Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Paweł Wieprzowski on behalf of WOOD & Company. I'm very pleased to welcome you to the first quarter conference call with Warsaw Stock Exchange Management. Today, the company is represented by Mr. Marek Dietl, President of the Management Board, Izabela Olszewska and Piotr Borowski, members of the Management Board, as well as Adam Młodkowski, Vice President of the Management Board of the Polish Power Exchange. Gentlemen, please go ahead.
Hello. Let me start. I'm Izabela Olszewska, member of the Management Board in charge of business development and sales. As usual, let's start with the slide which presents the highlights of the first quarter 2022. It was a quarter with the increased volumes and trading values in many product lines on the financial market. You can see the results on the left-hand side. You can see also the spectacular increase on the bond market. Of course, we started the year with the lower base. Anyway, it is, there's the increase which is year-on-year almost 180%.
Revenue, EBITDA, and net profit, all of these financial results, they are quite solid, however, year-on-year, a little bit lower. The reasons for this can be seen in, first of all, the change of trading structure. We observed the increased activity of liquidity programs participants. I mean here HVP and high volume provider and high volume fund programs as well as market makers. All these guys, they trade with the lower rates. The second reason, it was a drop of trading volumes in the commodity space, especially on electricity and property rights markets.
Good news for shareholders is that the management board of GPW just proposed a higher dividend per share to PLN 0.74, the higher that is from dividend policy. Of course, we decided to propose such dividend to our shareholders because of very good results of 2021. Dividend yield currently is much higher than 7%. We think that we are as a dividend company, I think that we proved that this dividend is really will be very solid. Just would like to inform you about ongoing review of current strategy.
This is the strategy with the end in 2022. First of all, we would like to prepare the closing report with the conclusion what was good, what was not good, and what was the reason that, for example, we didn't achieve some goals. It will be finished in the first part of the year. For the second half of the year, we have planned the preparation of the new group strategy for five years starting from 2023. We continuously work on product development and client acquisition.
In the first quarter of this year, we implemented the new ETF from the family of Beta ETF. This is the first ETF based on bond index. We also inform about the new clients in the trading space and also about the new issuers. Also we have a very good business line, which is the market data sale. Here also we conduct acquisition of new data vendors and non-display clients. Just to describe some main actually things, main information from the GPW group companies.
First of all, GPW Benchmark is working now on the new automatic indices, the alternative to WIBOR. They published consultation paper, and they started the public consultation on transaction-based interest rate benchmarks. In our commodity space, we're working on development of the agriculture market. This is very important new business line. Together with our partners which operate within the Agriculture Market Council, we try to create the very good solution and promote the agriculture markets among the potential clients. We conducted actions to optimize the IPO process. Currently the time from allocation to the bill has been shortened.
I think that we can shorten this time to two days, which is a very good result. It's comparable to other big exchanges which offer the same time from allocation to the build. Next slide, please. Next slide, please. I can see the first one. Okay. Just a moment. Okay, now. With the next few slides, I would like to guide you through the business topics on the financial market, which going from the individual segments and product line. The first quarter of this year was a time marked by the outbreak of war.
The war still has a huge impact on what's happened to its trading volumes on the secondary market with what is now primary market. The trading volumes on the main market increased year-over-year and also quarter-over-quarter. The average sessions turnover reached the level of almost PLN 1.6 billion. Just want to underline the very high volatility which was connected with the uncertainty and it was also the result of the war. The high volatility always attracted liquidity and caused higher trading volumes. We had some roadshows to London and Amsterdam in order to collect the opinion of our global clients.
The good news is the global investors approach is very rational to our market. They realize that we are the neighbor of Ukraine. Our geostrategic position is completely different than Ukraine's. We are the member of EU and NATO, so they don't treat us as a country with much higher risk. Also, in March, we had some changes in emerging market indices and especially MSCI indices because we are the part of MSCI Emerging Markets indices. Russia was removed from these indices. It was not the standard rebalancing because it was impossible to sell the Russian stocks and buy other assets.
In case of new flows in the future to emerging market indices, we think that Poland is one of the beneficiary, because our stake in these indices increased. In Q1, we observed the highest interest of our investors in, especially in banks, whereas in the first quarter of the previous years, the investors focused more on companies from technology sector. Around 30% of trading volumes concerns three companies, two banks, PKO BP, PKO, and also Allegro, from the e-commerce sector. Just a few comments on IPO markets. In first quarter, we had 2 debuts on the main market and 7 on NewConnect. There are 12 prospectus with Polish FSA waiting for approval.
However, due to the current situation and the lower valuations on the market and some uncertainty on the market, so we observed that the companies just are suspending IPO process. We expect the better second half of this year in on primary markets. Just on NewConnect, which is our SME market, we had decreasing turnover. The main reasons we think are first of all a decrease of interest in COVID sectors. The investors they liked very much medicine sector, biotech, gaming, technology in the previous years and in 2020. Now they are not so much interested in these sectors.
Also in times of high volatility, I think that it's normal that investors choose the markets with high liquidity. This is the main market on NewConnect. We have relatively lower volatility and of course, much lower trading volumes. Structured products and ETFs, those product lines, they grow constantly. Structured products, among structured products, the most popular were products based on German index DAX. On the ETF side, we observed the interest in ETF on our blue chip index WIG20 but version short, which allows to earn on bearish market. First quarter, it was a high activity in liquidity program, high volume provider and high volume funds.
I already mentioned it, with presenting our highlights. The next slide is about derivatives. On derivatives market, we had an increase of total trading volumes year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter. The good news is it included also our WIG20 future index future contract, which is the most profitable product on derivative side. Also, currency futures, there was the growth year-over-year and some drop quarter-over-quarter, which was related with the change of some trading characteristics by the clients. But the number of open position has been maintained on the high level.
We hope that also in the currency futures, the volumes will return in the next quarter. Derivatives trading is very sensitive to volatility and the higher volatility, the higher trading volumes. Since the beginning of the year till the outbreak of war, February 24, the average volatility of our blue chip index WIG20 was 23%. On the day the war broke out, the volatility reached 47% and then gradually increased up to 65% in March, high volatility time. On the next slide, I just want to focus a little bit on our ESG strategy, which was announced in the end of the last year. We are now focused on the implementation of the strategy.
The management board has just adopted some indicators for measuring the results of the strategy. There are two groups of measures, strategic measures resulting directly from our strategy and operational measures which result from GRI standards and also our guidelines for ESG reporting prepared by our company with the partnership with the EBRD. The mother company, Warsaw Stock Exchange, and our daughter companies just we have elaborated operational plans for this year in ESG area. We are going to publish integrated reports very soon in which ESG will have also an important place.
We are as an organizer of trading platform for other companies, we have been supporting our issuers, first of all, in understanding ESG and also adjusting to ESG trends. Together with the Polish Development Fund and EBRD, we provided our companies and market participants with educational activities. We promote green bonds, especially in cooperation with International Finance Corporation, which is sister organization of the World Bank. We have the common project on green bonds. Within the framework of the strategy for capital market development, which is the strategy and just the program managed by Ministry of Finance.
There is also a very important part of this strategy, which is devoted to green transformation and green bonds. Now, there is a part of our presentation on the financial results. Piotr, over to you.
Thank you, Izabela. In the first quarter of this year, we have quite solid financial results as a capital group of GPW. Sales revenue in this period decreased slightly by 1.2% year-over-year. Operating expenses increased by 4.6% year-over-year. EBITDA decreased by 5.9% year-over-year. It was resulted mainly by a lower revenue on the commodity market, combined with a higher revenue on the financial market and increase in operating expenses. All in all, it resulted in a net profit decrease by 2.1%, and it resulted in a net profit of PLN 38.1 million. The EBITDA margin stood at the level of 46%, while the net profit margin was at the level of 34.5%.
When we look on the financial market, the trading revenue was higher by 1% year-on-year on the first quarter. It was mainly the effect of high volumes resulted from the war in Ukraine, as Izabela mentioned. In this period, there was a high market share of market makers and HFT firms, high volume providers, and it resulted in a slightly lower average trading fee on the stock market, which was at the level of 2.11 basis points. Listing revenue was lower by 2.1% year-on-year, and it was mainly a result of a lower activity on IPO and SPO market. We had a smaller number of IPOs and SPOs in the first quarter when compared with the first quarter of the last year. Revenue from market data is a very stable source of income. It was higher by 4...
by 3.2% when compared with the first quarter of the last year. We are increasing our client base. We are signing a new contract, subscribing new clients for market data from our Capital Group, mainly the stock exchange, but also commodity exchange and both support. The first quarter of this year was a record high in terms of number of data subscribers. Now I hand over to Piotr Zawistowski, the CEO of our commodity exchange.
Thank you. Thank you, Piotr.
Sorry. Adam Młodkowski, CFO of the commodity exchange.
Yes.
Piotr was in the Polish conference.
Yes.
He's absent.
It's true. Thank you, Piotr. Adam Młodkowski from TGE speaking. I would like to present you results from the commodity market in Q1 in 2022. Total electricity turnover in Q1 was 42 terawatt hours. It means a decrease about 12% year-over-year. On the forward market, decrease was even higher than on the spot market. The reason for the declines could be significant increase of prices on the longer contracts on the electricity market. On the gas market, total turnover was 42.4 terawatt hours. It means an increase of 16% year-over-year. I would like to underline that Q1 2022 was the best first calendar quarter in the history of this market.
In TGE, on the green energy market, we observed a decrease in turnover of both types of property rights, more than 20% year-over-year. Next slide, please. Consequently related to changes in turnover on the markets. We achieved a decrease of revenues from trading electricity and property rights, and an increase from trade in gas, which is also an increase from other fees paid by market participants of 16% year-over-year. I think this is about revenue. Next slide, please. Yes. Due to lower turnover on electricity and property rights, revenue from clearing was lower and more than 4% year-over-year.
We also noted a decrease of revenue from the register of certificates of origin by 8.2% year-over-year, mainly driven by the lower volume of property rights issued. Thank you very much. That's all about the commodity market. Piotr, it's yours again.
Thank you, Adam. We are coming back to the financials of the Capital Group. Operating expenses they were higher by 4.6% year-on-year. In the first quarter, the cost-income ratio was at the level of 62.4% in the first quarter. Depreciation amortization increased by 11.5%. It was mainly due to the reduction of the depreciation period of our current trading system, equity trading system, and it is connected with the implementation of WATS. WATS is our new trading system we are working on. The short-term amortization period results in an increase in depreciation charges by 0.3 million per month. It will be accounted this way from the beginning of this first quarter to the end of the first quarter 2024.
Total employee costs increased by 2.88%, and it was mainly driven by additional headcount in our strategic new strategic initiatives. Polish logistic operator and Telemetry projects. External services increased by 5.3% year-over-year, and it was mainly driven. This increase was driven by rising costs of advisory services and costs of promotion, education, and market development events. The share of profit of entities measured by the equity method in first quarter was at the level of PLN 4.6 million. Traditionally, the biggest contribution was of KDPW, our national depository for securities, and it amounted to PLN 5.3 million. You can see the results of the KDPW group in the slide attached to this presentation.
Altogether, the group share of profit of entities was PLN 4.6 million because there was also a small contribution of our stock exchange center operator of the buildings we are located in. Consolidated statement of our group. The last slide, please, in our presentation. Thank you. There was a considerable decrease of receivables due to the VAT refund of the commodity exchange in the amount of PLN 99.2 million. In the first quarter in January, we redeemed the two bond series in the amount of PLN 120 million, and we are planning to redeem another issue of bonds in October this year. As we mentioned, the management board proposed to the AGM to pay dividends in the amount of PLN 2.74 per share.
The decision on this payment will be taken by general shareholders meeting planned on 23rd of June this year. Thank you. It was the last slide in our presentation. I'm handing over to Paweł.
Piotr, thank you so much for delivering such detailed presentation. I think we shall start with the Q&A question. If you don't mind, I'll just ask a few questions. First of all, you've mentioned that in the first quarter, cost-to-income ratio is 62%. This has been, of course, in place by the Polish Financial Supervision Authority. What's your guidance for 2020, as far as this ratio is concerned and which cost category would the drivers of the overall cost position?
We think that the cost-to-income ratio at the end of this year can be up to 63%. It will be mainly driven by employee costs and advisory costs connected with our new strategic products.
Okay, that's perfect. My second question is on GlobalConnect project. Introducing to your offer foreign stocks. What will be the cost of this initiative? What will be the expected benefit for you? If you could recall maybe some case studies of such programs, that would be immensely useful.
Maybe I will take this question. Just about the cost of GlobalConnect. I think that the costs are very low. It's now close to zero because we are going to offer GlobalConnect on a current platform. You know, the access of our broker-dealer to our system, they will stay the same. This is just another group of trading on our trading platform. On the revenue side, we identified quite interesting potential because when we look at other platforms which are similar to GlobalConnect, for example, the platform organized by the Vienna Stock Exchange.
We observed that since the start of the platform the trading volumes they grow in the pace of 100% annually. In the 2022, this year, they have like 1.2 billion Polish zloty trading volumes every month. We can see that there is the interest of investors in trading blue chips from the EU and the States just locally on a local exchange. We would like to offer to our clients the same.
Now, we are, let's hope, in the final stage of our consultation and discussion with Polish FSA, and, as we declared, earlier, we will be ready, to start the market, in about two months since, we received the green light from, Polish FSA.
Okay. Thank you so much. There is a question on our chat. I'll just read it. Can you shed some light on the strategic objectives of Armenia Securities Exchange acquisition? What is your expected yearly revenue and profit?
I don't know just whether I should answer or just.
Yeah, Izabela-
Mike?
You can go ahead.
Okay. Yeah, I can go ahead. Okay. As we inform the market, we sign the memorandum and then also the agreement, the shareholder share purchase agreement with the Armenia Securities Exchange. This is the smaller stock exchange than we are, but very profitable. Just want to clarify that this is on the EBITDA profitability they reached a level of 40%. As far as the net profit is concerned, it is at 23% profitability. I think that this is a very healthy business. Of course with the much lower scale.
The Warsaw Stock Exchange is going to buy 65% package stake and pay around PLN 8.4 million. It's worth underlying that currently the Armenia Securities Exchange they have around PLN 11 billion in cash and not debt. The financial results since 2019 are just they have been growing in double digits pace and the value of net assets doubled. I think that these are very good financial results and a good M&A target. Together with just EBRD we prepared the business plan for further development of this market.
I think that we have a plan how to find the income synergies in the future. Mm-hmm.
It seems that this is all as far as this question concerned. I see no further questions on the chat, so I will ask some few more. Recently, you released the dividend recommendation from 2021 profits. Dividend per share proposed by you is PLN 2.74 per share. In your financial forecast, the minimum dividend per share was assumed at PLN 2.6. So it's PLN 4.14 more than the minimum payout ratio that you assumed in your financial forecast. Why have you decided to increase your dividend proposal? That's the first question. Second question, what's your consideration regarding the future dividend policy?
Shall we assume that if you have, if you generate, solid financial performance going forward, you'll be paying more than the absolute minimum disclosed in your dividend policy?
Okay, maybe I will answer this question. We decided to increase our recommendation in terms of dividend because we had a very, very good last year with the net profit of PLN 161 million. Those were mainly the basis of this decision of our recommendation. It means that there is an increase of dividend per share by 10% year-on-year. I think that our shareholders should be glad with this recommendation. However, it's not an indication for the future because it depends on the situation on the market. This year, as you know, the war in Ukraine can have an immense impact. That it's very difficult to forecast.
What I can say that we will for sure stick to our dividend policy. Concerning the extra dividend, we cannot for now say anything about this.
Absolutely. Thank you. When are you planning to release the new strategy?
We are working on a new strategy summing up the existing strategy, and it should be announced by the end of this year.
Could you please shed some light on your expectations regarding revenues this year that you expect from the strategic initiatives you have been launching over the last two, three years?
Maybe I will take this question, but I'm not sure if I, you know, could hear you well, unfortunately. The question was about the strategic initiatives, yes?
Yes, yes. What's your revenues forecast from this initiative this year? How many millions do you expect?
Yes, as we just announced earlier, the plan is to achieve around like PLN 15.5 million from the strategic initiatives. Of course, it includes a couple of million of revenues from the planned M&A and takeover of the stake in Armenia Securities Exchange. Also there are a couple of initiatives that we think that they will start to generate the first, I think, revenues.
As we inform you during the presentation, in a couple of weeks, I would say, now just we are going to present the closing report, which will analyze and summarize the implementation of these initiatives within the current strategy. I think that it will be the clear information about the stage of the initiatives and also about the results of these initiatives.
Perfect. My last question is about MSCI. You've mentioned that at this stage the international investors are differentiating Poland and Ukraine in terms of the geopolitical risk profile of these two countries. Nonetheless, have you heard during your roadshows in London, in Western Europe any kind of hint that the clients or the investors may be considering leaving Polish stock market amid this shrinking universe of the emerging Europe?
Yes. According to the feedback received from our global investors, they think that Poland will be one of the beneficiaries of the changes in MSCI indices. Just to give you some figures. In MSCI Emerging Markets Europe, our stake increased from just 15 up to 46%. You know, this is the highest growth. I think that the funds based on this index probably will also merge with the MSCI EMEA funds. Here, our share was around 4%, a little bit less, and now it's 5.31%, so also increased.
In MSCI Emerging Markets world, it was much, much lower increase. Still, I think that we can be the beneficiary of the new flows of the index. According to reports that we received from our representative in London, there is the observation that currently there are the flows to this emerging market indices. It was more quiet time before because of the impact of the war. Now there are the first flows to these indices. Let's hope that we'll be the beneficiary of the whole situation.
Marvelous. Let's do hope so. I see two more questions on the chat. Do you expect further decline in electricity trading given sustained rise in prices? That's the first question. The second question. To what extent will the suspension of Russian oil and gas export affect gas and electricity trading?
I couldn't hear the first question. I'm sorry, but so could you please, sorry, repeat it a little bit louder?
Absolutely. Do you expect further decline in electricity trading given sustained rise in prices?
I think this is the question which should go to Adam Młodkowski.
Yes. It is hard to predict the future situation on the electricity market. We observed high volatility on this market. The prices are constantly going up. In the last periods, the turnover is rather stable, but it is not very high. In current situation, we don't predict any significant risk in some increase of the turnover on this market.
Mm-hmm. The second question I see, again, on the commodities. To what extent will the suspension of Russian gas export affect gas and electricity trade?
Excuse me. Could you repeat this question again? Because I have poor quality.
Sure
of the connection.
Sure. To what extent will the suspension of Russian oil and gas export affect gas and electricity trade?
Okay. If I understand it correctly, I'll try to answer this question. As a country, we are prepared to this situation on the eastern border. We are quite independent from the delivery of the gas from Russian market. According to strategic plans, the Baltic Pipe pipeline should be open in October this year. On the other hand, we also have a reserve of gas in storages. We don't think that there will be a problem with trading gas on our platform. We try to also develop interconnectors with other countries. The situation on the gas market currently is also, I could say, quite stable.
Okay, perfect. It seems that was the last question. I don't see any further questions on the chat. Gentlemen, on behalf of WOOD & Company, I would like to thank the Warsaw Stock Exchange team for delivering the presentation and answering the questions. Thank you also to all call participants for taking the time and dialing in. Have a great day, and hope to speak to you soon. Stay safe.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Good night.
Bye-bye.
Thank you.