Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. I am Gail, your Chorus Call operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Frigoglass conference call regarding the first quarter 2026 financial results. All participants will be in listen-only mode, and the conference is being recorded. The presentation will be followed by a question-and-answer session. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star and zero on your telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. John Stamatakos, Treasury and IR Director. Mr. Stamatakos, you may now proceed. Thank you all for joining us. Today, we present the group's financial and business performance for the first quarter of 2026. The presentation focuses on our commercial refrigeration operations from continuing activities. In line with our previous calls, I'm joined today by our CEO, Serge Joris, and our CFO, Manos Metaxakis. Before we begin, please note that this conference call contains forward-looking statements. These statements should be considered in conjunction with the cautionary statements included in our slide deck. With that, I will turn the call over to Serge. Thank you, John, and good afternoon, everyone. We have started the year strongly with good momentum and disciplined execution across our business. Demand for commercial refrigeration was robust in the quarter, with sales up 29%, supported by solid performance across all regions. Growth was led by Europe and India, with Africa and the rest of Asia also contributing positively, highlighting the strength and breadth of our geographic footprint. This strong top-line performance translated into a meaningful step-up in profitability, with comparable EBITDA increasing more than threefold to EUR 13.5 million, compared with EUR 4.4 million in the first quarter of last year. Overall, results were in line with our expectations and consistent with the guidance we previously communicated. The quarter also marked important progress in our transformation agenda. We successfully completed the disposal of the glass packaging business, which materially reduced leverage on our balance sheet. Using the net proceeds, we redeemed EUR 87 million of senior notes, strengthening our capital structure. We completed the disposal of our Russian business earlier this month. After a lengthy process, we secured all required U.S., European, and Russian legal approvals, enabling us to close the transaction as planned. Overall, the strong first quarter performance gives us greater confidence in our ability to deliver our 2026 outlook, where we expect sales and EBITDA to grow by approximately 15% and 60% year-over-year, respectively. Turning to slide five, which highlights the strong financial momentum we are building in commercial refrigeration. On a last 12 months basis, sales reached EUR 306 million in the first quarter, a meaningful increase versus 2023, which was the first year of our transformation journey. This performance was driven by customer diversification, including further gains in the energy drink segment and other non-core customers, as well as our broader focus on expanding opportunities across the business, including our entry into Egypt last year. At the same time, last 12 months adjusted EBITDA improved by EUR 27.1 million to EUR 23.9 million. This reflects both the operating leverage coming through from higher volumes and the disciplined execution of our cost reduction and margin improvement initiatives. All in all, we are delivering stronger operating performance while continuing to execute the transformation actions that support long-term value creation. Turning to slide six, let me walk through the key drivers of our regional performance. Starting with West Europe, sales increased by 35%, driven by strong demand across key markets including Germany, France, the U.K., Spain, and Belgium. In the quarter, we saw solid orders from soft drink customers, particularly in the fast-growing energy drink segment. In East Europe, sales grew by 19%. This growth was supported by market share gains with existing customers, particularly beyond traditional Coca-Cola bottlers, and a broader customer base. The main markets that we saw good volume growth were Poland and Bulgaria. We also continued to benefit from pricing actions in our Asset Performance Services business. In Africa and the Middle East, sales increased by 41%, led by strong demand in South Africa and Nigeria, as well as the contribution from our entry into Egypt last year. In South Africa, growth was driven by strong orders from a key brewery and energy drinks customers. In Nigeria, performance was supported by placements with a major brewery and soft drink customers. Egypt also contributed positively as the business continued to build on the initial market entry. In Asia, sales were up 26%, led by continued volume growth in India, supported by our efforts to expand the customer base and market share gains with existing customers. This performance was delivered despite currency headwinds from the Indian rupee. Overall, commercial refrigeration sales increased by just over 29% year-over-year, reflecting strong execution across all regions and highlighting the benefits of our increasingly diversified geographic footprint. With that, I will now hand over to Manos who will take you through the financial performance. Thank you, Serge. Good afternoon to everyone. Please turn to slide eight for an overview of our first quarter financial performance from continuing operations. Sales increased by 29% year-over-year to EUR 103.8 million, supported by strong demand in Europe, accelerated momentum in Africa, and continued growth in Asia. That top line growth translated into a strong improvement in profitability. Excluding the allocation of certain head office expenses to glass operations in the prior year period, comparable adjusted EBITDA increased to EUR 13.5 million. This represents an increase of more than three times year-over-year. Comparable adjusted EBITDA margin expanded by 750 basis points to 13%. These improvements reflect a combination of factors such as the better cost absorption from higher sales, production cost improvements driven by the successful implementation of cost out initiatives, mainly related to material cost savings and a more favorable product mix. These positive drivers were partly offset by raw material price increases, mainly in Asia, as well as adverse foreign exchange movements primarily related to the devaluation of the Indian rupee. The current situation in the Middle East continues to affect our cost base, mainly in Asia, and we are actively working to mitigate that impact through our agile commercial strategy and further material cost savings. Reported EBIT increased from EUR 2.2 million to EUR 10.5 million, which reflects the strong improvement in the underlying operating performance. Turning to slide nine. Let me present you the key components of our free cash flow performance in the quarter. After excluding the proceeds from the disposal of the glass operations and non-recurring expenses, adjusted free cash flow from continuing operations improved by EUR 1 million year-over-year to an outflow of EUR 2.1 million. This is a good outcome given the normal seasonality of the business. Working capital normally peaks in the first quarter, reflecting the concentration of sales in the first half of the year and those working capital investments usually unwinding progressively from the end of the second quarter onwards. Looking at the drivers of the improvement, EBITDA contributed EUR 8.6 million. These were more than offset by a working capital outflow of EUR 11 million. The main driver of the working capital outflow was the higher trade receivables, reflecting the strong top line growth in the quarter. That more than offset the cash inflow from the reduction of inventories, mainly finished goods, as demand was strong in the quarter. We remain focused on tight inventory control while also securing the raw materials needed to support the order book. Overall, free cash flow improved despite solid revenue growth and the usual first quarter working capital needs. Thank you for your attention. I will now pass the call back to Serge. Thanks, Manos. Turning now to the outlook for 2026. We have started the year strongly with 29% year-over-year sales growth and a double-digit EBITDA margin in the first quarter. While the external environment remains uncertain, this early performance gives us confidence and supports a cautiously optimistic view on delivering our full year targets. Our priorities for the year are clear and execution focused. We are building on the momentum of the transformation to drive profitable top-line growth, further expand EBITDA margin, and strengthen our competitive position. We will continue to deepen our penetration in the energy drinks segment, where demand remains attractive and where we've had already a good demonstration of strong execution. We also expect to continue gaining share with key customers, supported by a competitive and increasingly differentiated product portfolio. In Asset Performance Services, we see further opportunity to grow through new customer wins, supporting both revenue diversification and a greater mix of value-added services. At the same time, we are introducing innovative additions to our existing product lineup, while also expanding the addressable market and developing new recurring revenue streams. That said, we participated in Venditalia earlier in May, one of Europe's leading exhibitions for vending and unattended retail solutions, marking an important milestone in our digital transformation journey. During the exhibition, we officially introduced Unbound, our intelligent cooling ecosystem and new digital services platform designed to transform commercial coolers into connected, data-driven retail assets. Our booth attracted significant interest from customers, partners, and distributors from across international markets, generating strong engagement around our new offering. Together with our technology partners, we demonstrated how Frigoglass combines cooling expertise with digital intelligence to deliver next-generation unattended retail solutions. With this, Frigoglass is positioned among the very few manufacturers in the industry capable of offering a complete end-to-end retail solution. On profitability, we expect margin expansion to be supported by procurement-led cost reduction initiatives, together with selective pricing actions to help offset external cost pressures and ongoing trading uncertainty. All in all, based on our Q1 performance and the current commodity price levels, we anticipate sales to grow by 15% year-over-year, and an EBITDA margin in the range of 7%-8%. At the same time, we remain focused on disciplined working capital management so that growth continues to translate into liquidity protection and stronger cash generation. Finally, we will continue to evaluate strategic opportunities that can reinforce this progress and further strengthen our competitive advantage. Thank you for your time today. Manos and I are now happy to take your questions. Over to you, operator. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we'll begin the question-and-answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star followed by one on their telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, then you may press star and two. Please use your headset when asking your question for better quality. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. One moment for the first question, please. The first question is from the line of [Nikita Kolochekov] with [Akkron]. Please go ahead. Hi, everyone. Thank you for presentation. Could you please walk us through the expected margin dynamic for the rest of the year? Your guidance applies around 15% revenue growth, but also materially lower profitability with potentially even dropping below 5%. Is it because of input cost growth versus contracted revenue you might have now, or there's any other reasons for nine months lower margin versus first quarter? Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Nikita. As you know, our business is seasonal. Our strong results are in Q1 and Q2. Usually, we book almost 65%-70% of our sales in the first half of the year. This is why the margins in Q1 is higher and Q2 higher compared to the average of the year. We have communicated EBITDA margin of 7%-8%. Also you can check that this material improvement compared to last year where we have around 5.4% EBITDA margin. Thank you, John. Do you envision that at some point in the future, there is a capacity to grow to low double digits for the whole year, just like we can see at some of your competitors, like Metalfrio? I will take this one, it's Serge. Yes. If you look at the business plan that we have developed, that we are, of course, continuously reviewing, this is the objective to get to double digit. We believe that we have that line of sight thanks to continued growth that we see in the multiple geographies, but also by enhancing the margins through enhancing the product portfolio that we have. As you know, we have a profitable and very attractive services business, which we are focusing on expanding the services as well as expanding in some of the geographies where we believe we have good potential. One of the reasons why we started and launched Unbound is getting into digital services, digital solutions that will allow us to enhance margins going forward. Yes, if you look at the near future, we have the ambition, and we have the plans to get to double-digit EBITDA. Okay, great. Thank you. On Egypt, could you please remind me if this is a JV with a partner or these operations are fully controlled by Frigoglass? The subsidiary that we have in Egypt, which is taking care of the local market, is 100% owned by Frigoglass. Yeah. Thank you. The last one. However, as you know, we have established an agreement with a local manufacturer in order to accommodate the local needs. Yeah. The margin there are more or less on average with the rest of the portfolio, or it's lower or higher maybe? If you compare the Egypt margin with Europe, Egypt is with a lower margin. It's closer to the Asian margins. One of the reasons as well why there is a lot of emphasis, like we've done in other geographies with other portfolios, there's a lot of emphasis on driving that cost down by strategic sourcing, making sure that we have the right supply chain in place. As you know, we've started only last year. The most important priority there was to kick it off and to get the customer base that is representative also for growth going forward. Now we're really in a phase in the last six months to optimize cost, to optimize the portfolio, to make sure that we have the right product in place. As Manos said, margins so far are lower than the average, but with clear objectives and plans in place to keep on enhancing these margins as well going forward. Thank you. The last one on Russian sales proceeds. Do you expect to receive any cash inflow from that operation or no? Well, as you know, based on comparable transactions, exit in Russia involves significant legal restrictions that materially impact the total cash consideration. These include a mandatory discount of 60% on the appraised value, as well as the substantial exit taxes imposed under Russian regulations. In our case, after deducting transaction-related expenses, the net proceeds, including the settlement of intercompany balances, amounted to approximately EUR 8 million. We will provide development disclosures with the release of our first half financial results. Importantly, I believe, I want to add this, we have now fully exited our operations in Russia with the best possible outcome under the current circumstances. This will allow us to focus on driving and increasing value across our continuing commercial refrigeration operations. Mm-hmm. Thank you very much. Once again to register for a question please press star and one on your telephone. As a final reminder to register for a question please press star and one on your telephone. Ladies and gentlemen, there are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the conference over to management for any closing comments. Thank you. Thank you, operator. Again, thank you to everyone for joining today. We are very pleased with our first quarter results, which were in line with expectations. This supports our optimism in delivering continued progress and meeting our expectations for 2026. With this, I'd like to thank you once again, and please don't hesitate to reach out to us if you have any further questions. Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, the conference is now concluded, and you may disconnect your telephone. Thank you for calling, and have a pleasant evening.
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