Akzo Nobel (Euronext:AKZA) Q1 2026 Earnings Call

0:00 Hello, and welcome to the Akzo Nobel Q1 Results twenty twenty six Earnings Call. My name is Alex. I'll be coordinating today's call. I will now hand it over to Jan Willem to begin. Please go ahead. Good morning, and welcome to Akzo Nobel's Investor Update for the First Quarter of twenty twenty six. I'm Jan Willem Inhus, Head of Investor Relations. Today, our CEO, Fred Fuguillaume and CFO, Magdalene de Vries, will take you through our results. We'll refer to the presentation, which you can follow by webcast or download from our website at uxanobel.com. A replay of the webcast will also be made available following the event. For additional information, please contact our Investor Relations team.

0:49 Before we start, a reminder of our forward looking statements disclaimer on Slide two. Please note this also applies to the conference call and answers to your questions. I'll now hand over to Greg, who will start on Slide three of the presentation. Thanks, Guillermo. Good morning to everyone on the call. In Q1, we delivered a clear beat with EBITDA of EUR $345,000,000 coming in 7% ahead of the EUR $323,000,000 consensus. Organic sales were 1% lower year on year with a 1% pricing gain offset by 1% declines in both mix and volumes. Profitability improved meaningfully. Adjusted EBITDA was up 7% at comparable scope, while adjusted EBITDA margin rose to 14.5% up 80 basis points.

1:36 This marks the fourth quarter of margin expansion year on year driven by disciplined pricing and strong execution on our cost actions in soft end markets. Operationally, our industrial transformation will be completed by year end. We closed a further three sites in Q1 bringing the total to 15 since the program's inception. We've done all of this without business interruption. We also delivered a key milestone to our ongoing portfolio review in Deco Asia signing the sale of our business in Pakistan at 14 times EBITDA for an enterprise value of about EUR 50,000,000. Closes expected in the second half of the year. It's not a very large transaction, but it's another proof point after India that Deco assets were valuable, particularly to the right owner.

2:23 On financing, we issued a €1,100,000,000 bond, dual tranche in March, extending our maturity profile and reinforcing liquidity ahead of the proposed Axalta merger, which is on schedule. We enter the rest of the year from a position of strength, well equipped to navigate the raw material headwinds ahead. Turning to Slide four. In Q1, volumes were down 1% year on year, reflecting picture. We saw strong growth across Asia and South America, while North America and Europe remained slow. In coatings, volumes declined 2% in Q1 against the backdrop of continued macroeconomic uncertainties. Powder, specifically, powder demand improved in both architectural and automotive and the strong momentum in Asia continued.

3:15 Marine Protective delivered a lower quarter driven by project phasing and tougher comps in Marine, while Protective continued to grow, particularly in Asia. Automotive and Specialty remained sequentially flat. Aerospace is a clear growth engine, while Refinish grew in Asia and stayed at trough levels in North America as expected. Industrial Coatings declined low single digit with growth in coil more than offset by lower volumes in packaging. Moving to Deco, Q1 was a solid quarter. Volumes grew strongly across Asia and South America, offset by lower volumes in Europe, Middle East and Africa where the season started more slowly but accelerated through March and is also doing well in April. Latin America volumes were low single digits up, driven by Brazil's return to growth together with Colombia.

4:06 In Asia, growth accelerated sequentially with continued outperformance in China and Vietnam, while Indonesia is showing signs of recovery. I'd add as a comment in reaction to some of the questions we got this morning and some of the headlines that we saw that we don't see a whole lot of evidence of pre buying in either deco or coatings. I mean, they're very different businesses. But once again, there's no evidence of significant pre buying in any part of our business at this point. Thanks. Next page, Martin. Yeah. Thanks, Greg. And good morning, everybody. At group level, organic sales declined by 1%. Volumes were down 1%, while 1% price was offset by negative mix impact of 1%.

4:54 The divestment of India had a negative 3% impact on revenue. Finally, FX translation reduced revenue by 5% resulting in a reported revenue decline of 9%. Coatings were impacted by geopolitical uncertainty with volumes down 2%. Growth in Asia and South America was more than offset by lower volumes in North America and Europe. Deco delivered strong price mix of 2% on flat volumes. Group adjusted EBITDA was EUR $345,000,000, representing a 7% increase at comparable scope, excluding our India disposal and in constant currencies.

5:41 The EBITDA margin improved to 14.5%, up 80 bps year on year. This improvement was driven by 300 bps margin expansion in deco on strong pricing and structural cost savings. In coatings, softer volumes and negative mix weighed on profitability. Next slide. We delivered another quarter of free cash flow improvement by EUR39 million at minus EUR144 million versus minus EUR183 million in Q1 last year. The first quarter is seasonal quarter with inventory builds and related outflows.

6:29 Working capital also improved, ending the quarter at 16.8%, 120 bps below prior year. Notably, this was achieved while we closed three sites as part of our industrial transformation program, which requires inventory build up to support volume redistribution. Return on investments rose to 13.6%, up from 13.1% last year. And finally, supported by the improved cash generation, we maintained our leverage ratio at around two times. Now handing back to Greg. Thanks, Martin. Moving to Slide seven, think. Tensions in The Middle East have pushed oil prices higher and caused significant disruption across the chemical value chain, driving expected high teens raw material inflation for the remainder of the year.

7:27 In response, we move decisively to protect margins and have announced price increases ranging from the mid single digits to the low teens. The announced price increases will fully offset raw material and logistics inflation based on current market conditions. We'll execute further pricing actions if conditions worsen. So once again, these price increases have been announced, they've been discussed with customers, they're being implemented. The last cycle demonstrates the strength of our ability to pass through inflation. If you think back to that time, 2122, euros 2,300,000,000 of cumulative pricing to fully offset the €2,000,000,000 of raw material inflation. Although pricing took time to catch up. This time around what we're building on that experience and we've acted faster, bringing pricing and inflation into closer alignment in the early stages of the cycle. We're not executing at pace with the P and L impact of our pricing actions ramping up in Q2 and the full effect visible in Q3.

8:28 Beyond pricing, we're actively managing input cost inflation, contractual terms and competitive sourcing are limiting cost increases from suppliers, while our regional for regional sourcing model keeps supply continuity intact and provides resilience against further disruption. In short, we've navigated this before. Our response is in motion and we believe we have the track record to back our confidence. Turning now to our outlook on Page eight. Looking ahead, our 2026 adjusted EBITDA target of at or above EUR 1,700,000,000 remains unchanged. The EUR 100,000,000 step up continues to be driven by what we control EUR 90,000,000 of net savings from industrial program with SG and A carryover and productivity offsetting inflation. We remain firmly focused on completing the industrial program by year end, while maintaining strict cost discipline.

9:26 Although the Middle East conflict has limited impact in the first quarter, raw material and logistics costs will ramp up throughout the year. The exact impact is still evolving, but additional pricing has been announced, as I said, and will fully offset this inflation we see. And therefore, we believe that the actions that we have in place have neutralized that impact and we'll take further actions if needed. For Q2, we expect adjusted EBITDA of around EUR 400,000,000. Volumes are forecasted to be broadly flat against comps that are less challenging than in Q1. And pricing will build progressively throughout the quarter offsetting raw material inflation, while OpEx savings will be delivered as per plan.

10:12 Moving to Slide nine, the merger preparations with Axcelta are progressing as planned with three critical work streams running in parallel. On integration, the management office is up and running with a strong cooperation between the teams. Focus is on day one readiness and accelerating synergy capture. The shareholder book preparations continue to advance. The PCAOB audit is complete. The confidential F4 filing was submitted end of March and the EGM is expected to be held in early July. Separately, the regulatory process is underway with active dialogue across many jurisdictions including The US, The EU and The UK. We remain firmly on course to close by the end of the year or early next year. I'll now hand over to Jan Willem, who will close with information about upcoming events and then we'll start the Q and A session. Jan Willem? Thank you, Greg. Before we start the Q and A session, I would like to draw your attention to the upcoming events shown on Slide 10. For AGM, that will be held tomorrow, April 23. The ex dividend date on our 2025 final dividend is April 27, and the record date is April 28, followed by payment on May 6. This concludes the formal presentation, and we'll be happy to address your questions.

11:28 Please state your name and company by asking questions and limit the number of questions to two per person so others can participate. Operator, please start the Q and A session. Thank you. Our first question for today comes from Thomas Wrigglesworth of Morgan Stanley. Two questions, if I may. Firstly, around the volume outlook that you have, I mean, an evolving picture, but obviously, you've kept the volume picture flat and you're pushing through pricing.

12:16 Are you expecting to see some demand erosion? Or do you think that it's too early to tell? Or there are mitigating factors within there that mean that, that doesn't that shouldn't arrive this time around? And secondly, just on the you successfully you did very successfully pass through pricing in the previous cycle. But one of the issues we found was in the coatings industry, less so Akzo was kind of unique components that were missing or became short. Just in terms of your total inventory picture, how does that vary by region? How many weeks, how many days of inventory do you have in terms of visibility and in terms of lead time to get to enable you to get prices up? Thank you.

13:07 Thanks, Thomas. I'll take the first question, Martin will take the second. From a volume perspective, we've kept the outlook flat. When we look at so when we look under the hood, we're not really seeing we didn't see any pre buying of any significance. We are not seeing a slowdown either. We're essentially seeing a trend that is seems to be fairly stable. So will you know if we stay in a world of higher inflation because that Roman inflation would create price inflation and creates inflation overall, would that have an impact on demand overall? I mean, I think economic theory would tell you it would.

13:53 But it's one, it's not visible today. Two, it's too early to tell. Three, we're playing against easier comps starting in Q2. You have to remember, you had Liberation Day last year and all sorts of things that made our life exciting. So I'd say so far so good. And March was healthy. April was healthy too. We announced price increases that we discussed with our customers without seeing them ramp up their orders or I think there's a view in the market that there's potentially a resolution on the horizon. But whether that's correct or not, we're not seeing anything that would lead us to change our volume outlook for the time being. Martin, you want to take the second question? Yeah, on the pricing dynamics and maybe a few points to make. First of all, this is really a very abrupt price increase.

14:58 But of course, there is a different picture per region and also per business or per business segment. So we use differentiated pricing, of course, in that context. And on your question on lead time, what you see in general that in Asia and particularly in China, supply chains are significantly shorter compared to, for instance, Europe. So that's why in Asia within shorter supply chain, but also a more material increase, you see also there and faster reaction to compensate. It's really interesting, by the way, because Asia structurally has a higher impact from what's happening in The Middle East than the Strait Of Hormuz just because where these oil and some of these refined products go.

15:55 And as Martin said, it's just for the supply chain. So you should say, well, there's going to be more of an impact in Asia and that impact will be felt earlier. But actually in Q1, what's really pulled up performance is Asia. So it's holding up well at this point in terms of demand. Once again, to link Martin's answer on the second question to the first question. Thomas, did we cover your question? That's very impressive. Thank you. Both impressive and very helpful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Our next question comes from Laurent Favre of BNP Paribas. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Yes, thanks and good morning. Greg, how much of the pricing that you're targeting for the rest of the year is underlying pricing rather than surcharges, which I guess is a way of trying to understand how much carryover we get into 2027 as things are now?

16:54 And then the second question is on the Asia disposals in deco. So you did Pakistan and obviously that's a good validation, but I guess the process there started before the war. So I'm wondering to what extent that you think the current situation is just going to push back all your, well, I guess expectations around announcing more deals either from a valuation standpoint or just because there's too much uncertainty and people don't want to come to capital now? Yes. Thanks, Laurent. I'll take your questions in reverse order. You're right, Pakistan, we started discussions before the war in Iran. But the war in Iran did not lead to a value erosion of that process or a fragilization of that process. So there was no time when potential buyers try to use that as a reason to either take down the price or push things back.

17:56 And if you look at what we have in mind for the rest of Asia, it's really interesting. I mean, we're in this world where people WhatsApp you stuff all the time. And while we were getting ready for this call, I got a WhatsApp from a senior executive of a well known company that asked me about the availability of one of our deco businesses in Asia. So, you know, this is like real time stuff. So what that tells you is that people look through the crisis. These are really good businesses. Nobody is trying to figure out whether what's the impact for three to six months. They're buying for the long term. And these are franchises, you know, these are well known brands within trans positions in countries.

18:44 And, you know, I don't want to be cynical that things, you know, this too shall pass. But that's not how buyers look at assets. And once again, a few data points, no change on Pakistan despite events and people actively knocking on our door pretty much in real time for anything else that we might have in mind in deco in Asia. Your question on the price versus surcharges is I think it's a really good one. And we've explained in the past that about 25% of our business 25% of our revenue is based on formula, indexes. So take Akzo overall, there's about 25% of our revenue where prices adjust based on the formula. In industrial coatings, for example, that's a significant part of it. But there's other places too.

19:34 Those formulas, you know, they're not very effective for small variations, but they're really effective and really impactful for big variations. And we're in big variation land. So essentially, I was touching base with the industrial coatings business and essentially they told me yesterday that these formulas have already been agreed to the impact and it's already been passed on. So that's being rolled out in invoices in April, in May. I think the tail end of that is things that go in on the June 1 and no later than that. So it's kind of actually spread out between April 1, May 1, June 1. So that's about 25% of our revenue base.

20:23 And everywhere else in some cases we have longer term contracts, but a lot of it is spot essentially. And there you have the option of going with the price increases or surcharges. Our preference is to go for price increases because these the surcharge stuff is you're right, it's less sticky, but it has an advantage though that usually you can implement it faster. So overall, we've done proportionally more for price increases, but there are certain areas of the business where we've done for surcharges, usually in areas where that's the acceptable or accepted practice.

21:13 But once again, that's not our preference, but that's something we do when that's the market practice and when we believe that speed is of the essence. Laurent, did I answer your question? Yes, absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Our next question comes from Matthew Yates of Bank of America. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Hey, good morning, everyone. A couple of questions. The first one just around cash flow and working capital management. If I think back to prior cycle, you ended up consuming the best part of €1,000,000,000 in additional working capital.

22:01 Can you talk about sort of how you're thinking about the impact this time around and any lessons learned? I think with the benefit of hindsight, I think you yourselves were prioritizing security of supply that then led to quite a prolonged effort to unworking that. How are you engaging with your raw material suppliers at the moment to balance what you need versus not buying too much at perhaps what is the top of the market? And the second question, let's follow-up on what Lauren was asking around the process for Asia. And I'm a bit confused as to what the strategy here. I was under the impression that you were reviewing positions where you did not have a pathway to being a market leader.

22:50 Based on recent press reports, it suggests that you're taking a more holistic look at whether keeping any Asian business would be worthwhile if it has a lack of scale. I'm just curious how you're thinking about this process. Is it going to be piecemeal? Or are you looking at total exit of your Asian deco franchise? Thank you. Hey, Matthew, I'll take the second question. I'll start with that, and then Martin will take the first one. To clarify, our strategy hasn't changed. We love our deco businesses. We believe that our capital is better allocated to leadership positions. And if you take deco specifically, the part of the world where we don't always have a leadership position is actually Asia.

23:40 So hence the fact that in September, I think 2024, we announced a review of our Deco Asia position. So it's not coatings at all, it's just Deco Asia. We sold India. India was great business with 5% market share. We sold Pakistan. And we're looking at some of these other positions. And to your question of is that wholesale or retail? Is that are we looking at potentially selling as a package? Or are we looking at assets individually? Right now, we're just having discussions in general. We're not we haven't decided anything. But we've been clear that if we're not the leader and we don't have a path to leadership, we will consider options.

24:25 And that these are the options that we're talking about. By the way, that discussion does not include China. China is a really good business that is recovering ahead of the market that we're excited about for the years to come. But it's the scope that we are looking at from a strategic perspective is essentially the rest of Asia, which once you've taken out India and Pakistan is about €300,000,000 of business at a profitability, which is a little bit higher than the deco average. So hopefully that answers the question. But I don't have anything else to communicate on this at this point beyond the fact that we're continuing with the exact same strategy, taking a critical look at these assets. And we are having a bunch of conversations because it's not like we've been discreet about it.

25:25 So people are calling up or to allude to my answer to Laurent's question, people are what's happening. We're very modern. Martin, you want to take the first question? Yes, it's a very good point. And obviously, we have taken the lessons learned from the previous cycle. We are operating at the moment end of Q1 at an inventory level, which sits just about one hundred days and is in line with last year Q1. By the way, despite the massive transformation we're doing as part of our industrial footprint. Clearly, we will and we are and we will manage our inventories at a tight level because it doesn't make sense to start to buy when prices of raw material have spiked already because the spike is already there in terms of raw material prices.

26:23 So we manage it tightly, not buying at the highest level to make sure that we manage our working capital in a proper way. And as you know, yes, in value, inventory goes up, but payables will also go up. So that compensates each other and that underpins kind of the trajectory we see from for working capital throughout the year. But Matthew, you're correct. Last time around in 2122, we did really well in terms of pricing to mitigate the impact. We did really badly in terms of anticipate raw material prices and availability, and we had a tendency to hoard. And when the situation started normalizing, we had two or three quarters of relative underperformance because we were still working down higher priced inventories.

27:19 So in terms of lessons learned, that's lesson learned, which is we're going to keep a very close eye on days of inventories. And we haven't given our people relief. We haven't told them that target of getting under one hundred days of the IO is suspended. Let's go out and buy whatever we can. That's absolutely not what we're doing. It's business as usual, but it's business as usual in a more dynamic way because the market is a little bit stretched. Thank you.

28:04 Next question comes from Katie Richards of Barclays. Line is now open. Please go ahead. Hi, good morning. Two questions from me, please. The first, I just want to understand, to what extent the positive margin momentum in the deco side, was driven by the higher inventory backdrop you've been describing because you were talking about ahead of site closures, you're building inventories ahead of that. And secondly, you mentioned earlier that now the market has a view that there's a resolution on the horizon. So I'd just be interested to whether you're finding it more difficult to push through price increases now that the new headlines are focused on a ceasefire.

28:51 Thanks. Thanks, Katie. The second question is I'm not trying to be a geopolitical commentator. I was why I was giving a reason or an explanation of why we're not seeing a lot of pre buying. People are fairly calm in the value chain. But I think we all understand that even if there's resolution tomorrow, oil prices will remain at higher a level for the quarters to come and the chemical value chain will take some time to resorb. You know, the moment you open the Strait Of Hormuz, in all likelihood, the shifts that will be given priority are the VLC, you know, the very large crude carriers And all the stuff that has chemicals on them will be at the back of the queue. So I think we all understand that whatever happens, this impact is going be carried for the rest of the year. There's no magic wand to go back to pre Iran quickly.

29:52 So no, whatever is happening is not impacting our price discussions. And also, I think people have gotten used to the fact that those discussions are a roller coaster. So no specific impact from that perspective. Your point on Deco margins, we saw that our margins were up 300 basis points in Q1. And actually your question is a really good question because you're essentially if I phrase it differently, you're asking whether that performance is supported by positive inventory revaluations. And the answer is that it's not. The inventory revaluations have not impacted Q1. And therefore, that performance was achieved the old fashioned way. And the old fashioned way has been specifically to this. You know, this industrial transformation that we undertook, closing a lot of factories, we're streamlining the business, we're taking out some of the overheads.

30:47 Over time, it pays off. And what you're seeing is those actions paying off. You're not seeing any kind of weird one off accounting impact of raw mats go up and therefore we do an inventory revaluation that's positive that underpins the Q1 performance. That's not the case. I can confirm that. Do I answer your question? Yes, thank you. I'm not even sure that was your question, but at least that's my answer. Thank you. Our next question comes from Tony James of Rothschild and Co. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Good morning, and thanks for taking my questions. I've got two. On-site closures, you have reported you've taken out three in this quarter, and I think you said that's 15 in total.

31:45 Could you remind us what the target is for this calendar year and how that might split by division and region, if that's possible? And also, what are the criteria now with, you know, we're at the end of April, you have the Akzo merger hopefully on track for the next six to twelve months. Is that also starting to take effect? And then in terms of the divestments, sort of circling back to early questions, how much of the divestment strategy, particularly in Asia, is now starting to also consider the combined footprint with AKZOF or is that just not relevant at this point? Thank you. Thanks, Tony. The site closure question, we said we've done 15. We never gave an overall target, but if you go back to where we were last year, we were at 12 and we said that there we've done six for the year and we said there were at least as many in 2026 as in 2025.

32:47 So at least as many means above 18. I'm sorry to be coy and to but you understand these things are sensitive. But you know, you know, 18 plus and all of those are going to happen and none of changed by the impending Axalter merger. These are all things that we believe make sense regardless of whether we merge with somebody else or the market environment. So we're going ahead with those. And that was a divestment question, think, Martin? Yes, that was a divestment question. And again, are going ahead, as we mentioned earlier, and there is no relationship to the AXA merger, also not related to the footprint.

33:41 We are executing our standalone strategy and we are focusing on this year. And the merger will come from early next year onwards. And I think it may add something to what Martin said. It ties to a question we've been asked multiple times by investors, which, you know, the merger, really good investor support. But if they have one gripe, it's this pushes returns out into the future, you know, because a lot of people look at this and go like, well, you're going to be busy with the regulatory until closing. So that takes care of 2026. And in '7, you're going to spend $600,000,000 to generate 600,000,000 of synergies. So that means that the earlier I can start seeing returns is 2028.

34:35 But the reality, if you read the merger agreement, is that we've maintained the right to monetize some of our assets in Deco Asia. And as you can tell from what we're saying, we're continuing, which means that some of those returns are being brought forward by whatever we do with those assets specifically. And once again, no change because of Axcelta and no change because of the market. If anything that those processes are generating quite a bit of interest. That's great. Thank you very much, gentlemen. Thank you. Thank you. Our next question comes from Chetan Udeshi of JPMorgan.

35:22 Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Yes. Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. The first question I had was, Greg, you mentioned the local sourcing for local region strategy. But I mean, correct me if I'm wrong. I sort of remember in Europe, about quarter to 30% of your raw material requirement is actually typically imported from China. And I'm just curious, is this going to change how you look at importing from China in the future? Of course, the prices from China tends to be much lower, but then you know, if you if you have these sort of supply shocks like COVID, wars, does that make sense, or does it make sense, in your view, to double down on on local sourcing in in Europe or rest of Asia, even if that means, you have to pay higher prices to local suppliers?

36:21 The second question, just going back to the pricing, it seems to me at least that these are the price increases that you are pushing through. Can you give us any color on how the acceptance has been, you know, so far from your customers? Are they do they understand? Are they pushing back? You know, is it there's a war because, you know, we all take the price increases on the face value, of course, what matters is how much will stick? Let me take the first question regional or local sourcing. In fact, what happens post COVID, have focused more and more on local sourcing.

37:10 And if you look at specifically Europe and our local sourcing versus what we source from Asia, particularly China, that is in fact a very low piece. So it is significantly lower versus what you are mentioning. Currently, are more or less at a 10% level. So, our model has more change to regional local sourcing. Which, by the way, we talked about, I think, maybe eighteen months ago or two years ago, because the question was, are we taking advantage of the exceptionally low prices in China at a time. If you remember, it was when Europe was passing on tariffs on Chinese TiO2, anti dumping.

38:10 And what we said at the time is that we had de risked our flows. We realized that there's a geopolitical risk associated to having too many eggs in the same basket and that we were willing to absorb a little bit more cost to have more certainty. So it's exactly what Martin said. And if you kind of go back to what we said at the time, you'll see that it's very consistent. The second question Martin? So the price increases and customer acceptance. Customer acceptance. It's I go back to my answer to Laurent's question. There's about 25% of revenue which is formula based and then that takes away a lot of the emotion. On B2B side, so the other coating businesses, it's been the industry reaction has been fairly kind of consistent across the board. If you look at the announcements that came out from different players, we're all pretty much saying the same thing. And our customers are also B2B players. So they're also looking to see how they pass on.

39:19 So those discussions constructive. On the deco side, it really depends. In some deco markets, we are still on the tail end of discussions for the annual price increase for 2026, because these things have they have a tendency to be settled at the beginning of the high season and the beginning of the high season is essentially now. So it puts a lot of things on the table at the same time. But you know, everybody understands that this phenomenon is something that has to be mitigated. And actually, a lot of our customers are have already increased their prices in deco. And any discussion that they have with us is more about margin expansion for them than it is about whether there's a logic to the price increases.

40:11 But I'd say so far so good, Chetan. That's great. Anything else? Thank you very much. Thanks. Thank you. Our next question comes from Georgina Fraser of Goldman Sachs. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Good morning, Greg. Good morning, Martin. I wanted to just ask a bigger picture question, just revisiting the strategy to shrink Deco and consolidate and, you know, get bigger in the coatings business. Are there actually any dis synergies to owning both of these businesses? Or how do you present the value creation strategy behind this idea to shareholders?

40:58 Or is the disposal strategy in Deco just about the fact that you haven't been able to delever organically? Looking at the balance sheet, it's we're kind of just stuck and have been for some time. Thank you. Thanks, Georgina. It really is not about the balance sheet at all. Our cash flow generation was really solid last year. We are delivering at a higher level also in Q1. We've been actively managing working capital. We're not worried about our ability to generate cash. And we're certainly not worried about the balance sheet. And it's not at all about wanting to shrink DECO. It's about wanting to make sure that we are fighting battles that we can win, meaning that we have we want to focus in DECO on countries where we have a leadership position because deco is a local gain and it's a relative market share gain.

42:08 We're very strong in Latin America. We're the market leader in Colombia. We're the market leader in Argentina. The impact of having Colombia on Argentina is pretty much zero and vice versa. These are not different brands. The products don't travel from country to the next. Production is local. So the way you win in deco is by having the strongest brand and the best distribution. So it's a relative market share gain. So once again, if you look at the profitability of our businesses in Q1, I mean deco is at 17.3%. It's 400 basis points higher than co things almost. Now it's a moment in time. You know, co things is more impacted than deco by what's happening in the world.

42:54 But these businesses are really good businesses. But once again, we want to be in the countries where we have a winning hand. And we've also demonstrated with India and Pakistan that in countries where we're not necessarily the leader, these businesses are way more valuable to people other than us. So I don't know that any investor will look at me strangely if I sell a business where we have 5% market share and the market leader has 50% and we sell that business at 24 times EBITDA, which is exactly the situation in India. So once again, not about the balance sheets, it's about focus. It's about making sure that we are not too spread too thin. And to your question of are there the synergies to owning both? Not really. I mean, I think the there's complexity, which is that it makes it forces investors to have conversations ranging from the weather in The UK to aerospace travel, to whether people are crashing their cars in North America.

44:06 So it makes it it makes the story a little bit more complex. And from a management perspective, we're essentially with an axle. We're running a B2B business and and then we're running a smaller version of Unilever. You know, Deco is essentially an FMCG business, although, you know, it's the F is a small F, but it's very similar to those businesses. And which means that, you manage them and you allocate capital to them in a very different way as you would for the coating businesses. So that's all it is. It's pretty straightforward, not about balance sheet, a little bit about complexity and a lot about capital allocation and value.

44:53 Did I answer your question, Georgina? I think so. Thank you. I hope so. But if not, please send me a follow-up. Thank you. Our next question comes from Sebastian Bray from Berenberg. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Hello, good morning and thank you for taking my questions. On the Refinish business, please, can you give an idea of the geographic distribution of sales at Akzo Nobel within Refinish? And any comments on both the underlying market developments given that volumes have been weaker in recent quarters and the relative performance of Akzo's own business would be welcome. Thank you.

45:46 I don't think we've ever given the geographical split of the refinish business. What I would say is that we're top four in The U. S. And Europe. We have a stronger position in Asia. Our Refinish business in Asia did very well in Q1. Refinish in The U. S, as you know, was impacted by that sort tension between higher insurance premiums and lower disposable income. And that stabilized at a trough, but it hasn't picked up yet. And Europe was less impacted, but is not rebounding yet.

46:34 So if you run a refinish if you own a refinish business these days, what you have is growth in emerging markets. You have you're stabilized at a trough in Europe and The U. S. And but with an impending rebound that the bigger guys, you know, PPG and Axalta, we're forecasting for the second half of the year, which might shift a little bit if gas is $4 per gallon at the pump in The U. S, you know, maybe that has an impact on driving season. But it's a business that continues to have significant pricing power because it's a business that differentiates on technology. You know, for the body shops, the cost of the paint is not a big cost item.

47:22 What makes the body shop profitable or not is essentially throughput and labor costs. So if you offer a product that achieves a better result in less time, you're to make good money and you're to have pricing power. Hopefully, I've answered the I didn't give you percentages, but hopefully, I gave you some color. Did that help? Yes, that's helpful. Thank you. Thank you. At this time, we currently have no further questions. So I'll hand it back to Greg for any further remarks. Thank you. Well, look, it's strong Q1 in a market that is a little bit distracted by what's happening in the world. The market was soft in the first place. That is always a source of concern.

48:13 But as we look at how our business unfolded, January, February, small months, March was actually a good month, April is looking pretty good too. There doesn't seem to be any signs of panic or significant disruption in the market. No significant pre buying, no changes in consumer patterns that we can see at this point. Once again, we're keeping a close eye on that for the rest of the year. But keep in mind that we're forecasting flat and our comps get easier. Our cost structure is really under control. We continue to take cost out and it continues to have a positive impact as you can see from the performance of Deco in Q1 as just one data point.

49:03 And then we were pricing up before Iran, and we've stepped up one level because of the raw material impact, once again, in the high teens in our basket for the rest of the year, but mitigating by mitigated by already announced price actions that we believe will neutralize the effect. So that gives us some level of comfort for the rest of the year. Once again, volumes are always the question mark, but so far so good. We expect EBITDA to be about 400,000,000 in Q2. And once again, you'll see progressively, you'll see the raw material impact materializing in our P and L, but you'll also see the corresponding price increases making their way through our P and L at the same time.

49:58 And our aim is not to capitalize to spend margins. Our aim is really to price to neutralize the impact. Mergers making good progress and we thank you for your time and your attention today. Thanks. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect your lines.