Ladies and gentlemen, a welcome also from my side, and thank you for joining our today's conference call. Our prepared slides are available under the Investor Relations section of our website, www.r-stahl.com. Shortly after we will have finished this call, a replay of the entire conference will be provided for download at the same place. Please be aware of our disclaimer statement, which you will find at the beginning of the slide deck. And now, I pass on to Dr. Mathias Hallmann, our Group CEO, who will walk you through our presentation. Yeah. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Warm welcome to our Q3 2023 Analyst and Investors Conference Call. I start with a summary. What we saw in in Q3 is actually a very nice profitability, but let me start with the order intake. It improved 2.5% to a level of EUR 82.1 million in comparison to last year, mainly driven by high demands from the Americas. Sales showed a very strong year-on-year increase to a level of EUR 86 million. This is actually a result of significant performance improvements in our operations footprint, which we overall could develop to a very much improved level. EBITDA increased by 40% to a level of EUR 13.5 million, resulting in an EBITDA margin of 15.7%. This is also a number I haven't seen since I'm in this company since 6 years. Free cash flow improved EUR 4.8 million to a level of -EUR 4.8 million. So I think also at the free cash flow side or cash flow side, we are now at a turning point. Net profit raised 18.8% to a level of EUR 6.2 million. Here we see the impact of higher interest and higher taxes, and earnings per share came out at a level of EUR 0.96 per share in Q3. If we look at the sales side, we see growth in all regions, but what clearly steps out is the development in the Central region with growth rate of 31.2%. We see more moderate growth in all the other regions, but also here, we have to have in mind that Q3 2022 was already the strongest quarter last year. So a very nice development on the growth side. If we look in our profitability statement, clearly profitability is driven by the high sales volume of EUR 86 million. But what we also see is a very good cost of material ratio of 33.4%. Last year, we had 35.4%. It indicates that we were able to manage inflation very well, and we still, when we look in our order pipeline, it's very solid. Our expectation is that we stay on this improved material ratio margin. Personal costs moved up 10.5%, still lower in comparison to the overall growth, but significantly higher than what we reported in the first and in the second quarter. But that was expected, and we announced it in our last call that we will now see the effects of the negotiations with the unions and salary increases. Financial results declined by EUR 1.6 million. That's driven by the higher interest rates, and then taxes moved up, driven by profitability. I mean, that's natural, so that we end with a net profit of EUR 6.2 million against EUR 5.2 million last year. But we have to have in mind that last year, Q3 was already the strongest quarter since many years, and then the earnings per share of EUR 0.96, and the EBITDA EUR 12.9 million, EBITDA pre EUR 13.5 million. Coming to the cash flow statement, which rose. The cash flow itself rose up to 0.4 million to 12.1 million due to increased net profit. Cash flow from operating activities benefited from a lower build-up of working capital of EUR 13 million in comparison to EUR 16.2 million last year. And overall, the free cash flow improved EUR 4.8 million to a level of minus EUR 4.8 million, and net debt is now at a level of EUR 48.4 million. When we look in the sales and order and profitability development over time, we see the nice development of our sales. We see the nice development of our profitability. What we also see is certain flattening of the order intake, which makes us a little bit cautious when we look in the first and second quarter, maybe of next year. We have solid order backlog for our Q4 2023. I think we also have solid order backlog for the first quarter next year. But it's interesting to see how the markets will be developed from an order intake perspective in the next quarters. This is probably the only thing which makes us somewhat cautious. All the other developments are pretty positive, which is then also reflected in our guidance. We keep our sales forecast in a range of EUR 305-320 million. We increase our EBITDA pre-guidance from 35-40, to a level of from 30-36, to a level of 35-40 million. So a significant increase of the EBITDA pre-guidance. Free cash flow, we still expect low single-digit negative EUR million amount, and a slight increase of the equity ratio towards the end of the year, under the pre-condition that the interest rates stay on a relatively stable level. As I just said, we are very positive towards the end of the year. We are somewhat cautious when we look forward in the first and second quarter next year, because the markets are softening at this point of time, and we see it for many industries if we look into the news. Nevertheless, we are again very positive with the perspective of our long-term development, because we are still convinced that the sectors we are working in are all benefiting from long-term trends. So long-term growth expectations are still there, and it's now our task to drive the strategy, to drive our internationalization and digitalization efforts in order to prepare for the coming years. This is it from my side. Thank you very much, and we are open for questions. The first question is from Christian Sandner with NuWays AG. Please go ahead. Hi, good morning, everyone. Maybe the first question would be on Dr. Hallmann, what you said around the order intake. Did you see some more cautiousness across various industries? Can you maybe shed some additional light on this? So what industries are particularly weak, and are some other industries significantly stronger? Yeah, good morning, Mr. Sandherr. Thank you for your question. It's the industry which worries us the most is the European chemical industry. Yeah. I think the trends, the trends behind are the weak, building and, automotive markets, which heavily influence, the chemical industry. And, we saw already a softening of the chemical industry in Germany last quarter, and now we see a strong softening of the chemical industry all over the place in Europe. So this is, the main effect. All the other segments, like LNG, pharmaceutical industry, but also, general oil, are more or less stable at this point of time. Okay, understood. And, can you maybe give a little bit of an update on the whole nuclear topic? So, it's been quite new for you guys, and if we look into the news, recently, we see that Poland is basically launching quite a significant nuclear program. They want to build a large number of smaller reactors, and we all know that the French nuclear environment has to be remodeled. So, is this something where you are actively, I don't know, in talks with Polish authorities? And, I mean, in France, you already are obviously engaged with the operator. So is this something where one can expect additional order intake, or nuclear becoming a quite significant part of your growth going forward? ... Nuclear is, is definitely one of the segments I just, I just mentioned when I think about our long-term growth expectations. We are in discussions, especially on the British side and the, the French side, and, there is, there are lots of projects in the pipeline. What we, what we have to, what we have to see there is, it will take some time. I, I would expect that we, we, we can see nice orders again in, like, towards the end of 2024, from the British side. The French side will probably need a little bit more time, but nevertheless, we are, on, on the Polish side, I actually, I don't know whether we are already in discussions. Nevertheless, we are, we are very positive, and we are not only in discussions about concrete orders, we are also in discussions about joint technology developments. Okay, understood. And then my third question would be on your gross margin. So, you have been able to pass on higher raw material prices, and I get to, let's say, comfortable stage. If the prices for your imports are coming down again, do you have to pass this on to your customers as well? Or would you be able to keep the prices that are currently set? When we went into this inflationary times, we introduced a new pricing model. So we implemented what we call material surcharges in certain product ranges. And these material surcharges in some cases had significant amounts, especially when the electronics were involved, and we had cases where we had to pay $40 for semiconductors, where we paid $1 before. And that we handed over to our customers via these material surcharges. Those material surcharges we take out now. And this is also something we promised to our customers at the beginning, and therefore, it was well accepted, and now they expect us to take it out, what we do. What we don't do is we don't lower the general list prices. So overall, I would expect that the profitability level or the margin level remains. So the, like, 65% gross margin-ish, that's something where you would expect us to stay going forward? Yes. Or maybe some slight upsides if scale comes in, but definitely not lower. It very much depends also on the structure of the business. If we move into more projects, again, it might lower a little bit. If we move in the more small-scale business, it might go up, but the 65% is somewhat our target, yes. Okay, great. All right. Thanks. That would be for me for now. The next question is from Sebastian Hahn with HC. Please go ahead. Hello. Hello, Mr. Hahn. Hello. I have one question regarding the order intake as well, because in the presentation, you wrote that the flattening of the order volume only temporarily, which means, you are expecting still higher order intake than the EUR 82 million in Q3. Is that correct then? Uh, no. Maybe 97 from Q1, but- No, no, no, no. We are not for Q4. I'm still expecting lower orders. We are not; we will not see the eighties. I'm also not extremely optimistic for the first quarter, but I would expect that starting from the second quarter next year, and especially when we look more into the future, that the orders should come back. Okay. And on what is that basis? Is it basically that the chemical industry now reducing all the inventory, and that should be done, and they are starting to increase- But, uh- utilization? Or what, what is, what's the... They are just not investing, and they are extremely. They all started cost control programs. So we see. We don't see them spending money. And this is in a way we've never saw before, we never saw before, especially in the. When we think about the pandemic, the chemical industry continued investing, and they used the shutdowns of plants for maintenance and upgrading. This is something they don't do at this point of time. So they all have significant profitability issues, and they are all put cost saving programs in place. But eventually, they will come to a normal operation. They will not continue saving money in their technical equipment. Okay. And what's roughly the share of the chemical industry, which is- In Europe, it's around 30%. Germany, even bigger. So 30% out of your European business, and Yeah. So when you look at Germany and Central regions, so our biggest regions, which make probably two-thirds of our sales globally, then in that, the chemical industry is around one-third. Okay. Your assumption that the orders are improving next year from Q2 is not based on a recovery of chemical industry? Is that correct. It's based on a recovery of the chemical industry, but it's also based on our internationalization strategy, that we will see more orders from Americas and Asia Pacific, but it's also a recovery of the Central region and Germany. Okay. And you said Q3 or Q4, you're expecting lower order intake than the EUR 82 million. Can you give us an indication what that means? No, I can't. It's very much dependent on big projects which might come in this year or in January. It's honestly the crystal ball isn't that good at this point of time. There is lots of uncertainty in the market. I still expect a good order intake. We still sit on roughly EUR 130 million of order backlog, so I'm not worried about sales in Q4 and also not starting Q1. But I can't give you really a number. Okay, great. That's from my side. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from Klaus Schlote with Solventis AG. Please go ahead. Yes, good morning. Good numbers. Congratulations. Good morning. Thank you. Yes, I was a little bit astonished regarding your forecast change, change in your forecast. If I look at EBITDA pre, then we are at 32.5 after 9 months. Yes. And so we would add another EUR 2.5 million-EUR 7.5 million, which is roughly, or at the top, it's about half what came in in the Q3. Are there any specific reasons why you are careful regarding EBITDA pre for Q4? If you look into our historical numbers, you see that Q3 is always our strongest quarter. That's one thing. And Q4, we see some effects. And what we also see is that we will close down early in December. So December will definitely be a very soft month, and we see some flattening already in October, November. I said we still have good orders, but the short-term business, the underlying short-term business, the day-to-day business, is softening. So that we see a lower EBITDA in October, November and December. Yeah, it's a little bit reflecting also the uncertainty we have in the market. Okay. And then you mentioned the softening in the chemical industry. And what about the pharmaceutical industry? Because I just heard that Merck is starting a cost-cutting program. Bayer is not doing very well for several reasons. Is that limited really the softening to chemicals, or is it taking broader other industries along? At this point of time, it's, it's the chemical industry, but we are typically late in the cycle. Mm. We are watching the pharmaceutical industry. Mm-hmm. We are watching it, but we don't see significant impacts at this point of time. Yeah. Then, regarding your turnover, strong growth and turnover. Is that, can you give us an indication of what is price-driven and what is volume-driven? In general, if I compare last year to this year, I would say one-third is price, and two-thirds is volume. Regarding Zavod Goreltex, are there any new insights? What will you do about this company? Yeah, there are. There are insights. Actually, you might know, we only own 25% share. Mm-hmm. The rest, 75% was, or is owned by two Russian families. Mm-hmm. We typically call these people oligarchs in Europe. And they come from the agricultural business, and they were the biggest landowners in Russia. And what we got to know in the last couple of weeks was that they lost all their property and their factories in the agricultural business in Russia, and it was taken away from the state. So these guys obviously have problems with Mr. Putin. And that creates a lot of questions for us, which we can't answer at this point of time. So we don't know whether they will also lose the 75% of Goreltex. Right now, they still own it. We don't know exactly what kind of conflict they have with the government, and we don't know what all that would mean to us. So our managing director is still positive that it will not influence us. But again, my crystal ball gives me limited insights. But they are still alive? Yes. No, they're still alive, and operationally, they are doing extremely well. Mm-hmm. I don't mean Goreltex, but the business, people- The business- The two Russian- One, the one is sitting in Marbella. Mm-hmm. The other is somewhere sitting in Russia, but he's hiding himself, if I know correctly, and his son is in prison. Oh, okay. That doesn't sound like a comfortable situation. Not for them, no. No. No. But for the time being, you will do nothing about this, 25%. Uh- You're kind of wait and see, right? No, no, no. I wouldn't call it wait and see. We are permanently checking our options. But when you look into the regulations—I mean, if you sell—If you want to sell something into Russia, there is a process which starts with an evaluation of the company- Mm. which is, can only be done by authorized, companies. Mm. Authorization from the Russian government. On this valuation, then you have to give a discount of 50%, and then you have to pay a fee to the state, which amounts to another 10%. So, you have three steps driving down the value of your investment, and, putting all that together, it's just not attractive at this point of time. But, for the time being, you don't have a buyer or for your- For the time being, we don't have a buyer. We were in discussions with our partners, but they, they don't have money anymore. Okay. Yeah. And regarding dividend, is there any idea, after having been so successful in 2023, to pay some dividend for 2023? We do have these discussions internally. There isn't a decision yet, but we have to have in mind that we are still not ensuring, but we still have negative cash flows. Oh. But this is something, what you typically don't want when you pay dividend. Okay. Regarding hydrogen business, what is your comment on that business, please? Same, same like always. The hydrogen boom is mainly taking place in the press. And it's also coming down there. If you look at the stock prices of some companies. There are many open questions, starting from technical questions, over regulatory questions, and also financing questions. I mean, if you cannot build a hydrogen economy at this point of time in Europe without strong state subsidies. So the whole thing will take time. We are in many interesting projects. We also already booked one very nice project for the city of NEOM. This is the artificial city being built in Saudi Arabia, with a volume of close to EUR 1 million. So, we are present in the ongoing developments, but hydrogen will not play a role in the energy, let's say, for strong energy distribution in Europe in the next five years, and it will not play a significant role in our P&L in the next couple of years. Okay. So you would... I would guess then that you see more visibility in the nuclear business compared to hydrogen business. It's both, both are extremely, promising- Mm. for the mid and long-term development, but both of them will not drive our business in the next 2-3 years significantly. I mean, nuclear more than hydrogen. I told you last time that we already booked roughly EUR 10 million of orders, which will be 2-3 million. We already delivered this year, another 5-6 million we will deliver next year. So this is definitely impacting us in a positive way. But then we talk about 2% of our turnover, 1.5% of our turnover. And hydrogen is in a similar range, probably. And so the. It will take, both of them will take time. I saw that the business Americas is, order intake is going up. Is there any specific reason for that? Yeah, that, that's this, Inflation Reduction Act. I mean, what we see, I mean, part of the weakness in the chemical industry in Europe is driven by the fact that the chemical industry is investing in America, in North America. Then you see strong developments also in other industry sectors, driven by this, with Inflation Reduction Act of the American government. Mm. This is driving it, and therefore, we are focusing also on our internationalization. Mm. Strategy, because there is more to gain for us. Okay, thank you very much, Dr. Mathias Hallmann. Very welcome. The next question is from Ulrich Sachse, with UniCredit Bank AG. Please go ahead. Hello, Dr. Mathias Hallmann. Very impressive figures for the fourth quarter. Just let me take a look on the free cash flow. When do you expect the free cash flow to improve? In particular, the reduction of the working capital, which is impacting the cash flow, the free cash flow, a lot, the last quarters. We are right now in this discussion. To be very honest, what we did, we moved into certain agreements in order to safeguard our ability to deliver to customers in this phase after the pandemic. And we are renegotiating some of these delivery contracts right now. And depending on the outcome of that, we will see the working cap, the working capital coming down sooner or later. It will definitely come down next year. It will definitely come down next year. I hope to bring it down from the first quarter, but we are still in preparation of that. Thank you. Welcome. There are no further questions at this time. Yep. Okay. Thank you very much from our side for your participation and for the good discussions. Hope to talk to you when we issue our preliminary number. Yeah? No. No? Full year. Full year? In April. Full year in April. No preliminary numbers. Okay, good. Then thank you very much again. Bye.