Good morning. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. We are gathering at an LPP conference. We are going to summarize the financial results of the entire group for 2023. I'm Monika Wszeborowska, and I am a spokesperson for the group, and I will moderate today's meeting for you. Before we move on to the meeting itself, there are a few housekeeping remarks I'd like to share. Following a conference from the previous week, during which we told you about the process of LPP Group withdrawing from the Russian market, we got a number of questions and inquiries, requests to tell you more about the process. In order to clarify everything and having you here, we decided to provide answers to these questions, and this is what we are going to focus on at the beginning of the conference, right?
Afterwards, we will move on to the meeting proper, so to the summary of the financial results for the previous year. The results will be explained by Przemysław Lutkiewicz, Vice President of the Management Board, while Marek Piechocki, President of the Board, will tell you about the strategy of the group for the years to come. Marcin Piechocki, Vice President of the Board, will tell you about the evolution of the Sinsay brand. The brand today can be called a driving force behind the development of our core business. There will be time for questions and answers. We divided the session into two parts. First, we are going to listen to your questions, while in the second part, Magdalena Kopaczewska, Director for Investor Relations, will answer the questions that we've been collecting during the meeting over the online channel.
And now, one important piece of information for those observing us online, there is a chat box you can use to submit your questions. The window is already active, so please do not wait, and postpone asking questions till the end of the meeting, and you can submit your questions as we go. I know, and, I'm addressing now those who represent the media, that you asked whether on completion of the conference, it will be possible to get a recording of the commentary of Przemysław Lutkiewicz concerning financial results. We hope that we will have time for that, but if not, we would kindly ask you to address the reception of the conference with such inquiries, and then those who are other at your disposal will collect all your inquiries. And another important thing, please pay attention to the following fact.
Since Marek Piechocki and Marcin Piechocki are going to be with us, they care very much about their privacy. Please do not register the meeting today, do not stream it, and do not take pictures. We kindly ask you to respect this request. I thank you in advance for respecting this request. Now let us move on to the conference. Let me invite Marek Piechocki, President of the Management Board, Przemysław Lutkiewicz, Vice President of Management Board, CEO of the Group, and Marcin Piechocki, Vice President of the Management Board. Gentlemen, the stage is yours.
Good morning. Welcome. I would like to thank you for your presence, for showing up in such a great number. I'd like to extend the words of gratitude for understanding that I wouldn't like my image to be made public.
This is something that makes it possible for me to operate normally on a daily basis. So far, it has been the case that everybody has respected this request. I certainly hope that you'll make it possible for me to continue going as I've been going so far. This conference, in its title, has the summary, the results, but as you know, it is a very special moment in which we would like to explain to you a number of issues related to the publication of the Hindenburg Research reports. So the first part is entitled hypothesis vs facts. These are hypotheses that the Hindenburg Research formulated, and we would like to elaborate on them against the backdrop of the actual facts.
To begin with, I would like to tell you within the facts section that we need to realize that it's certainly a fact that operating to the benefit of the company, we've recovered PLN 700 million, and it was possible to write off PLN 2 billion as losses. Certainly, if we hadn't done anything back then, and if we had written off those PLN 2 billion for losses, the investors would complain, and they would have formulated the claims that we haven't done anything. We have done a lot to recover whatever possible to recover, and that puts us in a hard position as a board.
We, as a management board, do not really feel comfortable in this situation, but we need to pay attention to the fact that the entire transaction was planned for two years. That's a long period. Again, one might say that it is too slower pace. That was not a top priority project for LPP, but let me draw your attention to the fact that, in relation to this transaction, we have managed to regroup pretty fast, and we have adjusted our ways so as to focus on developing in Central and Eastern Europe.
And within this fast shift and focusing on what is of utmost importance for us and investors, we are now in a situation in which LPP has been able to have PLN 1,612,000,000 of profits net, 70% of which can go for dividend. That is PLN 610 million. And but evenly, we have been managing cash. We are a stable company, so even if we formulated a number of complaints, and if we claimed that much more could have been done, I would still argue that what we did, we did thinking about our shareholders, but also thinking about the employees.
Somebody counted that it was a few times that I took a deep breath during the last meeting, well, actually, this is the topic that makes you take a deep breath. Let me explain this once again. LPP has no operating or trading activities in Russia. We sold the Russian business in June. We divested it. We do not own the Russian company directly or indirectly. We do not have any control over it. We do not manage its structures. We will prove that as we go. The Russian company, in its own name and on its own account, sells goods in Russia, including, among others, goods purchased under the transition agreement.
What is important, what has happened over the last week, is that you are aware of the fact that the auditor, when it appeared that everything has been audited at LPP, and the auditor was close to actually issuing an opinion on the annual report, had to actually return with a number of supplementary questions concerning this transaction and the fact whether LPP still runs its operational activity and anything that goes with it. We, of course, provided the necessary information to the auditor, and the auditor has no doubts as to whether these facts were sufficient. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, now I would like to take the floor to go through this single slide of the many slides that we've prepared for you. So we split the presentation.
We'll take turns with Marek to tell you about particular thesis. We will refer to Hindenburg's claim.
There were claims that we failed to inform the market in advance, but the case is that we were not aware of the fact that such a report was supposed to be released because the company had not contacted us. Even until today, it has not done that. We did not know whether such a report would be created or published. What we knew was that for a few months, there was a person, a foreigner, calling our former employees, trying to get information from them, offering money in return. So that was the information that we got from our employees, from former employees, that simply called us and reported this to us.
But, they did not know what kind of information this person asked about, because those employees that told us would not give any information. They simply refused to answer any questions. Maybe there was a group of former employees who did, but they did not contact us. So we knew that there was somebody asking the questions, approaching the company from different angles, but we didn't know who this person was, what kind of question they asked, so we were not in a position to really formulate any kind of communication on that. We simply didn't know what was going. We informed the Head of the National Revenue Administration. You might want to know why we contacted the National Revenue Administration, that is KAS. Well, we have a horizontal agreement signed with our KAS.
We informed KAS about that there are a number of companies, more than 10, that have such a horizontal agreement with the National Revenue Administration, KAS. We inform the administration what happens in our company, about our financial results, but also about some atypical situations. Knowing that KAS is part of governmental institutions, it has more opportunities to really investigate into the situation concerning the company. That is why we decided to inform KAS, but we didn't get any response on who this person was, and it was only when the report was issued on the fifteenth of March that we learned what the case was. To our opinion, there were no thesis or any grounds for formulating any kind of communication to the public, because that would be gossip.
And we would like to focus on the facts rather than spread gossip and refer to it. We could file communication to be transparent and very concrete. In this case, there was no concrete information. That is why on Friday, when the report was published, we issued a number of communications that came out, and you might have expected that they would appear earlier on. But again, we had to collect information and had to take care to formulate clear communication on what we think about that. Investor in the Russian company, there is this hypothesis that the Russian... Well, the Russian company, as we know, was sold in June to those who are not related to LPP, as the CEO of the Russian company was one of the bidders. A similar transaction-...
is something that we carried out in 2010, when we sold ESOTIQ & Henderson. One of our former directors purchased the shares, and this person appeared with investors, and back then we sold the company. We thought that this transaction with a Russian company was similar, because again, we have a situation in which we have people who know how to run the business. We know how engaged they are. And this person is also a shareholder in the RE Trading company. We've already transferred for verification to the auditor, to the banking institutions financing it, and we will also pass to the National Financial Supervision Authority the registered data of RE Trading and trade agents, or those who own trade agents.
Out of the registers, you can clearly read that none of the person who is the owner has any relationship with Ma- or is any kind of beneficiary of Semper Simul or works for LPP. So, it is clear there are no connections. There were also suggestions that the foundation took out loans in order to purchase this company, but the banks know it very well. It is documented. There are documents that make it clear that the loans taken by Semper Simul had a completely different purpose to them. The one taken in 2020 was for purchases of LPP shares. It was restructured then in 2023. Another credit from 2021 was taken just to finance retail parks, and that there are clear data about that.
So neither LPP, nor Semper Simul, nor Marek Piechocki are in any way financially or personally affiliated with the investor in the Russian company. None of these persons or entities has financed the purchase of the Russian company. I can tell you this very clearly, and this can be proven by the documents that the auditor, the banks, also saw, and also the Financial Supervision Authority, KNF, will also get access to these documents, in the days to come. Another hypothesis in the report, there is the thread concerning Kazakhstan, suggesting that LPP sends goods to Russia through Kazakhstan. Over $17 million in export is the amount mentioned in those claims. So we decided to take a closer look into it. That worried us, because that's not true.
We have our own reports, we have our documents from the Polish Customs Clearance office, from the one in Kazakhstan, too, from the tax office in Kazakhstan, where we pay taxes on imported goods from the bank in Kazakhstan through which the invoices go. And we know that in 2023, to Kazakhstan, we delivered goods with a total value of $12 million. Additionally, we also cross-researched the official information by the Polish Statistical Office and also the Statistical Office of Kazakhstan, showing the official value of export and import of goods between Poland and Kazakhstan. And we also looked at the Tradesparq database that was quote quoted by Hindenburg.
Well, we found it strange that nobody actually knew about the database before or used it, so we decided that we want to get deeper into it. We bought access to this database, and we decoded the data it contained. We wanted to investigate the origin of those numbers that were out of place. It proved that there were errors in the database, that the records are multiplied many times, that simply make the value grow to PLN 3 billion that Hindenburg wrote about in its research. I also have a few slides to you showing where this multiplication originated from.
We have our invoice that we took out of a group of invoices that were mentioned in this database, and this is a record that has its number, 4,273. It shows 18 pieces of a given model. The value in EUR in total is EUR 35 something, and the gross weight is 2.8 kg. So 18 pieces, but in different sizes, mind you. And we have a customs declaration concerning the same values, same numbers. Again, gross weight, 2.8 kg. Number of units, 18, in line with the invoice. Value in EUR 35.28, in line with the invoice. And it was calculated by the statistical office into dollars. Therefore, you have 73, uh, uh, $37, sorry . And the number of declaration, 5,000, uh, 55,300, and so on and so forth.
We took a look into the database of Hindenburg, that Hindenburg relied on. What you can see there is a master bill column. There, you will find the number of our invoice, so our import documentation. And what we see there is a multiplication of this shipment, 18 units. You can see that in the middle column, right at the bottom. So the quantity of 18 is something that is correct, but that was multiplied by the fact that different sizes were simply multiplied. So the S size, M size, L size, XL size, have appeared in the database, separately. They basically multiplied these records a few times. And so you can see here, there's multiple records, these multiple records, depending on how many sizes we had under a given index.
But our data, official documents, for example, like the one you can see here from the Kazakh bank, show you the actual values paid for the export invoices from us to Kazakhstan. And it's not true that you can easily export the goods in volumes as you want. You need to address the Kazakh offices, and you need to get a certain contingent. We have an agreement for $300 million maximum signed, out of which we used several million dollars. But in order to be able to export big volumes, we would need to have contracted contingents quota for far greater value. So this is a certification from the bank showing that the amounts are far lesser than what Hindenburg claims. Then, additionally, we carried out a final check exercise.
What we did is we checked that there were 87 customs declarations in Tradesparq database that we agree with. The value in euro from these invoices matches with our invoices, but this multiplication results in the fact that in dollars, the amounts are far, far greater. Our IT specialists have cleaned to this base, eradicating the multiplied records, and we have the final comparison of the two bases. In the table, you can see particular months from 2023, the number of shipments, and to the end, you have the sum of 87. And the values that match with our customs clearance values in euro, this is the third column, and then you've got the fourth column in dollars. So euro calculated into euro U.S. dollars, and cleaned up of the multiplied records.
And the last column is the data, the faulty data from Tradesparq database. That presents, of course, the untrue state. As you could have seen in the report that we also published after midnight, LPP Kazakhstan revenues is PLN 103 million in 2023 and PLN 112 million in 2020. That takes us about PLN 220 million in terms of the official data from the Polish Statistical Office. Now, if you look at the official data of the Statistical Office of Kazakhstan, the total volume of imports from Poland is around PLN 700 million. Why this data does not exactly match? Well, no idea. We will have to ask the offices.
Sir, the data from LPP Kazakhstan on goods and invoices received from LPP Poland, certified by the bank from Kazakhstan, is EUR 18 million for the period from September 2022 to November 2023. And now, tax return submitted to Kazakh Tax Office regarding VAT paid on the import of goods in 2023, KZT 739 million, and then this equivalent of EUR 1.5 million, which results in the value of imports, EUR 12 million at a 12% VAT rate. The certificate from the Polish Customs Office on the volume of exports to Kazakhstan by LPP is EUR 12 million for 2023.
Now, our trade activity in Russia and whether there is any, fundamentally, when, as you see, shown on consecutive slides, in order to run an operation activity, we asked our management, that used to supervise this operational activity that we had in Russia in the past. You can see that, practically speaking, there is no operation, so there is no trade activity whatsoever. But what we did do is providing certain services for the Russian company, following from the agreement that we had concluded. The basic, index maybe that can show you this, in a year in which we did run operational activity in Russia, 280 people, that was 2019, prior to the COVID pandemic, 281 people would go to Russia, business trips, and they spent 995 days on trips.
These are data from our accounting department. In 2022, only one person was on business trip to Russia for five days. In 2023, nobody has done so. So it's quite a juxtaposition, quite a telling one, because I can tell you about the factual activities. I will show you further juxtapositions and tables. But in accounting, business trips is something that you cannot hide undermine, and you can simply compare the volumes and the values here. Now, moving on. As you will see on consecutive slide, we do not have operational activity or trade activity in Russia or whatsoever.
In the sales agreement of the Russian company, however, we commit ourselves to selling the goods in the territory of Russia, so that the buyer will not be selling the goods into the territory of Russia with our logotypes. But back when we had our goods in warehouses, they had the logotypes on them. Today, there are no logotypes of LPP because the Russian company purchases itself very often in the factories that we used to buy from. Now, in order to discern these products, in order not to have their products in our market and the other way around, they got them a completely different set of barcodes.
Not for us to control these goods, but in order to lead to the situation in which their goods do not appear at LPP or for our Reserved, branded, or other, brands, logotype-marked, goods did not go to Russia. So LPP does not run any trade activity in Russia, and the only goal for changing the barcodes was to discern the goods between the warehouse systems of LPP and Russian entity. Here, I have two sets of data, two slides to tell you about several operational activities that we used to carry out in Russia before we withdrew from the Russian market.
When you have a look at it until item 18, these are the activities related to the operations of the headquarters of the company and building of the stores with purchases for the stores and with their operations. When you move on, starting from item 18 downwards, you can see planning of the sales for stores, planning the working hours, and running through the inventory, managing the cost levels, and so on and so forth. A number of functions for making it possible for the store to operate. Of course, if somebody is a sole owner of a store, they might run the store without any supervision. But if you think about tens of hundreds of stores, then you need to plan certain operations.
You need to see whether nothing is stolen, you need to manage the level of costs at these stores, you need to manage whether people come to work at the right time, and so on and so forth. Maybe if they do not come, if there is a lower load, and so on. So as you can see, carried out by LPP, Russian side, you can see this is something that we ceased to do starting from 2023. Whether we have. What do we have here? Visual merchandising instructions, analyzing the sales of goods, running e-commerce, and so on. Purchase decisions, the most important thing, what to buy? Every store has to have something to sell, and, well, this has to be decided on by someone. Are we going to sell bananas or apples? We are not making these decisions.
The Russians have been doing that on their own. There are still things that we have been supporting the Russian partners with, and this is something that follows from the agreement. But once again, let me remind you, one, the most important thing, of course, it was possible for us to refrain from it, to resign from it, and we can still do that, but we have PLN 900 million receivables, so we would like to get it back. We do not want to lose it. We don't want to have to make any write-offs, but we do not run operational activity in Russia or trade activity in Russia, so what the report claims is simply false. Another element is information on goods supplied to Russian, to the Russian entity.
We have informed it in two annual reports, so the one for 2022 and the semiannual one for the first half of 2022, that we sold a business, and we have the so-called transition period, during which we will have to support the Russian company because it has to develop the competencies that it had not had thus far. So it was, of course, a trading company that managed stores and the staff, personnel. But in all our companies, distribution companies in Europe, there is lack of knowledge on how to purchase goods, on how to place orders, on how to ship the orders, and how to create a collection. This transition period is there precisely to make it possible for the companies to develop these competencies. So the Russian company started this process in 2022.
It started employing those that would support the company to create their own collections. So the support that we provided had this aim in view, that the transaction is successful, that the company can be self-dependent in the entirety of its operations, and that we can get back whatever there is to recover. There are those in the Russian company that we had worked with for 20 years. They built a Russian business, and we wanted to make sure that we can ensure them safety, job, further operations, and do not really do not really create any any risks for them. So, as you know, we had quite a lot of inventories, and we purchased it in 2020 for the Russian market. Additionally, we had inventories with a view of the the growth of stores number.
We had planned an expansion, and later on, we had to somehow decide on what to do with those high stocks, high inventories that we had in our warehouses. That is something that was reflected in our finances, because we had to pay the factories for that, and the goods were not sold yet. So we will tell you more about it in the financial results part of today. I will show you the slide, but there was a lot in the warehouses, and it took us a year and a half to get rid of the excess, and now we are reaching levels close to the optimal ones. But, well, these goods had to be sold, and that was then within the transition period and the agreement that we had concluded concerning the sales of the company, the Russian business.
Surely, it is worth mentioning that the Russian company or investors established two more agencies, the so-called trade agents, that purchase the goods in factories themselves, but it sometimes happens that they use the same factories in which we design and place orders at. The deliveries to Russia don't go through our warehouses, but they are sent straight from the factories to the Russian warehouses via different channels, ships, different vessels that we use to bring the goods to our stores. The questions were supposed about the amounts, about the margins concerning the sales. This information is to be found in our financial report, and detailed margin values splits into quarters is to be found in our result presentation that we have published. There are backup slides giving you the detailed information.
So right from the beginning, we've been informing you about the supplies for the Russian company, and that we've been doing it following the provisions of the agreement during the transition period. We care very much to get to recover the values for the products sold, but also for the store. So we do everything it takes in order to meet the expectations of our shareholders to simply change those liabilities into cash. There's always the put option that, again, resulted in many questions and doubts. Put option is on the investor's side. LPP does not have any call option. We cannot simply buy this business back. It is the investors that decided to have this option in the agreement for the business should the business not go the way they planned.
What does that mean? For example, if this business did not bring profit, if they failed to, let's say, generate cash flow that would be sufficient to cover the liabilities for goods in stores, they can switch on the put option, so give the business back to us. Theoretically, they don't need to pay anything more to us, but following this option, we do not have to get the money back that we got so far, that we got so far from them. So the option is on just one side, the Russian side, and it boils down to the possibility of resigning from the transaction, with none of the parties being obliged to give anything back to the other. Why is it this case? Why has this option found its way to the contract?
Well, well, let's bear in mind that it was 2022. The war broke out. The people were not queuing to buy the business. The time flew, and we had to do something about the business. That is why we decided that looking at those very few offers that were put on the table, that were not really good offers, we had to choose something within our internal MBO that guaranteed that knowing the persons behind the offers, knowing the bidders, people working in it, I'm talking about the head of the Russian company, we can trust that this business would keep on going, and that we would recover our receivables, and that our employees would be taken care of in Russia.
So that was fire sales conditions, and this is what we had to do in order to withdraw from the Russian market as fast as possible, with the hope of recovering as much as possible. Of course, the investors that wanted to also did not want to agree to sign a contract that would be unconditional, so that they would pay PLN 600 million to us, because that was a high-risk transaction for them as well. Whether... Looking from this point of view, whether it would work or not, well, we had an experienced team on the Russian side. We saw that many other companies were withdrawing from the Russian market back then. We knew that there were multiple stores that had know-how and could generate profit.
So we decided to go for it, to sign the contract with this option in it, and to simply try within the span of several months or even two to three years, to withdraw the Russian market completely. The information about this option is also part of our annual report. But whether it is possible that this option is actually activated, well, it appears that even technically speaking, that would be very hard to do. And this is mostly because of the fact that in Russia, a commission was established, a governmental committee, that evaluates, assesses such transactions. So even if Russian investors wanted to sell their company to a foreign investor, then first of all, what would be looked into would be the country of the investor.
Poland is on the list of those countries that are treated as enemies to Russia. So it appears that the agreement for a business to be sold to Poland appears to be something that was unattainable, so the chances are close to zero. The business does go on. They did pay the first tranche. This transition period is something that appears to be working. The company has been generating good results, so it appears that we have every reason to be optimistic about the put option not being activated, and the transaction will be brought to an end, or at least the majority of what we hope to recover will be recovered.
Of course, if it gets, if it happens, then we would have to close the business because we cannot take over the assets in any way. We cannot go to Russia. We cannot manage the business anymore, but certainly, we hope that this option will not be exercised.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to talk about the put option as well. I'm looking at it from a business point of view, and I see it the following way. I'm looking at it holistically. So not just that we got the first tranche for the company, but I'm also looking at lowering of the level of liabilities. I'm looking at how much money was transferred.
So it's difficult for me to imagine at this first conference, or somebody told me that, I have a certain certainty. Of course, we cannot be certain of anything, unless that, that maybe we will vanish from this, planet, and maybe some say that you can be also certain of taxes. But anyhow, somebody paid us some PLN 700 million, the first tranche, of for the company, plus reducing the levels of liabilities was down to around PLN 700 million. So we can see that, so, it is going rather smoothly, and this lowering of the level of liabilities is happening. It is hard for me, business-wise, to imagine. Well, being them, I wouldn't simply give up having such a business, because giving it up, meaning going for the put option, I wouldn't do that.
Przemysław is telling you about the technical aspects here, but I can tell you on the other hand side, that we had known it back then, and we know it now, that simply we will not return to Russia. That would mean going through some legal battles, but the first point is, it would be unreasonable business-wise if you put yourself in a position of someone who already invested so much. And secondly, legally, it appears to be highly complicated in order to pass it over to the Polish company. And thirdly, we would have to want to take it. It's like with the last will, and well, you might be assigned to inherit something, but you might not want to. And I'm going to read.
Since LPP deeply condemns Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Russian business was sold in 2020 to parties unrelated to LPP. Transaction that was put in place allowed LPP to recover part of the assets value left in Russian Federation, as I mentioned. Entities, Far East Services, General Consulting Services, and Asia Fashion Import Export, are not in any way under control of LPP, neither financially nor personally. Sales of Russian business was factual. It was confirmed by an independent auditor that the sale of the Russian business was factual and definite, but as I say, the document will pass on to the financial supervision authority. I have a certain remark concerning the auditor.
In the communication by Hindenburg Research, there were claims that the auditor that we have is a niche one, but Grant Thornton, at least in the Polish market, you know it very well, provides services for two WIG20 companies, 12 from WIG80, 10% of the WIG companies. We asked Mr. [Kiercz] about that. That would mean that actually, the entire system, if we followed Hindenburg's claim, was faulty. Grant Thornton, by past business, is scoring in the top 4, being ahead of some other auditors. So calling the company a niche one is, like, really not really rational. No option exists for LPP to buy the Russian business back. No call option. We lost control over it, as I show.
LPP lost control over the Russian business, and the repayment for the invested Russian business was spread over time and structured as MBO in the best interest of LPP's shareholders. That is all spread in time, but we do not plan to return to Russian market, and that's all concerning Hindenburg. Later on, we will have a question-and-answer session, we will move on. And now, let us focus on business, on our future, because you cannot go forever, really explaining on something that you're not really doing.
We'll move on, ending this, with this part of the presentation, so let's move on to our results, the main part of our conference. The key events, we have opened the first MOHITO store in Italy, near Venice. That is a shopping center. We are going to plan to open another one. So we have three brands of LPP operating in Italy, Sinsay, Reserved, and now MOHITO joined these two. You can see at the bottom, we should have 13 stores of Sinsay, four of Reserved, and two of MOHITO in Italy, so there is expansion going on sizably. We focus on the Southern European market because these volumes are significant. Another element, Bosnia and Herzegovina, we have opened in the fourth quarter online market.
This is a market outside the EU, so it's more difficult to run a business because of customs dues outside the EU borders. But we're moving on, rolling e-commerce to other countries. So this is another country. 10% goes through online channel. In the map, you can see our app operating in Romania, Reserved and Sinsay, in Bulgaria and Croatia, only Sinsay app. The other apps, MOHITO and Reserved, are going to be introduced in these countries. And the third event, we have opened the logistics distribution center in Romania. You remember that we had fulfillment center warehouses for e-commerce. So far, only this, so we are adding yet another element into this logistics puzzle. We have opened this distribution center. This is going to deliver goods to this part of Europe.
This is going to shorten the delivery time and optimize the last mile logistics. We'll also provide goods for the fulfillment center, for the internet center, from clients from this part of Europe. The map that you know very well, over 1,000 stores in Poland and then Romania, Bulgaria. We are adding new stores, Croatia and Serbia. These are very important markets for us. We are building new stores, especially Sinsay brand. Look at Italy or Greece, in seven in Italy, four in Greece. So we have more than 300 more stores, 230 abroad. Still in Poland, we are building new stores, so there is still room to develop. Now, moving on to financial situation.
Year- over- year, this is 9% increase in group revenue. Looking at the revenues from 2023, we wanted to have double digits here. Offline was developing better than online. 19% increase in floor space, like-for-like over 1%. In offline, we were saving a little bit. We focused on profitability of the business, so we were savings related to marketing expenses, but cutting it by half 2% in online as our sales was a good strategy in this respect. Now, the slide referring to the sales. We updated these columns with the sales to show you the sale into trade agents. It's going to phase out. It's not very important for us. We are not focusing on these businesses that are phasing out.
We are just focusing on those that are developing, on pro-development elements in our business. We are happy about a good sales, increase in the sales in the fourth quarter. You remember that the second and the third quarters were not very good. September was so warm that, in the retail business, we were complaining as for the, growth that was negative, and the fourth quarter was very good. When you look at Sinsay, 41% increase year-on-year, that's a very good result. But all our brands had a very good growth. Not as good as Sinsay, but this is the youngest brand. We invest very much in this brand. I will show you the outlook for the first quarter. So Sinsay is selling very well, exceeded two billion in quarterly sales.
In online, we are getting back to good results. In the sales, we had some decreases. We changed our approach. We invested in our apps, and we wanted to save in the marketing expenses related to digital. We spent over PLN 400 million, but we changed our approach to electronic marketing. In the fourth quarter, you can see growth in sales in Poland and abroad, 7% year-over-year. Our apps are very convenient because they attract our customers in a nice way. Sinsay app in Poland generated 70% of all online store. Reserved, 7%, 60%, and MOHITO nearly 50%. So we want to launch these apps in other markets as well. The floor space increased by 11%, 19%, 25% abroad.
In Poland, 12%, year-over-year. So these are retail parks, smaller cities, where we can still saturate the market with Sinsay products. We have more flexible approach to this concept. The stores are a little bit smaller. We are building stores with around 500 sq m. First, we focused on the 900 and 1,000, but the markets in the southern Europe taught us that we need to be more flexible in this respect. Therefore, we are going to talk about Sinsay expansion. Further on, we have very ambitious plans for the next years. Our gross profit margin, so we have less expensive sales in terms of dollar-based sales and exchange rates, so it should be more profitable in the next months. Inventories?...
These record high inventories that we had in the second quarter of 2022, over PLN 4 billion. These were goods devoted for the Russian and Ukrainian market. We were selling it off, and now we have very good optimal levels over around PLN 3 billion in goods, in terms of floor space, 1,500, around 1,500. So these are the levels that we planned, a very good turnover. As for the inventory, good management for inventories for just in time, so we don't have any issues with the logistics. All went back to normal. Looking at the costs, the decrease here in terms of cost in our own stores, this is 5%. The rent is a little bit higher. This, the personnel and the other costs, they are decreased. What is going to be like in the future?
We should have more stable costs. As for the rent for the future, a rather stable, in terms of other, so energy, depreciation, security, but, the element of cost rate to personnel, so remuneration, goes up. So, this minimum pay also went up, so this is going to increase, and the total, costs, e-commerce, divided by, floor space, it dropped by 7%. So we want to maintain these costs, below 40%, and we are managing. So summing up, profit and loss account for the fourth quarter, increase in sales by 15%, almost PLN 5 billion. Margin is better, three percentage points. Costs are, developing, much less, so we have this significant leverage. As for the, operating profit in the fourth quarter and PLN 500 million, in the first quarter.
EBITDA is over PLN 1 billion in only one quarter. Looking at the overall results, 9% better than last year, so year-over-year, PLN 17 million. So good management of the costs and good operating profit, PLN 2, 200,000,000 . Very good net financial profit, PLN 1 billion, 6 million, over 6 million. As for the cash flows, as for the liabilities, this is what we focus on. So this, the balance between that is much better. The working capital is much better, so the inventory grows much faster. So we still have time to maneuver with this money to pay our liabilities, over PLN 1 billion as for the operating cash flows.
When I looked at these operational cash flow, every quarter generated almost PLN 1 billion or over PLN 1 billion of operating cash. So this situation is very good. You can see that the debt is on a very small level with EBITDA and IFRS 16. If we take this last factor, we have PLN 800 million net cash. When we compare that, CapEx PLN 228 million, so everything was according to our schedule, our plan. Providing you these goals, we have PLN 17.4 billion. As for our guidance, gross margin 51%-52%, so it was in the middle of this bracket. EBIT 12%+, 12%+, we have 13%.
CapEx, PLN 1.1 billion, PLN 900 million spent for store development and that saved that level significantly, a bit on the cash. That's why the dividends that are going to be paid out. So, as for the beginning of this year, we are talking about the first of February to the 25th of March, so not full two months. Sinsay, very good growth, like-for-like 26%. Online sales 54%, so this is in line with our plan, with opening stores of this brand, investing in online stores. Other brands, Reserved, Cropp, House, and MOHITO, 5% in stores and 4% in online sales. All are profitable, and if some of the brands are developing slower, they generate very good cash, very good profit that can be invested later on in the development of Sinsay and in the payout of dividends.
Our aim for this year, our target, is to increase in growth. We focused on costs last year, on profitability in online channel, and to have better profitability. We managed to do so thanks to costs. No company can become bigger just by cutting costs. We need to focus on growth in revenues, double-digit growth. We are opening new stores. We plan to develop floor space 25% year-over-year, and like-for-likes with those brands that are with us. Online profit, we want to have double-digit growth. We have ideas how to approach marketing, spending less, so a different approach, but use our online and margin tactics. So our guidance is to reach PLN 21 billion. As for group revenue, gross profit margin 52%-53%.
Cost effectiveness below revenues 40%, below 40%. CapEx PLN 1.2 billion, PLN 1.5 billion, PLN 1.2 billion for stores and safe debt level to develop in a very safe manner. Opportunities and risks, you know that very well. These opportunities for this year, these are increases minimum wages. We can see that in Poland and in other countries, the increase in remuneration, so they should have more money for consumption, especially in Southern Europe. We are developing in other markets. We are developing apps. We believe that this exchange rate, Polish to dollar, is going to be profitable. What are the risk? Increased competition, especially in value for money segment. You know about the Chinese players, Shein and Temu, they are very aggressive in online.
This is a challenge for Sinsay brand. Short recovery in consumption, we are hoping this is going to continue. The increase in minimum wage, this is also an opportunity. People are going to have more money, but for us, these are higher costs of running our business. Geopolitical instability, this is an issue that is a risk that is going to stay with us. And the last information, dividend payout. On a record level, the management of LPP will propose the annual general meeting to pay PLN 610 per share as a dividend in two periods. First, till the 30th of April, and the second in the 30th of October. So this is everything from me, and now I'm passing the floor to Marek. He's going to talk about our development strategy.
This is not something I feel more comfortable talking about than really explaining the details of the reports that had nothing to do with the truth. Usually, there was Przemek who presented in this area. I did, so I can't remember if it was 2004 or how long ago. But even before the publication of the report, you remember, I... It had been signaled that I was planning to meet you in person and appear here to talk about it. Another reflection crosses my mind. It's been over 20 years that we've been listed at the stock exchange, and when our shares had their debut, had to pay PLN 40 for them. They are much more expensive today. I'm very happy that I've not failed those who invested in us quite a lot back then.
There was a number of institutional investors. Many of them have been with us. They did not sell their shares, so I hope that what is ahead is still a very favorable time. What I want to show you is a proof that we are again in this position, in which I can tell you what we are planning. Back then, in 2021, when in 2001, we had 16 stores. So there were those who said, "Oh, if they open one store, 100 stores, that would be good." Now, we have 2,200. But I want to tell you that today, there is another turning point in our history. This moment is quite exceptional because the concept that we have is exceptional, too.
A concept that is fully owned by Marcin, who is going to tell you about it as well. But I'm going to give you a few words on the numbers. We had those brands that offered us revenue of several billion PLN, but now we have a concept that has a much higher potential in it. The concept that we kept developing ever since 2019, already between 2019 and 2023, was really responsible for most of our revenues. Now, it is PLN 16 billion, so actually PLN 5 billion of it is what was contributed by Sinsay to the omni-channel sales. So 2019 was this year in which this original Sinsay was changed into something else, and Marcin is going to tell you about that. This is something completely different than the small store for the girls.
It is meant to attract somebody quite different. You'll learn more about it, but the fact that we are entering a different segment makes it possible that we can open up many more stores. We can add many more stores. Last year, we got ready to it the entire year, 2023. Half year through, we started telling ourselves that the concept appears to be mature, and now we can start to activate an actual rollout, and opening up 200-300 stores should be attainable. So we started creating team. The teams were built in particular countries. These were leasing manager teams. This is something that takes some time.
So since June last year to the beginning of this year, this process was on, and we can tell you openly now and proudly that we can open not 250 or 300 stores of Sinsay, but 600 in 2024. Next year, it will be even more, because we see that, adjusting the size of the stores, we can do so because we reduced the count here, and the stores small, we can open more. In 2026, we will want to have over 4,000 stores. That's quite a big number. On the other hand, that is why companies such as, I know, Hennes & Mauritz is much bigger. Why? Because they have many stores. That's quite simple. We have not had this possibility.
You know, that shopping malls are not being built now, and our brands like Reserved, Cropp, or MOHITO, they were mostly located in shopping malls. They do not open up. The market is saturated in the big cities, while an attempt at selling the goods from this segment, like MOHITO or Reserved in small locations, unfortunately, does not work so well. People simply do not have enough money to buy these goods in smaller places. The Sinsay concept enables quite a considerable rollout. Here are the plans. You might say, "Well, this guy standing up there on stage certainly has a huge imagination." Okay, people will take anything. It is PowerPoint, so anything can be written and displayed. But look, these are the countries in which we would like to open the stores. We are present at multiple markets now.
We would like to do that in many different geographical areas. Then we have those leasing managers, not only in Poland, but in Romania, Czechia, many other countries. If you think about that logically in [Shamek's] presentations, as you could see, out of the 2,200 stores, we have over 1,000 stores in Poland, and Poland is not half of the region, right? Poland constitutes less than one-third of the region. When you look at the population of Central and Eastern Europe, then actually, around two, two and a half that as much, of the population, is in the other regions. So we could potentially have 2,200 stores elsewhere. In Poland, we have around 300 Sinsay stores, but [House] has 1,200, so the potential for Sinsay to grow is enormous.
I would like to show you that these are not just unattainable dreams when I talk about 600 stores this year. In order for the store to be opened, an agreement has to be signed. When it has been signed, the store needs to be designed. Then it has to be constructed and commissioned for use. In our internal lingo, we say that the store that we want to launch still in 2024 maybe have two months of a chance for the agreements to be signed, but not more than that. For example, the stores that we open in the first and second quarter, they have been in the design stage. Actually, in the first quarter, they are under construction, because the construction phase itself takes roughly 60 days, as far as I remember. So these stores are now being prepared.
Those that are going to be launched in the second quarter, some are in the design, the end of the designing phase, some of them are under construction. So in the first and second quarter of the previous year, we opened up more or less 100 stores. This year, we will open around 200, I'm talking about Sinsay itself, so twice as much as last year. And actually, this huge acceleration is going to be something we'll witness in the second half of the year, because those leasing teams that are searching for the new locations were established in the second half of 2023. And gradually, they increased in number. We added people gradually. So we can see that this acceleration in the second half will be even greater than so far.
That is why I'm pretty sure that this developmental potential of Sinsay is enormous. In order for these stores to work and to be delivered goods to, because the potential is one thing, there has to be some logistic concept and potential behind it. We can see that now, slowly, we are reaching the peak of our capacity as far as the logistic network of Sinsay goes. In the first half of this year, we're going to launch one additional warehouse, 100,000 sq m , and in February next year, another warehouse is going to be delivered. It will have around 98,000 sq m . We would like to increase by 50% our logistic capacity, and this is probably what is going to be sufficient for the two to three years to come.
Of course, this is related with big CapEx on logistics and also with a big engagement of automation of the logistical operations. But I wanted to tell you that. These new stores that we are planning to open are quite tangible. These are the plans that we have been implementing, and that is why I would like to tell you more about that, distributed into quarters. I believe that in three years to come, we are in a position to double our store count. Logically, what should follow is also doubling of our revenue, of our sales. Whether this is going to be the case, well, you are going to look into it every quarter.
We can certainly estimate certain things, but the more I closely cooperate with Przemek, and the more I listen to how detailed questions they are, they are very detailed. But in order to give you reliable information, well, you have to wait and do that quarter by quarter. You will be able to see whether our revenues keep growing. And already on the 15th of June, we'll be able to see whether what was presented here on the slides remains in the sphere of dreams, or whether it comes into fruition. And then in September, we are going to see you yet again, and again, you'll see whether it is just storytelling or perhaps the truth. A number of things can be shown, as far as our operational activities go, because we've been doing a lot.
In order to run so fast, you have no time looking at how fast we're going. So, opening up of the warehouses, this is something that's going on really quickly. A decision on expanding the warehouse in Brześciu Kujawskim was taken some three months ago, and we know that within 12 months, out of just open field, we would like to turn it into an operating warehouse. We leased 1,000 sq m warehouse, but then we knew that within four months, after the decision being taken, we want to have a distribution center, dispatch center open there. So those are the things that you inquire about addressing me. Well, sometimes I cannot give you such a precise answer as Przemek could. I'm not a finance guy.
But on the other hand, I've been thinking that certainly my colleagues will correct me when I'm wrong, 'cause they will tell me, "Look, it says 620 stores. You need to deliver this." Are you sure I have to? And what if it's 590? Is this going to be a bad result? Bad result will be by 30% higher. A colleague will have a great collection, it will sell 5% better than in Like for Like. So it's not that I'm not attached to these numbers, they are significant. We run as fast as we can. The goal is 620.
It is quite ambitious, the entire investment and leased apartments, in order for us to open 620 stores, if you opened 270 last year, well, then you need all hands on board. But on the other hand, there is this saying, to the effect, shoot for the moon, and if you miss? You know it, right? Okay, so much from me.
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you. You can see that all his heart is into it. It's difficult not to feel moved. Sometimes people ask me, "Don't you think that you are a lucky one?" Well, I agree entirely. I'm very lucky that I was born to a family I was born into, with this surname, that my parents offered me education opportunities.
So I could, for example, study for 10 years here in Warsaw. Not everybody consider what kind of threads this is related in, but I certainly try my best to jump to all the opportunities. I'm intimidated by the numbers myself, but, having said that, I'm going to go step by step towards the goal, the accelerating in as much as possible, so as to really catch up with the pace. It is my pleasure to be responsible for the youngest of our brands for Sinsay. Ever since 2013, when Sinsay was created, that was a brand for two young teenage girls.
It was a response of our company to the growing trend of two young Sinsay teens, as we called them, that were friends and liked to spend some time hanging around a retail store, having a penny or two that they got from their parents, and then they could leave the store with the biggest shopping bag full. That is something that worked for six years. Polish girls loved Sinsay. These were small stores, around 250 square meters. But now, six years later, following all these dynamic growths, we thought with the team, which way to go next? What should we do with our concept?
Here, together with the team, with Dad, we went to Spain to get inspired with the success of our friends that have 20 more years of experience than... I don't know, have you ever paid a visit to Lefties? If you like reading reports, I certainly encourage their report. Our Spanish competitors write about their stores extensively in the reports, and that's quite intriguing. But I will be bluntly true here. Somehow, we did not fall for the Spanish concept. We, we did not love that that much. We decided that we didn't like it that much, but we preferred the idea of Primark. But that was not quite it yet.
Something that we were absolutely sure of, is that the offer had to be broad, the prices should be quite convenient, and that the locations would also have to be convenient. In 2019, we changed Sinsay, adding three new departments to it. Kids clothing, kids accessories, men home, and we opened up to bigger stores. Now they are over 500 sq m . Super trends at a super price. We have very convenient locations, and this is what gives Sinsay a competitive advantage. In our price segment, e-commerce is not such an obvious answer. If you look at the numbers or if you think about Shein or Temu, mentioned by Przemek, I believe there is a huge difference because Sinsay can boast impressive growth.
If you take a look at the slides, last year, the sales did not grow, but we focused on profitability very much. When you look at the active customers, year-on-year, we have - 13%, but we are very proud of our profitability. Przemek mentioned profitability in both channels is of utmost importance to us. I claim that it is quite a big difference between us and our competitors in that we have e-commerce altogether. So I say, in Sinsay, offer is what matters most. Offer, prices, and this is what we have under our fashion legacy. That is the legacy in the fact that we actually do have the e-commerce channel active. We are happy that it works smooth and it keeps developing. We are proud of the fact that it is very profitable.
Ladies and gentlemen, and I wouldn't be myself if I didn't tell you two words about Sinsay application. It's something that, again, e-commerce in our segment. Well, it makes us stand out. Two years after the launch, we have had a 27% share of the purchases. That is not quite typical for our industry, so having such great results, reaching 77% in March, is something amazing. Those applications shop twice as often as the other customers. I could tell you about the application extensively, but what is best to do is for the investors, for you, for the general, is simply to install it and use it. Myself, I love doing it together with my kids. That's a kind of ritual.
In the evenings, we like to click and add something to our cart. I know that reaching the level 120 is our ambition, because if you buy for PLN 120, then you not pay for the delivery. In Sinsay, it's not so easy to do that, but I really encourage you to do that with young kids. I've got a three and a five-year-old at home, so you might appear what a challenge it was to actually go to a retail park with them. Because anything that is at the level they can reach for, or sometimes, you know, it happens that you leave the store not having paid for something that you then found in your child's hand, and all that means is you need to return and pay.
So again, I encourage you to now download the application to order and hopefully to come even before Easter. Sinsay is not a regular apparel store. It is not a regular e-store either. What makes us stand out against the backdrop of our Spanish, South African or Chinese competitors is, first of all, our offer and also convenience. Convenience in the sense of location, accessibility, so the shops being stores being in close vicinity, and also having the possibility of picking up the goods from our stores or order them online. That's all the result of our fashion legacy that we are very proud of. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Now, the time has come to give the floor to you, ladies and gentlemen. We are moving on to our question- and- answer session.
As mentioned, at the beginning, we'll start with the questions from you, and there is a request that you use the microphone. So first of all, please raise your hand, then our team members will approach with a microphone. We would like for the content of your questions to be audible, not only here in the room, but also to those of you who follow us online. Then we'll move on to questions that we've been collecting, quite a lot of them already, as I'm being told by my friend here. The session has been planned for 40 minutes, 20 minutes for you and 20 minutes for those who ask their questions online. Of course, it would be great if you could introduce yourselves and tell us what entity you represent. The floor is yours.
Kamil Kosiński, Puls Biznesu. I wanted to ask you about sales to trade agents. During the previous conference, you mentioned that you did not profit on selling to Russia through the agents. Today's presentation, there is a slide, 43, the one you did not show today. It appears that the zero margin is something that are actually valid ever since the beginning of the year. So do you make profit or do you not make profit selling to the trade agents? You say that you have nothing to do with the Russian company, but Hindenburg's report claims that the goods are the same. So far, the company has presented it all in the way that you design your own clothing yourselves. So don't you care that somebody buys, actually your designs in the same factories?
Well, yes, we told you that we do not make profit, which is true. Starting from January this year, 0% margin within the transitory period on those goods. But in previous years, 2022, when we started the transitory period, and 2023, we did have a margin, and the reason was to cover these costs that our organization incurs supporting the business. At the beginning of our activities, supporting the Russian business within the transition period, we had more such activities that the cost of which we had to cover. That is why the margins were there. Now, the margin is zero. This transition period has its goal.
Having contacts with the investor, we can control at least hope the money to be paid, because it might be the case that they say, "We will not pay you anything," and then we could do nothing about it. So the idea is that when we support the successful development of the investors, we can really focus on transferring knowledge to them, hoping that then we would have a win-win situation. We would recover our receivables, and then at the end, they would be able to run their business. Then, when the transition period comes to an end, 2026, or we hope that it will be even earlier, even by the end of this year, we will each go our own ways.
Now, referring to the clothes being the same, yes, we agree to it in the transition period. This is something that stems from the agreement. So the clothes are made in the same labels as the same factories. The labels are different. Again, that's something that follows from the transition agreement. That company simply has not acquired the necessary competencies that would make them design. Of course, they do pay some of the models, and they do have separate models, but there is this common part for a while under this transition period for them simply to have enough time to acquire the competencies necessary. Transferring of these competencies is not something that happens in a flash. It's something that you need to learn how to place orders, how to learn how to design. It takes time.
Well, yes, yes, we do not feel good about it. We find it disturbing. But on the other hand, I can also tell you that we would like to get back PLN 900 million for investors. And of course, we can stop any kind of contact with the Russian company, and we will agree that we don't care. This option is always there. As I've said, we have many questions. Why don't we give a chance to other participants to ask their questions?
Łukasz Wachełko, WOOD & Company. I have two questions. The majority of my questions have actually been answered. So between 2021 and 2022, there was quite considerable an increase of other sales from 19% to 26%, and this level was kept in 2023. What is under the other label?
The other means selling to trade agents. This is not any other sales. This is what we've told you about. But I don't know, from 90%?
Well, that was something that we had in 2021, when Russia was still in our structures. From 2020, this percentage of sales was PLN 1 billion, and this is less than 10% of the entire sales figures.
Now, the owner standing behind the trading agents, this mysterious Chinese consortium, could we learn more about this mystery?
Well, again, we passed on the information about these persons to the banks that we've been cooperating with, as Marek said. We also passed on the information to our auditor. We wouldn't like, in public, to review the names and surnames of these people. Nobody would want to be exposed this way.
But these persons have been verified by the banks, by the auditor, and also, the data will be given to KNF, Financial Supervisory Authority. So as for these entities will be able to see whether these persons are not in the sanction list and so on, and whether they are really fit to run the business. Another question, please.
[Janusz Szkopek], mBank. You've mentioned that you are also closely watching the Russian company. What part of the, w hat proportion of the goods are is identical with your products? And how much of the independent share they have?
We do not have any insight into what they order themselves, but in terms of our collections, it is between 20%-40% of our collections that we offer here in Poland. So I can tell you that I know what I have, right? I know what we have, and I know what percentage of what we have is owned by them. What share it constitutes in their business, this is something I don't know.
[audio distortion] , I understand that the agents will generate PLN 40 million of losses on EBITDA this year, and last year, that was a profitable business. It might be controversial, but I'd rather you transferred the profits for charity purposes in Ukraine. So why do you expect losses this year when the sales, sale is already there in Russia? Why is there such a big growth in online in Q1?
That's quite impressive year-on-year. Did something happen, for example, higher costs of marketing? And what do you think about launching sales into Sundays a month with high costs of employment?
Let me respond to both questions. In terms of transferring or supporting Ukraine last year, when, well, when the war broke out, PLN 28 million is what we offered supporting Ukraine. And I think that still many people is employed and works from Ukraine. I'm talking about those who decided to move from the Ukrainian company to ours. As for the realistic calculation of profitability or profit, I can tell you that in this kind of transaction, trying to thinking about the general costs and, well, this is something that is rather difficult.
We've done the best we could, but again, this is probably Przemek is going to frown upon me as a financial director. I'm looking at it business-wise. It is the business that is dying out, and when I'm looking at the business that is fading out, and well, asking them about profitability is not something that I would want to focus on. Withdrawing from the Russian market, we wanted to minimize the overall losses for the company, and one, it's not just the profit expressed in values, but also we have assets, so the money that the company has. For us today, it is more important to recover the money in as short a time as possible than to simply focusing on the values, because even our expenses that dropped.
We take the risks, for example, when we go to the markets of new countries such as Finland, we incur losses, or in the U.K., where the same happens. We just simply agree with that, that when we take certain business decisions, we expose ourselves to the risk of losses. This is our business decision for the Russian business to be closed as soon as possible with such losses. Of course, these are just estimates. Another question, let me remind you, it was about, okay, the increase in e-commerce. Last year, we focused very much on e-commerce to be highly profitable. Last year, we looked at making sure that the profitability of this business can be close to the one generated by stores. Today, we take a different approach.
We would like to compete with the Chinese competitors that sell a lot, sell a lot, so we wanted to, to focus on the sales. We know how to manage profitability, so, we have the growth as we have in sales. And, also, our products or our goods today are far better than in the past because they were pre-produced, manufactured in more favorable conditions. When you look back in the first quarter last year, we still had those post-war goods with huge issues around it. I can't remember the third question. Okay, Sundays. These decisions are not in our hands, so we simply will see what happens, what is decided by the government in the sales. On Sunday, we have quite a big increase in e-commerce sales.
As was mentioned here by Marcin, people gladly click on Sundays, so we do not treat it as something that... Well, we have no impact whatsoever whether Sundays will be active in terms of the sales in stores. I want to ask about the Russian business.
I understand that you receive consecutive tranches in relation with your withdrawal. When are you expecting consecutive tranches? What values are we talking about? And, given the chaos that we have now, if you do not receive those values, are your developmental plans, for example, of developing Sinsay brand, independent of that?
Our developmental plans are completely non-dependent of whether the Russian company pays us back their dues.
Here, in terms of development in focus and development in Central and Eastern Asia, we have our own plans. Of course, there, we would like to simply recover the assets. We have no intention whatsoever to return the, w e simply want to get back as much as possible. Now, what you are saying in terms of w hether we will recover the and, all it takes. Well, the companies withdrawing from the Russian market, they, well, they, have different results. One of the dailies, two days ago, published, information to the point that the company, a company, had to be sold for 10%, and this company will have to deliver goods until 2025, some components and so on. So, you know, withdrawing from the Russian market, unfortunately, is not a piece of cake. It's not beer and skittles, not comfortable, not easy. Now, when we talk about our expansion, Russia does not exist to us. We do not have that market.
Yes, in the past, we had planned expansion there, a number of stores to be launched there in the Russian Federation. Today, this is not a topic anymore.
Prior to 2020, our plans could have been grand, but after the outbreak of the war, the plans are simply not even considered. We are not planning to return to the Russian Federation. We are so happy to have so many countries of Central and Eastern or and Southern Europe, where we are about to launch our stores, invest in e-commerce, fulfillment center, distribution center, or infrastructure, broadly understood, that will make it possible for us to run trade activities in a faster, more convenient manner in those countries, Ukraine, Serbia, Bosnia, and so on and so forth. Do you have any other questions?
[Lukasz Norzek], private investor. I wanted to ask you about buyback. You were saying that this is an option to consider. Anything happened in this respect? That's first question. The second is split of the shares as an element that could encourage a retail investor to invest in the shares.
As for buyback, it's more complicated. You realize that in present legal situation, Semper Simul has 60% of votes for the annual meeting, so we should have parallel resolution. Then the regulation, and the regulations change, the foundation cannot have more. If they wanted to buy one more share, they could then announce the call for 70% of LPP shares. This is enormous amount of money. The bank would not allow that. So we are considering this option, but this should be combined with a declaration of the foundation that it is going to sell, so it will be obliged to sell. The second thing, the split.
As far as I know, Przemek mentioned that there are instruments allowing us to purchase partially the shares. The price is high, but I know one company that has more expensive shares. You know, probably the name, and this is $500,000, Berkshire Hathaway, and they are managing it, so.
Another question from the room?
Thank you. Michał Szymański, TFI. You have more information right now why Sinsay has such an opportunity for development, for the success, taking into account the scale compared to other brands that with such small growth you have reached a certain saturation level. You mentioned one more element, the fact that Sinsay stores can be developed not in shopping centers, but somewhere else, in different locations. This is not the only factor behind the success of the Sinsay brand.
So I will give the floor to this young man.
Well, that was a question to you. No, no, no. Well, Marcin is responsible for the development of Sinsay. He's doing everything in this respect and managing the expansion of this brand. As for my experience, I'm supporting them, and when they are not sure, I encourage them to pursue certain activities. I believe that they have, they, not me, they have discovered a very unique element. This uniqueness of this concept involves as follows: we provide goods to small cities, small towns. When you have 10,000 or 20,000 inhabitants, when you compare that to 100,000 or 200,000 inhabitants, you have families probably in these smaller cities. You know how they count their money, thinking very carefully before spending them.
So a difference in this concept for this brand means that this is not the standard value for money as, for example, Pepco or KiK type of stores, or TEDi or other such stores. This is a store bringing razzle dazzle of a big city. This allows them to live differently, to buy much more, but more beautiful products. We combine thanks to the development of Sinsay, together with Reserved, Cropp, House, and MOHITO. Sinsay, as a concept, looks totally different. You haven't been probably in Sinsay stores, I believe. Maybe 10% or less than 10% of people in this room. We were with Marcin in Veszprém, in Miskolc, in Hungary, where we have 10,000 inhabitants.
Or when I was traveling with my second son to Kępno Baranów, this is a big shopping center or retail park. There is a store looking completely different, uniquely different. So the interior is very modern, is glittering, is nice, with good lighting. The goods are displayed nicely, and the quality of the goods is designed. This is not purchased ad hoc, it's just designed goods. So when we add on top of that, our competence as for the company we've been developing for 10 years, as for building internet stores. When you are thinking, let's say, whether Pepco, KiK, or other stores, they do not have this option. Sinsay, focused on this big experience of LPP company, developed for 20 or 30 years.
So when we combine right now, the fact that this store is located in a smaller city or town, then we have a mobile app. You know very well that, young people, young people in, in these, cities, they do not live without a smartphone. This is their whole world. So when we combine these two elements, and when we think that this app, plus the store being a store from a big city with good quality clothes, well-designed clothes, so I can feel, we have this golden grail. I believe we are, in 2001 again. 20 minutes passed by, but, still,
That will be the last question from the room, and then we will move on to the questions, from our online participants. [Jędrzej Bąkowski] .
I have a question as for the development in smaller towns. The barrier usually involves accessibility as for the area. How-- What does it look like in terms of... How do you see the development of the market as for the floor space in these smaller parts and accessibility of the small, of the floor area?
Well, good question. Of course, we are looking... We are actively listening first to our partners, where we open the floor space, and we are also looking for them very actively. Sometimes these are not very obvious locations in Warsaw, Blue City, Reduta, or if you visited Łopuszańska or Chmielna streets, these are not obvious locations. In smaller cities of 10,000 inhabitants, these are post-supermarket areas or of course in new retail parks, this is the best location.
They develop large or modern, so to say, building, and with our concept, we approach them. So we are actively looking for the partners in Poland and abroad. We are not limiting our activities to cities in Poland of 10,000 inhabitants. I don't like this saturation level. This is not the case for Sinsay. There is still a lot room to develop. This is not just a pie to cut and to share. We need to offer a client something the client expects or the client wants. First of all, we need to deliver that. Therefore, I'm very cautious as for this saturation level, topping up, so this is very active search. Pepco has 3,000 stores. We have less than 1,000 in Sinsay.
So development of leasing managers means that they can find, of course, space for that. It is not going to, the saturation is not going to happen within the next two or three years.
So right now, ladies and gentlemen, we move on to internet questions. Magdalena Kopaczewska from Investor Relations with the questions. We will have maybe the first group of questions.
Thank you. So we stay with Sinsay brand, who is designing women's clothes for designer for Sinsay, and how long this person is working in LPP?
Well, it's a very direct question. I cannot give you that very precisely. We as a team, we had with the team, we had a trip to Spain.
We were inspired by different concepts, but this is a very unique mix. You can see that you can hear it at our meetings that everyone is unique. But I believe that really, truly, when this is apparel heritage. Everyone working in LPP, whether this is an agent or person from logistics or from administration, they live fashion, they design from scratch, from a thread or from a single thread. We have a big team of people doing that, designing, people responsible for technology, for the structure of the apparel. So we are very proud that this looks like how it is. You can see Sinsay example here.
So I would like to add that two of the designers work the same amount of years as me, so you can see that, digging out. Sinsay team consists of people who were working in LPP for a long time. One person that worked there for 30 years, I believe, but also young people who came within the last couple of years. So this is not an external team.
One more question as for Sinsay, how advanced it is as for the recruiting of directors for the Sinsay stores?
Very precise operational question. We are working on that. We have our in-house HR departments, we have people. Frankly speaking, many of our managers, these are people who worked in the company for a long time. We have a significant network of these stores.
What is good is that 80%, these are women working as managers, regional managers. So there is this career ladder. We are supported by external companies, specialists for sales, but the managers, these are people from LPP. It's not done in this way that we are now recruiting a person for a store that is going to open in the fourth quarter of this year. This is done gradually, one by one, so we have large teams working on that.
Okay, another question, again referring to Sinsay, but to Przemek. What is the maturity level for Sinsay store?
With Sinsay, we have 3 years of maturity. First year, this is 85% as for the sales.
The return, we have separate for each store, so we want to have this time of return scheduled for two years. When Sinsay can experience cannibalism on other markets? It is happening right now in Warsaw, Reduta or Blue City. This is happening right now. These are two sites. Through online, this is visible, or through stationary stores, but I prefer to look at it from the perspective of supporting one another. So we have a lot of experiences when, in a town, Koszalin, like 20,000 inhabitants, the sale with two stores is much greater. The one that was earlier, when we opened the new one, their sales dropped, but on average it is growing.
So Pepco, 1,000 stores in Poland, this is not yet our case. When we reach this level, then we are going to discuss what to do next, because this might be problematic, but we are not there yet. Changing the topic, are you going to publish details as for this transition, transition period and call option? So details, details as for this transition period and call option. There is put option, no call option. We have provided you this data, and we would like to close this topic and move on to business as usual, because our plans are very ambitious. As for Hindenburg report, what's the final stage between LPP and Hindenburg, research report? When are you going to appoint an independent auditor to evaluate the, the results of Hindenburg, report as for the, barcodes?
Well, I explained that already. And this was done on behalf of the Russian company, so that we do not double these barcodes. Why from January 2024 you stop this option as for the agency? Well, sales, we want to complete that as soon as possible. We are seeing that the repayment is going too slow, and we would like to complete that... We don't want to have profits, even operational profits, on the other side. We just want to close that as soon as possible and forget it. What is your operation- what is your cooperation right now with the financial institution after Hindenburg report presentation? Do you have any more difficult situations where the factoring loans or reverse factoring are available still on the same level?
This is a question to me. I can see the representatives of banks in this room. I'm very happy because of your presence. There is no change as for bank's approach to LPP company. Of course, we were talking on a daily basis with the banks, and we also had one teleconference with the banks, me, Marek, and the banks. We are asking all the questions from the banks. No bank, as of today, withdrew from any financial decision. Any covenants of the agreement were violated, so the cooperation, of course, is as usual, plus questions that we are answering on a daily basis so that the banks have all the information. Whether financial institutions wanted any additional security? No.
Now, questions from Mr. [Grzegorz Kujawski.]
What are the developments as for the profitability for Sinsay stores? 24 months. What is CapEx for the stores? 430 sq m, EUR 1 per sq m. The profitability of Sinsay, compared to the group, what is the significant development of the group based on this brand, shifting the profitability of EBIT group? This is similar to average, in terms of Sinsay and the group. Do you think about the guidance for 2024? Taking that into account for 2024, can you discuss the performance one and two, the first and the second quarter, as for the gross margin versus SG&A, the guidance?
Well, I would like to refer to that, because this is such a detailed question.
It would mean that we are not going to talk about guidance, but annual guidance, but quarterly guidance. So, quarterly results, you can see after the quarter, so we don't, don't just want to overcalculate various things because it will be too difficult. We are not doing that on the external market. When I look, the conference on the 2027 was planned before Hindenburg report. Now we explained the entire process, but I looked very precisely the reports of two big companies, Inditex and H&M. I participate, and Magda participated in the teleconference. You know that the level of general information is so big that it's incomparable to what we are providing in our report. We are just with our pens down, giving you everything. So, the question is whether you want to even go deeper.
I understand that this is maybe not politically correct what I'm saying, but I said, Przemek, we cannot go crazy. We cannot go into such an operational level and so detailed, because then somebody else would like to run business for us or is just misguiding our investors. Because at the end of the day, when you think about it, what's most important? Most important is, at the end of the quarter, to show reliable results for our auditor, a reliable one. But within these results, what's most important, to provide you that the company is growing and is generating profit. Whether...
Well, when we have designers, when we have different brands in these questions, we have different issues, whether House is doing better, Cropp is doing worse, whether this is related to the Russian market, withdrawing from this market, entering a new one. I'm talking to our designers. I'm not interested in what you are selling, whether this is sand or stones, whether this is beautiful apparel. The offer we provide to our clients should be purchased by our clients. Of course, everything must be legal, not harmful to people, but there are certain services to supervise that, to control that. So in the factories where we produce where apparel, the children are not doing, we are not using chemical substances that are toxic. But for us, as the investors, the most important information is the result of the quarter.
So every quarter, we are presenting our result. Look at the report of H&M, look at Inditex. You will not see floor space, square meters of particular store. There is no information about that. Guidance of Inditex, they say, "Maybe they will increase the floor space by one digit." Historically speaking, you don't have this information, this historical data in H&M. You don't know the profit from other brand. We just have one general brand, H&M. But going into so many details, in my opinion, of course, I understand that well, we are not going to change our level of reporting. So we will say that we, we've changed something because of the Hindenburg report, but such detailed report is sufficient or maybe even too much.
And in such details, you may draw false conclusions without realizing how important the influence on our company comes from the apparel, the collections. Well, we need to provide an offer, and our customers need to buy it. In the guidance, annual or half-year guidance, it doesn't make more sense. Sorry about such a long explanation, but it may be it is my devotion to business and not just particular data. Another-
Ask about shortening of the transition period. Is it going to be related to the write-offs of expected receivables? If not, what would we owe it to that?
No, we certainly hope that we will get the most of the amount expected or the total of it. We will see what the future holds, but generally, we are getting the tranches every quarter. The first one for the stores has come in. We're hoping for the consecutive ones to come in as well. So we hope that the entire transaction is closed as planned. As of today, we don't see any major risks that this should not happen.
Unfortunately, we are running out of time, so before I read the final question, I just wanted to tell you that all the questions that we received will be answered. We will do that via the investor relations email.
Last question, "Is Pepco a direct competitor to Sinsay? If so, what advantages does Sinsay have?"
Well, everybody is Sinsay's direct competitors, KiK, TEDi, Primark, and online, Shein, Temu. We've been observing them all. I sometimes have that with if you have well, Gucci's T-shirt is also a competitor because in the end, it is a piece of apparel that you put, but it's a completely different segment, completely different price.
But back to the question, yes, I think, I think it is, but, well, the difference between us, as I've mentioned, first of all, the offer. Our offer is really an offer that has been created by entire teams of designers, graphic designers, sellers, and so on. This is our fashion heritage that we pride ourselves in. We are very proud that we design every single thread and label. All this is designed by us, by our people, by our graphic teams. So in terms of offer, this is the major factor that differs us from Pepco. In terms of e-commerce or any kind of presence online, us being present there with the application, that's another major difference.
Before we call it a day, I have a question to you. I assume that many of you have children. I'm not going to ask you for a show of hands, because I assume that half of you would raise your hands in the air. But actually, the question is for you to raise your hand if you've ever bought anything at a Sinsay store.
Thank you. Quite a lot of you. That means that you know something about the brand. I thought it was worse, but actually, quite a show of hands it was. Let us close this meeting, having this nice image in our mind and memory. So I'd like to thank those of you who have accompanied us online. Can you still hear me okay? Thank you very much for the questions.
Thank you for accepting our invitation. Another meeting, summarizing another quarter of this year, and the second quarter will be in June. So see you in June. Have a great day. Thank you very much. All the best also for the Easter time.