Salam Alaikum. Thank you all for joining today's call to discuss Aldar's financial results for the first half of 2026.

As the latter part of the first quarter and much of the second quarter coincided with a period of heightened regional tension disrupting market activity across the UAE. However, the UAE has demonstrated remarkable resilience in many dimensions from security to continuity in economic activity.

We have seen business activity continuing largely uninterrupted, public and private sector investment commitments reinforced, and consumer confidence has held up well. Against that backdrop backdrop, Aldar delivered a resilient first half underpinned by a sizable backlog, disciplined execution, and the defensive qualities of our recurring income platform, notwithstanding softer development sales and a weaker hospitality performance, which I will cover in more detail.

At group level, first half revenue increased 8% year-on-year to 16.8 billion dirhams, EBITDA rose 19% to 6.3 billion dirhams, and net profit after tax increased 18% to 4.9 billion dirhams. Earnings per share rose 17% to 53 fils.

Within Aldar Development, group development sales declined 34% to 12.1 billion dirhams year-on-year, reflecting a more measured approach to new launches in the UAE in response to prevailing market conditions. EBITDA increased 21% year-on-year to 4 billion dirhams in the first half, driven by recognition of our development revenue backlog, which today stands at 71.6 billion dirhams.

Aldar Investment delivered revenue growth of 12% year-on-year to 4.2 billion dirhams and an adjusted EBITDA increase 18% to 1.6 billion dirhams, supported by high occupancy, steady rental growth across core asset classes, and contributions from recent acquisitions. Assets under management increased to 58- 55.8 billion dirhams.

We remain focused on prudent capital deployment while continuing to progress on our develop-to-hold pipeline, which now stands at 20 billion dirhams, supporting further diversification and income growth over the next four years. Our balance sheet remains robust with group liquidity of 37.1 billion dirhams underpinning our strategy and countercyclical approach.

On slide number 4, we summarize year-to-date recent announcements across the group. I will only highlight key developments that took place during the second quarter and into July.

At the group level, we further enhanced our financial position in April by closing a 5 billion dirham, five-year syndicated sustainability-linked revolving credit facility, attracting strong demand from regional and international banks and reflecting confidence in the group's credit strength. On land replenishment, last week we announced Marsa Al Saadiyat, a landmark 100 billion dirham waterfront destination on Saadiyat Island with Aldar as the master developer.

In this role, Aldar will be responsible for securing the overall master plan approvals, coordinating the district-wide development strategy, as well as delivering the primary infrastructure across the destination and delivering over 7,000 units with a combined gross development value exceeding 70 billion dirhams. We plan to commence sales- exceeding 60 billion dirhams.

We plan to commence sales on Marsa Al Saadiyat during the second half of this year. During the quarter, we launched three new development projects in Abu Dhabi: Yas Park Place, Al Ghadeer Gardens, and The Orchids at Yas Acres, which were all well received by the market.

In July, we launched the second phase of Al Ghadeer Gardens in Seih Sdeirah and The Canopies, which is the first launch at Yas Point, a new waterfront destination on the north shore of Yas Island with a GDV of about 6 billion dirhams. During the quarter, Aldar Investment acquired three additional assets in KEZAD for 650 million dirhams and added five new develop-to-hold projects valued at 5.2 billion dirhams to the pipeline, which now totals 20 billion dirhams, which is expected to drive further scale, diversification, and earnings growth over the next four years.

The five new D-hold projects are: two affordable value housing projects in Abu Dhabi in collaboration with the DMT, a residential and community retail development in Dubai Studio City, and two schools in Abu Dhabi, first the relocation of Cranleigh Abu Dhabi to a new purpose-built campus on Saadiyat Island, and second the new Al Ghadeer British School as part of the recently launched Al Ghadeer Gardens community scheduled to open for the 2030-2031 academic year and accommodate more than 2,800 students. Turning to slide number 5, where you will find more information on Aldar Development.

The business delivered a solid first half performance supported by continued project delivery, backlog conversion, and a disciplined launch strategy. Revenue increased 10% year-on-year to 12.4 billion dirhams, while EBITDA rose 21% to 4 billion dirhams, reflecting steady delivery across key developments.

As mentioned earlier, group development sales declined 34% to 12.1 billion dirhams, reflecting a more measured approach to new launches in the UAE from a deliberate pause at first followed by a greater emphasis on mid-market product launches in response to prevailing market conditions. Nevertheless, first half UAE sales still came in at 9.4 billion dirhams, with inventory sales accounting for 67% and the three new launches in the second quarter achieving over 80% sold status or in the case of Al Ghadeer Gardens nearly sold out, demonstrating resilient demand for well-located family-oriented communities and providing us strong evidence to ramp up launch activity in the second half of the year, all the while while remain while we remain disciplined on pricing and phasing and payment plans.

Our international businesses continued to gain momentum with H1 sales of 1.4 billion dirhams at SODIC in Egypt and 1.2 billion dirhams at London Square in the UK. The group development backlog remains substantial at 71.6 billion dirhams, including 59.9 billion dirhams in the UAE, providing strong visibility on revenue and cash flows over the next two to three years.

Turning now to slide number 6, you will see further detail on UAE development sales. Notably, UAE sales to overseas and expatriate resident buyers totaled 7.6 billion dirhams, representing 80% of UAE sales, highlighting continued international confidence in Abu Dhabi as a global living and investment destination.

We handed over 1,000 units in the first half, already surpassing the full year 2025 total of about 850 units, reflecting strong delivery momentum on the ground. Cash collections totaled 7.6 billion dirhams in line with contractual payment schedules and demonstrating continued buyer commitment.

Default rates remained low and manageable with 90-day-plus defaults at 1.3 to 2%, a modest uptick from historical levels of around 1%. While we have seen some upward pressure on construction costs following the geopolitical developments, the impact has been selective and we have mitigated a significant portion of these pressures through competitive tendering, early procurement, forward purchasing of materials, and advance payments to contractors.

Where cost increases have occurred, they have been partially offset by stronger pricing. We therefore continue to expect project margins to remain broadly unchanged.

On slide number 7, you will find details on Aldar Investment, which has continued to grow as well as a well-diversified platform with 55.8 billion dirhams of assets under management, delivering a strong base of recurring income. Revenue increased 12% year-on-year to 4.2 billion dirhams, while adjusted EBITDA rose 18% to 1.8 billion dirhams.

Performance was supported by high occupancy, long-term lease structures, and rental growth across investment properties, as well as contributions from recent strategic acquisitions and completed D-hold projects, and finally from continued growth at Aldar Education and Aldar Estates. The second quarter reinforced the defensive and diversified value of the business with every segment performing well through the disruption other than the hospitality segment.

Turning to slide number 8. The investment properties portfolio delivered strong growth in H1 with adjusted EBITDA increasing 30% year-on-year to 1.3 billion dirhams.

Performance was supported by portfolio-wide occupancy of 95%. Commercial adjusted EBITDA increased 14% to 478 million dirhams.

Occupancy remained high at 99%, driven by strong demand for Grade A office space from a diversified tenant base that includes government-related entities and established corporates, and further supported by the newly acquired buildings at The Link in Masdar City in April contributing about 15 million dirhams of adjusted EBITDA in the period. Residential adjusted EBITDA was 261 million dirhams, down 1%, reflecting the turnover of a bulk lease and temporary vacancies related to refurbishment at Eastern Mangroves.

Nevertheless, occupancy remained high at 96%. Retail adjusted EBITDA increased 68% to 463 million dirhams, supported by strong fundamentals across the core portfolio and contributions from The Galleria Luxury and the recently completed D-hold asset, The Grove mall, expected to open in Q4.

Overall retail portfolio occupancy stands at 96%, excluding Rimal Mall and Grove mall. Yas Mall specifically maintained occupancy of 96% with tenant sales and footfall down 2.5% and 9% year-on-year respectively.

Industrial and Logistics adjusted EBITDA increased 173% to 95 million dirhams with occupancy at 97%. Growth was supported by continued organic growth, the acquisition contributions of Al Markaz and two KEZAD assets last year, as well as the three additional purpose-built multi-let warehouses in KEZAD acquired this year, and finally the completed D-hold project of 20,000-square-meter built-to-suit facility for Emirates Snack Foods.

A quick note on the recent Abu Dhabi rental measure, whereby rental caps were reduced from 5% to 0%. Our understanding is this remains a temporary initiative and to date our exposure has been limited.

As a reminder, our largest commercial assets are excluded as they are located in a free zone, and the majority of our residential units sit in long-term bulk corporate leases with contractual escalations. Therefore, the impact on EBITDA is immaterial, and if anything, this initiative only confirms how underrented and in demand Abu Dhabi residential remains.

Turning to slide number 9. In Hospitality and Leisure, adjusted EBITDA was 140 milli- 140 million dirhams, a decline of 18% year-on-year with performance impacted by regional geopolitical developments.

Occupancy was 54% in the first half with RevPAR decreasing 7% to 430 dirhams. However, ADR increased 21% to 800 dirhams, demonstrating the portfolio's ability to maintain pricing even in a challenging operating environment.

In Education, adjusted EBITDA increased 4% to 133 million dirhams, driven by steady organic performance and annualization of new schools such as Noya British Academy and Muna British Academy. Term 3 retention remained high, and more notably, we are seeing a very positive trend in enrollment for the upcoming academic year, which could be regarded as an indicator of demographic stability in the UAE.

75% of students across our 30 13% operated- sorry, across our operated 13 operated schools have re-registered for the next year, which is ahead of July of last year. Meanwhile, we have received applications from over 4,000 new students, which is in line with this time last year.

Aldar Estates adjusted EBITDA increased 18% to 227 million dirhams, reflecting strong contract momentum across PM and FM and integrated community services. The business now manages approximately 146,000 residential units and 2.5 million square meters of prime retail and commercial space with contracts valued at more than 2.9 billion dirhams.

Turning to slide number 10 and our key balance sheet metrics. Over the last couple of years, we have taken a countercyclical approach to funding and liquidity management aimed at reinforcing our financial resilience and building a robust capital buffer that positions us well to navigate periods of volatility, and this approach has served us very well throughout the recent disruption.

The 5 billion sustainability-linked revolving credit facility closed in April further diversified funding sources and strengthened financial flexibility. We have maintained a prudent leverage profile with net debt to adjusted EBITDA at 1.4 times and adjusted EBITDA to interest expense at 7 times.

These leverage and coverage metrics include the impact of debt-accounted 12.9 billion dirhams in hybrid capital notes. Total available liquidity stood at 37.1 billion dirhams at the end of June, comprising 16.8 billion dirhams of free and unrestricted cash and 20.3 billion dirhams of committed undrawn bank facilities.

The debt maturity profile remains well spread with an average senior debt maturity of 4.4 years and no material refinancing requirements in the near term. Looking ahead, our focus remains on our disciplined capital deployment aligned to long-term value creation and strategic priorities.

You will find our approach to sustainability and key highlights on slide 11 and 12. We have continued to make tangible progress under our sustainability framework while maintaining our MSCI rating of A, our number one ranking among GCC real estate companies in Dow Jones Sustainability Index, and our inclusion in the FTSE4Good Index Series.

All new developments launched in Abu Dhabi in the first half achieved a 3 Pearl Estidama design rating, while all new developments achieved a 2-star Fitwel rating. We also remained ahead of our 2026 efficiency targets with a 34% reduction in energy use intensity by design against ASHRAE 2007, a 42% reduction in water use intensity by design against the Estidama baseline, and a 39% reduction in embodied carbon in construction materials.

Across our existing assets, energy consumption reduced by 12% and water consumption by 20%, while 98% of construction and demolition waste was recycled. All investment opportunities also underwent ESG due diligence, and lost time injury frequency rate remained low at 0.04.

On human capital, we outperformed our Nafis commitment to recruit 1,000 Emiratis by 2026, reaching the target ahead of schedule with UAE nationals now representing 46% of the group's employee base. Turning to slide 13 on guidance.

This has been no ordinary year. Against a more challenging regional backdrop, we are pleased with the resilience of the business and the solid performance delivered in the first half.

We remain confident in the long-term outlook for Aldar and the UAE, supported by the country's resilience, continued investment, and clear commitment to economic growth and diversification. That said, in light of the current ongoing environment, we are updating certain full year 2026 metrics.

We now expect full year group development sales of 30 to 35- 30 to 34 billion dirhams, revised down from 45 to 49 billion dirhams, reflecting the impact of launch timing and and product offering in the first half of the year given the more measured demand environment. Despite this, demand remains healthy and we continue to see strong customer interest across our key projects and destinations.

Delivering the revised guidance will require a substantial stronger sales contribution in the second half, and we expect a busier H2 launch calendar with a faster pace of releases across established and new destinations, including the planned first launch at a at Marsa Al Saadiyat. This will be supported by continued sales of existing inventory and contributions from our international platforms.

Aldar Development EBITDA guidance is revised to 8.9 to 9.3 billion dirhams from 9.5 to 10 billion dirhams, while our UAE development gross profit margin guidance of 37 to 39% is unchanged and was supported by a first half margin of 38%. Group adjusted EBITDA guidance is revised to 12.3 to 12.7 billion dirhams, still representing strong growth over the 9.9 billion dirhams delivered last year, reflecting the resilience of our backlog, project execution, and recurring income.

Guidance for Aldar Investment adjusted EBITDA of 3.7 to 3.9 billion dirhams is unchanged, reflecting the strength, defensibility, and visibility of our diversified recurring income platform, where performance continues to be supported by high occupancy, long-term lease structures, organic rental rates, contributions from recent acquisitions, and the completion of develop-to-hold assets. Our capital deployment guidance is also unchanged at 3 to 4 billion dirhams from M&A and 3 to 4 billion dirhams for D-hold capex.

We remain fully committed to our 2030 ambition and to the strategic priorities that underpin it. That said, on our previously communicated three-year guidance, we are not reaffirming nor updating those targets at this stage.

They were established against an earlier operating backdrop, and as we enter our annual budgeting and business planning cycle, we believe it is more appropriate to reassess the medium medium-term outlook comprehensively rather than update individual elements today. We expect to provide an updated medium-term guidance alongside our 2026 full year results, and until then, the revised guidance guidance presented today should be the principal reference point for investors.

The timing does not reflect any change in our long-term ambition. It will simply allow the revised medium-term guidance to be based on the fully updated business plan and the latest operating environment.

In summary, the strength of first half performance and our financial position are the result of the strategy that we have executed consistently over many years to scale and diversify the business. We enter the second half with substantial earnings visibility from our development backlog, a growing recurring income platform, and balance sheet capacity to pursue opportunities through the cycle.

Our priorities remain unchanged, which are to calibrate launches carefully to demand, protect pricing and margins, progress on delivery of residential backlog and develop-to-hold pipeline, and deploy capital with discipline. With that, we conclude today's presentations and welcome your questions.

Thank you very much.

Hi, good afternoon Faisal. Thank you very much for the call today.

Just maybe two questions from my side. Let me start with the guidance, and in particular on the sales.

If I look at the revised FY 2026 versus H1, as you said, you are talking about potentially growing from a 12 billion in H1 to somewhere around 20 billion at the midpoint of the guidance into H2. Clearly that, brings us maybe back to a very solid pre-conflict run rate.

The question here is how confident are you on, delivering this guidance, especially that, if I look at H1 in Abu Dhabi, the uptake has been relatively slow compared to, one of your largest direct peer who has been maybe more aggressive on new launches? Maybe your thoughts on that, and do you need Marsa Al Saadiyat, Yas Point, and Dubai all working so that you can deliver this guidance?

That would be my first question, if you can maybe elaborate more please on that.

Sure. The answer is we feel very confident.

As we speak, we have customers downstairs lining up for The Canopies, which was the first launch at Yas Point. For reference, Yas Park Place, which we launched in April, was priced at around 27,000 dirhams per square meter.

Canopies is averaging about 31,000 dirhams per square meter. Not only are we ramping up, we continue our disciplined approach in terms of margin accretion and capitalizing on pent-up demand.

Then to your point, yes, we're going to have a busier calendar in the second half. We already have ready product in the cultural district that we have proactively decided to push to the second half, so that will be coming in the next few months.

Fahid is something that we have not launched this year, we'll be coming up with a new launch also in the second half. Marsa Al Saadiyat is something that we've been working on for quite some time now, we're also quite advanced on that master plan.

Then finally, the Dubai master plan that we've been talking about, we have not only started working on when we announced the acquisition, we had taken the risk of starting the master plan works even before agreeing the deal with Dubai Holding. We actually feel extremely, extremely confident.

To the point you made about some of our other competitors obviously being more aggressive, we are taking a more balanced approach that we believe protects shareholder value, which is a balanced approach when it comes to payment plans and pricing, and providing product that we believe is going to serve the demand that is out there in the market. You need to look at things not only what is the price per square foot, but ticket sizes is also an important thing to look at.

Again to reaffirm, we feel quite confident about this guidance.

Clear. Maybe just a follow-up question on the development.

If I look at the property development and sales, revenues for Q2, the growth was up around 10% on the revenues. Clearly you've done amazingly well on the margins, margins have actually expanded on that portfolio.

On the revenues, it just feels that the rate of growth has slowed down significantly versus where we were in Q1 and FY 2025. I just want to understand what was the reason behind that.

Is it slower execution? Maybe you've taken a more cautious approach on construction progress?

If you can just maybe shed some color on that, and along the same points with the margins, if I look at the EBITDA margin for the property development and sales, which is the UAE business, we are sitting at around 38% in H1 2026 on a gross profit margin. You're still committing to that guidance over the medium term 37 to 39%, you don't see any downside risk to that?

Let's talk about the drivers for the PDS business. The most important driver is value of work done.

Despite the supply disruptions that we have seen, we have actually been pretty much on mark in terms of our internal targets in terms of hitting our value of work done. Where we have missed is we had anticipated to have significantly more land sales, which are significantly more margin accretive.

Given the environment today, we have decided to defer those land sales so that we do not discount the prices that we were anticipating on them. Actually quite the contrary, we believe with some of the recent announcements that we have done, we can actually achieve better prices on those land sales.

The other thing is we've obviously seen slower inventory sales, and inventory sales are also somewhat of a driver for revenue growth. I think it's pretty much that.

Value of work done was as expected, but the other two were a bit slower given the circumstances.

Margins

wise? Then on the margins, we do feel very confident about our margins.

I think the best example I gave is The Canopies. We continue to launch projects that have significantly high GP margins.

Marsa Al Saadiyat is a premium to ultra-luxury offering. Those will typically have a significantly high GP margin.

We remain committed to the targets that we have provided in terms of our margin guidance.

All right. Thank you, very clear.

I'll come back in the queue.

Thank you. Hi Faisal.

I have two questions. The first one is the downward revision in 2026 EBITDA estimate at the group level is largely flowing through the property development segment.

Hi, can you hear me? Hello?

Hi Harsh.

Hi. No issues.

Actually I posted a question on the chat box because I thought probably it was some issue on my side, but my question was we've seen downward revision in EBITDA estimates for the group at 2026 and that's pretty much flowing from the downward revision that we've seen for the property development segment. I was hoping to understand if you could provide some more color whether it's the UAE business that's driving that downward estimate revision or is it the international business, because we've also seen very weak EBITDA contribution from international business in 1H.

Any clarity around that would be very helpful to get an understanding between what's happening on the EBITDA level at UAE versus international operations.

Sure. It is predominantly the UAE development business.

Now the revision I would say is not that significant. Again, if you look at the drivers, we do have less sales, which are again a somewhat driver for P&L recognition on the awarded projects through the backlog.

Land sales, we don't know if we're going to close those sales this year or we're going to have to defer them to next year. Then the year is not over.

You still have somewhat of supply challenges, which we have been proactively managing again, and we remain on track. There's a little bit of cautiousness, I would say, on that front.

Again, you're talking about something in the range of 400 to 600 million dirhams revision, which is not a lot of money.

Clear. Then just one follow-up, similar to your earlier comment on your expectations of pre-sales really rebounding in second half and you explained key drivers what makes you a bit confident about second half.

Even when we look at the EBITDA guidance again, the second half, seems a decent acceleration versus 1H EBITDA that you've reported, and even on a year-on-year basis when we look at the numbers, the growth rate looks much better compared to the weakness compared to the first-half growth. Do we expect a much rapid rebound in terms of execution in second half that's going to drive that recovery in second-half EBITDA?

You have projects that are at different cycles of the S-curve. You had projects in the first half that were starting to reach at the end point of their S-curve as we're starting to hand over.

Then at the same time, we have awarded a number of projects this year where the contractors have mobilized on site, we're going to start recognizing a decent amount on that front. Then again I go to my other point is we have seen a decent pick up in terms of inventory sales as well, which is also going to help gap that difference.

I'd say the second half generally should see a good uptick in activity.

Hi Faisal. Thanks for the call and taking my question.

This is Rahul Bajaj from Citi. I have two questions mainly.

Both are actually quite linked, I'll go together. Just wanted to focus on the international development business because that seemed to have done sales in the international business seemed to have done really well in the second quarter.

Just trying to understand what are the drivers for this kind of sudden jump in sales in the international business, both in SODIC and London Square. Is the sales in the international business anyway linked to sentiment of what's happening in UAE and in the broader GCC region, or that is completely separate and they are not really impacted and so they pushed through even if there are sentiment issues here locally?

Just trying to understand what has driven international sales. Linked to it, since you're providing kind of the updated guidance for full year sales, which points to roughly around 20 billion dirham of sales for the second half of the year, trying to understand will international continue to be a large part of it kind of at run rate at which it was in the second quarter, or it will be more domestic driven in the second half of the year?

Thank you.

On sentiments, I think you said is it related to the UAE sentiment. I think the current situation is not a UAE specific thing, right?

This is for us more of a global crisis that has affected the sentiment globally in general in terms of the disruption that has happened to energy supply and supply costs in general, and shipping, and global travel. Don't want to make a point, but this is not a UAE crisis.

This is a global crisis. The other thing is I would not read too much into what's happening in terms of the sales as something that is linked to the UAE.

If you look at last year, SODIC for example, had a very busy second half compared to the first half. They really caught up in terms of their sales.

I think it's just launch specific in terms of what they're offering in the market. In general, the North Coast in Egypt tends to do extremely well, their sales if you've noticed have come from Ogami and June, and those developments and prices have continued to perform really well given how attractive that destination has become.

London Square, I think, is a function of the investment that we have done over the past two years. We have a number of drivers that go into those sales.

You have private sales and you have BTRs, built-to-rents, which are sales to institutional investors, forward purchases to build buildings on their behalf. I think London Square is just in growth mode, and Egypt is generally launch-specific driven.

How much is international sales going to make up of the overall numbers? I don't want to give you a specific number today and commit to it, but I would say the majority of our numbers, the guidance is UAE-led.

Thank you very much indeed. Firstly, well done chaps, both to you Faisal and Talal, for the profitability number actually, which I think is ultimately the most important line, well done.

They just let me say the good news, Steve. I don't do anything.

I just carry on the team's success.

No, well that's, that's a good outcome, congratulations. Look, as everyone else is answering, asking multiple questions, I've got three, all short.

Q2 sales, I actually thought you might post bigger numbers in Q2, possibly from a carryover from Q1. I was a little bit disappointed this morning to see your Q2 sales numbers, but having said that, when we published last week, our full year numbers are in line with your guidance, in fact they're right in the middle oddly enough.

I'd just like a little bit of comfort on how you are supporting your full year guidance. That's question number one.

Question number two, The Wilds, this year your sales rate's pretty low. No surprise, all things considered, but just how you're thinking about that.

Then thirdly, you mentioned payment plans, Faisal, about being disciplined. Why are you being disciplined?

I was at one of your major competitors, actually probably your major competitor in Dubai about a week ago looking at one of their sites, and I got a very favorable payment plan if I pushed. What's the point in being disciplined?

Thank you.

On Q2 sales, see whatever we put out has sold really well. If you look at the first launch that came out was Yas Park Place.

Year to date, I think we've sold about 1.4, 1.5 billion dirhams, almost sold out. What's remaining is just large three-bed units.

Then in May, we put out Al Ghadeer, that was completely sold out, 1.1 billion dirhams, which is why we launched Phase 2 I think at the beginning of this month. Then in June, we launched The Orchids on Yas, that sold out in terms of what we put out.

We still have a number of villa offerings, which we have not put to the market yet. Could Q2 have been better?

I think if we've put out more product, maybe it would have been better, but again we took the decision that we wanted to play it a little bit more cautiously. The other thing is post the crisis in March onwards, we saw a significant dip in inventory sales.

They were down in general 70, 80% compared to previous years on a weekly basis, but we've seen a significant recovery in that. I'd say today they're somewhat around 20, 30% down year-on-year, still down, but having significantly recovered.

I think that will continue to improve going forward. Then I think I answered the point about the confidence for H2.

We have a lot of product that is ready now on the shelf. It's just a matter of putting it out, and we feel very confident about putting it out, especially on the high street created on those destinations.

Again, the example of Canopies, there was a lot of excitement around that product being on the beach, having a nice promenade, being in very close proximity to Disney. The market really, really got excited about it and we're being rewarded for it.

My team are showing me live sales, which is looking good, and we'll announce it probably in the next couple of days. The Wilds, you are absolutely right.

That is not doing well. We are keeping our eyes on it, slower than expected because of the time when it was launched.

It was the week of the crisis. Apartments in Dubai today are quite competitive even in that corridor.

Yes, today it's not moving as we expect, but the market will rebound. Never bet against Dubai, the market will come back.

We are not worrying about it too much. Payment plans, why are we being disciplined?

Because discipline is our key ethos and it has served us well over the past few years. Payment plans are a significant driver of your IRRs, and being a shrewd, prudent investor that we think we are, it drives significant accretion for our D-sell projects.

We generate somewhere between 25 to 40% IRRs on our capital, if not more. Then we are being somewhat flexible.

On projects where we have sold more than 80%, we have actually gone to the market and said, special offer, we'll offer you 40/60 payment plans, for example. We don't mind, because the average on those projects then end up being significantly above that.

Because if we sold 80% of a project at 60/70% during construction, then we don't mind being a little bit more lenient on the remaining just to keep inventory moving. The last point I'd like to make is if you want to scale, and we are scaling, the less disciplined you are on your payment plan means a significant jump in your working capital, and the more working capital you have to put, the less you can launch going forward.

We need to be very efficient and prudent in the way that we use our capital, and capital has a cost of capital. That's the way we think about it.

Defaults, that's the other thing we think about. If you tell a customer come pay me 5% and then see you in one year when the next milestone comes, this is a recipe for speculation and defaults.

Thank you.

Quality over quantity.

Absolutely. Our next question-

I promise I'll stop now.

Yes, hi. Thank you for taking my question.

Just one from my side. Going through your development to sell, a few projects appear to have slipped a little bit: 2028 versus 2027 or 2029 versus 2028 in terms of delivery.

Not unexpected, but given your supportive message on demand, on construction progress, supply chain, I just was wondering if you could just provide some context on the revised completion timelines. I'm looking at various projects like Louvre, Mandarin Oriental on the development to sell, and then on the development to hold as well there, like Saadiyat and DIFC Tower.

Then related to that, apologies, also just to check within the development to hold, you had Grove mall, which is now completed, which is 60% occupied. I'm mindful that it may not be officially open even.

You mentioned a Q4 opening, but just was wondering what you expect in terms of the ramp-up in occupancy there. Thank you.

Pushing delivery timelines, you are absolutely right. Let's start with the D-sell.

I think a lot of those projects are a result of longer design and award timelines post the project launches, which is catching up with us today. I think today we are doing a significantly better job than what we are doing in the past.

Today on average it takes us somewhere around maximum 6 to 9 months to award a project post-launch, so that gives us a lot more breathing room in terms of being able to deliver on time despite having any challenges with our contractors in terms of performance. We are on the right track now.

On D-hold, you are also right. I don't think we have done a good job on that portfolio in terms of keeping our timelines.

However, we have done a lot of changes as well internally. Part of those changes is hiring a new chief development officer purely for D-hold.

He has actually launched us last week, and the pressure is on him. The delays are not a result of contractor delays, they're actually a result of prolonged, again, planning and design and award from our side.

We have gotten, again, significantly better on that, and I expect that to improve going forward. Grove mall, the reason we put it as complete is because tenants have started taking handover of their units to start doing their fit-outs, which means financially it has started contributing to the P&L since the risk has now transferred to the tenant.

That's why we thought it was prudent to show it as complete to emphasize the point that this is now a revenue-generating asset. In terms of leasing, we have actually done more than 60% leasing.

I think we're over 80- How much percent are we now? 65%, and we expect by the time of opening probably to be over 75, 80%.

The timing for that opening is sometime in Q4, which is a busy season in Abu Dhabi with a number of things happening, which is the F1, Abu Dhabi Finance Week, it's winter, lovely weather. The Guggenheim is opening in December, it's going to be great.

We have also intentionally decided to delay the handover of the Grove units, the residential units, because we wanted to provide the residents with a better experience so that when they take over their units, they actually have the mall open and they are not going in with a construction site under their houses. That's the update.

Thank you very much. Good afternoon and congrats for your earnings.

I have just a follow-up from my side, which is on your H2 sales target, how many units roughly are you planning to launch and how that compares to what you've been launching in H2 2025 and H2 2024? Because I tend to agree that you need kind of a 20 billion dirham sales in H2, which is a relatively ambitious level compared to what has been done in the past, which is comparable roughly to what you've done in H2 20 2025.

Just to make sure that we get a sense of the volume of units you're planning to launch.

I don't want to focus on units because it's also really driven by the ticket prices. Again, the stuff we're going to be launching in H2, a lot of this is on the premium to ultra-luxury side.

I think in H1 we sold over 2,000 units. Last year I think we did about 7,000 units.

Again it really depends on the mix. I would just focus on the sales guidance that we gave.

How we get there, you'll get to see it by the end of the year.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Appreciate it. That's it.

Hi, good afternoon Faisal. Thank you for the presentation.

I had two questions. First, I wanted to ask about Marsa.

I understand it's an ultra-luxury community with an implied average unit price of over 8 million dirhams. On the other hand, I'm seeing that some other key projects on Saadiyat like The Source or Baccarat had a slower sales momentum in Q2, in particular Baccarat uptake only increased from 6% to 15%.

I'm just trying to understand how Marsa fits your recent pivot towards mid-tier segment like Al Ghadeer, which was a great success. Also, who do you believe could be typical buyer of Marsa?

Might it be more skewed towards maybe UAE nationals? My second question, can you please give some color on the recently launched off-plan mortgage offering in the market?

In case if you have done any studies, do you expect this to be a game-changer for customers? Thank you.

Marsa, maybe it's useful for everybody if I shed a little bit of light, okay? Marsa 1 was never part of our land bank, okay?

This is something that is now added to our land bank, it gives us additional run rate in terms of our sales, and you'll see that has been updated in our presentation. Marsa is a large master plan.

We announced 100 billion, okay? We are the master developer, we are responsible to design and deliver the infrastructure.

However, you would have noticed that we split the 100 into 60 for us. There is another private developer that is sharing another part of the district.

I'll leave it to that developer at the right time to announce themselves. We are focused on the 60 billion, which has around 7,000 units roughly, and the numbers are always going to change plus or minus.

We're looking at about 6,000 apartments and 1,000-plus villas and mansions and a little bit of ultra-luxury plots. Why do we think this is going to be attractive?

I think there's nothing that is going to be like Saadiyat built ever. You are not going to find a place in the UAE that has the number of museums that the Saadiyat Island or Cultural District has.

One of the centerpieces of Marsa is also Dar Al Funun, which is the opera house, which is a opera house. I think that's the last Frank Gehry design that has been done.

The villa projects is going to be a gated community. Lagoons, for example, is a project that we launched about four years ago, that is not a gated community, this has a little bit more premiumness to it.

Who are the types of people that are going to be interested in this? I would say typically Saadiyat attracts a lot of overseas investors, and we expect that to continue going forward.

Then yes, you're going to have a lot of resident expats and Emiratis that are going to find this very attractive. I have a note on my list on all the people I know in my contact list who have asked me to make sure I add them when this launches.

This is a product, this was the worst-kept secret in Abu Dhabi. Everybody knew this was coming, and everybody is waiting for it.

We're very confident about the pent-up demand that is there for it. Moving on to the off-plan mortgage, this is something that we are very excited about.

I think it comes at a timely time when, we have seen somewhat uptick in default rates, because people are somewhat under pressure for various reasons. The way this works: Central Bank regulation says that for a customer to be able to take an off-plan mortgage on a product that on a property that is not yet ready, they need to have paid at least 50% equity, which means developers that have payment plans that are lower than 50% during construction have no use of this product.

It is the developers, and I go back to the point about discipline, Steve's point, this has served us well today because we are the developers that can benefit from this. The way this is going to work, for example, let's take one of our upcoming developments, The Source.

We are going to very closely be hitting the 50% milestone on The Source, and customers still have to pay up to 60, 70%. The pitch to customers is going to be: dear customer, thank you very much for making your 50% milestone payment.

By the way, here's a mortgage product that you can get. Don't worry about your milestone payments, your next 10 or 20%.

A bank will pay on your behalf. Oh, and you don't have to pay principal.

You'll have principal moratorium until the property is handed over. Oh, on the top of that, we have gotten you a very attractive interest rate that is competitive, and you only have to pay interest during this period.

You can lock in your mortgage today and not have to worry about it going forward. Customer gets peace of mind, they don't have to worry about their future milestone payments, which means we have peace of mind because we have de-risked our collections, which means banks are happy because they are giving mortgages to a very reputable product, or backed by a very reputable product or developer, which means this is not going to default.

They know we have a credible track record in terms of delivery. That's how we think about this off-plan product, and we are ramping up to start issuing the first mortgages this summer.

Good afternoon and thank you for taking my question. I just wanted to come back actually on some of the questions around the pricing and the payment plans, if I may.

Given the market, and I suppose when you're launching projects today or any planned launches, are you having to factor in any lower average pricing levels compared to what you were anticipating say six months ago or even when underwriting that particular project? Just as a second part to that, if we move beyond say any revised payment plans, which you've already commented on, are there other incentives which maybe are on offer or which you could offer to a buyer to support any planned sales?

Thank you.

Could we have gone more aggressive? Have the sentiments been the same pre-crisis?

Yes, obviously we have could have been more aggressive. I think the most important thing is we have not reduced prices.

We have kept either prices constant or pushed them incrementally, or the example of Canopies today, I think this is about a 13, 14% price escalation compared to Yas Place. Yes, this is a little bit more premium because it's next to Disney and next to the beach, but price escalation is important for us not only for us, but because as a developer we do not want to discount the product that is out there for our customers as well in the market.

A price drop for us is a big no-no. We will not drop prices to sell inventory.

What can be done in terms of incentives: pre-crisis, we were doing 60, 70% during construction. We have shown leniency, we've done 50/50, we've done 55/45.

I think we'll continue showing a little bit of leniency. I think we have a little bit of flexibility in terms of the milestones in the first year.

We have done fee waivers, which is a bit easier to do in Abu Dhabi than Dubai because the registration, ADM fee in Abu Dhabi is 2%, in Dubai it's 4%. We do a little bit of freebies as well for customers on special projects.

Then I mentioned on inventory, on predominantly sold projects, we tend to be a little bit more lenient when it comes to payment plans. Lastly, the message we give to the team is we do not want to discount the brand and we don't want to discount the product.

If you start really dropping your pants, then it doesn't look good on the brand. We have the best destinations, we have the best product, we have invested significantly into our digital platform, which is benefiting our customers, and we focus on customer experience, what we call signature hospitality.

I think there's a lot of things that the customers also look into other than payment plan and pricing itself.

Hello. Can you hear me?

Hello?

I can hear you, sir. Go ahead.

Okay.

Thank you. I just wanted to talk about the debt.

If I look at the second quarter, your debt-to-equity ratio has now increased to about 64%, and it was as low as 49% this time last year. Is there a ceiling on that?

I understand very much the countercyclical approach and the idea of building up the cash pile, but I just wanted to know if there was a ceiling of that on that number, and where you thought you would be let's say by FY 2030. Then on the same point, have you noticed on a quarter-on-quarter basis funding costs that you are receiving for that debt actually coming down significantly?

I estimate about 200 bps, but it'd be interesting to see if it's getting marginally cheaper for you to borrow as well at the same time, you're taking advantage of that to build up your cash pile. Thank you very much.

We look at a few metrics. I think the two most important ones for us are loan-to-value and net debt to EBITDA.

We manage our metrics to maintain our investment grade status. We are, as rated by Moody's: Baa1 for AIP, which is the recurring income platform, and then Baa2 for the group.

AIP has a maximum LTV of about 40%, and then the group has a maximum LTV of about 30%, and we are well within that. We still have a lot of buffer on that front.

Then net debt to EBITDA for the group overall, I think we try to stay away from anything above 3.5 to 4 times. Then we have strengthened the balance sheet significantly.

We have issued over the past two years about 3.5 billion dirhams of hybrid notes, and those hybrid notes get 50% equity rating by Moody's. What you're looking at from an accounting point of view is 100% debt because it's tax-efficient to have it as a tax debt instrument, because it's tax interest deductible, tax-deductible interest.

From Moody's point of view, they look at it 50% equity. That's how we think about our thresholds.

We have still significant room to continue growing our debt. Yes, our debt has grown, I think end of last year to about 25 billion, it has gone up to 33 billion, but we remain significantly well within our thresholds.

Have we seen our financing costs go down? We have very competitive cost of funding.

If you look at our RCF, we have five-year RCFs typically that go all the way from 80 to 90 bps over EIBOR, that is super competitive. Then if you look at our senior instruments, our sukuks, I think the last issuance we did over benchmark was about 90 bps.

In the past, I think it has averaged around 100 to 110 bps. You've seen a spike obviously in the credit markets in terms of spreads post the crisis, but I think those have significantly gone down.

The majority of our debt by the way, our fixed debt has been swapped into floating, and we're benefiting today because we're paying less in floating than we are giving away in in fixed. We do have a quite competitive cost of funding.

thank you, Faisal, again. Maybe just to shift gears just on the recurring portfolio.

Just to understand how-

Taher, I can't hear you. I don't know-

Can you hear me now?

Yes, sir.

Yes, okay. All right, great.

Just to shift gears maybe to the recurring portfolio, Faisal. Just a few questions.

The first one is on the education portfolio. Feels that the growth rate on the EBITDA or there's some margin pressure on the education portfolio in Q2 and in H1.

Can you just help us understand what's happening there? Is it the ramp-up of the new schools?

That would be my first question. Maybe along the same lines in terms of enrollment for next year, I remember a few months back you said that the number was up around 7, 8% on a like-for-like basis.

How is enrollment for next year looking since we're actually almost coming towards the end of July? That would be my first question on the recurring portfolio, please.

Education, in Term 3 we have lost a number of students on the back of the regional crisis. We have a base of about 18,000 students.

The last time we updated you, we said we lost about 1%. That's now that number has gone up now to about 1.5%, which we think is still a quite positive outcome despite the circumstances.

That's one reason. The second reason is you're right, new schools like Yasmina American School, which was the old Yasmina campus, Yasmina British campus, is still ramping up, so that school is still loss-making.

You do have a number of other new schools that are adding to the bottom line, such as the new Yasmina campus where the students body from the previous school has moved, and Noya, which has accelerated in terms of ramp-up, and we expect the school to be full in this next academic year. Then on enrollment, I mentioned it in the earnings script, more than 75% of the existing student body have already confirmed re-enrollment.

This is in line with what we had observed last year. Then another thing is we have had more than 4,000 new applications, new students apply.

This is also in line with last year. Therefore, so far we are looking good.

Does it mean we're going to end up good? Probably, but let's see how it goes.

Far, the signals are very positive, extremely positive. We'll just have to wait and see how the academic year starts, but the growth in enrollment is probably going to be in line with what we saw last year.

We are comfortable on mid-single digit growth in enrollment, at least?

I would say we'll get very close hopefully to the double digits as well. We feel confident.

Okay. Double digits.

All right, okay.

Inshallah, we'll.

Inshallah, inshallah. Just a final question from my side is just on the guidance.

You have not changed the guidance on the deployment on the recurring portfolio, or the D-hold. I just want to understand the opportunities.

You've been busy even during the conflict, right, in terms of new announcements, especially on I think residential leasing and affordable housing with the government. What kind of opportunities do you think now are making more sense?

Are you seeing some attractive offers in the market in terms of sellers or potentially new asset classes that you're looking at, or you want to double down on few of the existing recurring segments that you have? Maybe some color there, please.

We have two deals that we feel quite good about. We think we'll do one sizable transaction hopefully in the next maybe month or two.

There's another deal, which is a distressed deal that we also like very much. Let's see how that goes.

We're still doing our due diligence, but we also feel good about that. Then there are some deals that are coming online now, bidding processes that we are looking at.

I'd say our favorite is Industrial and Logistics. By the way, last year in the first half our Industrial and Logistics portfolio had an adjusted EBITDA of about 35 million.

Today, this year first half is about over 90. Now, a lot of that growth is on the back of acquisitions, but I think we were very clear over the past couple of years about our conviction into this asset class.

While the jump is significant, it is not where we want it to be, because the asset base today even with all the greenfield that we have in the pipeline is only about 4 to 5 billion. We want it to cross 20 billion.

That's the target that we have given our team internally. By the way, speaking of hiring, because I mentioned the chief development officer for D-hold, we have also hired a chief industrial and logistics officer to emphasize the focus on this asset class, and a veteran from the industry as well.

I'd say that's somewhat of the color, we remain confident about deploying into M&A. There's a bit of catch-up that we need to do in terms of D-hold deployment in terms of construction activity and spending.

Closing remarks, I would say the results speak for themselves. The UAE has continuously demonstrated resilience throughout any crisis, any cycles.

Our business model, our diversified business model continues to serve us very well. Our roadmap has not changed.

Like I said in the earnings script, we remain committed to our 2030 targets and the pillars behind it. We just need to update you in due course in terms of how we get there, but the end destination has not changed.

The UAE and the leadership, I think following the crisis, had been investing significantly into resilience, into things such as energy security, new logistical corridors, in-country supply chain, which is something that is very important for us given how much we procure from the supply chain, social infrastructure. Abu Dhabi, for example, has announced this year The Sphere, the Guggenheim, and there's a lot more that is going to come.

Then there's a lot of things that are happening. You've seen the Fujairah port expansion, which is going to serve us around diversifying our logistical corridors, the ADNOC pipeline expansion, which is over 50% complete, which is again part of our energy security, the Etihad Rail integration, the first start of the residential rail from Fujairah to Abu Dhabi, and the stations are just adding up.

You're going to have Sharjah and Dubai very soon. Dubai announced the Gold Line metro, and the list goes on and on and on.

My conclusion is we are going to be significant beneficiaries of everything that is happening with the support of the visionary leadership that we have and the strong fundamentals of the UAE. That's it from my side.

Thank you very much.