Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. I am Sandra, the Chorus Call operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the quarterly statement 9 months, 2023 of Deutsche EuroShop. Business information transparency is very important for us. For this reason, this conference call will be recorded and shared on the Internet. All participants will be in listen-only mode. The presentation will be followed by a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, you may press Star, followed by One on your touch-tone telephone. Please press the Star key followed by zero for operator assistance. I would now like to turn the conference over to Hans-Peter Kneip. Please go ahead, sir. Thank you, Sandra. This is Hans-Peter Kneip, Executive Director at Deutsche EuroShop. I'm very much looking forward to this call after, unfortunately, not being able to make the last one in March due to illness. Thankfully, Patrick, who is with me today, took over this call in his usual experienced manner and guided you through our annual results for 2022. Now that we have gone through most of 2023, let's take a glance at the nine-month figures and the developments in the company together. Clearly, our team's constant hard work is reflected in our nine months 2023 financial results, and I'm happy to take you through them and address any questions you may have. Let's dive into our performance and future prospects. Thank you for your time, and let's get started. You can find an update on our business activities on slides 2 and 3. Compared to the first 9 months of 2022, we have seen an encouraging increase in footfall of 11% and 7.4% in the retail sales of our tenants. As a result, our tenants are generating sales that are higher than in the pre-COVID period. It is probably the last time we compare with pre-COVID era, as that comparison seems less and less appropriate. Shopping and the corresponding environment have evolved in the meantime, and we are well advised to now focus on future opportunities. Our revenues went up by 28.1% to EUR 203.2 million, and FFO increased by 34.5% to now EUR 129.7 million. In terms of financing, we are in a very good position with an LTV of 32.4% and a cash position of EUR 280.6 million. We have a steady funding situation, and all our financings for this year are completed. Our next loan is only due in 2025, with major financing only coming up from 2026 on. As you know, we have paid out a dividend of EUR 191.2 million in September. On slide four, we have a closer look into our centers. In Q3, footfall went up by 0.7% and the turnover of our tenants by 4.3% compared to the prior year period. As already mentioned, looking on the first nine months of this year, we have seen a plus of 7.4% in footfall and 11% in turnover, as shown in the yellow bar chart. Consumption continues to be impacted by the effects of inflation and the war in the Ukraine, and the problematic conflict in the Middle East has certainly burdened the mood in the recent weeks. Nevertheless, we are optimistic about the Christmas business, which will soon be entering its peak phase. Before I come to the financial results of the first nine months, I would like to remind you that we acquired additional shares in six of our shopping centers early in January. These acquisitions were financed through a capital increase against cash and non-cash contributions. As a result of the acquisition of additional shares, 4 property companies previously accounted for using the equity method were fully included in the consolidated financial statements for the first time, with economic effect from January 1, 2023. When describing the results of operations, financial position, and net assets of the group, I will provide this information on the basis of a comparable group, i.e., pro forma. The comparable group was prepared under the assumption that the acquisition of the 6 property companies had already taken place at the beginning of 2022. We have highlighted the effect in red for the 2022 figures on the following pages. Now let's start with the revenues on slide 5. This came out slightly higher at EUR 203.2 million, after EUR 197.5 million in the first nine months of 2022. This is a pro forma plus of 2.9%, which essentially comes from index adjustments and higher turnover rents. The breakdown between Germany and abroad has shifted slightly in favor of foreign countries, where we now have a 20% share. On slide 6, you see that the EBT, adjusted for the valuation, increased from EUR 109.1 million to EUR 135.4 million, which is a pro forma plus of 24.1%, due to income from reversal of provisions for ancillary costs and maintenance, as well as lower value adjustments and consultancy expenses. Another positive impact came from the interest income with +EUR 3.7 million. Please follow me now to page 7 and to the development of the FFO. The FFO pro forma increased from EUR 111 million to now EUR 129.7 million, or on a per share basis, from EUR 1.49 to EUR 1.74, due to higher operating results. I'm now coming to the balance sheet on page 8, where we naturally also see the effects of the acquisitions. Our total assets amount to EUR 4.6 billion. This is a change of EUR 344.1 million compared with the reporting date, end of 2022. Our consolidated liquidity as of 30th September 2023, stands at EUR 280.6 million. That is a minus of EUR 54.4 million. Please keep in mind that we paid out a dividend of EUR 191.2 million in September. Total equity, including minorities, increased by EUR 170.5 million. As of 30th September 2023, current and non-current financial liabilities stood at EUR 1.63 billion, which was EUR 151.3 million higher than at the end of 2022. In particular, due to the liabilities from the minority acquisitions. Non-current deferred tax liabilities increased by EUR 5.9 million to EUR 340.3 million. Our equity ratio decreased slightly, but still stands at a very solid 55.2%, and the consolidated LTV now stands at a low 32.4%. The EPRA LTV, calculated proportionally according to the group share in all assets, so to say, on a look-through basis, stands at 34.1%, a continued very low level. On page nine, we give you some information on our debt. There are no expiring loans this nor next year. Currently, our consolidated debt bears an average interest rate of 2.34%. The weighted maturity of our loan portfolio now stands at six years. Coming to some news on our portfolio on slide 10. As you know, we published new investment plans for the Main-Taunus-Zentrum, one of the largest and highest turnover shopping centers in Germany, and among the jewels in our portfolio. A new highlight is to be added to the MTZ, giving it a new, lively, and urban center with a high quality, varied restaurant and food offering. New freestanding restaurant buildings are to be built until 2024, some with roof terraces, some with outdoor terraces, attractive landscaped exterior areas, and sophisticated architecture. The new Food Garden will be built on an area of around 7,000 square meters in the heart of the shopping center, in place of a former department store building. The corresponding investment is around EUR 28 million. Construction work has started, and I'm very happy to tell you that we are already almost completely pre-let with high-quality tenants. The grand opening is planned for spring 2022, 2025, excuse me. There are also good news from Viernheim, where the Rhein-Neckar-Zentrum is located. You will see those on slide 11. From next February on, a new and modern freestanding L'Osteria will provide culinary highlights from Italian cuisine. In addition, three exciting tenants will move into the completely renovated former Bauhaus building in the middle of the year, providing plenty of Retailtainment, as we say. An interactive indoor entertainment concept, a trampoline park, and a successful cycling store will each be an attraction. Already opened and only a few meters away is the indoor skydiving center, which has started very promisingly. All these tenants will positively benefit from each other and give the entire center a further boost. On slide 12, we want to show you that we play an active role in promoting the settlement of promising new tenants to constantly adapt and enrich our portfolio. Here's just one example: In the last few months, European retailer Pepco has moved into various spaces left vacant from an insolvent shoe retail chain. Pepco offers a wide range of clothing, household goods, and decorative items for the whole family at very competitive prices, corresponding to the current demand and providing even more variety to our shopping centers. This shows once more our constant commitment to continuously increase the attractiveness of our centers. Finally, I would like to come to slide 13 and the outlook. With 2023 as the first year without COVID-related restrictions, we expected, and meanwhile see, a continued improvement of the operational business. We will further strengthen our competitive position with forward-looking investments in our shopping centers. ESG investments are naturally becoming increasingly important and a strategic focus. Furthermore, we plan a focused optimization and diversification of our financing structure, depending, of course, on the further market and financing environment. After raising our forecast for 2023 in August, and posting business performance in line with expectations in the third quarter, we are confirming our forecast for funds from operations of EUR 2.08-EUR 2.18 per share for the full year 2023. Ladies and gentlemen, we remain optimistic in the face of changing markets and habits, which also present us with unprecedented opportunities. Our company is well prepared, and we welcome our participation in this endeavor. So far, my presentation. Thank you for listening. I'm happy to take your questions now. Sandra, please take over. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we will begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star, followed by one on the touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, please press star followed by two. If you're using a speaker equipment today, please lift the handsets before making your selections. Anyone with a question may press star, followed by one at this time. One moment, please, for the first question. Our first question comes from André Remke from Baader Bank. Please go ahead. Yeah, good morning, sirs. A couple of questions from my side. First, thank you for the presentation. The first question is on your vacancy. What is current vacancy, and do you face any changes year to date or in the third quarter, and what are your expectations regarding vacancy going forward? That's the first question, please. Thanks, André, for this question. As you know, we have posted quite stable vacancy figures in the past, and you know, we'll come up with new figures towards our annual figures. So far, the portfolio has been very stable and very robust in terms of vacancy. We're just hovering around 5%-6% overall. And we currently estimate that this will remain stable. Of course, you know, and there have been a few examples also in the presentation that we are in construction works in some of our centers. So part of the vacancy of those 5-6% we've posted over the last few quarters are also due to concrete measures we are taking on in our portfolio. But overall, you can assume that vacancy will remain on a stable basis. Could you be a bit more precise what part of the 5%-6% is due to the construction or new development? We know that historically, if you follow Deutsche EuroShop for a while, the long term vacancy has always been around 2%-3%. So now, you see a higher vacancy of 5%-6%. And of course, there's a part of this is due to overall sector shift, maybe half of this change. So maybe that 1 or 2 percent may just be due to a changed market environment, and another 1-2 percent is due to the fact that we are constantly working and developing our portfolio. So that's how I would put it. Perfect. Thank you. Then looking to your FFO guidance, you already reached more than 80% after nine months of the FFO guidance. Do you expect a quite weaker fourth quarter? And if so, what are the main drivers for that? Yeah. So indeed, we have reached over 80% of the FFO guidance we have posted for the year. As you know, seasonality plays a role, especially in terms of construction work, maintenance work. So there may be some of the costs which may be a bit higher towards the end of the year. So, there's no, we don't see any lagging in terms of our operational business, but more a little bit higher on the cost side. So that's certainly the main impact we're seeing here. But of course, you are right in assuming that we are optimistic that we may reach the upper end of the guidance. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Brings me to another question. In former times, you provided a guidance for the upcoming year, quite early. So now it seems that you will only provide guidance for next year in spring next year. How could I read this? Is the visibility simply lower nowadays? I'm not asking for a concrete figure for next year, but what are the main drivers for FFO next year? Yeah. To be transparent, the operational business as such has not really changed compared to the former time. So, there you still see ongoing high stability, especially looking at our numbers, you see that in most of the parameters we are back to pre-COVID levels. So the business as such is stable as it used to be, with maybe the exception that, of course, we're still in a phase where market movements and movements with our retailers are quite significant. So that's certainly one aspect, but overall, the operating business is stable. What we are, of course, doing, and I mentioned this on further occasions, that we are reviewing our portfolio strategically of what we can, and also from a financial side, you know, that we are looking at our financing and capital structure, which may have some impact on a potential guidance. So therefore, that's the, I would say, the real reason on why we are giving out guidance later than maybe in the past, as we are looking both on our portfolio and financing side, with a little more flexibility and open-mindedness. And this is for us, the main reason. Okay. Thank you. You mentioned to be optimistic on the Christmas business. What I heard from the retail associations, for this year's retail, Christmas business, they are less optimistic. At least that was my impression. What makes you more optimistic? Does it relate to your specific tenant structure, or what is the reason for that? Yeah. Two points on this. You remember we had exactly this discussion one year ago. And there was quite substantial pessimism last year on the Christmas business, and also this Black Week, Black Friday. And it turned out that it was much better than expected. We had been optimistic already last year on this, and we still are this year. We know that some estimates, also from other research association, are always very cautious when they look at the Christmas business in Germany. But at least last year, we were proven right in being optimistic. And we think the situation compared to last year hasn't really changed. So of course, there are still headwinds. We all know that. And there are good reasons for consumers to still be hesitant regarding their spending. Inflation is still a big topic. But we also see positive effects. Inflation has reduced, especially on the energy side. I think there's more transparency and more clarity on what will happen. So there are also positive signs which may impact consumer spending in a good way. And then, of course, the second aspect is that I think the structure of our portfolios and the retailers we have in our portfolio do represent usually a very good fit within this region where they are placed in. There's no secret about, and you may also refer to those numbers, that many research associations say, okay, that Christmas business, Germans intend to spend less overall, on Christmas presents. But, for example, with the settlement of Pepco and other more competitive price retailers, that's exactly what consumers are looking for at the moment. And those are posting very strong results. You may have seen that in the press, if you have the right retailers in your portfolio, can achieve a very strong outcome. So therefore, yes, we are optimistic on the Christmas season. And of course, as always, happy to catch afterwards if we were right this time as well. Okay. Thank you. And the last question, on your portfolio valuation, what are your expectations at year-end? Any indications you already have received from appraisers or from market transactions? What is your view on that? Yeah. No, no indication really yet on the valuation. However, what we see is that the transaction market for retail and shopping centers seems to pick up. But it's still a little bit too early to read this, because there have been low number of shopping centers that are either put on the market or is there some price finding exercises going on. And of course, our valuer is currently quite actively investigating on what the price expectations may be. In the end, you know that valuers will have to look at concrete transaction pricings. There, unfortunately, there's not more evidence compared to the previous 9 months. So they are not still not a notable number of transactions, especially comparable to our portfolio. So it may be a little bit too early, but there are further transactions or at least processes coming up, which will certainly provide a cross read for also for our portfolio over the next the next few months. Okay, excellent. Thank you very much, Hans-Peter, and good Christmas business. Thanks, André. The next question comes from Andreas Pläsier from Warburg Research. Please go ahead. Yeah. Good morning, Mr. Kneip. Hello, Patrick. I have two questions left after the topics, evaluation we already touched. Firstly, on footfall. We have a lower growth momentum in Q3 of only 0.7. When you compare this level with 2019, where are we now? Because you mentioned already that you are, in terms of sales of your tenants, you are already above 2019. This is the first question. Mm-hmm. Second one is in terms of write-downs on receivables. What do you expect here, a level, in the coming years? We are still see insolvencies, and we have in 2019, a level of EUR 8 million, this year, probably the same figure. Is this a run rate, probably, for the next years? Thanks, Andreas, for the two questions. Yes, indeed. So we have posted very positive footfall growth over 2022. And also we have published that we are clearly above in terms of revenues, but not in terms of footfall. So on footfall, of course, it depends a little bit on the centers we are looking at, but overall, there we are still a little bit behind 2019 numbers. So, or roughly flatter, I would say. But, I think the point to take away is that there, the uptick is clearly on the revenue of our tenants, and less in terms of the footfall. So this, from our perspective, of course, you can never read a customer's minds exactly. There's two effects which can be read out of this. The first one is, of course, there is inflation, and no doubt about this. So those numbers of turnover are nominal. So this may be one explanation on why relatively turnover is higher compared to the footfall, which is just the 2019 numbers. And the other explanation may be that customers are coming less, but then in a more focused way. So most likely, reality is somewhere in between. But bottom line is that in terms of footfall, also nice growth, but roughly around 2019 levels and not significantly above as the turnover numbers. I know that's a little bit longer answer compared to rather short questions, but we always believe that footfall and revenues have to be seen in conjunction to see the real picture. Okay. Regarding your second question, so for the projection, write-down of receivables. So you know that we are still in kind of a transition year, more on the positive side, because of course many around write-downs of the receivables we had in the past, in the end, we didn't need. So you see strong uptick in other operating income from the release of this or reversal of those write-downs. So therefore, I wouldn't take this number that you see now as the new run rate. So for the new run rate, we have we don't publish this figure anymore because it's very stable. We have a collection rate of rents of 99%, roughly. So there's very few write-downs that are needed. Thus, therefore, as a more stable assumption, we calculate with roughly 2% of the revenues as our internal guidance, as we don't expect that those insolvencies that you mentioned in your questions will continue from there. It may not be the last ones which we have seen, but the worst is over. We have adjusted our portfolio in a sustainable way. We have discussed the vacancy which is quite low in the portfolio, adjusted for construction. So therefore, we are optimistic that those 2% write down cushion will be enough going forward. Therefore, that's something also you could take into account. Okay, great. Thanks. Thanks, Andreas. As a reminder, if you wish to register for a question, please press star followed by one. The next question comes from Manuel Martin from ODDO BHF. Please go ahead. Hello, gentlemen. Thank you for taking my questions. Two questions from my side. The first one, maybe one by one. The first one is on rent. Could you give us some indications or flavor on your rent renewals? So are you experiencing lower rent levels when you make a new contract, or what's the trend there? Maybe to the upside. Yeah, very good question, because, as you know, there have been quite significant changes also in the past. We have. It's a quite varied picture. So you see that overall, we have posted positive revenue figures going forward. And you know that this is due mainly to indexations and turnover rents. But those are, of course, predominantly old contracts. In terms of the new contracts, certainly we see, depending on the strength of the center, some contraction in the rents, also lower rents, but also, depending on the shopping center, significantly higher rent. So it's a quite diverse-... A mix, depending on the center where you're in. So to just give you an example, if we are in our strong centers, which have a very strong competitive position, and no vacancy, of course, we have much more room for negotiation. Therefore, for those new tenants, for example, in the Main-Taunus-Zentrum or the Altmarkt-Galerie Dresden, or Galeria Bałtycka, which are all fully let, we have a strong bargaining power, and therefore, here we don't really see lower rents, but more stable, or sometimes even higher rents. For example, if you look at the Food Garden project in the Main-Taunus-Zentrum. So of course, we have higher rents, but also there is CapEx against it. In locations which are, I would say, more positive to average. Of course, we have also had some concessions in terms of rents. You know, that this year and the previous year was not an easy one in terms of insolvencies in Germany and across our portfolio. And there, our priority was always to have the shopping center occupied and to manage vacancy in first place, then in order to target the maximum rent. I know there are other strategies and tactics in the market, but that's the way our company functions. So in the end, it comes down to the question on what is sustainable? And we see in most of our portfolio occupancy rate, cost ratios, i.e., rent to turnover of our customers, which is very sustainable. So we don't expect that from here, rents will have to be reduced significantly, but there is still some adjustments to be made. So overall, as of now, I would say rather slightly negative impact from new relettings across the portfolio, but also here, a stabilizing trend. Okay. And the second question would be on the MTZ in Frankfurt. So, according to the presentation, there's EUR 28 million total investment. Can you indicate how much have been spent so far for the Food Garden there? And what is the rate of return that you expect for this investment, more or less? Yeah. So on the MTZ, we announced that we have just started construction work. So, there is the amount that has been currently spent on the MTZ is below EUR 5 million. So that's, you know, all the planning and run-up costs. So that has been spent already, but construction has only started in October. So the most CapEx is still to come on this project. And in terms of yield expectations, we are in a range of roughly 5.5%-6% for the project, which for the asset MTZ is a good figure. And of course, that's also something you have to take in mind, EUR 28 million. That's the total investment for the entire project. You know that the Main-Taunus-Zentrum is jointly held. We have a controlling stake of 52%, and it's jointly held together with an investment fund. So our proportion would just be roughly half of it. Uh-huh. Okay, understood. Thank you very much. Thanks, Manuel. Gentlemen, so far there are no more questions on the phone. I hand back to you for closing comments. Thanks very much for listening to the call and also for your questions. Very much appreciated that you continue to follow Deutsche EuroShop so closely. So thanks for your time and looking forward to our next call together. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, the conference is now concluded, and you may disconnect your telephone. Thank, thank you for attending today's call. Goodbye.