Good day, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Volkswagen AG live audio webcast and conference call on the half yearly 2021 financial results. For your information, today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Ms. Helen Beckermann, Head of Group Investor Relations for Volkswagen AG. Please go ahead, madam. Hello. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. We welcome you to Volkswagen's conference call for investors and analysts on the results for the period January to July 2021. Based on our half- yearly report, which we published early this morning. For today's conference call, I'm delighted to be joined by Herbert Diess, our CEO, Arno Antlitz, our CFO, Christian Dahlheim, our Director of Sales, and Stephan Wöllenstein, our Head of China, our CEO of China. We'll kick off with Herbert today, who has a short presentation, followed by Dr. Antlitz, and then both Christian and Stephan are available for specific questions, either on sales or on China performance. Over to you, Herbert. Thank you very much, Helen. Yes, good afternoon, everybody. Volkswagen had a very strong first half of the year. Best EBIT ever in the first half year, thanks to good mix. We did some pricing. We had a very strong premium brand business. We had good cost discipline on the fixed cost side and a strong financial services result. BEV sales more than doubled in the first half year, compared to last year. We have further momentum to expect in the second half, especially in China, through additional product momentum. Semiconductor supply shortages we managed quite successfully in the first half year. We see now the first real impact in our production. Especially in China, we have lost already quite some market share because of semiconductor supply. The impact is more likely to become visible in the second half of the year. Next quarter, we would see some production constraints. We are working hard to recover in the fourth quarter. The combination of our strong base from first half-year, the expected weaker Q3, but a catch up in Q4 gives us enough confidence to raise our group guidance by a further half percentage point to the range of 6%- 7.5%. The strategy, NEW AUTO, is our plan for transforming Volkswagen into a software mobility company. We are well on the way. We are organizing now the implementation and a few steps we already can communicate later today. All brand groups contribute to a strong first half-year performance. The volume of brands under the leadership of Volkswagen show the growth of around 28% compared to last year. Volkswagen grew its market share in Germany to around 20%, strongest market position since 2016. Germany is a high contribution market, that helps also to improve Volkswagen's situation. The four top most sold products in Germany are all Volkswagen, led by the Golf, Tiguan, Passat, T-Roc. Since many months, Volkswagen was never so strong, that should then also give momentum in the second half here in the other markets. Premium and sport impressively strong, more than 30% more deliveries in the first half year. Audi with its most successful first half of the year in history. All premium brands, Audi, Porsche, Bentley, with double-digit EBIT margins. Truck and bus with growth over 60% and 3% more than the pre-COVID first half of 2019. Incoming orders with 170,000 units are a first half year record figure. In many regions, Volkswagen Group could gain market share. In Europe, Volkswagen gained further market shares with deliveries growing significantly stronger than the overall market recovery. In Western Europe, deliveries in Q2 were significantly stronger than in Q1. We are really making progress. In Europe, our product momentum, product cadence, product lineup is coming along very well, and we have good order intake still. North America is particularly strong. Volkswagen is back in the United States. Sales are up 30% year-over-year. Best Q2 results since 1973. Order books are full for the ID.4, Audi e-tron, and for the Porsche Taycan. We play an important role meanwhile in the electrification in the United States. We aim there for a number two position for electric vehicles, which I think currently we have around 9% market share, which is already twice our market share compared to the ICE side. In China, Volkswagen Passenger Cars was particularly affected by semiconductor shortages in Q2. We expect chip supply to gradually improve from the third quarter onwards, while at the same time, BEV sales are expected to increase significantly. We have positive news and Stephan will later touch a little bit on what we are doing to even improve our dynamics in the EV sales in China, which is a critical success factor for our future success in China. E-mobility, in general, is gaining momentum, and BEV sales will further accelerate in the second half of the year. In Q2, the deliveries more than doubled to around about 171,000 units. The major model offensive is having an effect. The Audi Q4 e-tron now coming to markets, Škoda Enyaq, both have very high order intake, so we have lead times of three to four to five months to get your electric car delivered in Europe. In its first full quarter of delivery, our world car, the ID.4, has become our best-selling BEV, followed by the ID.3, the Audi e-tron, and the Porsche Taycan. Bugatti has an electric future now. You are aware that Porsche has taken over the leadership and is pooling Bugatti's expertise in the hypercar business with the electrification competence of Rimac. Both companies are working together since many years. Porsche is relying on Rimac's expertise in electrification also in their lineup. This combination now makes best use of the synergies between a real sport car brand, Bugatti, when it comes to chassis building, engine technology, and now also electrification. I think Bugatti never was really well-positioned here in Wolfsburg because synergy with volume car business has been low. Now, I think we are well-organized, and we found a nice future for probably one of the most prestigious brands in automotive history. We are a clear market leader in Europe, meanwhile, in the EV business, with a market share of about 26% in BEV deliveries. We appreciate the European Commission's "Fit for 55" targets, and we think it's feasible. It will be tough. It's a demanding program for mostly investing in batteries, ramping up battery production, and also upgrading the fast-charging networks. We think it can be done, and we are aiming at a 60% market share or, let's say, share on our deliveries of EVs in the year 2030. Not market share, but deliveries in our sales. In the U.S., our market share in the BEV market climbed to 9%. I already mentioned that. It's significantly higher than in our overall market position. In China, initial sales figures for the ID.6 are promising. We aim to sell a total of 80,000- 100,000 BEVs from the ID. family by the end of the year. Further product momentum to come. We are just gearing up our dealership and our sales approaches. Stephan will touch briefly on that. PHEVs are also in high demand. The deliveries more than tripled to 171,000 units. We stick to our prediction. We plan to deliver up to 1 million electrified models for the first time in 2021, combined electric vehicles and PHEVs combined. That is why we are fully on track to reaching our CO2 targets in the European Union. We presented the NEW AUTO strategy through 2030 two weeks ago. The transformation already is in full swing. We achieved important milestones also in recent months. We are now really putting the measures into place. Our strategy is a combination of very successful brands, customer contacts, modernizing our brands, and combining the brands with big platform approaches, hardware, software, battery and charging, and mobility and services. Mechatronics and software is making good progress. We are building our new lineup based on the so-called SSP platform, our unified electric platform, which will be developed here in Wolfsburg, mostly, a combination between Volkswagen and Audi. That is why we decided for an investment of EUR 800 million into our Wolfsburg R&D facilities. They have been a little bit outdated. We have to bring that up to speed. That will increase efficiency, speed in the R&D work, and we will have a dedicated team for the SSP platform. We are ramping up our capacities in China, in Anhui. There will be the main focus, the SSP, our new hardware platform. On the software side, we also making progress. The first over-the-air updates for the ID. are coming in place. Customers really like it because the car gets certain upgrades, gets new skins, and people are getting acquainted to the continuous software updates, which they receive. In the future, all this was driven also already in a collaboration between our software unit, CARIAD, and the brands. Battery and charging, also a few things to mention. We partnered with Gotion High-Tech, a battery manufacturer from China, where we have a major stake in. Gotion will help us to industrialize our battery cell production in Salzgitter. This is a competency a classic OEM wouldn't own. Now with the combination with Gotion, we think we are in good shape to ramp up this battery plant in Salzgitter and probably some more in other parts of Europe efficiently with the right skill base and a professional partnership. Volkswagen will invest or has invested another EUR 500 million in sustainable battery activities with our Northvolt investment. We are partnering with Enel X, for developing, owning, and operating more than 3,000 high-power charging points in Italy of up to 350 kW each. I think we have been talking several times about this. The fast-charging infrastructure in Southern Europe is not as deployed as we would like to have it. It hinders our electric car sales, and that is why we are investing and partnering in Italy and in Spain to get fast charging as fast as possible, and then help us also to get our EV sales up and running also in Southern Europe. Mobility and services. I think it's worthwhile mentioning that, and you're all aware, that we are taking over in a consortium the Europcar rental car business. Just to mention, I will explain that in a few slides, we are not buying a rental car business to own a rental car business, but we think that a rental car business is the best starting point to build mobility platforms. I will try to explain you this a little bit later. You see in our strategy overview that mobility and services is one of the big platform games we want to play, with later on then going to robotaxis and different mobility services. A big cornerstone of this strategy is a mobility platform. We think that the best starting point, indeed, is car rental. Why so? To run mobility platforms, you need a brand. It's basically to mitigate between mobility demand from the customer side and supply from the, let's say, different mobility provider side. On the next slide, we skip one. We can show you. Can we skip one slide, please? Next one. On the next slide, we can explain. We see a clear tendency, a trend, that mobility demand is changing over time. We see people renting a car for the weekend, using fleets within the week, using company fleets, trying to swap cars, change cars. They don't like to lease cars for three years, four years anymore. They want a specific car for the weekend, another car for in week or the family. The demand is gradually changing. The question is, who can provide the best service to the customer? We think the most important piece to own and relevant is the customer ID and the customer knowledge, which we think we can build a mobility platform which is really worthwhile using for many customers in the world. We think the best basis is car rental because car rental already has many of the capabilities and skills you will need for the mobility platform. We already have customer contact. We can provide cars in any airport, at central main stations in many cities. We have the capabilities to run big fleets, to maintain big fleets, to buy cars, to sell cars, and this is why we think a profitable rental car business is the best place to start for a mobility platform. We have to add that capabilities, more customer knowledge, pricing capabilities. Also, we have to add third-party offers. We can combine offers from our brands, so branded mobility offerings. But having that, let's say, key capabilities of a rental car business is the best place to grow. And if that's profitable, I think that's the best place to grow from a profitable business. We think we are in good shape to even be competitive later with the big ride-hailing companies of this world or other mobility providers because we start from a profitable base, which we will grow fast on the new service side. This is basically the rationale behind. On the next slide, once again, showing that there are synergies with already existing mobility offerings. We have been trying a lot sharing activities. We have WeShare in Berlin. Many of our brands are trying sharing. We found it very complicated to get it profitable because of the usage of the cars. On this slide, you can see that it makes a lot of sense to combine rental and sharing. It's complementary. Over the life cycle of a year, sharing and rental are very complementary businesses, if you think into one spot, one location. Even within the week, sharing and rental could be very complementary. It depends a little bit on the city. What does it mean? If you use the same car fleet, probably adding additional cars from our retail activities, which might be loaners or test cars, then you can make just better use of your car fleet. Make better use of your car fleet is the critical parameter to get sharing, rental, and all those mobility services to profitability. This is what we are going to do. First, we will combine our businesses from the sharing activities. We will combine that with the rental business of Europcar and already find some additional growth potential. Some of our peers are already investing there. We have reserved about EUR 300 million in our takeover bid to ramp up our IT competencies in the rental business fast to get Europcar from rental into mobility platform. This is what we are aiming to do. We do that. Now please two slides back if that's possible. We do that in a consortium. We don't do it alone. One of our most successful importers and retailers, Pon, is partnering with us, a very competent partner in mobility services already. He's in bicycle leases. He has many customer contacts, very successful in Holland. He's partnering with us. One of the initial investors, Attestor Limited, will help us to restructure and align the company for the new strategy. We are very happy that Attestor stays with us at least for the next five years to build up or rebuild Europcar and make it a big mobility platform. That also leaves the situation where we will not fully consolidate Europcar because we share the leadership, which also allows us to develop Europcar independently or quite independently from our core business, apart from our core business, make it a little bit more agile. Attestor will help us for sure to restructure what's still necessary in the Europcar business. We think it can be profitable, again, profitable very soon because rental car business is recovering fast in the United States. With certain delays, this will also come to Europe. Then we can build it or rebuild it on the basis of a profitable rental car business. That's what we are going to do. That's our aim with Europcar. Probably not easy to understand at first sight. We will show you some evidence that this is the right way to go very soon. Arno Antlitz. Thanks very much. Good afternoon, colleagues. Good to talk to you. With rising levels of vaccinations, the COVID situation has somewhat normalized, and we hope continues to do so. The whole industry is faced with a shortage in the supply of semiconductors. Against that backdrop, against the backdrop of this challenge, we were able to deliver an extraordinary, solid half-year result. Financial highlights, sales came in at 4.7 million vehicles, well above 2020, but sales also well below 2019 figures. Sales revenue, however, came in at close to EUR 130 billion, even above the level of 2019. Operating profit came in at EUR 11.4 billion. This corresponds to a very strong operating margin of 8.8% for the group, well above 2019. This result was mostly driven by strong passenger car business, which benefited from further market recovery and strong product momentum, especially our premium brands performed impressively. We had strong focus on mix and margins, and we showed high fixed cost and investment discipline, especially compared to 2019. Our financial service business also performed very well. Focus on cash flow generation is our key priority, especially in the transformation. Our reported net cash flow for H1 came in at EUR 10.2 billion, driven by high underlying operating cash flows, especially premium, lower CapEx, even below the disciplined 2020 spending and low inventory levels. We operate currently at about 20%-30% below ideal stock levels. Clean cash flow, before M&A and diesel, amounted to EUR 12.3 billion, and net liquidity rose to an extremely robust EUR 35 billion. It's an increase of EUR 16.4 billion versus first half year 2020. These results clearly demonstrate our strong operating performance, show our focus on working capital, and prove the robustness of our business. Net liquidity profited from a strong underlying net cash flow. In H1, we received EUR 1.5 billion in dividends from China, which is around half of the dividends we expect to receive for the full year 2021. The main M&A investments this year so far were the capital increase in Northvolt AB, EUR -0.7 billion, and the capital increase in Argo AI, EUR -0.3 billion. Already in Q1, we paid back EUR 1.2 billion hybrid bond. Please be aware we expect significant cash outflow in H2, among others, for dividends to shareholders and M&A outflows relating to Navistar or Gotion. Nevertheless, EUR 35 billion is a robust starting point for this transaction, and we still strive to keep net liquidity well above EUR 20 billion at the end of the year, including M&A activities. Coming to the performance of our divisions. Within the automotive division, passenger cars delivered EUR 8.5 billion operating result and a very solid 9.3% operating margin, well above 2019. Commercial vehicles came in at EUR 0.3 billion. This result was burdened by substantial restructuring costs at MAN of EUR 0.7 billion. Power engineering came in at breakeven, and the financial service division contributed a strong EUR 2.5 billion result, benefiting especially from high used car demand and very good residual values. Now moving to the passenger car EBIT bridge. The strong result of EUR 8.5 billion for the passenger car business was driven by substantial volume price mix of EUR 11.2 billion. The block exchange rates and derivatives came in at a EUR +1.7 billion versus last year. This was mainly driven by the fair value valuation of commodity derivatives of EUR 0.7 billion, of which the absolute positive contribution in H1 2021 was EUR 1.1 billion. We were so far able to compensate for higher material costs and prices, we expect larger headwinds in the second half of the year, for example, in relation to steel. The position fixed cost others had a significant negative effect of EUR 2.8 billion versus 2020. Overhead costs were higher by EUR 0.4 billion versus 2020. On the other hand, we achieved significant positive contributions from our overhead cost program. Please consider that we compare costs with the first half year of 2020, where production was brought to a stop in lockdowns for several weeks. There's a significant base effect in there as well. Development costs were higher by EUR 0.6 billion due to our continued BEV ramp-up and significant software investment. Third reason are mainly one-off effects of EUR 1.8 billion in comparison to 2020, with the major driver being the transfer of AID to Argo in 2020. This transaction had a significant positive effect back then. Coming to our brand group's performance within the passenger car segment. Within the volume group, Volkswagen came in with an operating margin of 4.4%, mainly driven by the ongoing recovery of the regions. Despite COVID-19, we expect North America and South America to achieve a consolidated break-even this year. Škoda delivered a very strong operating margin of 9.5%. Within the premium group, Audi delivered an operating margin of 10.7%. Bentley came in double-digit at 13.4%, and in the sports and luxury group, Porsche delivered an impressive 17.6% operating margin, standing out in the industry. Looking at the commercial vehicle business in more detail, you get a mixed picture. Scania delivered an impressive 12% operating margin. The underlying business of MAN had a negative result, which was mainly driven by restructuring costs of EUR 0.7 billion. Before restructuring, MAN achieved a margin of 3.4%, which is a significant swing versus prior year. In H1, the proportional operating profit of our major JVs in China came in at EUR 1.3 billion, which is below 2020 figures. In general, chip shortage had a negative effect, whereby Q2 was stronger affected than Q1. The FAW Group China premium brands have been doing very well in H1, leading to a decent proportioned operative result for our northern JV, FAW-VW. On the other hand, competition in the volume segments, especially in the lower segments, remains tough and negatively impacting the FAW-VW brand. Please note that SVW was also burdened with initial ramp-up costs for Audi vehicles, which do not have corresponding sales yet, but in the future. Overall, for the full year, we expect the proportion operating result roughly in part with 2020 figures. H1 has been very strong despite a tough environment. We've managed COVID and the semiconductor restrictions quite well so far. The combination of a strong base from H1 expected weaker Q3, but catch-up in Q4 gives us enough confidence to raise our operating margin guidance by a further 0.5% to the range of 6%-7.5% return on sales. The risk under supply of semiconductors have once again shifted now into the second half of the year. Achieving the upper end of this guidance depends on our ability to recover vehicle production, especially in the light of semiconductor situation, lower our order backlog, and recover lost sales in H2 as much as possible. Relating to automotive clean cash flow, we expect a level of above EUR 15 billion. I'd like to update you on some of the proof points of our strategy. Focusing on BEV ramp-up, our BEV volume continues to ramp up significantly. We delivered 16,000 BEVs in Q1, 110,000 BEVs in Q2. We are now striving for a BEV share between 5% and 6% in 2021 with a minimal tactical spending. To continue with transparency on the performance of CARIAD, currently shown within the other line, our group P&L, since CARIAD is in the initial investment phase and the operating result and net cash flow were both negative and R&D costs doubled in Q2 as planned to EUR 1.0 billion. CARIAD has increased headcount by a further 500 employees in Q2 and now has a headcount of around 4,500 people in total. Looking at our fixed cost program, which include general overhead costs in our headquarters, indirect costs in our plants worldwide, and the budgets of our national sales companies. For better comparison, we track our overhead cost program versus 2019 figure that were not distorted by the 2020 plant closures and short time measures. We managed to continue our progress and decrease this cost base by around 8% versus 2019, a further 2% decrease since Q1, and we are absolutely committed to continue this disciplined approach. The sharpened focus will continue throughout this year as well as until 2023 and beyond. We've very ambitious transformation plans that are required to safeguard our future. For that reason, we have guided for R&D of around 7% for the full year 2021. While this is still above our strategic target of 6%, is a necessary reflection of the execution of our BEV strategy and of building up our software competence. R&D spending came in at 7.2%, still above our 2021 target of 7%, but in terms of CapEx, we showed industry benchmark discipline. The H1 CapEx ratio came in at 3.5%, what was well below 2020 figure. In absolute terms, we came in well below both 2020 and below 2019 at EUR 1.4 billion. We put full focus on product and future technologies while keeping non-product related and structural CapEx at the minimum. Since we've already achieved a very decent CapEx ratio in Q1 so far, we see an upside despite the typical seasonal higher CapEx spend that will come in Q2. We will continue our strict discipline approach, and we will increase our efforts to capture synergies between the brands to compensate for higher R&D costs in the years to come. At Q1, we communicate that we would raise focus and transparency on cash and cash flow even stronger and provide transparency by brand. For the time being, the premium brands are the key contributions to the very strong cash flow generation. Our volume brands still have a way to achieve acceptable cash flows levels, but please take into account that cash flow from the Volkswagen brand was still burdened by diesel outflows of EUR 400 million. Of course, the net cash flow of all our brands benefited from lower inventory levels of finished goods. Ladies and gentlemen, with our strategy NEW AUTO, we have a clear plan to transform our company into a technology and mobility service group. We will continue to focus on synergies across brands and working hard on cost and efficiency. While focusing on technology, ramping up our electric platforms, and developing and deploying a leading automotive software stack. We intend to shape and financially steer our transformation with as much accountability and transparency as possible. Thank you very much, and now I will hand back to Helen. Thank you. Thank you very much, Arno, and thank you, Herbert. If I could just clarify two small points, please. On the passenger cars, EBIT bridge, the block exchange rates and derivatives came in at EUR +1.7 billion, not EUR 0.7 billion, versus the prior year. The correct value is shown on the chart. Secondly, of course, we meant that the higher typical seasonal CapEx will come in the second half of the year. Operator, if I could please pass over to you to kick off our Q&A session. Thank you. Thank you. Now we can go to our first question. It comes from the line of Tim Rokossa of Deutsche Bank. Yeah, good afternoon. Thank you very much for taking my questions. The first one is probably for you, Herbert, of a question. I understand that you still want to do a bit of explanation on the Europcar acquisition, but I think what was most important to your investors and why a lot of them didn't really like the idea of you acquiring this is that there's a lack of understanding why you need to own a good chunk of this asset rather than just partnering with them. Is that something that you can already allude to what the rationale behind that element of the acquisition is in this idea? Secondly, obviously, you have steered the mix in a tremendous way. I mean, these margins that we're seeing at Porsche and also Audi are very impressive. Should we be prepared for a mix dilution once the semi shortage normalizes, or are you ready to cut out some of the lower end of the portfolio even by that point in time? Thank you. Should I probably- He said it would be Christian. He asked for Christian. He asked for Christian. Okay. Christian, I think the first question was directed to you on the logic behind buying a chunk of Europcar. Tim, good afternoon. Thanks for your question. I think the two fundamentals, one is obviously you also, if you put everything in the new mobility platform, you will also leverage the brand. Obviously, if you only partner with the brand, you actually strengthen a massive brand that you, at the end of the day, don't own, if we are successful in the future. Second point, you need to, as Herbert Diess has explained, you need to work out of an integrated fleet. If, for example, through Europcar, we offer branded subscription service for, let's say, Porsche or Audi, you want to deliver more Audis and Porsche, relatively speaking to that partner, and that's a partner you should have a particular intensive relationship, i.e., ideally own at least a part or the majority of it. These are the two main reasons. Part, of course, from the third effect, it's much easier to line everybody in this group to a partner that we actually have a significant shareholding in, and you participate in the value creation that we hope to generate. Okay, Herbert, if you could take the second question. It's on our steering of mix if things are what I will say will be positive when things go back to normal on the semiconductor, whether we see a mix solution then or whether we can maintain our very strong mix as in the premium brands. Yeah, for sure there is an effect of a mix improvement because of prioritization, but we have a strong focus on keeping the margins high and improving our mix. We have seen that we are able to price some of our increased costs, and we will maintain that route. We're not striving any more for volume leadership. We are striving for profitability. Our task is, and our aim is to keep the margins as high as they are today. Great. Could we please take the next caller, please? Our next question comes from Arndt Ellinghorst of Bernstein. Yes. Hi, good afternoon, everyone. First, a question for Herbert Diess, please. Dr. Diess, on capital allocation, I think we all know and understand that you and the management team are very passionate about the value of Volkswagen and the potential of value unlock from really lifting hidden value from the various businesses you have. Now at the moment, it seems that we're moving in the other direction with Navistar, Europcar, Gotion. We're potentially looking at about EUR 14 billion of liquidity outflow with the second half alone. Can you just update us on your thinking regarding core versus non-core businesses and the action behind it that might lead to a more valuable Volkswagen? Secondly, on China really. I mean, thanks for the additional slides on the deck. It's now, we've seen this for a while now that the net equity contribution from the joint ventures is dramatically falling. It's obviously related to Shanghai VW, and as you say in your slides as well, the mass market exposure. Can you just talk about what structurally, how you will reset the VW brand in China and how much it will cost you to reposition or even take out Škoda? Thank you very much. Okay. Yeah, first of all, I think it's fair to say that we are doing a lot also to streamline our operations. Not many months ago, we put our SEAT operation, for instance, into a joint venture with Porsche. I think the move now with Bugatti, where we didn't have a clear future answer, now having it under the leadership or under the control of Rimac is a very good move. We streamlined our operations for the premium sector. The combination or, let's say, adding Bentley to the product portfolio of Audi makes it now very easy to manage the entire product portfolio under one umbrella, but allows Audi to address higher segments with Bentley leveraging scale and technology. We think we are moving the organization of the group into groups in volume premium and letting alone Porsche makes a lot of sense for reducing the complexity. Actually it's working really well. We don't deal with the minor investments like Ducati, Lamborghini anymore. It's in good hands with Audi, and they leverage all the synergies and scales. On the other hand, we think that premium brands are valuable, and we have a good chance to increase brand value over time. In our strategy shows clearly that by the year 2030 also, it will be very much a brand game. Now brands have to be aspirational, also emotional, and we have probably the best brand portfolio in the world, and I think we have restructured the brand portfolio decently. It's well-organized, and it's working well. The combination now is with the big platforms. Also, I think this we have organized in the right manner. Hardware platform, software platform, which allows for the right scale. We strongly believe that automotive industry in 2030 will be more of a scale game than it is today. Software is fully scalable, autonomous driving is fully scalable. Hardware platforms will be one unified hardware platform. You will see that this is going to be a game for very, very big companies. At least you need the economies of scale on the technology side. We think it's absolutely the right setup. Same applies to batteries and charging. This is why we are very confident that we are making the right moves. Is there something where we have to work on our brand portfolio? Yes, in some aspects. Škoda is doing very well. They're getting close to 10% profit margins now. We're streamlining the worldwide business. Škoda has taken control for India, for Russia, East European markets. Volkswagen is coming back strongly in Latin America, in the United States. The brand portfolio, our weakest point probably is SEAT, and they are very well on the move now with their sports brand, CUPRA. CUPRA is already bigger than Alfa Romeo has been over the past years. They are going into higher margins. Their new product launches are received very well, so this might be the way forward, and we are confident that it can be the way forward for SEAT as well. We have, by far, the best worldwide brand portfolio in the industry. All brands are being modernized, made future-proof, are electrifying. This allows us also to play the scale game in the EV sector also, probably on a different level than many of our peers, because 70% of the EV platforms are on full scale between the brands. This is how we play the game, and we think this is the way we are going to be successful. Whenever it's possible, we streamline. Think about SEAT. We have other things in mind. We already reorganized our supply plans quite considerably. We phased out plastic components production. If we see further potential to streamline, we will do so. We will have strong investments because the industry will remain very capital intensive. We have to add the battery plant, and we will do that in a way to maintain our margins high and only invest where we really see the right margins, or where we see strategically very relevant investment. This is the case for Europcar. We think mobility platforms can be highly profitable, because at the end, it's customer knowledge, it's software, it's a brand. The best basis to build up one of those brands, or probably several of those brands delivering services, is Europcar. We see high potential for also creating value with building a mobility platform. You can see that. We think we can be more successful than many of the mobility players you have in mind, like Uber or Lyft or so, because they are probably in a worse position than we are now. Time will tell. Your question regarding China. Yes, we are in a difficult situation because of semiconductor supply, but our brands are in good shape. Škoda is suffering because it lacks the size for China. Now we are just too small, and the efforts to make Škoda really successful are really big. That is why we are really losing market share. The premium brands are doing excellently because premium is growing much faster in China than volume. I'm not too concerned about Volkswagen. Volkswagen has a very strong market position. We are around over 10%, 12% market share even now in a crisis situation, where we have given up market share because of semiconductor supply. Very strong. The next brand to follow us has probably, it has a little bit more than half of our size. The economies of scale, we are owning there. The brand perception is very positive. We have a very loyal customer base. We have good dealership network. We are in good shape in the traditional business. Where we really have to gear up now is NEV. NEV is a new game in China. We have new competitors. It's a new customer we have to address. Probably Stephan will lose a few words on it. We think that we are in good shape. Our product substance is good. We have the right range, battery, product excitement. We are very competitive. Now we have to really make it work. I would say the first signs are positive. The order intake is growing. ID.6 was very well received by customers and the press. ID.4 sales are picking up, but we have to be aware that NEV is still in development. Now we have Tesla there, very dominant on the high-end side. Then we have very low margin, small scale NEV electric vehicles. There's no other real competitor which has been able to overtake us. Not talking NIO or any others which are very much hyped. We are in much better shape than those. If we do the job, if we find the right way to address a new customer base, which is a much younger customer, if we are fast enough to build up the charging network, we can be, on the NEV side, as successful as we are currently on the combustion engine side. We have been able to demonstrate this in Europe. We are currently demonstrating this in the United States, and we will demonstrate this in China. Stephan, you have to add something. No. Perfectly summarized, almost, as we said. We are well on track also with regard to July. You stated that our China-specific model, the ID.6, is surprisingly well-perceived. Let's say mixes on order intakes are higher than we expected. I would not say we are doubling now almost every month, but we are now gaining on a month-by-month basis between 50%-70%+ on orders as well as on deliveries. As we have also stated in the last days, our aim is, which seems to be quite realistic, to deliver between 80,000-100,000 cars on the ID family this year in China. Mr. Ellinghorst, as you probably know as much as the colleagues that the NEV market is about still a 2 million units. Except Tesla, there is actually nobody who delivers, let's say, a six-digit number on a yearly basis on comparable models if you exclude the minivans in this respect. With this number in mind, we are very confident that the first big step into getting Volkswagen also into the NEV game will be made this year. Then with further growth and normalization of the sales trend to be expected for next year. It is a different game, probably also to further elaborate of what Herbert stated on this. You know that in particular, the pure NEV brands, most of them are startup-based ones. If you leave, for instance, BYD as a more traditional contender out, also have pursued a different sales model, which we are also adapting to our traditional franchise model. We are selling in China, as we do in Europe also, our ID models via the agency system. We are currently with both joint ventures ramping up massively exclusive ID stores, relatively small-sized ones, but in prime location in shopping malls. We aim for a network across both joint ventures of roughly about 150 of such prime locations in high-frequency areas in China, where also our competitors are now presenting their cars, which would be a similar sized network as also the NEV-only brands have. Of course, on top of it, we have our natural strength with our established 2,000 unit dealer network, which of course, is able to deliver a first-class service, which some of our competitors are certainly not able to reach because simply of the maturity in the market. NEV is probably the most important strategic initiative to come. Nevertheless, as you have also elaborated on the Volkswagen brand as such, we are still on the way of executing our so-called Move Forward strategy. Also this year, we had just recently launched another SUV car, which was one of the key areas where we had to pick up. There is one more car to go in order to complete, and then we will have more or less a completed and saturated ICE portfolio. Future model extension will happen purely in the field of electric vehicles, where we are more or less for the transition phase, are building a second compelling portfolio on NEVs. Then at the end of the decade, certainly, we expect also for China, then the tipping point to be reached where NEVs are taking the majority over the ICE car business. Also worth to mention that similar to Europe, but probably even more radical, we also build our own charging infrastructure in China in conjunction with our colleagues from FAW as well as with Star Charge, where we are also completing the offer in terms of charging and not completely relying on public or semi-public charging infrastructure. Making sure that our NEV customers have access to first-class VIP services on charging. I believe still the holistic experience, including the charging and service element, will be one of the decisive factors to turn NEV into the big future thing to happen in China. That's great. Thank you very much. Maybe just one quick follow-up really for Herbert. Herbert, given you've got a new contract now, which gives you more planning visibility for the group, do you personally believe in a partial IPO of Porsche? As I said, we continuously reviewing our setup. First priority is now to finance the battery ramp-up. We try to partly externally finance, and we are working out the models. All the other, let's say, possibilities to go to market, which might be trucks, where we could dilute a little bit and coming a new strategy or any other things, we have to consider. The first priority now is to finance the ramp-up in batteries. Thanks a lot. Okay, thank you. I think we now have José next in the queue. Operator, please, next person. Thank you. We can go to José Asumendi of JP Morgan. Thanks very much. José, JP Morgan. Couple of questions, please. Dr. Diess, can you comment a little bit, please, about the collaboration with Ford, specifically in Europe on this NEV architecture that's going to give you, I think, very strong economies of scale. How is that progressing? Has there been any developments since the last time? Any opportunity to expand on a geographical basis across any other region? Also, can you comment a little bit around Argo and again, that collaboration with Ford, definitely not valued or priced into the share price currently. Can you comment a bit around either the investments, the commitments you have there, any latest development on the technology side that you may share? Second for Arno, can you help us a little bit in terms of the maybe little bit the short-term momentum into the third quarter? Are you seeing wholesale down versus Q2? Are you seeing raw materials becoming a substantial headwind, or do you think you have the opportunity again to offset some of the headwinds with pricing and with mix. Thank you. Yeah, of course. That's a bundle of questions. Ford Alliance is working out really well. We did that mostly driven by the strategic position of our light commercial vehicles, and I think we are gaining a lot of competitiveness over the next couple of years using mostly Ford platforms for our commercial vehicles. It's well on the way. The projects are making good progress. The designs I've seen are really promising. The cost base we are going to achieve are good, and we already see recovery of our light commercial vehicles. I think there should be, even in our planning, some upward potential because of the Ford partnership from light commercial vehicles and chances. The Argo venture is making good progress. Now, it was tough times because we couldn't communicate well, we couldn't drive the cars. Now Bryan Salesky is coming over. I think he will give a presentation on the Munich Fair, where we are going to show the next steps. The cars, I've been seeing the cars which are being equipped now with all the LiDAR equipment. They started test driving at the Munich Airport, and later this year, I'm invited to a test drive and then next year, hopefully we're going to see some fleets in the United States and our cars here in Germany. They are telling us, it's a third party, that their sensor technology is much better than what you see on the rest of the competitors. Compute hardware is very similar. I think we are at eye level with, at least at the same level of technology than most of our peers. Test drives next year should show some progress. The vehicles look nice, I think. Hopefully we can, next year, test drive some of our cars in the [MOIA] in Hamburg or in Munich. I'm happy that we made the investments. It took us, I would say, probably half a year. We examined all potential partners. We ended up with Argo, and we don't regret. We think we have the right partner, and we have the right partner with Ford. Now, we all know it's a long way to become profitable in that business. Its technology roadmap is still a long one. I don't regret anything, and I think we've made the right choices, and the team is making good progress. Ford is happy, we are happy. I agree with you that we have to show it more because it's an asset. It's probably more of an asset than you have in your books. Next question was. Headwinds headwinds, wholesale figures. Yeah, probably. Arno, can you? José, on the margin side, you asked last time also for Q3 or for Q2. Let me start with the full year. Look, we start with a starting point of 8.8% now, you know we have a certain seasonality in our business, a typical seasonality specifically in the third quarter. We have closing shutdowns for the summer period. That accounts for, on a full-year basis, for half a point or up to a percentage point. That 8.8% in the first half of the year should ideally have led to a guidance of 8.8% for the full year. Why didn't we go for the 8%? Let me first make clear, we are absolutely committed to achieve the best margin possible, we see some uncertainties in Q3. That, from today's perspective, is difficult to predict, specifically in terms of visibility. We do not rule out that we even slightly surpass the 7.5%. For today's perspective, you should expect a more normal Q4. That obviously mathematically leads to a higher burden we expect in Q3. Again, as said, we do not rule out that we surpass the current margin guidance if we really manage the supply of semiconductors quite well. Okay. I think we had a question, a bit more details on raw materials, if possible. Raw materials. A little bit counter-intuitive, what you saw on our EBIT bridge, because we had a significant positive effect on the product cost side. What we see is currently, the raw materials we use, we have it added in our inventories. Basically, these raw materials still had lower prices, but we see the steel, the aluminum we buy, so far, the prices increased significantly. You should expect a higher burden in the second half of the year. Of course, we are hedged. Of course, we have long-term contracts, and of course, we look into pricing, and of course, we look into the possibility to compensate for that on the cost and fixed cost side. Yes, in a theoretical EBIT bridge for the second half of the year, we expect a swing to a negative figure there. Maybe Christian, the last point on the development of pricing into Q3 and rest of year. I can assure you that my boss reminds me every morning that we should additionally price our car. I think generally speaking, as you can see from our mix and price effects, I think we've done a pretty decent job to leverage pricing. Again, pricing, of course, always has two aspects. One is our price increases were already done in March. We have done a second price increase, or we will do a second price increase already announced on the 1st of October. Thirdly, of course, we have reduced technicals massively, which is effectively nothing else than a price increase across the board, pretty much across all markets and all segments. Okay. I think with Kai Mueller now, we still have, as I'm looking, eight or nine more people in the queue. If I could ask to restrict yourself to one question, I think we've covered very comprehensively some of the bigger topics. We're checking the possibility of extending 10 minutes, depending on where all these guys need to get to. Hopefully we'll get through. George is the next one. If we can hand over to the operator, please. The next question comes from Kai Mueller of Barclays. Okay. Sorry George. Thank you very much for the question. If I just stick to one, on your Europcar deal, as Tim outlined earlier, there's a lot of question in terms of the structure of the deal. Can you just clarify a little bit how much will it actually cost you to invest into this, and what shareholding you will be having? What is the idea behind being a shareholder in such an asset versus owning the asset outright? Christian will take that question. Happy to take the question. First of all, as Herbert Diess has explained, we will buy Europcar, or we intend to buy Europcar in a consortium. We will buy 67% of the shares at the price of EUR 0.50. That will cost us EUR 1.655 billion. If, as we hope, we will reach the threshold of 90% and then will allow us for a squeeze out, we will pay EUR 1.688 billion. This is for our 67% relative to 100%. Attestor will own 27% of the shares, and Pon will invest EUR 176 million, owning 7% of the shares. We believe that instead of owning it outright, I think we leverage actually the abilities of three great partners. One, starting with the private equity partner, will help us to do some necessary structuring measures, which sometimes is easier and better to do in a partnership than as a big corporate alone. Second, Pon is in often is much more agile and advanced in terms of mobility. We will be able, first of all, not only to test new things in the Netherlands, for example, or in other markets. Second, we'll have someone who also holds us accountable. Being a large corporate, we're sometimes slow, so it's good to have someone to push us and do some things maybe a bit more agile, if I might compare it. Well, competing with Sixt, for example, that's a well-run agile company, so we need someone to be at the same speed. That's the reason why we strongly believe that partnership is a good combination of our abilities. Thank you, Christian. If we could now take the questions from George, and I can confirm we will extend for 10 minutes to hopefully get you all in. George Galliers of Goldman Sachs, please go ahead. Thank you. Thank you for taking my question. Look, I wanted to revisit something which has been raised in the past. You are clearly making good traction with your electric vehicle sales. If I look back this year, your share price on Power Day was at a similar level to today, before increasing by more than 20% in the following 30 days, seemingly indicating that investors too are excited by your EV offensive. However, since then, it does feel like some of the excitement has faded. With that in mind, would you be willing to change your position on the reporting of your battery electric vehicle sales to report them monthly rather than quarterly, so that the market can more easily follow your progress? In addition, can you confirm that internally you are tracking the revenues and contribution profit generated by your battery electric vehicles, and is that something that you might consider disclosing to the investment community? Thank you. Okay, Christian will take the question on reporting of our BEV progress. George, maybe I think Arno has explained it multiple times, of course, we'll increase our transparency on the BEV reporting massively. We strongly oppose, me included, the monthly reporting, because in an organization like ours, what happens then people run after monthly delivery targets, we deliberately want to steer for profitability and not for volume numbers. We believe the three months reporting is sufficient transparency and enables us internally to steer what you want at the end of the day, of course, as our investors steer for profitability and not run after monthly published targets. George, your second half of your question. We have internally, of course, margin information, and based on that information, combustion engine versus battery electric cars, we gave you the indication that within the next two to three years, the margins will converge. We explained in our strategy day the effect of better margins from battery electric vehicles, better scale, better battery costs, and the parity we will see within the next two to three years. For the time being, we won't disclose for competitive reasons, specific margins on specific models. We are confident that we can stick to that margin convergence prediction within the next two to three years, which should be a good measure for most of the capital market from our point of view. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, George. We'd like to now take the call and take Stephen, and then we have five left, so it's looking good on time. Now we can go to Stephen Reitman of Société Générale. Yes, good afternoon. If looking at slide 26, which is showing the cash flow, obviously it's very striking that when you look at the very strong cash flow that you generated, the EUR 10.2 billion, it's predominantly the result of Audi and Porsche. Obviously, those companies also in quite heavy spending phases as well. They're still managing to generate, obviously, very strong cash flows. I'm wondering how do you think the development of the more volume-oriented part of the business can be in terms of cash flow generation going forward? Obviously, I did take note of your higher cash flow guidance for this year. Second question as well about the United States. You mentioned that you're pretty much sold out already on the ID.4 in the United States. Obviously, those vehicles are being imported from Germany at the moment. Could you update us on how quickly you'll be transitioning to local production in the United States? Thank you. Thanks, Stephen. Arno will comment on the cash flow development, in relation to brands versus premium. Stephen, thanks for your question. As promised, we increased focus and we also increased transparency. Basically, the result you see on page 26, yes, there is significant upside potential specifically in the volume brands. If you look at the Škoda cash flow for six months, it's not too bad already. Volkswagen Passenger Cars, is burdened by diesel payouts, but they know they have quite some way to go. As you're aware, Volkswagen brand currently operates on 4% margin. There is a path to 5% next year and 6% in 2023. With that operative improvement, the margin should improve as well. There is a small thing you need to consider when you look on this net cash flow exhibit. Due to our operating model within CARIAD, there is a significant negative cash flow, which we also communicated in the deck. That basically, theoretically, you had to add to the brand specifically also partly to the premium brands because if they had to pay for their upfront investment in digitalization and in software, their cash flow would be a little bit more diluted. Still, it's a really strong cash flow from Audi, strong cash flow from Porsche, basically from a very strong product momentum, very strong operating business. The next small reason is, yes, we operate a little bit under ideal stock, 20%-30%, and that will normalize over time. As said before, we increased focus, we increased transparency, and we also increased our initiatives on working capital. Perhaps in Q3, but at latest in Q4, we will give you more detail on our working capital initiative, which has basically three streams: focus on ideal stock calculation, a much more stringent and robust and ambitious focus there, then receivables and payables. From this initiative, we should also see another positive effect. Again, what you summarize with the improvement of the operating result of Brand Volkswagen in 2022 and 2023, we should also see a much more positive cash flow. Okay. If I could hand over to Herbert. If I can hand over to Herbert just to address when we will localize the ID.4 in the USA ID.4 is going to be localized quarter three 2022, quarter three next year. Until then, we are trying to squeeze out a little bit more production here from our German plants to satisfy the U.S. demand. Okay. Next we have Horst. If we can go to the operator, please, and take the next question. Thank you. Our next question comes from Horst Schneider of Bank of America. Yeah. Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for taking over my questions. Most of my questions actually have been asked already. Therefore, just the final one. On financial services, on the splendid result you reported here in Q2, just want to get a feeling what has driven the result in Q2, and to what extent the tailwind effect is going to be permanent also in the next two quarters. I want to get a feeling, what is the run rate from here in financial services? Thank you. Horst, thanks for your question there. There were extraordinary factors, but there are a lot of factors we should expect also in the coming quarters and years to come. In the financial service business, we started a fixed-cost and operational improvement program, they have a very good and a positive business. On the other hand, we saw very good residual values, and very low, basically, factors on risks. It's difficult to predict whether these effects will be permanent. From the sales perspective, we try to make them permanent, since what we said before, we will promise that we keep the cost discipline, we keep also the inventory discipline and incentive discipline. That should also lead to a more permanent positive effect on our financial services side. The credit risk is difficult to predict. For the time being, they didn't materialize. Customers are still solvent, you know this is something you can't really predict for the future. For the time being, this is very solid as well. Okay. Operator, if we can take Tom, please. Our next question comes from Tom Narayan of RBC Capital Markets. Thanks. Tom Narayan, RBC. Thanks for taking the question. Question is for Stephan on China. First, thanks for the details from before. We've been hearing some press reports indicating some issues maybe Chinese consumers have been having with the software on the ID family. I'd just love for you to maybe respond to this, and what are those issues, and when might they be resolved? Thank you. Tom, as you know, we brought the MEB factory alongside the ID.4 also the first time to China. Indeed, as I would say, with all complex software, hardware, and topics, we had to adjust some. As we did so, I would say we are currently, since a couple of weeks out with the software, where we see hardly any problems, which we are currently also, let's say, offering to our customers also very first days. Similar to you, as you probably know, that we are also aiming, let's say, for the over-the-air update ability, probably slightly delayed to Europe, simply for two, three reasons. Because in China we have a slightly different hardware, much more performed than we have it in Europe. We have more legal requirements in terms of permanent delivery on data to government backends to observe and monitor the battery status, which is a legal obligation in China, which, of course, is affecting all software updates to function as well. We are planning to go in front of our customers with update ability and increased functionality. We'll be very attractive software package to hit the market, I would say around the year's changes, latest early next year. The good thing is, as the hardware is not going to change, this will be a positive also surprise and benefit for all customers that have already decided and deciding these days to buy an ID. car in China. Okay. We can take the next questions, please. Our next question today comes from Henning Cosman of HSBC. Yeah. Hi, good afternoon. Thank you for taking the question. Maybe while we're on China, another one for Stephan and on slide 19. Thank you for indicating the profitability for the remainder of 2021. Obviously implies that you go back to above a EUR 1 billion contribution on a per quarter basis. Last year in H1, you obviously had the COVID dilution. This year, you had the semi dilution. Is the understanding correct that you can sustain the above EUR 1 billion contribution on a per quarter basis going into 2022 as well? Not really looking for guidance, but just order of magnitude so that you, for the first time, again, now are able to break that trend of declining earnings in China. Thank you very much. As I said, what you call the decline of earnings in China is really more on extraordinary effects. We had one-off effects, financial ones, that are positively affecting our 2020 results, which are not to be repeated in 2021. The colleagues have stated earlier on, we are in particular hit in China by the semiconductor shortage in quarter two and quarter three. Just for you as a background, if you do not know, we are, let's say, in the same boat as we are on many components globally. We are specifically for a safety relevant part also related to the Japanese supplier that had a burn down in their semiconductor factory in March, which are now on the way to fully recover. Which was hitting our MQB platform massively on the steering box in quarter two to be, let's say, continuing in quarter three. We have an alternative supplier also in on top of what we have with our main one, hoping to see a return back to almost normal levels by the end of quarter three, quarter four to commence into 2022. On top what Arno in general stated, we had also specifically in China, also for a joint venture that was raised by Ellinghorst on SVW, a massive fixed cost optimization program in place where we are able long-term lasting to also reduce the fixed cost by more than EUR 1 billion. This will, of course, positively contribute in the earning qualities in the years to come. I would say if we are really able to manage on one hand the ramp-up cost on Audi as we go for a second partner strategy with the South. If our fixed cost programs now unfold fully, we have a price value strategy for the brand Volkswagen to come. We have a richer product module mix on the core brand Volkswagen, as I stated earlier on. If the lasting effects go through and the short-term effects mainly around the chip shortage in 2021 will pass away, we will see, let's say, improved financials for China to come and to last. Henning, if I understood it correctly, you asked for a guidance for 2021 or for 2022? I think 2022, right? Henning? As far as I understood, I think 2021 is clear. We said roughly on par. We said we will give more transparency in the future, and I don't rule out that in the future, we also guide for the proportionate operative profit, but it's too early to guide that for 2022. I would propose that we do that within our normal guidance process coming next year, and then we can discuss what we expect for 2022. As said before, we will, and we promise to increase transparency, and that might be part of that higher transparency we give in the future. In absence of new extraordinary factors, there's no reason to assume a deceleration in run rate compared to the EUR 2.3 billion in H2, right? That's the message. Could you repeat your question, please? For 2021, we said roughly on par on the 2020 figures, yeah. No, exactly. Which implies EUR 2.3 billion for the second half of the year, right? I'm just asking if in absence of additional extraordinary factors, or like you say, a normalization into 2022, there's no reason to expect a deceleration from the H2 run rate. Exactly. Okay. That's clear. Thank you. If I can just add, Henning, if you're looking at the 2020 proportionate operation result, that was EUR 3.6 billion. That's the number we're referring to as being roughly on par. Yeah. Okay. Sorry. If we could now take Charles, and we have Jürgen Pieper, so it looks like we're finishing on time. We can go to Charles Coldicott of Redburn. Hi. Thanks for taking my question. Just a clarification, actually. I think you said earlier in your prepared remarks that you're now expecting fully electric vehicles to be 5%-6% of your total deliveries this year, which I know is only a small change, but I think previously you said 6%. Obviously, that's relative to an overall group deliveries figure for the year that you now are saying is lower than you previously thought, about 5% lower. I just wanted to check the reason why your expectations for BEV sales might be lower than previously thought. Is that just the chip issue in spite of prioritizing supply of chips for the BEV models, or is it something else? Thanks. Christian will cover the topics related to the target for electric vehicles for the full year. That's true. I think in our previous guides, we always communicated up to 6%, so it's 5%-6%. Again, the slight change in the outlook is so minimal relative to the share of BEV that that doesn't have an impact. Obviously, we're prioritizing BEVs due to the semiconductor shortage, but also BEVs are slightly affected. That's why we guide 5%-6% at this point in time. Maybe important addition, we continue to say that we definitely will hit our CO2 compliance based on these numbers. Just to avoid any confusion here. Also, for IDs, last point, as for all other models, we're obviously optimizing for profitability. That's why we, for example, cut some production relative to original budgets. Also there, we optimize for margin and profitability, while of course, satisfying customer demand and hitting CO2 compliance. Thanks, Christian. If we can take Jürgen, please. Yes. Hi. Good afternoon, gentlemen. I have one question left on the used car business, which seems to be very strong. Can you quickly describe it, maybe? Why is it so strong? I guess this is more or less 100% combustion cars. Why do people rush for these products? Is it just more or less a demand thing because people who just don't want to wait for 12 or 18 months for a new car go to used cars as a bit an exit strategy from their side? Is it a widespread phenomenon across markets and across products, or is it more a specific thing, let's say, in Germany and some other markets? Yeah, maybe I can take that question. Maybe I start with the last point. This is actually widespread across Europe and the U.S. most notably. In the U.S., it's actually particularly big. It's driven by two key factors that apply for both markets. One, of course, you have an effect due to the simple fact that 2020 you sold less new cars. If you sell less new cars, then at least on the shorter term, used cars you have less supply. The second, of course, is the fact that new cars are first of all, more pricey due to the increases we all do, and second, they are not as available as customers are used to. Of course, they consider used cars as an alternative. These are the two, let's say, individual factors. I think generally speaking, all manufacturers are fully aware meanwhile about the importance of residual values, and I think we're all jointly managing the used car business a bit more cautiously and thoroughly, and I think that's why we believe it's also, while not maybe in the order of magnitude, but it is a longer-lasting effect because the RV management becomes so important for our entire industry. Thank you, Christian. Sorry. Thank you. Oh, sorry. Thank you, Jürgen. We'd like to wrap up now for today's event. Thank you all for your participation. I would like to make a reminder that tomorrow at 01:00 Central European Time, our Audi colleagues are holding their webcast and conference call. They're looking forward to your participation. To wrap up, the most important thing for today for all of us, staying healthy and having happy, relaxing holidays. If there's questions, of course, contact us or the IR team. Have a good day, a good afternoon.