Good morning, and welcome to our update call for the Q2 and first half year 2023/24 for HORNBACH Holding. My name is Antje Kelbert, Head of Investor Relations. Today at 7 A.M., we published our financial results comprising the period from the first of March until the end of August 2023. Welcome also to our CFO, Karin Dohm, who will present today and will answer your questions. Please note, the entire conference call, including the Q&A session, will be recorded and made available with the transcript on the company's website afterwards. Please also take note of this disclaimer, which is valid for the entire presentation and the Q&A session. Now I hand over to you, Karin, to walk us through the set of numbers. Good morning, everybody, and a very warm welcome from my side as well. Let me start with some highlights. In Q2, we saw a recovery in both sales and earnings, with strong customer frequency in our stores, leading to good sales. Our Adjusted EBIT stabilized in Q2, including some catch-up effects in the garden area. As you recall from Q1, we had had a challenging spring season, which was impacted by unfavorable weather conditions. Inventory reductions had a positive effect on our working capital. This resulted in an Adjusted Free Cash Flow above previous year's period, excluding the repayments from the Reverse Factoring program at the beginning of the fiscal year. We also demonstrated our resilience by continuing to increase market shares in several of our key markets. While our home market, Germany, remains a significant proportion of our business, we are seeing the benefits of our geographic diversification strategy. Reflecting the weaker macroeconomic outlook, specifically in Germany and the Eurozone, we have updated our guidance. Management is focused on striking a balance between closely managing costs while continuing to invest to improve operating performance and deliver long-term growth. Throughout the first half, we've taken a number of steps to improve our business and keep pushing those through. The management team has a strong track record in successfully navigating short-term challenges, and our long history shows us that HORNBACH has been able to emerge stronger than its competition in relatively tougher times by building on our market position. Leveraging our geographic diversification and leading interconnected retail offering, we are well positioned for when markets recover. We see the underlying long-term trends in our industry unchanged. Structural trends such as energy efficiency, demographic development, and an overall aging housing stock will continue to drive DIY spend on home improvement. We believe these drivers continue to underpin the attractions of our investment case. Let me highlight a couple of our key investment areas, including ESG focus themes. Delivering growth and further improving our logistics footprint, we have opened our new logistics center in Essig, based next to our headquarters, which began operations in June. It includes a regional warehouse, stock inventory for our stores, as well as a cross-docking facility for long and bulky goods. Furthermore, we continued our successful expansion in the Netherlands with the opening of our eighteenth store in Nijmegen. At the beginning of the financial year, we completed the back-end migration of our online shops for the Spryker platform, which has improved performance and speed for our online offering by adding much more agility and flexibility to a modular platform architecture. We've successfully continued to roll out process automation tools and standardization of back-office tasks. For example, we invested in a new software for 3D store planning, which makes our updates more efficient. Rolling out our strategy to reduce our CO2 footprint and switch to renewable energy, we've installed 20 photovoltaic systems on the roof of stores and logistics centers. We now operate systems running with an output of, in total, more than 12,000 kWp. Further rollout is going ahead in the next year. We also continue to extend our sustainable product offering with the rollout of bio certification for our private label plants and seeds, which is now implemented in eight of our nine countries. With regard to our supply chain emissions, which are the most important part of our footprint, we have joined forces with other leading international home improvement retailers in a Scope 3 task force of the Global Home Improvement Network. The goal is to develop a consistent methodology for measuring and reporting emissions. Together with other DIY and gardening stores, we are introducing an industry-wide solution for reusable plant tree trays, which are a big contributor to plastic waste in our stores. Let's double-click on our sales development. We are encouraged by the resilience of our sales in the first half, with group net sales close to the previous year's record level. Net sales of subgroup HORNBACH Baumarkt, including the online retail, were almost flat. A challenging picture in Germany of -2.4% was balanced by a positive contribution from our international markets, with an increase of 1.8%. As a consequence, on a Baumarkt level, the share of the international business further increased to 51.6% from 50.5%. In general, we've seen a slightly reduced average ticket size, but strength in smaller tickets, while there was some softness in big tickets and discretionary purchases. Keep in mind that Q2 last year was also affected by some panic purchases, which did not take place this summer, for example, electric heaters.... Since the beginning of this year, we are seeing good demand in articles within our renovation assortments, hardware, and tools. More recently, specifically with sunny and warm weather continuing into autumn, we've also seen a strong demand in the outdoor living category. Sales of private label brands have also picked up in recent months. We're especially excited about broadening our offering of private label innovations, in particular for professional customers. For example, in our Modulor and Akkit product lines. Our private label ranges are specifically designed to offer value for money products to our customers. We will continue to lean into product innovations that simplify the project, saving our customers time and money. Let's drill down to a country-by-country sales development. We saw a positive sequential trend in like-for-like sales across all our markets in the Q2 compared to the Q1. In total, HORNBACH Baumarkt increased like-for-like sales by 1% in Q2, the flattest home market development in Germany, but a 1.6% growth in the rest of Europe. We continue to see very strong numbers from the Netherlands, with an increase of 7.5% in Q2, following an outstanding performance in Q1. Luxembourg, Slovakia, and Switzerland also recorded positive like-for-like growth in Q2. Overall, this performance has also driven our market share development, which you see on the next page. Despite the uncertain economic backdrop, persistent inflation, and softening consumer confidence, we are pleased to deliver market share gains in a number of our geographies. In our home market, Germany, we've seen slight increase from 14.7% to 14.8% in the period January to July 2023. We also continue to see a strong development in our market position, especially in the Netherlands and Czech. Switzerland has also contributed positively to our market share gains. When we look onto the e-commerce share of HORNBACH Baumarkt, you see that net sales stood at 13.2% in the first half of 2023, 2024, stabilizing at the level we saw by the end of Q1. Our overall level of e-commerce sales still remains well above pre-pandemic levels, and we're excited about customer engagement across our interconnected platforms in all regions. Customer accounts have increased significantly in the first half of the year by 11% to 3.9 million as at the end of August. This confirms the increasing attractiveness of our digital office offering, which we are continuously enhancing with new features and services. More than half of e-commerce sales continue to be fulfilled through our stores, either through Click and Collect or our store delivery centers. This underpins the strength of our interconnected retail approach, leveraging the value of our dense big store network, serving as a point of sale, as well as storage and fulfillment facility. Moving on to our cost structure. Our gross margin was down by 36 basis points compared to last year, reflecting ongoing inflationary challenges. However, Q2 gross margin development indicates a stabilization in recent months. Going forward, we expect this stabilization trend to continue during the H2 of the year. Our operating expense performance reflects, for a large part, higher wages, including inflation support payments, investing into our people and teams. At the same time, we steer our headcount very consciously to optimize both in our stores and specifically, of course, in the back offices. Keep in mind that the ratios were also affected, specifically in Q1, by the deleveraging from our top line results. We successfully reduced our store operating costs, which we managed down by more than 6%. This includes savings from lower energy as well as reduced energy prices. Just to note, selling and store expenses were also affected in HQ by non-operating effects from impairments. General and administrative expenses have also increased due to higher wages, as well as specifically from investments into technology and IT. We also kicked off our S/4HANA project in HQ, which we are expecting to run for the next two years - three years. As a result, we see an EBIT development, as highlighted here, with an adjusted EBIT, which has stabilized in Q2 with -13% compared to Q1. For the first half of the year, the reduction summed up to 20%, and our EBIT margin came in at 6.4%. Let me summarize: We're focused on improving the gross margin in the H2 of the year, while maintaining our competitive pricing in line with our everyday low price strategy. We expect positive effects to result from decreasing purchasing costs for a range of products from the very high levels we saw during the pandemic and the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war, mainly 2021 and 2022. We continue to stay in constructive dialogue with our suppliers to ensure that decreasing input costs on their side are also well reflected in our purchasing prices. As said earlier, implementation of energy reduction measures are bearing fruit. We're benefiting from both decreasing energy costs based on falling prices as well as lower consumption. We balance any cost reduction measures carefully, while not compromising our long-term development and opportunities of future growth. We are, and we will also continue to invest in technology and our interconnected retail offering. We are very pleased with the outcome of our inventory development and inventory productivity. Inventories have already been reduced by 14% compared to the end of February. Beyond seasonal reductions, which were subdued in Q1, we brought down inventory levels by 6% in comparison to the same period last year. We will continue to optimize our differentiated ordering management to ensure high availability, both on stock and on shelves, with focus on our professional and project customers, with respect to fast-turning project goods. This also includes the usual up-ramping of stock towards the end of this fiscal year, where we will focus on balancing the productive build-up of inventory for the next spring season, while maintaining a high level of product availability. The successful inventory reductions, obviously, also are reflected in our cash flow. The development reflects the previously mentioned key items. Firstly, strong operating cash flow from continuously improving throughout H2. Second, successful stock reduction, supporting specifically the change in working capital. And thirdly, our reverse factoring program, influencing specifically the Q1, as you know, where we were keen to make sure that we transform the outflow of money for payments for goods from the Q4 of the previous year to the Q1 of this year. All in, we had therefore an adjusted cash flow of roughly EUR 260 million in H1. CapEx spend was at EUR 91.7 million in H1, of which 54% were spent on land and real estate, maintained mainly for new store, which is consistent with our organic growth strategy. When we take a look into the balance sheet and compare that to February twenty-eighth of this year, you see that we had, as planned, a decrease by roughly 5.3% to EUR 4.5 billion. This was mainly driven by the successful reduction in inventories on the asset side, as well as short-term liabilities. Equity ratio is extremely stable, slightly built compared to last period, with 44%, and has further strengthened to a very comfortable level. Let me remind you that our balance sheet contains significant value in the form of own land and real estate, which amounts to EUR 1.8 billion as of August 31, 2023. The real estate is conservatively accounted for at amortized cost. While we are not real estate company, those assets are a significant financial reserve that not every retail company can rely on. This further underpins our robust financial position and contributes to our conviction in the resilience of our business. Especially when you look back in industry, the DIY industry in general, and specifically also, HORNBACH, has reemerged stronger from periods of economic downturn. At HORNBACH, we can also show a track record of delivering strong performance during these times by outperforming GDP, general retail, and the DIY industry in Germany, resulting in continuous market share gains and growth for us. Through the combination of the highest DIY sales density in Germany, a compelling customer proposition, and our attractive ICR offering, we have been able to adapt and tackle external challenges in the past and will so in the future. Last but not least, successfully establishing new sales channels and geographic diversification have contributed significantly to the stability of our business. Summarizing that, before we move to Q&A, let me highlight once again, improving operating efficiency is a key priority for us, and management is closely focused on cost and inventory optimization. Against both, we have already delivered now in H1. In parallel, we will maintain our price leadership for our customers and remain a reliable partner for them, with a strong focus, as before, on our professional customers and the depth and breadth of our store SKUs. We will continue to make targeted investments to improve operational efficiency and maintain our strong market positions. In line with our commitment to sustainability, we will continue to broaden our offering of sustainable products. Lastly, we have a robust balance sheet, which enables reliable dividend payment. Overall, we are confident that we will continue to successfully navigate the current unique and uncertain environment, operate with agility, and respond to evolving customer dynamics. With that, let me conclude, and I hand back to Antje. Thank you, Karin. So we will now take your questions and start the Q&A session, and for this, I hand over to our operator. Please go ahead. 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, you may press star followed by two. If you're using speaker equipment today, please lift the handset before making your selections. Anyone who has a question may press star followed by one at this time. We have the first question from Thomas Moll with DZ Bank. Please go ahead. Yes, thank you. Good morning, Thomas Moll from DZ Bank. Thanks for taking my questions. I've got three. Number one, can you please elaborate a bit on current trading in September and your expectation for the H2? Number two, could you please shed some light on the impairment losses recognized in Q2, what happened here, and, yeah, which stores are affected? And, the last one, you just highlighted that you recorded good growth in your private label segment. Can you please remind us how high the private label share is, and, where it will go, and how that impacts your gross margin? Thank you. Yeah, thanks a lot. Just quickly, first one, September, current trading, I think partly a continuation what we saw in August, namely, we see really strong demand, in outdoor living, also, driven obviously by the favorable, mild weather across all of our regions. We still have good frequency, and we see a continuation in, what we, what we had before, the, the slightly slower demand on big tickets, and the strength in, in smaller tickets. So I would claim, in the broadest sense, a continuation of what we had towards the end of the Q2. You asked for the, the private label ratio, so we're roughly at 23%-24%, more or less. We're always, as you know, aiming to have this in moving higher, so that is definitely one of our strategies, as we think with it's not only obviously a part where we have especially good margins, but it's also a part where we can really offer a broad range, specifically targeting professional customers and people who have larger projects. So our aim is towards, ideally toward, in the direction of 30%. Nevertheless, you always have a strong demand for brand products as well, which is totally fine for us. As I said, that's just the target corridor, I would claim. Oh, okay, thanks. And And then- Yeah. Sorry, you had a third question. Yeah, it was on the impairment losses recognizing- Ah, the impairment losses. Yeah. So, the impairments are driven by a mixture. We had, number one, a little bit of, once again, ECB interest rate raises and a couple of also our neighboring central banks as far as they are not in Eurozone, as you know. And on the other hand, the slight decrease of the year's expectation on the top line is triggering a little bit. That is, when you look into the underlying stores, that is particularly, it's across a number of stores, so more smaller impairment, but a larger number of stores. But if there is any majority, I would claim it's in Sweden, because, you know, Sweden has macroeconomic challenges currently, where customers are a bit more hesitant to spend in light of the fact that they have, the vast majority have their private home financing on floating interest rates. That means they are way more affected by the rising interest rates than consumers in our other countries. Okay, fine. Very helpful. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star and one on your telephone. One moment for the next question, please. The next question is from Thilo Kleibauer with Warburg Research. Please go ahead. Yeah. Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I've two questions. One is on Austria. Austria seems to be a little bit the weak spot in you lost market share there and significant like-for-like decline. So anything specific in this market in terms of competition or some problems on your side? Maybe you have some more insight. And second question is on potential new locations or the potential to acquire additional real estate facilities in the current environment. Do you get more offers for potential land for new locations? Or maybe do you get attractive offer to buy back stores which are not in your own property in the current real estate environment? Thank you. Yeah, thanks for your questions, Thilo. Number one, on Austria, absolutely, that is a bit of a weak spot. The underlying challenge there for our colleagues is we are, they're specifically strong really in the project and, let's say slightly more larger project-related business, and that is the part that has shrank, and it has shrank stronger in comparison to critical retail, customer footfall and spending. And I think that is the reason that we there see currently that we are giving a slightly smaller share of the market that we would like to see. Mm-hmm. Colleagues are obviously focused on that, and for us, that is more a temporary topic than an ongoing or a permanent topic. Nevertheless, definitely a focus area. With regards to new location, yes, we partially get real estate offered, which we are in a long-term rental or leasing agreement. In those instances where that's happened so far, the expectations from the selling side were nevertheless in an area where I don't see that as an attractive opportunity for HORNBACH, or we as a team didn't see that. On the other hand, yes, we're specifically also exploring opportunities where we can step in into other locations, and I might have said that in one of our last calls already. I definitely expect that there is more flexibility on some counterparts and market participant sides in the next months, or maybe I would say 12 months -18 months, where we will definitely have more, just more things happening, so to say, and more movement in the market, given the interest rate environment, given other people's refinancing costs and other aspects where I would expect people to be more flexible, so to say, also on the sell side. We're continuously monitoring that. We're in a number of talks where we examine things, and then we just see where it makes a lot of sense to build further, either our network or just densify it in some countries where we already are. Maybe I can highlight there, our average interest rate currently is, it has slightly increased, but it's still below 3%, and I think that's a very comfortable situation in which we are there, and I think that is also especially comfortable in comparison to some others. Yeah. Okay. But do you plan to issue new financial things like loans or promissory notes in the short term, or? No, currently- Do you have sufficient cash? We have sufficient cash. We have nothing where we see the necessity to take up additional liquidity for the operation as they are. So there, there's nothing planned currently. Nope. Okay. Thank you. That's helpful. Sorry, just half a sentence. Our bond, just a reminder, is running until 2026, so that's also not- Mm-hmm ... recent. Yeah. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Lars Hepp with Hauck & Aufhäuser. Please go ahead. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I have a few. So starting with the guidance, I was a little bit puzzled when looking at your guidance. The beginning of the year, you had a range of about, like, 10%, so -5% to -15% here regarding EBIT development. And now, after a half year, that has risen now to a range of 15%, from -10% to -25%. Normally, you would think of that within the year, that range becomes narrower and narrower. So with you, it's the opposite. So what is really the reason behind that? So has really the environment become so much more uncertain, so compared to, like, three months ago? Don't you have any kind of, let's say, cost-cutting countermeasures to, to go against that development and, and, bring it more in direction where you want to have it here? So this is the first question. Then I've got a question regarding the, yeah, regarding your, your targets in the future. When, when looking at the share price and looking, like, these price book measures, and I think we are rather now coming down to kind of all-time lows here, it seems like investors are really, really confused with the future prospect of the company. And, you've shown a slide, how good the, the company development in the, in the, in the past. But somehow, I think investors don't, don't, don't really, yeah, buy that. So isn't it possible to give some like some targets for the future, where you want to go, where like gross margins should go again? So that I don't know the investors become a little bit more confident again compared to what they are now. And then last thing is, when I'm looking at these guidance cuts you've made about two weeks ago, isn't it possible to like I don't know maybe make a conference call the next day to explain a little bit what happened here? So I had the feeling that a lot of people were really confused, and then it takes like two weeks to explain that. And this is a kind of vacuum for an insulation vacuum, and people are really confused, and I think that's also something that brings down the share price a little bit, and maybe that would help to really react directly, actively afterwards. Thank you. Yeah. Thanks, Lars, for your questions. So let me start with the guidance. As we said two weeks ago when we came out, obviously, and you saw that also with some of our peers, now I'm thinking here about Kingfisher, for example, and others. There is definitely a development in this time of the year over the last months, and especially when you look into the outlook on the macroeconomic side, when you see interest rate developments, you see GDP outlooks getting adjusted, whether you think about central banks or some think tanks and others. And you see customer sentiment in general and purchase power development. So those things have all not developed positively but negatively, and the outlook is definitely more challenging than it was at the beginning of this year, specifically in the first month of this calendar year. So I think that is not very exotic, but unfortunately, a situation where many of us are in, and that was the main driver of our guidance adjustment. So we've reacted to the shifting macroeconomic backdrop and reduced likelihood of further recovery of those aspects which we missed in Q1, due at that time, mainly to the weather. And then to your second question with regard to targets on the long-term side, HORNBACH has, per history and tradition, as you all know, always given guidance on sales and on EBIT for the following year, but hasn't given long-term targets. I think we're currently, as any company, of course, as we move towards calendar year and then, and fiscal year, and we will of course go through the next cycle of planning, and we will certainly see whether there is something where we can add value to our investors by providing a more longer-term perspective. Nevertheless, I said the current habit of this company has been in the short term providing measures. So I think that hasn't changed. But, as said, we will, we will talk about that in our next internal planning cycles, definitely. And a third one, which was about the sequencing. I think as you usually have, you have, of course, around these half-year figures, where we also have some legal requirement and internal governance with certain bodies and other components, finalization of figures and making sure that the auditors who do a limited review also have their go. That is just a couple of things that drove those differences between first clarity on sales and EBIT, where we came out due to legal requirements. Whilst as said, certain procedures that then follow to make sure that our governance is in good shape and that we have the full figures going out now and in a moment where those steps have taken place, that just drove those timing. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a final reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star and one at this time. And the next question is from the line of Miro Zuzak with J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead. Good morning. Can you hear me? Yes. Thank you for taking my question. I will have two. The first one is regarding the gross profit margin. The last time we spoke, you were a bit, let's say, positive on the gross profit margin. Now we see a decline year-over-year. The question is: Is this related to the impairments that you have taken? So were they booked in the gross profit margin in Q2, or is this a clean margin that we see now? Yeah, thanks for your question. The impairments are not part of the gross margin. The gross margin is purely indicating or a result of, obviously, the sales and the costs related directly to the goods, not to stores or personnel in the stores. That is all in the store expenses. With regard to the development, as highlighted earlier, we have seen a stabilization of our gross margin in the Q2. So throughout those six months that we have passed now of this fiscal year, the direction of travel has been into the right direction. So that is why we're confident that this will be now a good basis for further stabilization. We have seen a decrease, especially on the supply side, so anything that we buy comes in at lower prices. We've seen reductions in logistics and other costs attached to the goods to make sure we have them in our hands. Some commodities have significantly come down. I'm thinking here about lumber. If you look into those prices, I think we're currently at five hundred US dollars per thousand feet. And I think we were two years ago, it was three times that high, so 1,500 at the same time, so summer 2021, more or less. So I think there are a couple of items that give you a good indication, especially also our proactive on the supply side, to make sure that suppliers pass on their own price reductions to us. And I think all this, as said, gives us a very good confidence that we have here a stabilization, which we can work upon, and that will gradually flow also more and more through our gross margin. Just to follow up on this, sorry, if I may. I think you said, or even you wrote at some point in time, that you expect a slight increase of the Gross Margin in the current year compared to the last year. Correct me if I'm wrong, if you haven't said that, it's just my notes, but would that still be valid? Do you still expect an increase now, looking at the full year, which is ongoing at the moment? I know it's just halfway through, right? But, yeah, I hear you talking positive about the Gross Margin development. Do you still expect an increase in the current year? Yeah, absolutely. As said, with a further stabilization, and we see the potential for a sequential improvement until year-end, fiscal year-end, no? Okay. Thank you. Then the next one would be regarding the leasing payments. And maybe you remember, that was also a question I had in the last call, whether they related to-- they would relate to interest rates. The answer was no. Now, I see an increase from EUR 24 million in Q1 to EUR 30 million in Q2. And I think you didn't really change the portfolio. Can you please explain whether, firstly, what has happened here, and, secondly, whether this is now the level we should expect going forward, EUR 30 million per quarter, or are there other moving parts which I'm not aware of? On our leasing payments with regard to, you mean whether they are linked to inflation or? Sorry, if I- Yeah, I just noticed an increase to EUR 30 million in the Q2; it's in the cash flow statement, compared to EUR 24 million in the Q1. And, at least to my knowledge, this is not depending on interest rates... That's what you told me when we spoke last time, but- Yeah, yeah. I also asked the question in the, in the last call, in the last quarterly call. So now I still, I was a bit surprised to see now an increase of EUR 6 million, which is like 20% or 25%, from EUR 24 million to EUR 30 million. Sorry, I'm not sure. I'm following where on which figure exactly you're looking, but happy to follow up on that. Okay. can follow up. Yeah. Okay. Then, would be great to get some insight there. Thank you. And the next one would be regarding current trading. I know, I mean, you gave the profit warning, like, two weeks ago, but still, have you seen any better development now in September? What are the first signs that you see here? Yeah, I think we answered that question already earlier, but happy to repeat. We definitely saw good development, specifically in certain product areas, such as garden equipment, anything that is happening outdoor, very strong demand there in September. This is partially, as said, offset by the developments we saw already earlier. People are focusing more on smaller baskets and refraining a little bit from bigger projects. So that is, I would claim, up to a certain degree, relatively normal picture, favorably affected by the good weather currently, or the mild autumn, if you want to say so, across all our geographics. And a little bit there is a offsetting effect. Last September, we had some of those panic purchases, again, with regard to energy supply, batteries, electrical heaters, when things were looking way more negative for the winter and the potential supply of warming energy. So that is not happening this September, but otherwise, as said, as described earlier. Okay, thank you very much. The next question is from Ludovic Allègre from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead. Yes, hi, everyone. Just two questions. The first one is on the gross margin. So just to be sure, of what you just said, so you expect the gross margin to increase this year, meaning it would be higher than the 33.4% of last year? So you expect an inflection point, in H2, this year? Just to confirm that, that's the first question. And the second one is on the wages, and particularly in Germany, how much wage increase can we expect, this year? Can you remind me if you finished the negotiation with the trade union yet, or not? And, my last question is on the inflation bonus. Will this be deducted from the future wage increase, or is it something that will add up to the wage increase in Germany this year? Thank you. Yeah, thanks for your questions, and let me start with the second one with regard to the wages. So there is not yet an agreement with the trade unions. That is still outstanding, and we currently have no indication when that should or could come through. We have now a proposal from the Retail Employer Association in Germany to pay to the to the to everybody who is subject to this a payment from from 5.3%. And that means that excuse me 4.3%. And that means that the that the agreement would be an offer where every retailer can participate, but that doesn't mean there is already an agreement with regard to those payments. And we will see what how those come out. We have, as, as we said before, we have reflected anything that we want, by, or what we, what we foresee, in our plans and in our, so to say, forecasts, to make sure that we include that in, in any guidance. So that is something where we just need to see whether things will differ, and how they play out over time. But we currently feel confident that the various options are, in the one or the other shape and form, reflected in our plan figures. What we do not know, of course, is any specific extra payments, in 2024 or the following years. There is an expectation that whenever this agreement comes, it, it lasts for probably 18 months. And yes, as you, as you said, right, as you said, we have paid in Germany this inflation bonus. We also see that as said, as an investment into our people and our teams. Of course, we are currently also expecting that that is in, is then in a part set off from that. With regard to your questions to gross margin, so as said, we have a number of components that have a positive impact on the gross margin, as I mentioned, especially, so to say, on the incoming side. Nevertheless, there could also be, which we're currently not foreseeing, but just to put here a little disclaimer, of course, there could be a potential downside on the sales price side, depending a little bit also on competitors' behavior. But in general, as said, and I can, that's so to say, definitely the case, we're seeing throughout the progressing time of stabilization. We currently absolutely aim for a slight increase towards our fiscal year end, with, as said, once again, the given uncertainties around the next months to come. Okay, thank you very much. There are no further questions at this time, and I hand back to Antje Kelbert. Yeah. Thank you very much for all your questions and your time this morning. We also would like to invite you to meet us during the upcoming capital market event. You see that also on our slide, where we will attend certain conferences over the coming weeks and months. Yeah, and whenever you have some follow-up questions or some discussions, any topic, I'm happy to get in touch with you. Just give us a call or drop us some lines. And so just once again, thank you for all of your interest this morning. Have a nice day, and hope to see you soon. Thank you very much. Goodbye.