Earnings Call: Q2 2021

Mar 4, 2021

Earnings release

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Manchester United Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question and answer session. We would like to remind everyone This conference call is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Karina Friedman, Head of Investor Relations for Manchester United. Thank you, Grant. Hello, everyone, and welcome to Manchester United's Q2 2021 Earnings Call. Our call is being recorded and webcast, A replay of this call will be available on our site for 30 days. Before we begin and as a matter of formality, we would like to remind everyone that this conference call will include estimates and forward looking statements, which are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from these statements. Any such estimates or forward looking statements should be considered along with the cautionary note included with our earnings release as well as additional risk factor discussions in our filings with the SEC. With us today on our call this evening, Ed Woodward, our Executive Vice Chairman Richard Arnold, our Group Managing Director Cliff Beatty, our Chief Financial Officer and Hemant Tasseo, our Director of Corporate Development. I will now turn the The call over to our Executive Vice Chairman for opening remarks. Ed? Thank you, Carina, and thank you, everyone, for joining us. While our focus today is on the 2nd fiscal quarter, it's also an opportunity to reflect on what's been an extraordinarily challenging year for Manchester United, For football and of course, for society as a whole, it's almost 12 months since the pandemic began to tighten its grip on the U. K, and we were required to Close Old Trafford to support us. As I've said before, their absence has only highlighted the importance of fans to the fabric of football. We can't wait to welcome them back. However, while matchdays have not been the same, we are proud to play their part in keeping football going to maintain a Precious source of entertainment and community for fans around the world. I want to pay tribute in particular to our coaching, medical and support staff We've enabled this hectic schedule of matches to continue in very difficult circumstances. The past year has tested our club's resilience and values, and I'm pleased with how we've performed in both respects. Since the start of the pandemic, the club and our foundation together provided over £5,000,000 of charitable support to good causes in our local community and beyond. This reflects our commitment to being a positive source in society and a source of pride for our fans. It also reflects the dedication All of our employees and robustness of our finances fueled by commercial business and responding to this once a century level crisis. In Europe, we continue to play an active role through the ECA in discussions on the future of UEFA's European Club Competitions after the current competition cycle ends in 2024. While many details are yet to be resolved, we look forward to seeing the full final proposal from UEFA We anticipate will include greater involvement of clubs in the governance and control of the competition and of course, a new format with greater appeal to fans and which crucially will continue to go hand in hand with thriving domestic leagues. Demand for life football remains strong, We feel very confident about the long term prospects for our sport. In the near term, our focus remains on preparing for the return of fans to Old Trafford. We're seeing some positive examples around the world of live events with reduced capacity crowds delivered safely with social distancing. The Successful rapid rollout of vaccines and falling rates of infections in the U. K. Makes us optimistic about the government's roadmap out of the lockdown, including plans for the gradual reopening of sports stadium to spectators beginning this spring. Initially, this will be with limits on capacity. We're hopeful of crowds ramping back up to full capacity next season. As we look beyond the pandemic, We feel more confident than ever about the power of sport to unite and inspire across generations, cultures and ideologies. Football, in particular, is playing an active role in the campaign against racism another form of discrimination that still sadly plays a challenge for our game and our society today. We as a club will continue to be at the forefront of those efforts. In summary, I'd like to reiterate this club's strong underlying fundamentals. Return of our fans to all traffic enabled by strong vaccine deployment in the U. K. And the easing of lockdown restrictions is no doubt a light at the end of the tunnel in the near term. And while we're pleased about this season's on pitch progress and the strength of our current squad, We are as equally bullish on our long term prospects. Our best in class digital operations, increased fan engagement, Enduring sponsor partnerships that facilitate investment in the playing squad, the strength of our academy and most importantly, our self sustaining operating model We'll enable this club to emerge from this crisis in a stronger relative position. In a moment, I'll hand over to our Group Managing Director, Richard Arnold, to update you on our For the final comment, I would like to extend my thanks to all our teams both on and off the pitch Thank you, Ed, and thank you to everyone for joining us today. As we reflect on the past year, few understood at the outset of the pandemic the full ramifications of the exponential spread of this virus for the huge social and economic impact that global lockdown measures would impose. To echo Ed's sentiments, This past year has tested all of our resilience, and we are eager for the continued widespread vaccination rollout, which will help save lives and steadily but surely put us all back on a path towards normality. At the same time, we recognize that not everything will revert to the way things were before and that the pandemic has created an opportunity for us to rebuild better. It's been said many times that the pandemic and Global Forward has accelerated trends that were already in motion, and this is no doubt true of the impact That this has had on our operations as a club, whether it be providing a more flexible and modern workplace or by deepening our digital connections with our fans and followers. Despite the uncertain And the profound absence of our supporters at Old Trafford this season. We're proud of the way we've responded to crisis with resilience and adaptability. While the ongoing global pandemic remains a significant headwind, We've quickly pivoted and transformed many aspects of our business, the results of which We expect we'll generate benefits for many years to come. As Ed briefly touched on, We're humbly proud of the positive difference we were able to make in our communities in 2020. As Chairman of our foundation, I'm really proud of the work that has been accomplished. We supported our community with approximately $5,000,000 in contributions, including direct donations, fundraising efforts and payments to our casual staff. We believe that nearly 93,000 unique people benefited from our efforts across the NHS, local schools and food banks in 2020. We've also recently opened Old Trafford for use by the NHS as a training center for hundreds of volunteers that are taking part in the national vaccination program. And we will continue initiatives of this kind To help our communities for as long as the pandemic continues. We will also remain committed to advancing Diversity and equality in our club and in our sport. The club was one of the founding signatories of the FA's Football Leadership Diversity Our commitment to diversity spans all areas of our club, and our aim To achieve appropriate representation of all underrepresented groups in society, including the upgrade of our accessible Facilities was completed at the end of 2020, and Old Trafford will be better equipped than ever to welcome back all of our fans. As you all may be aware, last week, the government released its 4 step roadmap for the easing of the national lockdown. If plans proceed according to the current schedule, crowds of up to 10,000 people will be allowed to return to Football stadiums in the U. K. After May 17, with all restrictions ending from the 21st June. It is our understanding that this would mean a return to normal operations at Old Trafford. Obviously, this will continue to be subject of circumstances in the U. K. In parallel, we're establishing protocols to deal with testing, Passports and ongoing distancing. We know that our season ticket holders, members and other fans are very eager to return, We expect our supporters will treasure these shared experiences now more than ever before. We look forward to sharing more details on our plans on our next earnings call, including our plans for next season when we hope to return to full capacity. Moving now to our business update. Turning first to our digital and media operations. Given the absence of Match Day supporters, we continue to prioritize digital initiatives to drive engagement As part of our ongoing club wide digital transformation, the rate of that acceleration has increased and we've continued to invest not just in platforms and technologies, but we have also further strengthened our leadership team in digital marketing and CRM. In social media, we continue to broaden our geographic and demographic reach as we launched a club presence on several new and growing social media Our women's team launched in July 2018 has recently surpassed 1,000,000 followers on Instagram, amassing a bigger following than 9 Premier League men's clubs. On our own platforms, We have developed and launched several new mobile app enhancements and features, specifically our gamified predictions and streaks functionalities, Which has significantly increased our mobile app usage this quarter, and more users Are now logged into our mobile app than ever before. More compelling and personalized data led engagement have benefited in a superior end to end fan experience. A strong engagement in turn drove strong traffic to our e commerce channel. I think it's useful to note that e commerce merchandise sales for the 6 month period have already surpassed the entire prior season. In fact, all 3 of this season's men's kits achieved record launch day sales, And we're also enjoying record sales of our women's kit. And this momentum is continuing into the current quarter as we achieved record e commerce sales in January. While these stats are impressive, We believe we are only just getting started, and we see significant open runway On a gross basis, we are seeing that these sales have helped to offset the revenue loss at the megastore, which was closed on December 31, We expect the store to reopen the fans on April 12 in accordance with the timeline communicated by the government. Turning to our sponsorship operations. We believe the market continues to stabilize and we're seeing a flight to quality across the industry. Since the Q1, We've signed renewal deals with 2 of our global partners and continue to support all of our partners with new and exclusive interactive digital events. In mid December, we took our I Love United Support and Partner programming to India virtually via a multi platform broadcast featuring local hosts and influencers. This event generated 24,000,000 MU impressions, channel impressions and 223,000 supporters stream the event live. We also recently held an I Love United USA fan event last weekend, with 23 of our partners activating across the event, Hosted by high profile United supporters and featuring ULE and our recent U. S. Signing, Tobin Heath. This event was viewed by nearly 6 times the amount of viewers of our India event with 1,400,000 live streaming via Facebook, YouTube, Turning to China. United was the most engaging football club on China's Weibo and WeChat platforms for the 2021 season this quarter. Weibo, Manchester United is currently the most followed We also launched on the Doyin platform simultaneously with our global TikTok launch in November, And we've earned nearly 2,000,000 followers and over 17,000,000 likes in the brief three months since launch, becoming the fastest Off line, we remain on track for a late March, early April opening of our first And finally, though we continue to expect near term challenges, there remains much to be optimistic about. We will continue to relentlessly pursue the many growth opportunities that remain for our club, And we are excited about the potential to deepen our community engagement via our own platforms as well as launch on new and emerging platforms, which we expect will drive engagement to the next generation of supporters. Ultimately, the strong commercial engine of this club, Inspired by our commitment to deliver the engagement our fans demand drives a virtuous cycle and fuels our ability to continuously and sustainably Reinvest in the team, fortifying our club's future, not just over seasons, but over decades. And with that, I will now turn the call over to our CFO, Cliff Baty, to review the results the details of our results and discuss our financial outlook. Cliff? Thank you, Richard. I'll first talk to our fiscal year results, which continue to be impacted by the COVID-nineteen pandemic and related Given this uncertainty, we will not be providing any forward revenue or adjusted EBITDA guidance today. As a reminder, year on year comparisons relative to fiscal 2020 have been impacted by our return to the Champions League and the number of games played in the year. Total revenues for the quarter were $172,800,000 up $4,400,000 versus the prior year due to the impact of the Champions League revenues relative to the Europa League. Adjusted EBITDA was $70,300,000 down just $1,800,000 from the prior year quarter. Turning to the key items and the results. Total commercial revenues were $62,600,000 on ship revenues of $37,800,000 $7,300,000 lower than the prior quarter, due primarily to a one off credit in the prior year together with lower revenues owing to our shared sponsor extension. Merchandising and Licensing revenues were $24,800,000 2.7 percent below the prior year figure, which reflects a significant contribution in our mega Significant reduction in our megaspill trade due to COVID impact, offset by increased new commerce royalties and wholesale revenue. Broadcasting revenues increased by $44,000,000 to $108,700,000 due to the Champions League revenues compared to the prior year year ago quarter. In addition, all 6 group stage games were played in the Q2 of this season. Max Day revenues for the quarter were $1,500,000 Membership fees and property income. 10 home matches are played at Old Trafford with no fans in attendance, including 3 Champions League matches. Moving down the income statement, operating expenses excluding depreciation and amortization increased by 5.6% versus prior quarter. This includes total wages, which were up 15.2%, primarily due to higher player wages with participation in the Champions League. Other operating expenses for the quarter decreased by $4,600,000 reflecting the impact of playing matches behind 12 Doors. Depreciation and amortization costs were $36,100,000 an increase of $1,200,000 versus the prior year. Net finance income for the period was $19,700,000 an increase of $4,400,000 due to foreign exchange gains on the unhedged portion of our U. S. Debt. As we have mentioned in previous quarters, our cash interest cost in U. S. Dollars remained broadly consistent year on year. Turning now to our balance sheet. At the end of December, net debt was $455,500,000 an increase of $64,300,000 over the prior year, reflecting the impact of COVID through loss of Match Day revenues, resulting in us drawing down $60,000,000 of our available $200,000,000 credit lines during the quarter. At the 31st December, we had just over $80,000,000 of cash on the balance sheet. Finally, we expect player cash CapEx in fiscal year 2021 It will be approximately $110,000,000 with amortization of $127,000,000 Looking forward to the current quarter, It's worth noting that we'll be lapping the early stages of the pandemic and the initial cancellation of matches, which occurred beginning March 12 last year. We therefore expect to play an additional 5 Premier League matches in the current quarter versus the prior year. In closing, I'll reiterate the sentiment of Ed and Richard. We are well positioned to weather the current uncertainty and optimistic for the future. And with that, we now will take your questions. Operator? We will now begin the question and answer session. Our first question today will come from Laurent Valjesku with Exane BNP Paribas. Please go ahead. Hey, guys. This is Zian on for Laurent. A couple for me. First, on the retail side, down only 3% as you mentioned. I thought that was pretty impressive The retail megastore was closed. You mentioned e commerce was strong. Can you help dimensionalize a bit How big e commerce is for you guys and how big was the decline in the megastore? Richard, do you want to take that? Yes. So I think the first thing to understand is that There's a difference in the gross versus net reporting between the what goes through the megastore where we report The gross retail passing through to consumers, whereas the e commerce, we report the Licensed share of net profit as revenue, so a difference in mechanism. In terms of the drop, that's been offset by both the explosion in the scale of the license profit As well as wholesale, that's the sale by us to our e commerce license partner of products that's offset The reduction. So whilst the gross numbers are broadly the same year on year, that translates In total, that translates to a smaller reduction than you would expect purely from the closing of the mega store. Okay, got it. Thanks. And then second on broadcasting rights, as you think about it longer term, I think there was An article recently about the NFL potentially getting double the fees. I I was wondering how you're thinking about the growth profile for the broadcasting revenue and maybe if you can break it out between maybe domestic broadcast Right versus international, what how you're kind of thinking about potential growth rates over time? Let me start with that and then maybe Cliff, if you jump in. I mean, NFL is the best example, I think, to point to In terms of Premium Sports League, and I think the way we think about The growth that we expect to come, I think it's likely to be less lower rate of growth than we've experienced the last two cycles in In the U. K. Rights sales, but set off that reduction of growth is covered by Still big growth that we're seeing on the international side. So the cycle 2021, 2024 that the Premier League Have been selling during COVID as well as a couple of deals just at the start, has seen some good growth rates. So I can't really I don't really want to put a number on year on year growth, but there is positivity that we're hearing with regard to the deals as they come through Even during COVID, and I think that's the same as the NFL, at least in terms of positivity despite the environment that obviously they're selling the rights in. Cliff, is there anything to add on that? No, I think you mentioned, I mean, we had the net deal you Which happened just before sort of COVID, which again sort of shows the appeal of Premier League, of course, international. Our next question will come from Randy Konik with Jefferies. Please go ahead. Yes, thanks a lot. You touched on China a little bit in the remarks. Can you just give us some perspective, added Perspective on how you're thinking about monetizing the region in a deeper way, obviously, you talked you gave us those great statistics On the engagement of your team or club versus everyone else. So I was just curious on Update on the different part the partnership you have over there, what's going on with the latest there and just any other areas of monetization you're thinking about to really Capitalize on the strength you have for the brand and the team in China. Yes, so 3 main monetization routes that we are both pursuing and participating in. The first, obviously, with such an important part of our family of fans in China is The benefit that comes in the attractiveness of our rights to sponsors, So that engagement translates into an ability to engage with those fans and higher sponsorship revenues. Secondly, the integrated partnership we have with the Alibaba Group with the content Ecosystem basis drives e commerce revenues and then finally, the in market experiential work That we're doing, particularly with Harbs, obviously, we'll drive and that's we're opening the first of those this spring And with a further 4 sites identified and 14 sites contracted, so a big expansion of that in terms of its reach across And very excited about what that can bring for us in terms of fan engagement and sponsored driving. That was super helpful. The one thing that we're seeing at least in the U. S. Market, I'm sure it's around the world, is the Traditional media companies or Fox or what have you, they're trying to do more, I guess selling more like Netflix like content, which means less commercials or what have you. So are you seeing Disproportionate more interest in different from the sponsor side from the different brands out there that want To get more exposure to your brand and the live exposure you get across the world, just give us some more thoughts there and Any type of out of the ordinary demand that you're seeing from within the sponsorship commercial segment? Yes, that's a good question. So I mean, I think the there are a couple of items that set us apart In what I would say is a unique way globally. The first is the scale of the And that translates into for partners looking to particularly in a digital setting, a very deep engagement level with our fans, and that translates to get deep engagement Sponsors and successful commercial engagement, and that is a huge multiple of the typical advertising you see in So that itself is very powerful. And then further to your previous question, we're able to offer that engagement and Commercial success, not only in a Western Digital Ecosystem, but in As strongly, equally as strongly, if not more so, in the Chinese digital ecosystem, and those are obviously distinct A subset, so that is unique in terms of being able to offer that strength on a genuinely global basis. And that attracts partners that are seeking to be successful in that way and in that market. And that tends to be the large And powerful, fast growing global company. Super helpful. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Robbie. There being no further questions, this will conclude our question and answer session. And the conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.