and Polish złoty. And the third element would be the postponement of repairs resulting from high inflation in our opinion, which led to the temporary weakening of the purchasing power of the drivers. So to conclude our sales results, we are satisfied nevertheless with the revenue line and sales dynamics, especially with the increase in the number of units sold, just over 10%.
And also, especially regarding the revenue line, when we compare our sales results to the competitors, we would like to underline that, okay, maybe we have not met the target that we set to ourselves being 15%-17%, the range between 15% and 17% of sales growth for 2024. However, we have managed to outpace our competitors, and on the majority of the markets, we are growing faster than our competitors. So of course, we believe that the key to better results in 2025 is, of course, further sales growth and cost optimizations, of which I will discuss a little bit later.
Regarding the gross margin, the consolidated margin on sales for three quarters of 2024 was at the level of 29.3%, while in the same period of last year, it was 29.6%, which means that in 2024, for three quarters, there is a decline in the gross margin of 0.3 percentage points. After eliminating the impact of exchange rate differences, the margin would amount to 29.5% for nine months of 2024 and 29.8% for nine months of 2023, also meaning a decrease. The key factors influencing the level of the gross margin in the whole period of nine months 2024, in our opinion, are similar to sales, reduction in purchase prices of some of the suppliers, or no price increases as well. Reductions in prices of goods purchased in euro resulting from the strengthening of Polish złoty, which also impacted goods purchased in other currencies.
Consequently, where we see the impact also of the gross margin is that consequently, the average selling price also dropped because in most of the cases, the sales price on the market are based on the suppliers' purchasing price lists. The third element would be the declining margin that we mentioned earlier as a result of smaller players defending themselves against consolidation, especially in the situation when the market was a little bit slower. The fourth element that we think had impact on gross margin, especially in quarter one and two of 2024, was the need to sell out the surplus of inventories by distributors. We are thinking about inventory which was purchased during the period of increased inflation or goods which were purchased at higher prices, either due to the exchange rate or goods were acquired before price reductions.
However, what we would like to emphasize is that in the third quarter of 2024 alone, the impact of exchange rate differences on the change in margin was insignificant. And when compared to the prior year, the quarter-to-quarter Gross Margin was on the same level, being 29.9%. This is very important because, in our opinion, it is worth noting that this is an improvement over the previous periods. In our opinion, Gross Margin improved on what we see: that the Gross Margin improved on the majority of the markets, including Poland, which during the previous teleconference we discussed as the most competitive market. We see the increase of the Gross Margin. And the driving forces that we see here are slightly improved competitive situation on the market and, of course, the effect of our sales activities, including our high quality of service, which is appreciated by the workshops.
Therefore, we believe that the consolidation of the market will accelerate and small players will be put under pressure because they must grow to stay on the market. Now, regarding the operating costs, the share of sales and general management costs in the period of nine months of 2024 in relation to sales revenues was 14% and is higher by 0.4 percentage point compared to the same period of the last year. This result is, of course, comparable to the ratio that was calculated for the, let's say, for example, for the first half of 2024. We focus on improving operating margins, of course. We continually focus on process optimization and continuous assessments of initiated and ongoing projects.
But what we would like to emphasize here is that we expect that throughout the entire 2024, we will be able to achieve a cost-to-sales level close to the level of 13.6%, which happens to be the level that we achieved back in 2023, and this certainly is an improvement, especially over our results, effectiveness of costs in quarter one and two 2024. This is certainly below our ambition that we made public at the beginning of 2024. However, I think we should stress here that maintaining costs in relation to revenue, despite enormous wage pressure or lower than expected nominal sales, we think is still quite a big achievement. Regarding the profit, the group generated a net profit of PLN 552 million, which means a profit decrease of 5% compared to the same period of the last year.
In this case, the cumulative impact of exchange rate differences is similar in both periods, so it's actually neutral. In case of stock rotation, the inventory turnover ratio was 137 days, and it's two days better than when compared to quarter three 2023. However, this is an increase of ratio versus the rotation measured at June 2024, where it was 133 days. But the increase in the rotation should be considered in terms of forecasted sales for October, November, and December 2024. We've already reported the sales for October showing sales dynamics of almost 14%. So from our point of view, it was necessary to invest in increasing the working capital, especially in this case inventory, in order to prepare for increased sales in the quarter three to quarter four 2024. With costs, of course, in our investments, our CapEx and expenditures are somehow related.
We would like to give you some update on the status of the robotization. Regarding robotization of one of the warehouses in Zakroczym, the value of investment in works was EUR 20 million. Half of this investment was already incurred in 2023, and the second part was incurred in 2024. We are now two months after the production launch and during the stabilization period, and we have not encountered any critical errors that would negatively impact service. The system works simply reliably. Currently, we are preparing another warehouse area for the installation of the second stage robots in Zakroczym, which is due at the beginning of quarter four 2025. Regarding the new robotized warehouse in Brașov, the value of investments in robots is around EUR 50 million.
The warehouse will be financed with funds obtained from banks with the support of KUKE, which is a guarantee from, in fact, the State of Poland, which is the guarantee for the foreign investments. The investment is located in Brașov in Romania, and it will be a completely new facility. We plan to stock the warehouse in the fall of 2025. There are three main elements of these investments: automation system, conveyors, and racks structures. We are going to use the same automation Skypod system that will handle approximately 70% of warehouse processes. The rest 30% will be handled with the use of human. The building will be rented. Currently, 95% of the works related to the adaptation of the building have been completed. Installation works and internals and other internal warehouse installations are in progress.
And we plan that this warehouse will be fully operational at the beginning of quarter four 2025. Now I pass on the voice to Krzysztof, back to Krzysztof, to summarize our teleconference. Thank you very much.
Yeah, to summarize, we see potential for further growth in 2025 and next years. And we see that it's not impacting us for now, the transformation change around the industry. And as the company with the highest growth rates in independent aftermarket in Europe, it's giving us great news that already even this year we consolidate the market, and in the future, it will be further consolidation. In their case, we will continue the process of digital transformation, warehouse robotization, and optimization of internal processes, which was presented by Piotr. The aim is to maintain high above-market growth dynamics on the market and continue growth of the profitability.
We believe that we give added value to the customers, and in the long term, in their case, would be the leading company in Europe. Thank you very much, and we can switch to the questions.
So if you have any questions, please ask. Please remember to unmute yourself if you would like to ask the question.
Hi, this is William Sewell from Vergent Asset Management. Thanks for the presentation.
Hello, William.
Hello.
Hi. I've noticed, so if you're following the automotive space these days, it seems like the parts companies in particular are feeling a lot of the strain from very soft volumes across the automotive industry. And it seems like a regular headline now that you see Continental or Schaeffler maybe announcing some kind of distress, whether it's job cuts, etc.
Does that feed into your strategy at all that you're still able to grow volumes reasonably well in spite of the difficulties the consumer is facing? But the main parts manufacturers are struggling. Are you able to press your advantage at all over time?
But you know that our biggest advantage is itself the work with the independent workshops, which are we could say the market is fragmented. You have many players, and they need the service providers as Inter Cars. The parts, even if we look to the time of the pandemic, is supply chain. We have many suppliers, not all of them. They have the issue. And most of them, if we mention from the names, is the way how they cope with the digital transformation and Green Deal. And what we see, the biggest issue is not of these departments of the people which serve aftermarket.
The biggest issues are for the people which serve EV change. And as well, what we see that maybe in the future as well, the China supplier will take more space for the developing parts. Why as well we are present in China? We have the products from India, Turkey, China, Europe. The Polish market is one of the biggest markets of the production, the parts, which so far we do not see potential risk that some discounts or the plans will be not fulfilled by the suppliers. In the past, when it was a big crisis in 2008, it was some suppliers even of Inter Cars which had some issues, and even some of them were in a Chapter 11.
That time, we did as well the risk management on this, but they sold part of the business to a few other players, and generally, the offer was on the hand, and the discounts were paid, which so far we do not see a big risk for Inter Cars. Even what I see that the change of the car park will be delayed. The Green Deal probably will be delayed. Why? Because it's so difficult and tough for the transformation of the economy in Europe. And I see as well, and even I was on the meetings that you can find the synthetic if you will, the possibility that you can have still quite clean solution for combustion engine. It's only the decision about the volumes and the scaling of the business as well on this field.
The companies like Aramco already they have the patents and the way how to do the e-fuels or refuels, which in the end, we see that the future for sure will be more complex. It will be more products and consolidation on the supplier side in Europe, even I think go forward. But we will have the new players on the market from China side, which already as well our suppliers. Today, to Poland and to other locations, we have distribution lines already in the containers floating the goods for the new China brands, which are already on the streets. And I do not touch only the products for the EV cars, but as well for combustion engine.
In Poland, for the first half of the year, was sold a lot of the Chinese cars, but 85% of these cars are with the combustion engine, which I could say for big companies like Inter Cars with strength in the digital way to make cataloging and then has all the tools towards the garage. It's especially interesting even for the newcomers from China, which I see everything what we see in the papers can influence us that these guys which are losing this place to work in some company. They will have less salaries. Then maybe they will delay the repair of their personal cars. But from the other side, everything what we thought in the past or it will be for the future for independent aftermarket economy itself is not the answer for the growth of aftermarket.
It's the car park, age of the car park, and mileage of the cars, which probably it's based in our favor. I would only add to this that I think the market of spare parts manufacturers is not homogeneous. So I think the situation is not as clear that all of them have problems. Today, even we got some information, some reports and statistics showing that, for example, in this given situation, looking at the manufacturers of spare parts, which are quite important, which are located only in Poland, have noted in 2024, 30% of them noted increasing profitability. Yes, this would be a little bit contradictory to general understanding what you see in the papers that the factories of some car manufacturers are being closed or planned to be closed or production is going to be limited. In such situation, improve the profitability.
So I think headlines in the newspapers and what's actually happening might be a slightly different thing. The second thing I would mention is that Inter Cars have always promoted so-called multi-branding strategy. That means that we have for some product lines, we have even up to, I don't exaggerate, 15 suppliers, which is enormous. So that means that we are really safe on that side that even if one or two have some problems with, would have some problems with, let's say, production capacities temporarily or permanently, we still have some other suppliers that could fill in the gap. Also, I think the third point would be for me that aftermarket is a very profitable business for spare parts manufacturers, much more profitable than selling to OE, which of course provides very long-term contracts, but you know that the conditions are quite, I would say, rigorous.
There is some potential, of course. This is also up to the discussion, but we hear more and more that there is some potential for changes in the directives because the pressure being put on the automotive sector, mainly on the production of spare parts and production of vehicles, it is going to be maybe somehow revised. Yeah, so we will see what will happen. We see that maybe some of the measures went too far or too quickly, that a lot of people, especially in Europe, are involved in the production, and all this production, like employment, people are put at risk, and the last point from my side would be that growing distributors, big companies are really a good solution for some of the suppliers. Yes.
This is what we tried to underline in this presentation today, that it seems that maybe this is also a chance for us as a big supplier, having also quite big sales dynamics, that we could be an even much better partner for some of the suppliers, which will, of course, lead to a higher consolidation of the market.
They have a space to reduce for us prices because of the volumes we can deliver. And as well, the suppliers which have this switch from traditional business for combustion engine as well to EV, even they split the factories dedicated to aftermarket, which in favor of this, if you look what Piotr mentioned, sometimes aftermarket giving them much more profitability, which on the end, I think it would be in favor of us. The picture of the market is quite good.
We see, of course, that on a short term, the customers can delay the decision about the repair of the cars, but this decision never be stopped because if you want to use the car, you have two options: or to prevent the service or react after some damage come. And generally, what we found in the past that even in the COVID time, when it was supply chain problems, it was the best time for the distribution network, which are with a good connection with many suppliers, as Piotr mentioned, as a multi-brand solution, and as well with the good service on the delivery. And we believe that as well it will be continued.
Thanks. I'll see if anyone's got any other questions, and I might come in with something else.
Thank you. Did we answer your question?
Yes, that was very helpful. Yeah. Thank you.
Thank you. Super.
Hi, this is [audio distortion] . Can you hear me?
Yes, we hear you.
Yes, we can hear you.
Just a very general directional question. Can you just say how the fourth quarter in terms of gross margin potentially can look like, more like in the history that it used to be lower than third quarter? So that is one question. The other one is very similar, how we should think about gross margin development for 2025. And then in terms of working capital, should 2025 for any reason should be sort of better, different than 2024, or working capital should be more how it has been developing in recent two or three years?
Okay, I will try to answer these questions. I think regarding the gross margin, in the long term, I don't think we provide the forecast to the investors.
So, I'm sorry. I don't think I will be able to answer these questions. But in the short term, I think we can. I think we can mention that especially in the third quarter, the gross margin during the teleconference. I mentioned specifically that in the third quarter of 2024, the gross margin is basically the same as it was last year. Quarter two, quarter one of 2024, there was a decline of gross margin in terms of percentage. What we see now on the market, and not only in Poland, but also in some other markets, that we see some potential for growth of the gross margin, and we are trying to grasp it. I think that some of the distributors simply felt the pressure on the side of the costs. And also there's a slight change regarding the foreign exchange, especially U.S. dollar.
And simply selling of the spare parts at lower prices while your purchasing price in US dollars increased does not make sense. Yeah, so that gives the space. In a short term, it gives us the space to sell, to generate some additional profits because, as you know, we acquired stock. Our rotation is slightly around three and a half months. So what we are selling now, we purchased three and a half months ago. So while there's a sales price increase simply coming from, for example, US dollar, there is a potential to generate additional margin. And I think this is the case right now. We don't know how long it is going to last because this is, I think, unclear.
But what we wanted to stress during today's presentation is that we have a really positive outlook for the next year, both in terms of sales dynamics and Gross Margin. So I think this is what we can say for now regarding the Gross Margins. And the second question related to the working capital, I think if we plan to grow faster in 2025 than we grew in 2024, I think you should not expect major improvement in working capital. Over the last 12 months, we've already improved by several days. In terms of the working capital, I think further improvement in working capital would be very difficult in order not to jeopardize our value proposition and our competitive advantage. If you own the market, ask somebody where you can buy this. The workshops always say it's for sure available at Inter Cars.
And this is what we and so in order to keep this advantage, we cannot exaggerate with the improvement in the working capital.
Just one more, if I can.
Sure.
Can you just tell us how you see the Polish consumer? There has been a lot of sort of discussion regarding his strength. When you speak with shops, what's the sort of situation? Is he getting weaker? Is he getting better? No change, you think, 2025 versus?
It depends. If we discuss about the shops, generally, we compete on the end of the shops. It's not a big group of our customers. Okay, in the place which is not our network active, we have some shops or some shops buy from us something which is not available. But as well, we have many segments, different story and strategy to the truck business, different to the passenger vehicles.
Generally, the industry of transportation and the truck business is suffering, and we are much above the market. If we touch the passenger vehicles, we see that the customers as well avoid expensive repair. They did a lot of the repair during COVID and after the pre-COVID time, and when they repair very old cars, we see quite big import of the used cars, what as well I tried to explain during the presentation, which now you change something which you have for better, newer, old, but better and less with the need of the service, which even I come back to 2004 when we started to be listed that in 2004, before accession to EU, it was a huge import of the used cars, and at that time, we were less experienced how to count these volumes.
In 2005, already these cars were much better than we had on the roads. They not in one year gave us the growth of the market, which means that if we look for the last few years, we see that the market will grow, the service will come because if you want to transport yourself from point A to point B, still the transportation from the side of the country, it's not only the topic in Poland. We measure this as well on other markets, is limited. Going to the work, going to the doctor, going for some not only holidays, but in all need is connected with the cars, which you can postpone some service, but on some point, we see we call it it's like a kind of the demand, which is even cumulated, and it will come.
Probably it will come 2025, maybe not first quarter, but the second part of the year because we see these trends all over the world, not only in Europe. And we see that even at the beginning of this year, the volumes were quite good, and then everything decreased in Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, which probably it will come back, and the customers start to repair as well cars based on the reaction, like they will need to change, for instance, the clutch. Maybe one comment from my side. I think our customers are not drivers. Our customers are workshops. And we have a recent poll from the workshop made by the SDCM, which is the organization Association of Distributors and Manufacturers of Automotive Parts. And currently, it says that the situation is more or less 50-50.
Around 40% of workshops say that the situation is similar to prior year, and the remaining, let's say, 50%, it says that its revenue are rising. Yeah, so this is the situation on the level of the workshops. And this price component depends very much if we look on the, of course, as Krzysztof mentioned, depends on the, it's not the most important element when choosing the supplier, but also it depends on the labor consumption. So if the workshop is installing spare parts, which are very time-consuming to implement or install into the car, then the price is not important and is focusing on the more, I would say, on more premium spare parts, yes? If the workshop is fixing something which is very simple, not very time-consuming, then the reliance on more budget spare parts is possible. Then in such a case, price might be an argument.
So I think this might slightly maybe gives a little bit different perspective, yes, to what our customers is and how he's making the decision. And independent aftermarket, as it was, it's quite safe harbor. And even if we have limited volumes, it's not like it's like a cycle, but it's good that we do not have big structure change because then it's like EV. It was like the kind of the gossip that it will be structure change and everything will be on the new. Even on these cars, what Inter Cars did many years ago, why we implemented to sell the tires to have as well quite a solution, which as well can give us the transition to the EV times where the torque is higher and these products you need as well exchange with the less kilometer driven by year.
It's something I think that our business is quite diversified based on the same business, distribution of the parts. We feel on this quite confident. Of course, we would like to have big growth of the turnover and big growth of the profitability, but as well market is fragmented. We believe in consolidation and we would like to play a main role on this field in Europe.
Maybe one point that came to my mind now because we are currently experiencing quite high sales of tires, yes? Tires are typically the product we see that drivers might put off the purchasing of the new tires because they can drive a couple of more kilometers on the old tires. It is a kind of, I would say, indication whether or not this purchasing power of drivers is improving or not.
We currently see that there's quite a big peak of sales of winter tires, which honestly speaking, we have not expected so much. Yeah?
He said above expectation.
It's above expectation. I think this indicates also the situation which is currently on the market being improved over the situation in quarter one and two.
Maybe we're going to get very tough winter in Poland this year.
We will see tough winter is great for Inter Cars. Even in short term, it will be less turnover on the end. You need to change a lot of the parts I can really list it.
But actually, the winter conditions, changing conditions are one of the important factors influencing our sales. The change in the amplitude of the temperatures is more important than the minus temp erature.
Exactly. Exactly. We are also somehow weather dependent. Yeah.
Thank you so much.
Welcome.
Okay.
Are there any questions? Any more questions? Thank you very much for the questions you asked, but if we could ask some more, reply to some more. If not, thank you very much. If you have further comments or questions, you can pass them to us as well directly after the telephone conference. Thank you very much for the audience.
Thank you,
and see you on the next teleconference.
Thank you very much for being with us. See you next time.
Thank you very much. The recording will be uploaded to our investor relations sites. So please, and also the presentation for investors. Thank you very much and see you next time.