Good morning, and welcome to the presentation of the SSAB Q2 report. My name is Per Hillström. I'm responsible for investor relations. With us today is our president and CEO, Martin Lindqvist, and our CFO, Leena Craelius. If we look at the agenda, Martin will start going through the quarter in brief, then Leena will explain more details on the financials, and then Martin comes back with the outlook and summary. Then at the end, we will have good time for questions. With that, please, Martin, go ahead. Thank you, Per, and good morning. I will start to go through the second quarter in brief. The second quarter was a record quarter by many means. We had a combination of high realized prices, I would say solid, decent internal performance, and good cost control. We had an operating profit for the first time exceeding SEK 10 billion in a quarter, SEK 10.4 billion, and that is 29% EBIT margin. We continued to grow special steels. We reached almost 400,000 tons in a single quarter, and we have been growing now special steels volumes with 8% per year since 2015. Safety performance continued to move in the right direction. We had the Moving Twelve at 1.56 in Lost Time Injury Frequency, and if we look year to date, we are at 1.1, including contractors, which is, I would say, in the steel industry, a very good performance. Not where we would like to be, we want to be at zero and to be the safest steel company in the world, but still a good development. We closed the quarter with a strong balance sheet with a net cash position of SEK 7.2 billion. If we look into the divisions, we had record results for all divisions during Q2. We had a result of two point four billion in special steels, an EBIT margin of 27%. In SSAB Europe, we did just north of SEK 4 billion, meaning an EBIT margin of 28%, which is very strong. Of course, SSAB Americas with SEK 3.5 billion and an EBIT margin of 40%. Very strong earnings and profitability in the three steel divisions. Tibnor had an EBIT of a bit more than SEK 600 million and an EBIT margin of 13%, which is good and strong. Ruukki Construction, a bit more than SEK 200 million and a margin of 10%. If we look at other important achievements during the second quarter, we continue to build up our unique value chain for fossil-free steelmaking. We continue to deliver pilot volumes to customers and partners. We also inaugurated our big hydrogen storage pilot up in Luleå during Q2, and it's now up and running. What we aim to do and continue to do is to develop this fossil-free value chain and start to produce fossil-free steel in a big scale at the latest 2026, and then be completely fossil-free around 2030. We are following that plan. We see good development. We are now manning up the project office, hiring project leaders and so on. So far in line with internal expectations and plans. We saw during the second quarter also the first construction machine built by using fossil-free steel from SSAB, and that one was delivered by Volvo to the construction company NCC during the second quarter. This was a big achievement, so now we start to see also finished products out in the market used by end users. It has been received very positive from the end user side. Leena, some words about the financials. Yes. Let's start with the shipment volumes. The outcome of Q2 being 1,711 kilotons, improvement versus Q1 of 3% while being 8% lower than last year. The main reason for this deviation, it is linked to this incident we had during Q1 that we told about related to Raahe blast furnace and chilled hearth being idled most of the Q1. The startup took place in March, and then Q2 was still the ramp-up phase. The transportation and logistic challenges that we've been reporting, there was a slight improvement during Q2. Not fully resolved yet, but the situation at the end of Q2 was slightly better than end of Q1. Also to repeat what Martin already showed in the previous slides, the special steels had the record shipments, almost 400 kilotons. That's indicating also that the premium mix decent. If we then look at the sales graph, the revenues, SEK 35.5 billion, improvement from Q1 of twelve percent, which is then the sales going up 12% and shipments 3%. That's telling the story of the improved sales prices. EBITDA per ton of delivered steel improved during Q2 compared to Q1. Maybe if we just summarize once again the strong performance, it is with more stable production, continued good cost control and the higher prices, all leading up to the EBITDA total of SEK 11.2 billion, and EBITDA margin then almost 32%. If we take the analysis a bit more, comparing to the Q2 last year, and here we are comparing the operating profit outcome of SEK 10.4 billion this year versus last year SEK 4 billion. Biggest positive impact definitely with the sales prices. If we compare the average sales prices of steel divisions versus last year, with special steel division, we are talking about 55% higher price level, with Europe division 64%, and Americas at 67%. Also Ruukki and Ruukki Construction and Tibnor contribute positively for the positive result. Volume being 8% lower, as already illustrated in the previous slide, and the main reason being the Europe division, with 140 kilotons lower shipment volumes. If we look at the variable cost, the variable cost had a negative impact, and this is now coming mainly through with the PCI, coking coal. Alloy, scrap, energy and logistics costs were higher compared to last year, while the iron ore was relatively flat. Fixed cost, they were higher this year. We did or have some higher manning this year. We also took this full profit sharing for 2022 at the end of Q2, in line with the good result. We had some higher repair and maintenance work done during this year. Also to mention that the cost for external materials and services is somewhat higher this year, along with inflation. Some minor item to mention that some of the costs related to transformation program starting to occur, which is telling that things are starting to happen. FX rate had a negative impact of SEK 140 million, with the weaker Swedish crown versus US dollar and euro. Capacity utilization also linked to this ramp-up phase in Raahe. If we look at the comparison versus Q1, prices developed still positively. Special Steels and Europe division, around 10% increase in prices, SSAB Americas 4%. Tibnor and Ruukki Construction also contributing positively in this comparison. Volumes already mentioned the 3% increase, and the increase coming mainly from SSAB Americas and SSAB Special Steels. The variable cost from quarter one to Q2 did go upwards, and this is coming from all the main raw materials. Fixed cost having negative impact, this month is, or this quarter being the summer quarter with higher level of summer workers, temporary personnel. Full profit sharing that we already mentioned in the previous slide, and then some higher repair and maintenance activities. FX deviation the same as versus last year. The capacity utilization in this comparison is positive, and that's also related to this ramp-up of Raahe blast furnace. The positive item in other is related to the provision we did for Oxelösund hub during Q1. Let's continue to analyze the strong cash flow. Good earnings partially offset with the negative impact from working capital. Inventories have gone up in value with higher raw material cost, and we have some higher raw material volumes as well. We were securing during Q2 the safety stock for raw materials to secure the production for coming months. We also have some higher accounts receivables, which is then related to higher sales prices. The net operating working capital over net sales ratio is still on a lower level than last year, end of Q2 being on a level of 18.7%. Last year was 20%, so we are in a good control with the net working capital still. Taxes on a high level, as we have been indicating, this is mainly now related to the outcome of 2021. Far, we have paid almost SEK 3 billion in taxes. As said, that's related to previous year result. Also to mention, in April, we did the payout of the dividend, SEK 5.4 billion. When we compare the cash flow from current operations this year versus last year, we were doing a better result. All this led to the financial position of net cash of SEK 7.2 billion at the end of Q2. The cash need for the business. This slide we have not updated or changed since last time. We still see that the cash need for business for this year is SEK 8.5 billion, with the SEK 5 billion related to strategic investments, including Oxelösund conversion and the expansion of this Q&T line in Mobile. Interest expenses expected to decrease. Our rating was improved to BBB-, and we have lower level of debt. Also the taxes will be higher than already discussed in the previous slide. If we continue to discuss a bit more about the raw materials, that had developed upwards since Q1 and last year, that development unfortunately will continue also for Q3. This graph on top illustrating iron ore prices, as in the bridge, we also referred to the deviation from last year being relatively flat. The cost will be slightly higher for Q2, and then thus impacting Q3 costs, but minor negative impact with the pellets, which is then the opposite of the development of coking coal, which is the graph illustrating below the price development going heavily up during this year. The prices during Q2 will have an impact in Q3 of consumption cost, and we are talking around 30%, 35% even increase quarter on quarter with the coal cost. Definitely having impact to our margins. On the other hand, the scrap spot prices developing downwards. Our purchase prices during Q2 were somewhat higher than Q1, but now the latest development with spot prices is that they have gone down and see the July prices on this graph. Before I let Martin continue with the outlook details, a reminder that Q3 is the quarter of maintenance outage. Here, the table illustrating that during Q3, we start the maintenance. In Special Steel Division, we have maintenance ongoing in Europe and Americas. Compared to last report, we have shifted the outage in Americas from October to September, thus shown in the different quarter here. I let Martin continue to tell details about the outlook. Thank you, Leena. If we then look at the market segments for third quarter, let's start with heavy transport. I would say that the market is on average fairly neutral. There are, of course, risks for further production stops in the heavy duty trucks due to shortages. On the other hand, we see good activity in rail cars and marine in the US. I would say overall neutral. Automotive, yes, also neutral, risk of further production stops due to shortages. We continue to see underlying structural growth in advanced high-strength steel, which is what we deliver to automotive. Construction machinery, a bit more uncertain with the weakness in China, but I would say on average between neutral and weak. Material handling, we continue to see good demand from especially the mining segments. Energy, very strong and solid demand from wind powers, transmission poles, and so on. That is definitely green. Of course, construction. We are, as everyone else, expecting a slowdown in construction activity due to rising inflation, rising interest rates, and so on. The big swing factor as always, service centers. When we look at the service center segments, which we are most dependent on in the U.S., we see low inventory levels, lower than normal. On the other hand, service centers are speculating on lower plate prices going forward. There is no big room for inventory takedowns in the U.S. service centers. Then as always, we expect a seasonal slowdown in Europe, in the Nordics in July as always, and then in the rest of Europe in August. Looking at spot prices and the development during Q2, that will be eventually seen then with a slight lag in our contract prices. We see the development of the European strip prices that are now back on the level or even slightly lower than the level we saw in beginning of this year. The plate prices in U.S. has depended on what graphs you look at, but been stable or going slightly down the spot prices during the second quarter. This leads us to what we see then for Q3 in our order book when it comes to prices. For specialty steels, we expect stable prices. For SSAB Europe, we expect significantly lower prices, due to the development of, the spot prices in Q2. In Americas, we expect, lower prices. On top of this, we will expect to see continue over time a stronger and stronger development of the product mix. If we look at shipments in special steels, somewhat lower due to the outage. In Europe, lower due to outage. In Americas, significantly lower because of the outage in September that was moved from, October. When we met last time, we said October. Now we do it in September in order to keep, the equipment up and running and better safe than sorry to do it slightly earlier. All in all, Q3 will be a maintenance quarter for us. We have, a fairly, good view of the market. Of course, things can happen. We expect to see a seasonal downturn in Europe, and we expect to see a relatively stable, heavy plate market in North America. If we sum it up, I would say that good earnings at record levels in all divisions and for the group in total. Continued good trend in safety. Continued good cash flow generation and a strong balance sheet. Some uncertainty in the market outlook, but we have structurally, the last couple of years, improved our ability to manage any downturn whenever it comes, and we are ready and prepared for that. Our plan for fossil-free steel production is on track. We have, as said, continued with pilot shipments to partners and customers, and we are on plan. This transition of course requires sufficient availability of fossil-free electricity in time. But if that is solved, we are in a very good position to deliver on our targets and our plan. With that, Per. Yes. Thank you, Martin and Leena. We can now move into the Q&A. We would ask you to maybe stick to a couple of questions in the first round. There will be good time here to come back also. If you have more than one question, please state them one at a time to make the process smoother. By that, please, operator, present the instructions. Thank you. Excuse me. This is the conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. The first question is from Alain Gabriel with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Yes. Good morning, everyone. Martin, my first question is for you. The cash build is happening much faster than expected, and even if your profits moderate, this would continue to some extent. Capital return is a board decision, but you now have more flexibility to invest more in the business. If this continues, what would be your investment priorities, or where would you be investing more in the near term? That's my first question. We have clearly made up our mind. We will invest in fossil-free steel making. Right now we are investing in Q&T, of course, and we will continue to build out capabilities within specialty steels, and the new quenching capacity of 100,000 tons will come on stream as we speak, which is much needed for the market. Apart from that, we will do maintenance investments. I would say over time, fairly in relative terms, lower maintenance investments because we are planning for the mini mill. We are devoted and 100% focused on that, and that is what we are going to do in the future. We will continue to generate strong cash flows. We will continue to strengthen the balance sheet. We need to, in some way or form in the future, also handle that. Currently, we don't have any mandate for doing anything. Thank you. That's very clear. The second question is for Leena. The cost components as we head into Q3, you've given some color on the coking coal, which, if I may confirm, you're talking about a 30% increase in price Q-on-Q. What about the other cost components like iron ore and scrap in light of your aim to diversify away from Russia or Russian raw materials? That's my second question. If I start with iron ore related to Russia, we actually did find some as replacement for Russian iron ore, which was more expensive, and that will be taken in use in Q3, and that will have an impact in the Europe division cost base. Otherwise, iron ore expected to be relatively flat quarter-on-quarter. With coking coal, as already illustrated, the prices have gone up and that will of course have an impact in the cost base around 30% higher cost. What we didn't have a graph on is still the PCI coal that we were also sourcing elsewhere than Russia with higher prices. So that will definitely have also a negative impact. Alloys, relatively flat, but definitely biggest negative impact with coals and PCI coal. The next question is from Tom Zhang with Barclays. Please go ahead. Yes. Good morning. Thanks for taking our questions. I've just got two, please. First on the Americas. You're guiding for weaker pricing, and you sort of flagged spot prices have come off a little bit. One, it looks like some peers are trying to push price hikes through again. Two, I think you said before, even though the U.S. is very spot-based, there is normally a sort of one-quarter lag, and we've only really seen plate prices come off, you know, through early June. Is there anything else that we're missing in the Americas in terms of maybe mix or something else that means you're expecting weaker pricing? Then maybe just one- Yeah. No, I mean, as I showed on the graph, prices have come down a bit, a little from very high levels, and that is what we expect to see in the contract prices and the invoicing prices for Q3. No dramatic changes, but still slightly lower. Okay, that's clear. Maybe Leena, wanted you just on the sort of, net cash position that was sort of helped out by SEK 2 billion of FX and derivative revaluations. Could you maybe just run us through any big drivers within that? Also, what are the risks that unwinds in the future as if sort of FX rates move back, or is it not really a risk in your eyes? Definitely the impact of this revaluation of derivatives, which is then related to financial assets, liabilities, and foreign currencies, that has been revalued over quarters. It has been, last year, negative. This year it has been positive. Difficult to predict what the outcome will be after next quarter, but risk-wise, we don't consider that as a risk. It is a normal revaluation process. Okay. Pluses and minuses over time. Okay. Sure. Thanks. The next question is from Tristan Gresser with BNP Paribas Exane. Please go ahead. Good morning. Thanks for taking our question. I have a question, please, with regard to special steel pricing. In the past, you've emphasized the relative stability of special steel prices versus the more commodity grade products. Q2 still saw a really remarkable increase in both divisions. With the Q3 guidance for special steel stable versus a significant decrease in Europe, what's the implication here? Do you believe that special steel has now structurally reset higher, or are you gonna see simply a delayed contraction perhaps going into Q4? Thank you. I mean, over time, special steel prices and especially margins are much more stable. The reason why we have been able to increase prices is that demand has exceeded our ability to produce or production capacity. Now we are taking more production capacity on stream as we speak, 100,000 tons yearly in our investment in Mobile in Alabama. We had the possibility now to push up prices to compensate and more than compensate for increased raw material. That was mainly, I would say, due to that the demand was so much bigger than our capacity. It is also, I mean, a mix shift within special steel. Special steel is Q&T, but there are different grades of Q&T as well. We have now launched very high grades of Hardox 600 and so on. They start to get traction. We also expect, going forward, not maybe visible from quarter to quarter, but more and more Protection steel being produced, and those are typically the volumes and the products where we have the best margin. There are, call it, mix differences in margins and prices within Special Steels as well. We, as said in the beginning, have been growing our Special Steels volume-wise with average 7.7% per year since 2015, and we expect that journey to continue. Thank you. Just one follow-up and a second question, please. With the ramp of Mobile nearing now, is the expectation to be willing to sacrifice price in order to ramp up those volumes? Or would you be willing to No. Continue to keep the market tighter? No. That's not the expectations. You could see that slight amount of tightness persist even with the ramp of new capacity? That differs of course over time, but it is 100,000 tons yearly volumes. We could easily have sold those volumes during the first half of this year. Okay. Thank you very much. The next question is from Alan Spence with Jefferies. Please go ahead. Yeah, thanks, and good morning. Actually a bit of a follow-up to Tristan Gresser's question around special steels, but actually more on the order book. Could you comment on the shape of that and what kind of visibility you have and what that means for second half utilization with special steels? We look at the order book for special steels. I would say that it is what we guide for. We say somewhat lower low volumes, but that is due to the maintenance outage. The order book for Q3, and that's typically what we see the coming quarter, is in good shape. You haven't any visibility on Q4 yet? We have some volumes for Q4 as well. Okay. On the tonnages around the fossil-free that you have delivered to the customers so far, can you share a little bit of feedback about what they've been saying about the quality of the steel? Very positive feedback and no quality differences, compared to the ordinary steel we produce. You need to remember that, I mean, what we do is we produce sponge iron and they are iron units. It is really a virgin material, a fossil-free virgin material that we then melt in electric arc furnaces. I mean, we have the same quality and the same properties as we have on our normal steel, which is received very positively from our customers. Very good and positive feedback. Great. Okay. Last, just a clarification one for me, for Leena. That additional tax from last year that needed to be paid this year, is that fully done or is there more that needs to be paid in the second half of the year? We would say that most of it is now done. Okay. Thank you very much. Yeah. The next question is from Patrick Mann with Bank of America. Please go ahead. Thanks. My first question is, I just wanted to ask about your exposure to natural gas, where in the business is it being used? Yeah, that's the first question. I've got one other follow on. Thanks. We do use natural gas in our production with the relatively limited volumes. We have that gas in use in Hämeenlinna and also to some extent in Raahe. The exposure, if you are now referring to the risk related to natural gas, we have done some good work securing the sources for natural gas in Hämeenlinna. We are buying from the Baltic region, let's call it that way. Then in Raahe, we are also able to switch to propane if needed. We have rather limited risk when it comes to natural gas. Thanks very much. That's clear. I had a follow-up question I think Tom asked it. The $2.1 billion adjustment to the cash balance. Now I understand it's, you know, you're not emphasizing it, and it can be positives or negatives. I just wanted to confirm, is the major driver of that the US dollar? Yeah. It's related both to dollars and euros. Yeah. Euro. Okay. Thank you very much. That's all. Thanks. The next question is from Luke Nelson with J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead. In Sweden, we have an agreement expiring. I think it is end of March next year, so it's too early to tell. In Finland, we also have an agreement. I don't really, from the top of my head know. I think it is a yearly agreement, which expires next year, but I'm not sure. In U.S. we are a non-unionized plant, so we have these local agreements with all our employees. The difference between our European operations and our U.S. operation is that we have in U.S., mainly. We have a completely different pay structures. We pay for prime tons of prime yield, so a very big part of the salary being variable. When we produce a lot like we do now, salaries are definitely much higher. If we have a standstill or an outage or something else, we pay less. A much more flexible solution with a fairly, I would say, limited increase in base pay, but big flexibility. Times like this, salaries are really good in U.S., in our U.S. operation. In Sweden, I think we have a three-year contract that expires end of March next year. Okay. You should not expect any salary inflation during the second half that has not been seen during the first half. So no salary inflation quarter-over-quarter or half-year-over-half-year. Okay, that's very clear. Thank you. Just on working capital, obviously a sizable build and you talk through some of the moving parts on building inventories, raw materials. Can you just talk through on how you see that moving into Q3 and Q4? And then also specifically within that, is there any finished goods buildup of note? I mean, what we typically do. A couple of parts in that. I mean, typically before a maintenance quarter, we build up inventories in volume. We have also been building up, as Leena said, raw material inventories in volumes to secure that we have enough raw material to keep production running for this year. Given the uncertainty with raw materials and so on that occurred together with the invasion of Ukraine, we have been building up safety stocks and other stocks. The biggest part of it is of course inflation or prices. We have also been building working capital in accounts receivable. I mean, if prices are moving down, when they are moving down, you should expect us to release working capital. All we. In volume, we mainly build up for the summer outage and safety stocks. Of course, we have also some buildups in volumes in finished goods due to transportation issues, problems to get hold of boats, trucks, railway wagons, and so on. On the margin that has also affected it. We have some build-up of finished goods in volumes as well. That is, of course, a backlog from Q2 moving into Q3. It's a combination, but I would say, the majority is related to the price component. Okay. Then I suppose just to push on that, just given comments on raw materials potentially still being or coming through elevated, should we not be expecting a significant release in Q3, but more significant in Q4? Or, is there some flexibility to maybe release amount in Q3? I don't know, Leena, if you have an answer on that, but I wouldn't expect a massive build-up of working capital in Q3. As Leena said, we measure, of course, in absolute terms, in relative terms. One very important KPI for us is net operating working capital over sales, and we continue to improve there. Still room for improvements, but we continue to improve. The only thing we know is when the business cycle turns, typically we release working capital. Okay, great. Thank you. The next question is from Grant Sporre with Bloomberg Intelligence. Please go ahead. Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking our questions. I just have one. It's only the sort of negative adjustment on EBITDA. It was relatively low this quarter compared to last year. If you could just take us through what's entailed in those adjustments, that would be very helpful. Thank you. You mean, Grant, on the other line in the P&L? Yeah, that's correct. The adjustments during Q2. Let me see. Yeah, underline that it's always a bit negative. Are we talking about the items affecting comparability? No. Uh- Sorry, I don't follow the question. Sorry, I didn't mean to be pedantic. I think in the first half, I'm just going through the results now. I think it was sort of nearly SEK -800. Then I think it's somewhere around SEK 300, if my memory serves correct. In the other we had during Q1, we had the provision for Oxelösund EAF and. Provisions for Russia and others. But that's in the- Okay The one-off items. I'm not sure if this is now including the items affecting comparability. Let's come back to the question. Let's come back to this one. Yeah. Okay, fine. Thank you. The next question is from Rochus Brauneiser with Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead. Yes. Hi. Morning, all. Two things from my side. One is, again, on natural gas. What shall we think about the timeline until current gas spot prices are hitting your balance sheet? I wouldn't consider that in the Nordics there is any comparable mechanism as like in Germany, where utilities could shift from contract to spot at any time if needed. What would be the timeframe until, based on your contract structure, it's hitting you? We have already seen effects of that. We have also in especially in Sweden we have been taking extra cost to make sure that we don't have any Russian molecules in the natural gas. We have already seen costs increase in cost for natural gas. It's not, for us, a big issue. I mean, our main energy source is coking coal, and from that, we use all the gases. The only place really where we use natural gas is in the non-integrated mill, like Hämeenlinna and partly in Borlänge, and that is to warm up reheating furnaces. We have alternatives there as well. Natural gas is not a big cost in relative terms for SSAB. The cost inflation that has been on natural gas has already been seen in the P&L to a large extent. Oh, okay. It, of course, depends. Is there any- Of course, it depends where it moves from here. When it comes to the whole downstream process, are you seeing any other substitution or any mitigation strategies other than propane? Anything which is feasible right now? Short-term, not really. Midterm to long-term, yes, definitely. Short-term, not really. We are working a lot with looking into, I mean, electric heating of reheating furnaces and so on. The big steps will be taken when we transform into fossil-free steel making. On the margin, we are looking at other alternatives, but it's not so easy to have these big reheating furnaces heated by electricity. We are looking into- Mm Hydrogen and so on and other solutions. Short-term- Okay. Okay. Of course. Quarter-over-quarter, no difference. On auto outlook, I guess what you're saying, Martin, is not necessarily sounding like you're warming up to the demand perspectives for auto. What is the kind of visibility that the call-off rates are finally ticking up from here? What kind of sense you have right now? To be honest, no clear view. What we see is that the substitution from into more and more advanced high-strength steel is continuing. When we look at our automotive volumes compared to the general market of automotive, we have been better than index, so to say. We see still this structural growth of advanced high-strength steels. That is going on. Then of course we know we have a couple of new platforms and a couple of new cars that we are now starting to deliver, and we typically have that every year. Then of course it depends on the development of those volumes. What we clearly see is a very strong interest for fossil-free steel in the future, and we start to ramp up volumes according to that. Not only to have zero until 2026 and then something. We start to ramp up, we start to do prototypes, we start to work with partners and so on, and see huge interest. Overall, I would say that we will follow the overall automotive trend, with the exception that we only produce advanced high-strength steel, and that is as part of the total volume that is growing compared to taking market shares within automotive. We will be dependent on the total automotive market, but we will have a structured growth on high-strength steels, and then we will ramp up volumes in advance of 2026 when we can start to produce fossil-free steel in larger scale for the automotive sector. Mm-hmm. Maybe, I mean, not a clear answer, but that's how we see it and that's what we see, so to say. No, no, I think it's fine. Maybe finally on fossil-free, any kind of takeaway or lessons learned from what happened with one of your competitors who kind of has thrown the towel on DRI? I think, Rochus, you have to specify who has thrown in the towel. No, I mean, I think one of your competitors in Europe has sold its DRI facility to a competitor. You mean the first. Obviously, they now made it out of losses. first facility in Technically. in U.S. Apart from, you know, I am not, we don't have to discuss operational things, but from a more technical standpoint, is there anything looking at this we can take as a lesson from there? I think for them it must have been a strategic decision if they want to produce that in U.S. for using it in Europe. I don't really know because I don't know the background and why they took the decision. What we have learned during this process, and the process started already 2016, is that it's not that easy to produce fossil-free sponge iron. We have also developed a lot of interesting techniques and have some interesting IP pending. It's not easy, but so far we have managed to overcome the problems we have had. At the end, it's up to the customers to judge if the quality is good enough and if we are doing the right thing. So far it has been a very positive response. That's what we know right now. You need to remember that we are only now producing in the pilot plant. We are producing 1 ton per hour, so fairly small volumes. We're using those volumes together with partners for them to do prototypes and small serial productions. We've also developed possibility to produce fossil-free powder. We have invested in a 3D printing facility together with that in Oxelösund. We are now also within automotive and some other segments doing prototypes together with partners. We are, I mean, following our internal plan and so far it looks very promising and it continues to look promising. Very good. Thank you very much. Thank you. The next question is from Bastian Synagowitz with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead. Yes. Good morning, all. I only have two quick questions left, please. The first one is for Leena Craelius. Leena Craelius, could you give us a quick update on your cash tax rate and also some broad guidance on the spillover in cash taxes, which you're expecting from 2022 into your 2023 cash flow at this stage? That is my first question. Regarding the tax rate, I'm looking at it now, Per. It's around 20%. 20%, yes. 20%. Yes. And, uh- The technical guide for it. We expect to pay around that level as well. Yeah over time. Yes. The problem with earning a lot of money also means a lot of taxes paid. Exactly. That's always a nice problem all day. What's the number you expect to be spilling over into next year, given that there has been a, like, a reasonably large number from last year spilling into this year's cash flow? Is there gonna be a large tax, like, spillover or is it gonna be more, like, balanced in maybe your 2020 trend? Hopefully, we will pay a lot of taxes in 2023 as well, because that means that we will earn a lot of money in 2022. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I would say, Bastian, you typically see this delay that you earn it in the year and then you pay a lot of taxes in the beginning, then, of next year. I wouldn't see That it would be a different seasonality here. No. No. Going forward. If you use 20% as a proxy, and then you hope that we make a lot of money, then we'll pay a lot of taxes beginning of 2023, which will be very positive in that aspect. Not paying taxes as such, but having a strong result. Mm-hmm. Okay. No, I'll get here. Okay, thanks. The second question is just on your decarbonization strategy. Wondering, have you already decided which DRI technology you're aiming to go for? And also when do you expect to place the order for the DRI plant within the HYBRIT JV? No, we will continue to develop our own technique, yeah, and build on what we have learned in the pilot plant. We are now in the phase of finalizing the feasibility study, and we'll take the decision, I guess, during the fall. The technique is developed by ourselves, and then we will build equipment and buy components, and build it together with our partners in HYBRIT, LKAB and Vattenfall. What you're saying is you're basically developing your entirely own DRI technology here? It is a difference doing this with natural gas and doing this with hydrogen, and it is much more complicated doing it with hydrogen. That's what we have been developing since 2016, and that's why we decided to build a pilot plant. Because it is different, and that's what we continue to do. As said, so far the results has been very good and very promising, not only according to us, but also according to the users. That's why I mentioned why this, we continue with this, we call it pilot shipments then because they come from the pilot plant towards these strategic partners we have chosen. That's why I also showed the picture of the first fossil-free vehicle being produced by Volvo Construction Equipment and delivered to an end user. Then we will see what the end user thinks about that dump truck or dumper body or dump truck. So far so good, and it's not just buying any DRI plant, off-the-shelf DRI plant and then use hydrogen instead of natural gas. You could try and do that, but then I wish you all the best of luck because it won't work. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That's very interesting. Basically you're not relying on like a single plant engineering partner here, i.e. Primetals or Tenova or whoever that may be. No, but we will never become an equipment manufacturer. We do as we usually do, we develop the technique ourselves and develop the equipment, and then we build, buy components, and then we build it. We will work with many partners like we have done in the pilot plant. Okay. It will be call it a pilot plant, but in bigger scale, taking into account all the lessons we have learned by running a pilot plant, because a pilot plant is really a pilot plant, and it is part of the R&D, research and development project. Okay. Very interesting. Thanks. Thanks, Martin. The next question is from Viktor Strömberg with Danske Bank. Please go ahead. Yes. Thank you, operator. Good morning, Martin, Leena, and Per. Morning. Thanks for taking my question. So just firstly on your CapEx commitment, we have seen some other players, you know, talking about CapEx overruns and CapEx inflation. Just if you could walk us through your CapEx scenario for firstly Oxelösund, I think the large bulk was here in 2022, but also 2023. Is that already committed upon, or would you see any risk for higher CapEx in that project? Part of it is committed, part of it is not. Of course, there is always a risk of continued inflation, and we see inflation when it comes to investments. We have already seen that. We have, I would say to a large extent, taken that into account when we have given you the figures or the guidance. I would say up until now at least, no big deviations. Okay. No, that's clear. I guess, you know, you keep your 22 guidance is sort of an indication that you have some headroom in your budgets. Yes. I guess the same then for the coming investment phase in the call it European restructuring or the investment in the European operations. You know, when you work on that pre-feasibility study or feasibility study, have you seen any changes in terms of CapEx inflation as to when you started with it? Yes, that's in line with the figures we have given externally because there is, of course, as always, some headroom in those figures as well. So far in line. Okay. What will happen in the future, hard to tell. Of course, we have both contingencies and some other, which you typically have when you give a figure in an early stage. Contingencies and other, call it risk factors. Okay. No, that's comforting. Up until now, we don't see any reason to change those figures. Okay. No, that's clear. Second question, just if you could give any flavor on the European market, what you're seeing and hearing, at least on the screens, it seems like the European prices have sort of stabilized. I know you don't guide on the price. No. for the coming period. No, no, I don't. Important to remember is a couple of things. First of all, there is. I wouldn't say no but very limited structural overcapacity left in Europe. I think we also see much better discipline in Europe, and that is of course helped by the current cost of emitting carbon dioxide. Like, the average European steel producer emits around two tons carbon dioxide per ton of steel. If the cost of emission rights are EUR 90 or something around EUR 90, the marginal cost is close to EUR 200 per ton for a European steel player. We are in that aspect, in relative terms, a bit more, I would say, lucky because we only emit 1.6 or something ton carbon dioxide per ton of steel, and that gives us more free allocations due to the benchmark system. Then we have, as we have discussed before, since 2018, also been buying emission rights because we took a decision. We thought it was cheap back in the day, so we said, "Let's buy every month." We are not fully covered, and we will start to see cost, or we will see costs already this year. In relative terms we are quite okay. This cost of carbon dioxide emissions would prevent the European steel players to hunt for marginal volume, so to say. Then of course, we have seen this much less or the import from Russia has gone away and from Belarus, but mainly from Russia, which was a big supplier to the European steel markets. I would say that even though, of course, the invasion of Ukraine is a big catastrophe and not good at all, it has, I mean, had effects on supply and demand. I would say the European market is not as it was a couple of years ago, four or five years ago, structurally oversupplied. The part, or a big part of the import has gone for the time being. My guess would be that it will take quite a long time before we start to use Russian steel in Europe again. No, that's clear. Thank you for the- The market has structurally changed a bit due to that. Now we start to see discipline. We see discipline in the market. We see competitors in Europe taking down production volumes and taking out the blast furnaces. One explanation to that is, of course, the marginal cost of producing steel. Yeah. No, that's clear. Thank you for that step back tonight. Thank you. As a reminder, if you wish to register for a question, please press star and one on your telephone. The next question is from Krishan Agarwal with Citibank. Please go ahead. Hi Martin. Thanks a lot for taking my question. Most of them have been asked. If I can ask a quick clarification on the Americas volume. You're bringing the outage from October to September, and that probably is driving your guidance for significantly lower shipments in Q3. Yes. Does it also mean that the volume hit you are taking in Q3 probably will not be seen in Q4 because seasonally it is lower and hence probably we are seeing some kind of a flattish kind of outlook for Q4 volumes? No, the reason why we move, one would claim that it would be better to have the outage from a market perspective in Q4 than Q3. We are moving the outage one month from October to September. The reason we do that is that we don't want to risk any production disruptions or unplanned outages. We go through the production equipment and felt better safe than sorry. In a perfect world, we would have kept it in Q4, but now we moved it four weeks to make sure that we don't have any production disruption. That's the reason. Of course, that's the main reason why we guide for the volumes, because we will have this outage, which we typically have every 18-24 months in U.S. instead of every year. That's the main reason. Understand. Would you agree that the other way to look at it is that because the market in the U.S., the plate market has been strong, you had to postpone it, the outage, without much of, you know, kind of advance notice, and hence you couldn't stock it up? Sorry, you couldn't? Stock up the volumes. Stock up. You couldn't build the inventory. Okay. If you mean we haven't. No, but we have some backlog, but we have been delivering everything we have been producing with the exception then of supply chain issues, lack of transport and so on. We have some backlog into Q3 in Americas as well. There was no possibility. The market didn't allow us to build up any inventories for Q3. Yeah, yeah. That's what I meant. Yeah. Okay, okay. Sorry for misunderstanding. Good to know. Okay. Thanks a lot. Okay. The next question is from Robert Radin with Carnegie. Please go ahead. Yeah, hi. Just to follow up, maybe I didn't listen properly when you went through that slide, but you had a bullet on the summary slide talking about structurally improved ability to manage downturns. If you could say something about that, what the building blocks are for that? No, it is a couple of building blocks. It is about the mix and the stability in the mix. We have been reducing the volumes of hot rolled coils a lot. I mean, we have not been building volumes overall, and we should not be building volumes, but we should be developing the mix. If you take special steels, as I said, we have grown that since 2015 with 7.7 or 7.8% a year. If you look at the premium mix in SSAB Europe, which is not the same volume products, but more resilient and more stable. We have gone from 25% in 2015 to 43%. We have been doing a lot of structural improvements. We're working with this continuous improvement program of SSAB One, which is focused on structural improvements. We have the synergies and the structural things we did with the Ruukki acquisition amounting to a bit more than SEK 3 billion. We have been selling, call it, non-strategic low performing businesses, and we have been acquiring businesses within downstream, SSAB Services within Tibnor, within Ruukki Construction. Our market coverage when it comes to services, the small and fragmented market has increased also quite a lot over the years. There we see much better stability in earnings. What we are really working hard with is to increase flexibility, of course, and then also take up the earnings in the bottom of the cycle, because that is, as I see it, the most important part. That is structural work. In Swedish, we say "gnetande," everyday work. Look at the structure, do structural changes, become slightly better. We call that system internally SSAB One, and that's what we are doing. I mean, if you do, I did that with some of your back-of-the-envelope calculation and looked at what we have achieved compared to using 2015 as a proxy. It is quite a lot of money that we structurally have improved SSAB with. What will happen in the next downturn and how deep will that be? I don't really know, of course, but I know that SSAB is in a much better shape as a company than we were five years ago or even 10 years ago. Of course, on top of that, we have a decent strength in our balance sheets. We don't have to take any decisions in order to solve that, so to say. I would claim that SSAB is structurally a much better company today than we were 2015. I would also claim that going a couple of years in the future, we will be even better, and that's what we are focusing on, the things we can influence ourselves and take up through profitability. Perfect. Thank you so much. The next question is a follow-up from Patrick Mann with Bank of America. Please go ahead. It was just a quick follow-up on the maintenance question. You brought forward the US, pushing Europe out one quarter. Was that just to better align or what was the thinking behind pushing Europe back a quarter? Thanks. Now you're referring to Raahe. I think that was related to the strong plate demand. I think that was the reason that considered that we can also do it during Q4 as well as Q3. That was the main reason. Which we would have typically done. The opposite reason for US. In US, we felt we had to do it in Q3. In Raahe, we felt that, given the strong plate market, we could delay it a month or two, given the status of the equipment and the, call it, the risk assessment. Makes sense. Thanks very much. That's all. Thanks. There are no more questions registered at this time. I will give the floor back to the speakers for any closing remarks. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. Thank you for good questions. Thank you, Leena and Martin. By this, we conclude today's conference and wish you a nice weekend. Thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you. Bye-bye.