TX Group AG

SIX:TXGN

Q2-2025 Earnings Call

[Urs Fehr, executive]

So good afternoon, lady and gentlemen, only one lady in the room. First, I guess, we are inventory, right? And also welcome to the guests that have joined us virtually. It's a pleasure to welcome you here in the offices and virtually to this year's half year results presentation. It's a special pleasure for me since this is my first event since joining TX Group roughly 2 months ago.

Our Chairman, Pietro Supino, will start with the presentation and then is followed by our CFO, Wolf Benkendorff, our Chief Portfolio Officer, Daniel Monch; and by Tanja Waldeck, our Chief Operating Officer. And then the floor is yours for any questions you would like to ask us. [Operator Instructions] Many thanks for being with us this afternoon, and it's my pleasure to hand over to Pietro Supino, our Chairman.

[Pietro Supino, executive]

Thank you, Urs, and that was also the opportunity for all of you to meet Urs, those who have not met him, he's our new responsible for communication at the group level and for Investor Relations. And welcome to this analyst conference, you have seen the results. We'll go into it in more detail. I'm not doing that. Otherwise, you get it like 3 times. Just to mention that, obviously, we are also affected by the instability that we have to live with globally, the instability politically and economically.

Luckily, we are only indirectly affected, but still we are affected, and you can see that in our numbers. Then the picture is mixed. We have said it and we'll go into it -- into more detail. On the side of media, where the results are not up to our expectations, I can say that the critical questions are on the table and a lot of work is being done in the various areas and that we are confident that we will be able to deliver on the margin goals that have been announced 2 years ago, which means that 20 Minutes and Goldbach should achieve the margin goals next year and Tamedia the following year '27 as we have communicated, and there is no change in our expectation in that regard.

I think that's important to mention on the background of these figures that we present today that are not up to our expectations. And the second positive note I would want to underline is that if we look at our results on a cash flow basis, and that is what I'm most interested in, it's at least more or less on the level of the previous year. So all the deterioration we observe is also -- can also be explained by a variety of different effects. But if we look at cash flow, at least, we are at the level of last year, which, of course, is not up to our medium- and long-term ambitions, but I think it's important to note it.

We have also been spending some time thinking about our equity story. And the short version of it is that we see our group standing on 2 pillars. On the one hand, the marketplace businesses, including digital recruiting, which is of value for society. I think we deliver a service to society, which is important with these activities, and they are promising in terms of growth in addition to the high profitability, which they show. And the second pillar is and remains media. And there, our ambition is to reconstruct a sustainable base for journalism in the future. And as I said, we believe that we'll be able to achieve this, and it has to be proved in the next 2 years, that is the case.

So we invest in companies in these areas. We would like to find new sources of growth within our existing companies or in new investments around these themes. And having said that, it's also clear that all the other activities are not strategic. They are partly of important value, namely the real estate, but these other activities that are not marketplace and not media, they are not strategic for our group.

Lastly, I would like to mention the share buyback program, which we have announced today. The reason for it is that we have excess cash, which we think we should return to our shareholders as long as we don't have better investment ideas. And it shows the confidence we have in the potential of our group. But I should also underline that the magnitude of this program is somehow limited by the already not high free float and liquidity of our share. And it is not our intention to take the company private. We think it's for the benefit of our activities to be in the frame of a publicly traded company. So we want to remain in that frame.

And my family has no intentions to sell any shares because they are also convinced that the potential of the group is there. So it is, I think, to be taken as a logical step and as a signal that we care about the interest of our shareholders, but it is somehow limited by the frame in which we operate. And that I wanted to clarify. So with this, I hand over to my colleagues, and then we are here, as always, to answer questions you might have. Thank you for your interest.

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

Good afternoon. I'm Wolf Benkendorff, CFO of TX Group. I'll be presenting a brief overview of TX Group's financial performance for the first half of 2025. In the overview, you can see that revenue, EBIT adjusted and profit margin decreased. The equity ratio remains largely consistent and net liquidity has declined primarily due to reduced cash holdings compared to the year-end 2024. This reduction is attributed to dividend payments to TX shareholders and the acquisition of 200,000 treasury shares.

Despite lower revenue and EBIT adjusted, free cash flow before M&A, as Pietro just mentioned, remained unchanged, and I will give you more detail on the next slide. Cash flow from operating activities was stable year-over-year despite a considerably lower EBITDA and the reduced positive impact from changes in net working capital. This stability is primarily attributed to the ordinary dividend of CHF 18.4 million from SMG for the 2024 business year paid to TX Group. This is the first ordinary dividend from SMG since its founding in 2021.

As a reminder, in November of last year, SMG paid an extraordinary dividend totaling CHF 230 million and CHF 71 million of this amount has been paid to TX Group last year. Investments in property, plant and equipment and intangible assets were consistent with the previous year, resulting in a free cash flow before M&A of CHF 82.1 million, aligning with 2024 levels. The increase in cash outflow from financing activities was mainly driven by the already mentioned buyback of 200,000 TX shares valued at CHF 30 million.

Now we'll go into more detail about the development of revenue and earnings. If we start on the left, you can see that revenue declined by 7%. JobCloud faced headwinds in the digital job market, Meanwhile, 20 Minutes experienced weaker advertising performance and the closure of the Lausanne printing center led to lower print and logistics revenue at Tamedia. EBITDA and the EBITDA margin decreased primarily due to lower revenue. Additionally, negative one-off effects at 20 Minutes and Goldbach out-of-home contributed to the decline. Despite the negative one-off effects, more than 50% of the revenue loss was offset by cost savings. Concerning EBIT, we see only a minor increase in D&A and overall adjustments of CHF 31.5 million, roughly the same amount of adjustments compared to the last year.

Revenue saw a reported decline of minus 7.5%, though organic revenue loss was a more modest minus 5.3%. This difference is attributable to the 2024 divestments of Goldbach Dreifive, Goldbach Austria and DJ Digitale Medien, that is heute.at. No significant investments were made in the first half year of 2025. If we look at the income statement, revenue decline outpaced cost reductions even with personnel cost savings over CHF 10 million. And it's worth mentioning that this already includes a one-off expense for the 20-minute social plan.

Net income from associated companies and joint ventures remained stable. Weaker results from Karriere.at and the divestment of Ultimate Media were balanced by additional contributions from SMG. The significant decline in the 2025 financial result is attributed to extraordinary effects in the previous year, an earn-out payment of CHF 4.2 million from the sale of Trendsales and a CHF 4 million gain on the disposal of the dreifive Group. The adjusted income statement mainly corrects for the amortization from business combinations from SMG, the plus CHF 5.6 million and the fully consolidated companies, the plus CHF 24.2 million.

In addition to that, all costs related to closing the print centers were adjusted. The adjustment in the financial result concerns a one-off effect of plus CHF 2.2 million due to the revaluation of the purchase price liability from the full acquisition of minority interest in Neo Advertising. Overall, the adjusted income statement clearly shows that revenue loss uncompensated by reduced costs results in lower profits.

I will briefly address the financial development of the segments in the following section. This slide shows the main investments in the TX Markets segment on a 100% basis. JobCloud and Karriere.at experienced a decline in revenue and earnings attributed to a challenging job market. Despite this, margins remain appealing, holding in the high 40s. SMG continues its positive trend with sales up 16% and substantial earnings growth. In the Goldbach segment, sales sharply declined. The primary drivers for the changes observed are the reintegration of ad sales into Tamedia in 20 Minutes, alongside the divestments of the dreifive Group and Goldbach Austria.

When analyzing Goldbach without out-of-home business, a substantial portion of the revenue decline has been offset by cost reductions or cost reallocations to Tamedia. This strategic adjustment led to a slightly positive result for the first half of the year, even within a demanding advertising market. The out-of-home business on the right-hand side, experienced a slight increase in sales. Excluding a one-off effect related to an onerous contract, the results for Goldbach out-of-home are clearly better than the previous year's performance.

Despite a challenging advertising market, 20 Minutes results would have been slightly positive without a negative one-off of minus CHF 5.3 million for a social plan. Intensive cost management helped 20 Minutes largely offset this revenue loss. In order to properly assess the performance of 20 Minutes, the effect of last year's sales of the shares in the Austrian companies, Heute and heute.at must also be taken into account.

Compared to the previous year, this reduced revenue by CHF 3.8 million and earnings by almost CHF 1 million. Tamedia experienced a decline in revenues, primarily due to the advertising market and printing business. However, strict cost management enabled Tamedia to slightly improve the results, thereby fully compensating for the revenue loss. Venture sales remained stable, while results showed a clear improvement with EBITDA turning positive for the first half of the year.

Group revenue saw a decline due to the ongoing reallocation of service activities from the group to the media companies. As Pietro already mentioned, our Board of Directors has decided to conduct a public share buyback program. As part of this 3-year buyback program, TX Group intends to repurchase own registered shares up to a mid-single-digit percentage of the outstanding share capital. The buyback at market price will be carried out on the second trading line, followed by the cancellation of the shares and is set to start in the coming weeks. The purpose of this buyback is to deploy capital efficiently and return funds to our shareholders.

With this being said, I will hand over to Daniel Monch.

[Daniel Monch, executive]

Thank you, Wolf, and a warm welcome also from my side. I'm happy to give you a brief overview on the first 6 months of the portfolio. Even though there have been quite some changes in the portfolio, for example, 2 new CEOs, one at JobCloud and one at Doodle, the overall trends and development remains constant. I will go into more detail company by company, starting with JobCloud.

As Pietro and as Wolf have mentioned, the job market in Switzerland and in Austria remains challenging. That's no secret. Within these circumstances, we are quite happy with the development that JobCloud shows. A strict cost discipline helps us to maintain an attractive margin, while ongoing investments in product and innovation help us to defend our strong position. In Austria, the business is even more affected by the current conditions, resulting in lower revenue, but still a strong margin. The chart on the right-hand side showing the web visits underlines what I've just said.

Even though the situation is complicated and challenging, JobCloud was able to improve its position against its competitors. As already done in the first 6 months of this year, we will continue to closely monitor the macroeconomic developments in the second half of the year and maintain a strong cost focus.

Coming to SMG, you can see a lot of green on the slide, which underlines the positive development that Wolf already has mentioned. SMG was able to grow by double digits and the result is even better when looking at the verticals. As you can see on the right-hand side, each of the verticals also was able to contribute to this result and to grow by double digits. SMG continues to invest in improving the security, efficiency and user experience of its platforms, while at the same time, keeping an eye on cost measures.

Examples for product innovation are [ Tenant+ ] in real estate or digital contracts for private sellers in automotive. Since its foundation in 2021, it has always been clearly communicated that the shareholders intend to take SMG public. This remains unchanged and all shareholders are committed to the IPO path. That said, it's important to outline that no decision on the potential IPO or on the timing has been made yet. As you may have seen, SMG has also published its own half year report earlier this morning, where you can find more detailed information on the verticals and on their performance.

Looking at group and ventures, including real estate, the task regarding real estate remains unchanged. We're currently developing a tailored property strategy for each location, and we're assessing whether to do that through partnerships or on our own. We are making good progress and expect to be one step further in early 2026. Doodle and Zattoo present a mixed picture. While both companies face challenges in reaching their growth ambitions, they have significantly improved their bottom line. While we are already at the implementation of the strategy at Zattoo, at Doodle, we're in the midst of the strategy development with the new CEO, Christian Fielitz, who joined May 1.

Our Fintage Fund has shown an increased net asset value and successfully closed 3 new deals in the first 6 months of the year, and we are seeing an ongoing very positive interesting deal flow. We are confident that we will be able to make interesting new investments also in the second half of this year. Overall, despite the challenges I've mentioned, we are pleased with the development of the portfolio and remain confident that the various assets are moving into the right direction to fully unlock their potential step by step.

And with that, I'll hand over to you, Tanja.

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

Thank you, good afternoon from my side as well. Thank you. Just like 2024, the first half of 2025 is characterized by transformation and change across our media companies. Over the past 6 months, we have set the following 3 priorities for all companies. First of all, to transform the group from a highly functional structure into a decentralized group of independent businesses, each with a high level of entrepreneurial freedom and stronger consumer focus and in this context, shifting resources from central administrative tasks to product and consumer-focused activities.

Second, to divest nonstrategic and nonprofitable activities and businesses; and third, to focus on our digital strategies and accelerate the growth in our businesses. Overall, I can say we are confident that with these efforts, we will be able to reach our communicated margin targets.

So let's go through the companies one by one. Aligned with the group priorities and to improve its profitability for the next year, Goldbach has undergone further restructuring, particularly reviewing its existing portfolio in Germany; and second, realizing savings in the Goldbach Group and taking over services from the TX Group in context of the decentralization.

Overall, Goldbach had to compensate for the handover of the Tamedia and the 20 Minuten business. This is supported by strong development of the core TV and out-of-home business. Goldbach out-of-home began 2025 with a good operational performance despite a challenging environment. As was said, a one-off depreciation for a loss-making contract impacts the picture, but it should not distract from the strong operational performance that the team shows.

Due to the restructuring of the digital ad business with Tamedia and 20 Minuten, the Goldbach digital business had a challenging start in the first half year and had to rethink its stand-alone strategy. They have decided on a clear focus on programmatic and our strong video position in the market, which can be seen on the right-hand side of the slide. We are confident that they will come back on track in the coming months.

20 Minuten has taken a head start into its purely digital future and decided to discontinue its print product at the end of the year. We are excited to be able to build on such a strong digital product for the future. To build a solid financial base and to ensure its profitability for the upcoming years, 20 Minuten has undergone an organizational restructuring in the first half of the year with the reorganization of its editorial activities at its core.

While integrating the advertising sales activities took longer than expected and the advertising market has proven challenging, the new setup has now been in place for more than 6 months. We can say with confidence that the decision shows first positive results. We observed an uplift in direct sales and see the development of several additional monetization ideas. Investing strongly in AI and monetization opportunities will help 20 Minuten to drive future business growth.

Following the big restructuring in 2024 and the closure of one of its 3 printing centers this year, Tamedia has begun operating in its newly defined organization during the first half of the year and is very satisfied with the first start and results. With preparations underway for the closure of the Zurich printing center in 2026 and the reorganization of the Tamedia advertising team that has taken -- has been taken over from Goldbach, Tamedia still has several key initiatives ahead this year.

Although the advertising market did not show the expected development, Tamedia was able to offset the loss in revenues with additional cost measures. Tamedia is now focused on its transformation and its digital growth strategy to secure long-term success. Overall, we can say that we are confident that the continuous hard work on the transformation of our businesses will show first positive effects on our margins in 2026 and 2027. Thereby, thank you very much. I think I will hand over to Urs, right?

[Urs Fehr, executive]

So thank you. [Operator Instructions]

[Unknown Analyst]

First question, the 200,000 shares, are they also already part of the buyback?

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

No, they're not part of the buyback, and they will not be eliminated.

[Unknown Analyst]

So you bought them for what purpose?

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

Maybe I hand over to Pietro.

[Pietro Supino, executive]

So these shares, they come out of the family shareholding. There was the structure of one deceased shareholder who wanted to sell the shares. We could buy them at a discount. And I thought it was right to do it in the interest of all shareholders, so not to have it traded to other family shareholders, but to buy it with the company and through that, also increasing the free float in that case.

And the idea is to place these shares with a new shareholder outside of the family pool. We are not right now in concrete negotiations for that, but we hold them to ultimately place them or use them for strategic transactions, if ever that possibility came up to partly pay with our own shares. And to a certain degree, we could also use these shares in the future for management incentivizations.

[Unknown Analyst]

And the CHF 4.9 million provision in Neo advertising that contract, can you tell us a little bit more about that?

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

That's a contract which is already a while ago, we can see that actually the assumptions we had for this contract were not correct. So we had to adjust for that with the onetime depreciation. We hope that talking to the partner, we will come up with a better solution, but we don't have it yet, therefore...

[Unknown Analyst]

And then on 20 Minuten, Tamedia and also Goldbach without out-of-home, you have these 2026 targets. Obviously, the margins in H1 are quite far away from these targets. Maybe you can give us a little bit of more insight about the bridge to these 2026 targets. Obviously, talking about 20 Minutes, the discontinuation of print will play a significant role and Tamedia will be a printing center. And Goldbach will be probably the sale of the businesses, but maybe you can give us a little bit more insight.

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

Yes. So let's maybe start with Tamedia. You just mentioned it. I think the biggest step ahead is the closing of the Zurich printing center, actually to that target. And additionally, the further basically restructuring of the company that's going on. And on the other side, of course, growing on the digital side. Those I think are the 3 big steps that have to be taken.

If we look at Goldbach, Goldbach is working very hard on the cost side, first of all, in the group. Second, divesting a lot of activities who are around the core activities where we don't see that they are strategically important for us. So those kind of activities we're selling. And the third part, of course, is also growing the business on the digital side. That's what we need as a combination.

And 20 Minuten has actually done the biggest step this year by restructuring the team and restructuring the whole organization. This is one of the biggest steps that they have to take. And the additional levels are basically to grow the revenue side again with the investments that we're doing in content and monetization model.

[Unknown Analyst]

So add-on questions, if I may. Can you give us an idea about how much sales and EBITDA or EBIT loss the print addition of 20 Minuten they produce?

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

How much what, I'm sorry?

[Unknown Analyst]

Sales and EBITDA.

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

We don't disclose that, I'm sorry.

[Unknown Analyst]

Okay, then. I'll ask the other way around. So we are around breakeven. And without print, how much -- how close does that get us to the 14% to 16%? Is it 2/3 of the rate of the print addition? If you think about...

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

Think about it as the restructuring of the team, I think that's far, safe to say. The print part, let's put it that way. It was not breakeven, but it's not the biggest lever you have, right? It is important to do it because it enables you also to focus as an organization. But the restructuring they did this year was the biggest step towards the margin. They're very confident that they will be able to reach it.

[Urs Fehr, executive]

More questions in the room?

[Unknown Analyst]

You mentioned the substantial investments in 20 Minutes. So can you talk about or quantify them?

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

Yes.

[Unknown Analyst]

First question and you looked at Neo, all the contracts -- are there older contracts that you still believe there might be a possibility for more provisions?

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

I would start with the last question and then go to the first question. I think we now after basically the merger of the 2 out-of-home companies gained a very good perspective on the contract. And I think we know it's already built in the numbers which contracts we feel very confident about and which not.

So I think there are no surprises, if that's your question, waiting for us, which I completely guess as a question. And we're working on basically each and every one of those contracts, right, to renegotiate them. Of course, they're all coming up again after a while. So we have the opportunity then to negotiate them with better terms.

And the first question, 20 Minuten, we are especially investing, first of all, in initiatives on the AI side, which will help us to gain efficiency, but also in product innovation. But this is already taken into account with basically our idea of reaching the margins next year.

[Unknown Analyst]

An add-on question with the closure to the printing centers, do you expect for the second half any material other costs to happen? Or is the next step in 2026 to expect?

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

As far as I see it, I think the team has a pretty good view on how to do it, what kind of costs will be involved. So that's again the question, I think there will be no big surprises on that. They have a very good plan on how to execute it. It just takes time. It's nothing you can do immediately. You have to rearrange a lot of contracts with partners and everything. So -- but I think the team has a pretty good plan on how to do it.

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

And maybe your question is about additional provisions. Everything that we knew last year regarding the closing of the printing center was already included in these provisions. So that's basically reflected and the provision is the full plan to close the 2 printing centers and all the related costs.

[Urs Fehr, executive]

Who's next in the room? Carol, do we have some questions online? Nothing?

[Tanja Waldeck, executive]

Here's another question.

[Unknown Analyst]

Maybe looking at JobCloud, it has not really grown in the last years for obvious reasons. So can you give us kind of a substantial growth rate of the business? And are you already in after recruitment services like [indiscernible] and Grupa Pracuj, I think, if I pronounce it correctly.

[Daniel Monch, executive]

It's hard to pronounce. You're right there. As you know, Przemyslaw is in the Board of Directors of JobCloud, the CEO and Founder of Grupa Pracuj. You mentioned it yourself, it's not growing in the last years. That's due to the difficult conditions we find in the job market. I think compared to our competitors in Europe, we're still doing good.

I think it's thanks to really a high cost discipline on the one hand side, but on the other hand side, also still continuing to invest because we're convinced that when the market conditions will improve that then also we will be back on the growth path and that companies that invest now will even more benefit from the clearing up. So it's hard to give some concrete numbers on the growth, but we are still expecting some growth coming back after the macroeconomic development gets a bit better than it is at the moment. And the second question was, sorry?

[Unknown Analyst]

HR services.

[Daniel Monch, executive]

Yes, we always -- that's a very good question. And you mentioned one company that is heavily investing into HR tech services. We're not at that stage, with JobCloud at the moment because we're convinced that in the core of the business, there's still a lot of potential for the business, may it be blue collar, may it be the young generation. So we see a lot of potential still in the core. But this is a question that will be tackled in the upcoming years for sure.

[Unknown Analyst]

Can you comment a little bit more about 2 questions on jobs. Obviously, volume declines macro driven. Any pricing that you can potentially put through? I guess you have a very strong position. And I imagine there's some less strong players out there that potentially are getting into budgets of the HR teams. Is there a way for you to price your way up and gain a bit of share there on the wallet side? Or what -- if you disclose any of the mix on how does that growth look like?

[Daniel Monch, executive]

Yes. I think we're still at a very good pricing level in Switzerland. And I think especially in situations that are challenging, I think, in a partnership, it's also important to also reflect the other side of the business, which are the companies that are also facing quite some challenges. Otherwise, they would recruit more than they are currently doing. And I think your question, how do we get back on the growth path? I think it's -- with jobs, it's for sure, more volume than price driven, I would say, and more services that we are offering.

[Pietro Supino, executive]

Maybe more generally about jobs has to be borne in mind that the growth post corona exceeded all expectations. And so we are still kind of comparing with an acceleration that has taken place. So the curve will be flatter long term. Then the fundamental reasons why this, in our view, remains a very good business is the shortage of qualified labor, especially in a country like Switzerland.

That has not changed the demographic situation. The attractivity of Switzerland, I think, is unchanged. So in the medium- and long-term view, the fundamental reasons why we have been believing in the potential of digital recruiting are unchanged. And the business is highly profitable. If you compare the profitability of our businesses with any peers in the world, you will see that it is run in a very efficient manner.

And maybe lastly to mention this growth potential in the core is mainly in the segment of the small and medium-sized enterprises, while the market is much more challenging with large enterprises and professional recruiters because they obviously, thanks to the technological development can intermediate to a certain extent what we do. But in a country like Switzerland, where there is a very strong tissue of small and medium-sized enterprises, we believe that there is really an important growth potential in the core, and that's the top priority for group.

[Unknown Analyst]

And maybe just as a follow-up on the capital allocation side. Obviously, the buyback is a signal strongly out there that you think the prices are underpriced. Does that have an implication on dividend payout policy you have? Or what's the best way to think of that going forward?

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

No, there has no consequence on dividend payment. We announced last November that we guarantee a dividend of at least CHF 4 per share for the business year '25 and '26 as well. So this has not changed. It's more like returning a bigger chunk of our liquidity to the shareholders.

[Urs Fehr, executive]

So we have a question via the webcast. Carol, can you please read it out.

[Unknown Executive]

Yes. So can you please provide an update on the real estate portfolio strategy? What should we expect as disclosure going into 2026 to help us better understand the value?

[Daniel Monch, executive]

Yes. As I said, we're working on the strategy, and I think we will proceed with the strategy, and we'll be ready to maybe communicate next steps early 2026. And I think on the disclosures, maybe the question for you, Wolf.

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

Since we are not using these assets or the printing center in Lausanne and also the new building that we're building here at our location in Werdstrasse, we will not be using them for operations in the future. That means we have to change accounting standards here. It will be treated as an investment property.

And part of this change, we will give more information about the fair value of these real estate. And once the group center in Zurich will be closed for operation, then we also give more information about the fair value or we have to give more information about the fair value of this property.

[Urs Fehr, executive]

Any more questions?

[Pietro Supino, executive]

Maybe to add this, what I said at the beginning, we see our group standing on 2 pillars, which is marketplaces, digital recruiting and media. And all the other activities are not strategic, and that includes real estate. But we are, as Daniel has explained, in the process of developing a strategy that will help us to make the best out of these values. And whatever negotiations we would like to enter in regarding real estate, we can only do a good job and defend our interests well if we clearly understand what we have and what the potential and the value of what we have is, and that is what we are working on in the development of these strategies.

[Urs Fehr, executive]

More questions in the room? Anything virtually?

[Unknown Analyst]

Is the loan to General Atlantic repayable upon the IPO of SMG?

[Wolf-Gerrit Benkendorff, executive]

Yes. The current loan to General Atlantic is linked to the IPO. So any proceedings from the IPO from General Atlantic have to be used for the repayment of this loan.

[Unknown Analyst]

Could you spin off your SMG shares to your shareholders at or after the IPO?

[Pietro Supino, executive]

I didn't understand.

[Unknown Analyst]

Could you spin off your SMG shares to your shareholders at or after the IPO?

[Pietro Supino, executive]

If and when an IPO takes place is open, the company is preparing it and is well on track on that procedure. And by the way, for those who do not know, SMG will have their own press conference or analyst conference today at 5:00. So any specific questions relating to SMG would be better placed there than here.

And as far as we are concerned as a shareholder, it's not possible, unfortunately, to distribute our shares to our shareholders without tax consequences that just make it not feasible. So it is not an option for us to distribute these shares to our shareholders. Otherwise, we would have considered it, but it's not the plan for us.

[Urs Fehr, executive]

More online questions? In-room questions? If not, thank you very much for being here this afternoon. It was a pleasure, and we hope to see you soon again.