Good afternoon. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Tinexta Group consolidated results at the 31 March 2021 conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing star and zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Josef Mastragostino, Chief Investor Relations Officer of Tinexta. Please go ahead, sir. Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, and good morning to the folks in the U.S. Thank you for joining Tinexta's First Quarter 2021 Results Presentation. Here with me today is Pier Andrea Chevallard, Chief Executive Officer of Tinexta, and Oddone Pozzi, Chief Financial Officer. As a reminder, all the relevant documentation of the first quarter 2021 results can be downloaded from our company website in the investor relations section. For the purpose of this call, I will go over the first quarter 2021 highlights and updates. Oddone instead will go over the first quarter 2021 financial results as well as the business unit's performance, providing us with a deep dive. The last part of the call will be dedicated to Q&A. A recording of this conference call will also be available on our company website, and it will be posted upon completion of this call. At this point, I will kick it off by turning to page three of the presentation. The First Quarter 2021 results provided a strong and robust start of the year. For that matter, a solid resiliency of the business coupled with a sturdy start in Q1 led to enhanced financial performance. Please note that in order to allow as complete an analysis as possible, First Quarter 2021 results are compared both at constant 2020 perimeter as well as on a 2021 perimeter, which includes all of Tinexta's companies with the addition of the newly acquired ones. Revenues came in at EUR 82.7 million in the First Quarter, +50.5% versus prior year, and even more importantly, increasing +17.6% on a 2020 base. EBITDA, which is calculated after stock option, came in at EUR 16.4 million in the first quarter of 2021, posting a +49.8% versus prior year and at 30.3% on a 2020 basis, mainly driven by Credit Information & Management as well as Innovation & Marketing Services business units. EBITDA margin was 19.8%. EBIT was EUR 9.5 million, growing more than 100% versus prior year, 74.7% on a 2020 base. EBIT margin was 11.5%. Noteworthy, net income was EUR 6.8 million, 100%+ versus the prior year. The first quarter also generated a solid cash flow of EUR 24.8 million in the first quarter, growing on an LTM base to EUR 71.4 million or 74% of 2021 expected EBITDA. Net financial position of EUR 187 million. Leverage calculated as net financial position over LTM EBITDA was 2.2x, entirely reflecting the recent acquisitions. The first quarter results provided material expansion of all our business lines, with all units contributing to growth versus the prior year. Digital Trust grows 19.4% in revenues, EBITDA grew 21%. Margins reached about 23%. Credit Information & Management increases 10.7% in revenues, with EBITDA surging more than 47%, with a healthy 28% EBITDA margin. Innovation & Marketing Services posted a + 34.6% in revenue, with EBITDA also rising above 47%. EBITDA margin was 31%. The newly established business unit, Cybersecurity, started strongly the year, with revenues hitting EUR 16.8 million and EBITDA margin reaching above 11%. From a human resources standpoint, as of March 31, 2021, the group employed 2,153 employees, reflecting the recent announced acquisition. I will now turn to page four of the presentation. Most of the data here has been commented. I would draw your attention to net income, which has grown to 8.3% versus the prior year. At this point, I will leave the floor to Oddone, who will go over the first quarter 2021 financial results. Okay. Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you, Josef. I will walk through the results. At page six, you can find the P&L of the group, and we may compare this on a same perimeter basis as well as the comparison with the prior year. If we go through, as previously shared by Josef, we see here a very strong growth of the revenue compared to the previous year. The growth is more than 50%. I would say that even more important is our capability to grow in the first quarter on the same perimeter basis of approximately 18%. This basically happened, as we will see later on during the presentation, in all the business units of the group. The group was able to even accelerate faster in term of EBITDA. When we compare EBITDA on a same perimeter basis, the EBITDA was growing at 34% and driving the EBITDA margin in the range of 23%, improving from 20% EBITDA margin of the previous year. The first quarter overall closed with EUR 82.7 million revenue, with EBITDA at EUR 16.8 million, with 20.3%. If we go through the P&L, depreciation, amortization, and provision are increasing compared to the previous year as expected, as a result of the previous investment that we performed. This is happening mainly in all the business units. Financial charges are above previous year. This is driven by the recent acquisition that we completed. If we go to the net income before taxes, the profit before taxes is growing up to 10.5% on Q1 2021, improving from previous year. The net profit is EUR 6.8 million. Here that is 8.3%, much better than 5.3% of the previous year. Here is also benefiting from a one-off on the tax benefit that we got from government new rules that applied on 2020, IRAP tax. Very solid P&L, improving basically in all lines of the P&L, and with a very strict control of cost and improving on the operating margin. If we move to the balance sheet, we see here that following the acquisition that occurred during January 2021, our net invested capital is up to EUR 357 million compared to EUR 265 of the end of the year. This is mainly driven by the acquisition, like we said, for more than EUR 100 million, but we are benefiting of the continuous improvement in working capital that improved by more than EUR 12 million over the last three months. Net financial position improved from one side, like I said, from the acquisition for more than EUR 100 million, is benefiting from more than EUR 24 million of free cash flow generated over the period. Shareholder equity is slightly declining around 2%, as here we have from one side the profit of the period, also we have the adjustment of the put related to the new acquisition. This adjustment is mainly driven by the improvement of the planned results of the company, therefore the put has been adjusted. As you can see, if we move at page eight, I will drive the focus basically to the LTM free cash flow. As you can see here, since several quarters that our LTM free cash flow is improving, it is very important. Basically, it's double compared to the end of fiscal year 2019. Also, in the last quarter compared to the same quarter of last year, we have a generation of free cash flow that improved from EUR 20 million up to EUR 25 million, definitely driven by the EBITDA, but also by a constant improvement of the working capital. As we may see at page nine, basically, the quarter has been affected by significant investment that we have done, but the operating indicators are all positive and help to keep the net financial position as of the end of Q1 below the EUR 200 million. In term of ratio of net financial position EBITDA, this has grown above 2x. We have to consider that from now till the end of the year, we will have, on one side, the growth of the TDA, and from the other side, we will have the drop of the net financial position before any acquisition we will do, but by the free cash flow that the operation will generate. We are perfectly aligned to the guidance that we released to the market during February. At page 10, you will see on a LTM basis the same information as already mentioned by Josef here. The free cash flow on LTM basis is very high. It's in the range of EUR 70 million, this is basically the best news that we have. Before diving into the business unit, we can confirm that as you have seen here, we delivered a very solid P&L, improving all the ratios, improving also from the financial standpoint, the free cash flow generation, we ended up a very positive Q1. Let's go through, basically, the business unit. I will jump, as anticipated by Josef, basically, we have an overall improvement in term of both revenues as well as EBITDA in all the business unit, we improve also all the indicators. The EBITDA margin is improving in all the different business units. We have to consider that Q1 is the less important quarter in absolute term, both in term of revenue as well as in term of EBITDA. Any case, I think we step in into the 2021 in a very positive manner with a significant and solid growth compared to 2020. Let's go to the Digital Trust. The Digital Trust started the year very well. The growth is close to 20% in terms of revenue and above 20% in terms of EBITDA, with the EBITDA margin jumping up to 23%. Let's say that here, definitely InfoCert, that is the main contributor of this business unit, continues to grow in a very solid manner. We had the growth in terms of off-the-shelf products, well above in the range of between 10% and 20%. Even more important, the enterprise solution we are delivering to our clients are growing as expected, as shared with the market, much faster than the off-the-shelf products. This helped to deliver a 20% revenue growth. In terms of profitability, we are perfectly on track with what we shared as a guidance of the year, expecting EBITDA of Digital Trust growing faster than the revenue. We move to the Cybersecurity, the newly established business unit following the acquisition of early January. Results, it's not possible to compare to the previous year as they were not part of the group. Any case, we can say that the results delivered in Q1 are perfectly aligned to our guidance, and even the EBITDA margin is aligned with our guidance at, let's say, slightly even better from what we were expecting. Also here, we are very confident that we have a solid start, and this is perfectly on track with what we expected. Credit Information and Management posted an overall positive Q1, with the revenue growing more than 10%. Definitely, in this segment, we had a benefit from the business process outsourcing division that, in terms of number of manager requests by the group, that remain very high in relation to access to Central Guarantee Fund. This is an improvement, obviously, compared to Q1 last year, where this activity was really a very starting point, but Q1 of this year is basically substantially aligned with our expectation. This help to deliver a very solid profitability. As we have seen at the end of 2020, the profitability of this business unit jumped from 24% average 2019 to 28%, and in Q1, we deliver exactly 28%. Definitely, demand of business in relation to the business information is still aligned with the performance of the previous year, but this is the part of business that is not growing compared to the remaining part of our business. The part of Real Estate started well the year, and we have a growth in the range of 5%, and this is perfectly aligned with our expectation. Also in this area, solid growth of the revenue aligned with a much better improving of the EBITDA driven by the revenue mix that we delivered. Let's move now into page 16 to Innovation and Marketing Services. This is a very important area. It's the area where the group delivered the largest part of the EBITDA. Also in this area, we had a very strong start. On an organic basis, the growth is more than 20%, mainly driven by Warrant, while the part of consulting services for internationalization is basically flat to previous year, and this is a good news, and is aligned with what we expected. Warrant has a very good and strong start, as with the different revenue mix between the business units, but definitely a very positive start. Also, Queryo, the newly acquired company active in the digital marketing business, started the year very well with EUR 1.3 million posted in Q1, and the overall profitability improve significantly more than 30%, with the EBITDA margin jumping above 30%. Overall, also in this area, we are positive of the results delivered, and also this is aligned with our expectations. Overall, as you have seen here, results are, as Josef anticipating in the early part of this presentation, are very solid, very robust, and overall, we say these are aligned with the guidance that we released to the market during the month of February. To Josef, thank you. Yes. On page 18, we have some closing remarks. Oddone already went through them. I'll just repeat them in order to emphasize the strong quarter that we had. We had a very strong start of the year, with all business lines contributing to growth. Obviously, cash flow and cash generation remains a key and clear objective of the group. It fortunately was in line with expectation. The focus is still to delever. Tinexta confirms the 2021 full year guidance of revenues of about EUR 370 million, EBITDA of about EUR 96 million, and an expected net financial position at about 2x. I will leave it to the operator to open Q&A. Excuse me this is the conference operator will now begin the question and answer session any one who wishes to ask a question may press star and one at this time. To remove yourself from the question queue please press star and two. Please pick up the handset when asking a question, anyone who has a question may press star and one. The first question is from Russell Pointon from Edison. Please go ahead. Hello. Good afternoon, all. Nice to hear from you. A couple of questions, please. You haven't provided any underlying growth rates for Cybersecurity on a pro forma basis. Is it possible to do that? If not, looking at the numbers you've reported, the Cybersecurity revenue is just over 20% of the full year guidance that you gave earlier in the year. Does that imply some seasonality, or do you expect the growth to ramp up through the year once you've owned the companies for a longer period? My final question is on Digital Trust. Your two year growth rate looks very healthy, well above the 7% that you were talking about at the start of the year. When we spoke about this earlier in the year, you implied that you're quite cautious about the rate of recovery in the economy, et cetera. Are you now more optimistic? If not, why do you think the growth rate will tail off for the rest of the year? Thank you. Okay. Good afternoon, Russell. Oddone here. I will go through your first question about the Cybersecurity. Unfortunately, we may not really compare to previous year, the Cybersecurity, as also the company we acquired are not good companies at that time. It's a combination of different parts of other companies. Any case, I can confirm you that the revenue is growing at the pace of the market on a same perimeter basis. This is aligned with our expectation, and I can confirm that overall, the full revenue coming from Cybersecurity is in the range of 20%. Overall, the three companies are performing exactly aligned with the plan that we developed. Also the margin of the three companies are perfectly aligned with what we were expecting. It's just the first quarter, but this is for us, very good news. This is very aligned to our expectation. As of today, we have no different indication. About Digital Trust, you were basically meaning if you think that potentially the results delivered are a bit cautious compared to the guidance. Already anticipated, I would say that Q1 is not the major quarter of the group. The numbers are not so big in this part of the year, sometimes, slightly better results in terms of some hundreds, thousand revenue can change the percentages. The first quarter is very positive, but we still stay on the guidance for the full year. This we may go through after the Q2 to have some better deep dive, but as of today, we perfectly confirm. Again, Q1 probably is less than 20% of the full year, so it's too early to have a different indication. We are very confident of what we shared with the market, and we are very happy for how the year started. Great. Thank you very much. You're welcome. As a reminder if you wish to register for a question please press star and one on your telephone. The next question is from Isacco Brambilla with Mediobanca. Please go ahead. Hi, good afternoon, everybody. A couple of questions. Actually, three questions from inside. The first one is on the outlook for this year. I appreciate your usual degree of cautiousness, especially in this context, but can you provide some flavor of what could drive sort of stop of organic growth in the next quarters, which is what is implied for the remainder of the year, just to match your EBITDA guidance for 2021? Which are the main risks to the current sustained organic growth you are experiencing? Second question is a more general one. I would be curious to understand, in your three years assumptions, to which extent you are factoring in tailwinds from recovery plan measures approved by the government recently, wondering in particular to Innovation and Marketing and Digital Trust. The last one is on tax rates. You have been mentioning some incentives recorded in the first quarter of this year. Can you provide a guidance for full year 2021 for the sustainable tax rate? Thank you for your question. As of today, as I already answered to Russell, Q1 is not the major quarter of the year. Again, we are glad of results that the group deliver, and even more, I would say, all the business units, including the Cybersecurity, that as is included in our press release, started the year in the expected manner. We are perfectly on track, compared to what we are expecting. As of today, we have no different indication of something decaying. I would say this is very solid, so the level of risk of delivery is slightly lower. As of today, happy with the results, and we confirm totally our guidance. With reference to the second question of the recovery plan, in our guidance, there were not basically included any effect of the recovery plan. We are monitoring very strictly what is going on, but we are already at mid of May, and really no precise indication what is going to happen is available definitely to us or to anybody. I would say, but any case, our numbers, when we developed the plan, when we shared the plan with the market, we did not include any effect of the recovery plan. We don't expect any impact from the recovery plan on our P&L for this year. Maybe beginning of next year, we will have some impact, but for the time being, we don't have any information which would be useful in order to consider some impact already this year. If I go to the third question, we had this one-off as probably all the companies that are reporting today are doing. You have this one-off that for us accounted for EUR 900,000. If we exclude this, as of today, we fully confirm our previous indication of a tax rate in the range of 30%. From that, you have to deduct the one-off impact that I mentioned before. Okay, clear. Many thanks, both, for your answers. You're welcome. For any further questions, please press star and one on your telephone. Gentlemen, Mr. Mastragostino, there are no more questions registered at this time. Excuse me, there is a question from Gabriele Berti with Intesa Sanpaolo. Please go ahead. Hello. Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for your presentation. I have just one quick question. Looking at the Digital Trust business unit, can you provide a portion of growth related to the enterprise solutions, please? Yes. Like I said, and as you know, also Mr. [Cattaneo] shared during the presentation of the plan, we were expecting an overall growth, but with the different revenue mix between off-the-shelf and enterprise solution. As anticipated, we have a Q1 with the growth in the range of 20%. I would say that off-the-shelf grew below 20%, let's say in the range of 15%, while the enterprise solution grew much faster in the range of 30%. Let's say that again, we are talking about Q1 and numbers that are not so big. In any case, the first indicators are perfect and perfectly aligned with what we were expecting. The trend is there. We are growing in a very solid way here, and this is fully aligned with what we were expecting. we confirm the trend, we confirm the revenue mix, and this is obviously helping us to deliver an improvement of the EBITDA margin. Thank you. Gentlemen, there are no more questions registered at this time. I turn the conference over to Mr. Mastragostino for the final remarks. Thank you, operator. We would like to thank you for connecting to Tinexta's conference call. If you would like any additional information, please don't hesitate to contact us. Thank you very much. Have a good evening. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.
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